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Despