Squandered Potential: Games that could have been so much more
 

Every so often I have to shed a tear for games with unrealised potential. Usually they got shafted in terms of resources and development time because they weren't known money-makers. Post some games that you think could have been world-shatteringly awesome if they'd just been fully realised.

Saga fucking Frontier. Holy shit that was a cool game. Even with its released form being barely a fraction of what the complete game was supposed to be, it was still awesome. You had space cops, vampires, monsters, robots, and even tokusatsu style superheroes interacting believably in the same setting. The combat was flat out orgasmic once you got the hang of how to get new abilities and build your stats. Every species had very unique ways of building their levels, which made them really feel like different beings instead of the usual "short humans with pointy ears" approach to different races. There were so damn many abilities you could develop and master that really, every time you played the game your characters would come out differently.


The rendered backgrounds were fantastic, and the things you could do in combat were really cool. Speaking of backgrounds, this game had atmosphere like crazy. All the regions felt like different little worlds - you had crisp, clean Manhattan, cyberpunky Koorong, backwater York... the cities didn't need to have their backstories told, you could tell just by walking around that Junk was a boom-town on the downswing, Koorong was a place where you could find anything in the right alley, Manhattan had skeletons in its closet.

The plots for each characters quest are what really suffered. You can tell from playing that there was supposed to be a lot more character interaction. Even without it though, much like Live a Live, Squaresoft really managed to capture the feel of cinematic drama, which is something I wish would have expanded to their other games. Like, playing Red's adventure actually feels like interacting with a tokusatsu show instead of a game based on one.

The incomplete plots made the game very repetitive between each character's quests though. And repetitiveness is what I think really killed it for most people. It took me quite a few tries over the years before I really picked up on what a gem SF was. It wasn't until I really got the hang of the leveling systems that I started to love it.

Asellus suffered the most in her plot. Where her ending was supposed to be based on all these little character interactions, it wound up just being based on how powerful her mystic side was and whether or not you saved Gina. Even so, her story had some heart-rending moments in it, like her mother's rejection of her, and White Rose locking herself in the labyrinth.

What really sucks is the places where you can tell something major was supposed to happen. Virgil's castle needed a lot more done with it, and the Bio-lab, fuck, the BIO-LAB was crazy and clearly had so much plot planned for it. The things that were left out of Saga Frontier stand out like great big gaping holes, but where this would just make me annoyed with most games, in SF I feel a great sense of loss like when your favourite author dies before he can finish your favourite book series. It makes the game a bittersweet experience that I just keep going back to.

I feel that the modern age of games has come with a bit of a price. It takes so much time and money to make a game that lives up to current standards that it's just not worth it for companies to experiment as much.

Edit: Oh, and the little bits of art they showed between chapters were phenomenal.

Fuze suffered the most, he was cut entirely from being a main character.

Well, I'mma pick an obvious one and say Chrono Cross. So underdeveloped. But I'll leave that one at that.


I'll also have to say The Legend of Dragoon. It was a solid game as it was, but then it kind of drove itself off a cliff in the last quarter with Miranda. I'm sorry, but it was just a poor choice to introduce a new character that late in the game and then keep on trying to develop her up until the very end. She came in as a bitch, stayed a bitch, and got a Freudian excuse when it was too late to matter. She never really meshed with the team. If they'd introduced her earlier and had GIVEN her her backstory earlier and made her deal with her problems and actually develop, it might have been okay.

Also, some of the Dragoon powers just weren't worth it. The cast really needed to have a better balance in their abilities.

That game's health system makes me wonder if Link had something similar, which makes me wonder about his size as he gets up there in heart tanks, which makes me wonder if the whole of Zelda isn't just one big smutty metaphor where Link is trying to "rescue" Zelda from the sexual frustration represented by Ganon (I'll figure that one out later), but first he needs to fill up his hearts so he can shoot off his sword.

That fellow has a fanTASTIC narrating voice.

I think Metal Fatigue could have actually been a sucessful game if there was more to it than just building big robots.

Building big robots just isn't fun enough on its own, and the game offered little more(still loved it though).

I think you'll find Spore is the ultimate example. Man, if that had done even half the things promised it'd have been the last game that ever had to be made. It'd allow you to easily make any game you wanted within the game world. But someone decided it'd be too complicated for the customers to do all that, and also the game needed friendlier, cuter graphics to not offend anyone, and there we are.

On a more personal note, there's one little detail Blizzard's RTS games that ruin single player mode for me. I love spending hours slowly wearing down the enemy until they have no money left, but since Starcraft that's impossible, because the computer is periodically given a bunch of resources. Screw it, I'm going to play Warcraft 2 again now.

Dark Void could have ruled if it wasn't kicked out so prematurely the boxart was still covered in afterbirth.

I'd like to just step in quickly and mention Xenogears. Fuck that second disk, there was at least 2 disks' worth of content left in all that!

Scribblenauts. What's been announced about the sequel indicates that it's biggest problem (controls) will be fixed though.

Appearantly, in Warcraft 1, the comp cheated in the campaign and only mined 5 gold per trip, as long as the goldmine was in the Fog of War. Wouldn't be too surprised if this happened in Warcraft 2 too.

I didn't know that. But no, War2 must be the exception then, I've tried and tested and read all sorts of things there and the computer definitely uses real-time resource gathering.

Warcraft 3 also has campaign computers gather one gold per trip (and return ten), regardless of whether you're watching or not.

Samurai Legend Musashi (a.k.a Musashidon II Blade Master) Had great potential to be a good Zelda Style Action RPG. Sadly the voices sucked (US Version), the combo system and technique learning system wasn't as amazing as it could have been if they had added a little more to it, and I felt that the game could have been a lot longer then it was if they had worked on it more. Maybe even made the Wind Priestess/swordswoman a playable character in the main game or a "What if" mode.

I really enjoyed this game despite it's flaws and what looked like Square caring only about graphics then game play (the graphics were some of the best cell shade graphics I've ever seen. Almost on pares with PS3 graphics). But it was still average at best.

So much potential Square. So much potential.

Biggest grip about that game right now.
 

FFXIII apparently. Anybody want my copy? Ugh.

It's not even out yet. Hell, I'd take it if I didn't already have a pre-order in.

This was an actual concern.
 

Hahahaha! YES

As much as I will loathe playing it, I was worried the game might actually be decent and I wouldn't be able to tear it a new asshole.

@Blues: He has an early copy. :P

That's like worrying that the sun might stop being warm.

God I love writing for the Dojo. "Phew! This game isn't good. I was getting worried for a moment!"

Super-agree.

Also, Final Fantasy VI. This isn't to say that it's a bad game, because it is, in fact, one of my all-time favorites. However, there are just so many pieces of the storyline to which you get a mere taste. If I had written the game, it would probably be three times longer. And, if no one else, I would like it better that way. :D

Final Fantasy VIII is another one which comes to mind, mostly because the only parts of the game I liked were Laguna's. His adventures were far more compelling, and the characters in his timeline had more personality. His romances were vastly more convincing than Sullen McPouty and his spoiled brat girlfriend. I think the Laguna 'flashbacks' could have made a fantastic game all by itself, and I would have liked the game better if it had been that way.

You're gonna have a good time. It's actually getting a lot better now that I'm out of the 3 hour tutorial.

Well, the storytelling is still jRPG. But the gameplay is bit better now.

NonCon being disappointed is always a plus in my book. Hopefully, it'll eventually teach him to stop deciding his opinion before he gets the game. :p


Because you have to admit, Nonsie, you do let your biases get in the way on occasion. ;)

Knights of the Old Republic 2. The parts that were finished were so much better than the first game, but there was just so much cut out of it, including the ending. I played through the game 5 times trying to find out what I missed, never using a guide for any of it, only to later find a guide after I was frustrated and found out that no, I didn't miss anything, it just wasn't there. So much wasted potential.

I'm probably alone with this, but I also feel that Dragon Age had a ton of wasted potential. It was a decent enough game, but towards the end it just got too repetitive. No real strategy needed beyond the one you make and use for every single fight ever, with slight adaptations that work on every single boss. Yet another 'spiritual successor' that failed to live up to the game that it was supposed to emulate.

What are you talking about? The game ends around the point where Ramsus makes Fei and Elly crash.

I have to second the comments on Saga Frontier. From what I've heard Lute's story was basicly supposed to be the 'all the main characters come together to beat the crap out of someone' storyline. What ended up happening was a story with only a miniscule amount more plot than Blue'sMister 'you can't come home until you go get the higher levels of magic and kill your brother. We'll pretend that was a plot.
I have plenty of other minor problems with Saga, like how you essentially need a guide to get a decent monster character. Still, I've always had a soft spot for the game.

I suck at similes.
 

Yeah, because everyone has biases, and pretending you don't is pretending like you don't have a ribcage. Yeah, you can say it, but no matter how much you do it proves fairly ineffectual when I break your ribs... or something...

Besides, games have a fairly easy time changing my opinion, it's just people who suck at it. I've been disappointed in games I was looking forward to, and have been very impressed with games I assumed would suck. Someone trying to convince me that a game I liked wasn't as good as I thought, or a game I didn't like was better than I thought, is going to have a hell of a time though, and I'm okay with that.

I remember previews of FF4DS claiming that they restored a large chunk of the game's plot (25%, I think), but by the time I finished the game the only extra content was being able to hear the characters' thoughts and a flashback to when Golbez was a kid.

Also, I don't think the Fable series has been mentioned yet, but I'm guessing everyone probably thought "Nah, too obvious". Not even the dog turned out to be half of what PM sold it as.

Divinity 2: Ego Draconis.

An ARPG in which you can turn into a dragon. Sounds neat, right, what could possibly go wrong? Unfortunately the flight combat and physics, and especially transitioning between human and dragon form, were half-assed and horrible. Combat also was generally annoying because all ranged attacks had a limited "seek" feature, meaning if you went up against more than a couple archers at a time they'd turn you into a pin cushion in short order. Pretty unbalanced.

Sacred 2.

Think Diablo with a much, much more open world. Cities are actually cities - dozens, hundred of NPCs and houses - and not a couple of huts abstracted for brevity. I wish they had spent time adding a lot more secondary quests with an overarching plot, in addition to the main plot. There are tons of side quests, to be sure, but they're all simple and there is little interconnectivity - no life to the world.

And unfortunately the open world is about its only redeeming feature. As an ARPG it's passably good (better than some I've played) but combat was generally annoying because all your trained abilities have cooldowns. This is very annoying because generally you're having to kite enemies into packs to kill them while waiting for your abilities to refresh (and when you first train them, abilities have an absurdly long refresh time). Too much of the game seems designed to inconvenience the player just to make it take longer.

I actually have the original, and for a Diablo II rip-off, it wasn't all that bad once you got going. Granted, GETTING going in many cases was like pulling teeth. The Vampiress was particularly egregious in that you're holed up in a house getting attacked by a giant mob. If it weren't for the saving grace that you respawn at your starting location at no penalty, it would literally have been impossible. On the other hand, the Battle-Mage has a good start, looks awesome, and plays well, so I stuck with him. The horse combat was handled pretty well, too, being the first to try it.

The major issue with that game is that there's not a whole lot to do starting out. It's very pretty, and mostly functional, but the beginning area, despite having pretty large settlements, comes off as very empty due to just how BIG it is. You'll find quests peppered throughout it, but they all involve killing one monster or another and coming back for a reward, and so much of it is empty space + a couple packs of enemies.

I WILL say that it does do one thing well, and that's make it feel like a consistent world. Unlike Diablo I and II, Sacred has a set map (I think), and you'll find all the other starting locations if you explore enough.

From what I've been reading and viewing, FFXIII under-delivers, but the levels to which is does depends on the person.

I personally loved FF12, with all the marks and optional missions, I'm already somewhat disappointed that the game has regressed in the non-story-gameplay area.

I'm sure I'll enjoy the game once I buy it tomorrow, but I'm also sure it won't be as enjoyable as it could've been.

Really hope this isn't the last non-MMO entry in the series, as has been rumored.

Doubtfully. They'll probably follow the present course. 2 RPG games, 1 MMO Game. For the foreseeable future. I doubt they'll end FF with FF XIV and then wait 5-10 years for FF XV as another MMO.

NWN 2 disappointed me, I always thought there could have been more there. Same with NWN 1. Maybe because they paled in comparison to Baldur's Gate 2.

No cause there's still Final Fantasy Versus XIII which has yet to be released.

EDIT; Hmm it seems I've reached 1,000 posts. I wonder if I can break my Forum Curse this time?

I'm pretty sure everybody here knows about the Fallout series. In particular, Fallout 2. Sure it was as complete of a game as I would have expected, but there were a lot of scripts and questlines that never got finished or were too buggy to be finished. I've heard that there's a fan project that's doing something about it, but the point still stands that the original developers never finished developing it.

In the Final Fantasy line of thought, Blake Morse is clearly the cleverest motherfucker in the world.

Regressed how? You have a modified Hunt system back in the form of Missions. They're like Hunts you can do more than once. Unless that's the issue.

One of 'em, aye. From what I've read, there are a lot less of both, Marks/Hunts and side-quests than previous game entries have had.

I may change my mind after a playthrough, could be more satisfied with those than I'm expecting.

I remember reading something a while ago that the Final Fantasy games in production were the last Final Fantasy games.

I will fully grant a faulty memory if that's not the case, and I hope I'm inaccurate.

I don't... there are so many more deserving IPs than Final Fantasy. Chrono, Saga, Dragon Quest, The World Ends with You, Lufia, Front Mission, Musashi, Valkyrie Profile, Mana Series, and Einhänder come to mind.

It seems to me they are siphoning time and resources to keep Final Fantasy NEW AND SHINY! so that they basically only have time and money to do Final Fantasy (and the umpteen million remakes/ports they have done in the last 3 years) and have two feet in the door to becoming a one strick pony with only their ass hanging out.

As long as it sells, they'll keep doing it. It's just plain good business. You make what sells. Looking at it this way, as much as I'd love Chrono Break to come out, with the issues raised by Cross, there are good reasons to not make it when you can make surefire money elsewhere.

Maximize profits, minimize risk.


Edit: And, uh, Dragon Quest kind of has its own entire team working in an entirely different half of the company, just to point that out.

No your right they are the True Final Fantasy games. There won't be anymore after XIV and versus XIII.

The FF remakes will still be made but there won't be anymore new ones.

Calling bullshit on that. I think it's kind of not true that they'll stop with FF, given they're quoted as having said they want to continue exploring the world of Fabula Nova Crystalis over the next decade.

Hey this was said way back in 06 before the PS3 came out. Who's to say they didn't change their minds.

Besides I think Numura was the one who said it so it could be that he meant he himself won't be doing anymore FF games after vsXIII is finished and out the door.

It also could of meant that they won't do anymore roman numbered FFs meaning no FFXV and up. But instead stuff like FFCC and such.

I think there's very little indication the line is ending, and frankly, the numbered titles are what's making money. Because they're what's good (besides Tactics). Crystal Bearers is pretty much a flop in my opinion with several glaring flaws that don't suit a main line title, but then the Crystal Chronicles games have always been an experiment and have always suffered harsh criticism (which is at least partly justified). Which isn't to say Square should stop experimenting, but they should maybe test one variable at a time like in any good experiment, rather than cobbling things together and ultimately generating titles that fall into obscurity.

See, this really isn't an experimental market, so if you've got a sure sell, you're going to whore it out just to stay afloat. Maybe you can save pennies for an experimental title or two, but at this point, ending the numbered Final Fantasies would result in closing the company.

It's was more stated then indicated. though seeing how the FFCC series did they could have meant the end of that and any other minor experiment games.

Meh I'll drop this for now. I've got no way of backing up rather or not they really said that something in the FF line won't be done anymore after VsXIII's release. No since in talking about it.

Blues, Kyanbu is right.

They may be moving on to something different. Whatever you feel, it may be time for Square to hang up the RPG moniker it has and move into different realms and expand. Or maybe they'll make another MMO to compete with 11. I unno.

I can see where you're coming from, but I disagree. Each of the new numbered FF games in the series is a wholly separate RPG, with a few exceptions. The only thing that ties them all together is the name Final Fantasy and some common memes, like Chocobos, Moogles, Crystals, etc.

Yes, they always seem to put a lot of time and effort into FF, but it's also their cash cow that saved the company. I, for one, would love them to continue the numbered FF line.

Danke for the link, I'd thought I'd read it somewhere.

At the same time, it's only inference/speculation on the boss' part, and he also said it may be the last ones developed internally.

I'm going to go back to my original basic video game assumption that "there will always be a new Final Fantasy every few years", until the announcement that the line is outright canceled. All it takes is one bad quarter/year and an announcement for the new FF wouldn't be far off.

Yeah, reading the full interview (http://www.next-gen.biz/magazine/an-...ada?page=0%2C0), it sounds more like he's talking about making some internal changes and possibly incorporating more patently Western tastes into the games. He said nothing about actually ending the series, just that he's hoping to take it in a new direction, which could mean anything from motion controls to a gameplay shift to making it more Western in design or story. Or even that he's going to cut down on development time to keep up with the Western market. FF could go into episodic gameplay and it would still fit what he was saying.

Essentially, I really highly doubt FF is dead after this, but it might undergo some radical changes.

I agree with Blues, it does sound more like a shift in what type of game FF is. They've been shifting away from a Tradition JRPG anyways starting with 10. So it'll be interesting to see what direction they take it but it doesn't mention that Final Fantasy is over as a series, just that it could no longer be a JRPG.

While it's possible that they're taking the "main" FF in a different direction, FFCC is already their guineapig series.

Latest issue of the Escapist talks a bit about games with lasted potential, I thought it was worth mentioning here.

Mirror's Edge
 

By far, the biggest let down has to be Mirror's Edge in recent memory. Let's face it, you had a girl who wasn't Lara Croft. She ran and you had to find the quickest routes to deliver your package to wherever it needed to go.

No FPS had what she had. The ability to make your surroundings a weapon in and of itself.

But as I looked at review after review, I was let down. It was too different for a world that has grown up on Wolfenstein, Doom and Modern Warfare. The very fact that you can't run faster even with a knife, your friends are separated by a radio, and this concept of running on walls was brand new means we may get more games of the FPS vein and less action adventure games that really push the envelope.

G)(^&%*mit!

Did you actually play the game? 'Cause while I'll definitely acknowledge that more could have been done with it, it was still pretty sweet as it was.

I've got two to list here.

Dante's Inferno (still a good game, I enjoy it thoroughly, but man, it could have been so much more than just a God of War clone)

and

Kingdom Hearts (as a series - there could have been limitless possibilities, but Disney chained Square to the bed on several occasions. Instead of redoing the movie world stories poorly by inserting the main characters into it like a bad fanfic, they could've truly innovated, and given us a more in-depth look into how these worlds coexist and interact with the others. You know, give us more of a look at the Kingdom Hearts/Square side and less of a... well, Disney side. That said, 358 did its best to break away from the lameness. If only there were more than a handful of non-Heartless and Organization bosses.)

I can't. My *&^%$ laptop is one of those that hates games with graphics.

So no Starcraft, no Crysis, and ESPECIALLY nothing that comes to looking good other than TF2, Half-Life, and HL2.

I can't wait to get another one in about three years. *sigh* -_-;

I gotta agree with the whole Kingdom Hearts thing. The whole background of the universe behind the games could've been expanded upon so much better. I remember years back as a little kid when I was first looking at KH when it first came out and I was just like dreaming about oh how cool and awesome this is gonna be and then it just ended up being kind of mediocre in comparison to my hopes of it.

Mirror's Edge I liked, but I agree that the potential was really somewhat wasted. I really would've preferred it be a Prince of Persia-type game where you already have an idea of how to get from Point A to Point B and the fun is just wallrunning and jumping from platform to platform as you go to your objective in first person so it REALLY feels like you're there. Instead, it ended up just throwing you in environments that just seemed like giant huge mazes where you have no idea where the fuck to go and the premise became "oh where the fuck can I find a platform to get up to where I need to go" as opposed to "holy shit I'm fucking wallrunning. This is sick!" I know I'm oversimplifying it and maybe some of you disagree with me, but that's just what I thought.

And in all honesty, I kinda would've preferred more of a different approach to the chase sequences. Some were incredibly fun/tense, like the one where you're running from the unarmed super soldiers. But when it came to actually running away and even fighting armed soldiers who were shooting at you, the game just went from challenging to really really frustrating incredibly fast.

That has reminded me.

Bloodlines is the penultimate failed potential game. Anyone who says otherwise deserves to be cut like the bitch they are.

She can deliver my package any time. Wink wink, nudge nudge.

I played an advertiseral 2D version of Mirror's Edge, and it was about the best Flash game I've seen. I thought from the moment the game was announced that the sort of joy in movement gameplay that it was based on always had and always would work best in a third person perspective. What's the fun in doling stylish walljumps if you can't see yourself being stylish?

Granted, the whole gimmick of the game was to try and translate that gameplay effectively to the first person. It was just doomed from the start.

am I the only one that realizes that the whole emphasis on running, movement, pacing has been done successfully before. The game was called Sonic

Master of Orion 3 was a catastrophic let-down from the expectations that the first two games had built up.

I don't know if the AI that micromanages the player's Empire is actually that incompetent, or if it's really that difficult to get the Empire to go into a wanted direction; I didn't play the game that long. There were crippling bugs to the battle system, and that was kind of a key element.

It was just a game that was released unfinished. A few programmers short of brilliance, maybe.

Quote for emphasis. Holy shit Bloodlines ruled.

EDIT: I still kinda liked Mirror's Edge.

Another thought, though this has less to do with squandered potential and more to do with possible potential of combining two genres:

Overlord 2. While the game is pretty fun in taking the role of an evil overlord and directing your minions rather than doing all the hard work yourself, the game is just too linear. With the exception of going back to old maps [because you have to] with new minion types, there's nothing to explore.

Though the game itself could do with simply being expanded more, I'd like to see that kind of gameplay combined with another cult favorite: Dungeon Keeper.

You begin either as a physical being (e.g. the same method as Overlord) or a presence or "force" (e.g. like Dungeon Keeper) in the Netherworld. Your first task would be to either usurp or carve out a place for yourself to begin your quest for control, which would become your prime dominion for the remainder of the game.

The world you desire to conquer is divided into territories. In each territory you must first establish a base underground, occasionally raiding the surface for supplies, in a Dungeon Keeper style gameplay. After suitably strengthening the rift to your dominion, The Overlord (you) would manifest physically in your dungeon and lead your forces onto the surface. This would be an Overlord-style above-ground gameplay in order to finally capture or destroy the local place of resistance, probably involving the same kind of puzzle-solving miniquests you saw in Overlord itself. In the early game these would be simple villages, but as you progress, become forts, castles, or whole cities, requiring more advanced tactics, use of spells, and specialized minions.

There's a lot more to expand on there, but that is the jist of it.

Mostly, I think I just want another Dungeon Keeper game.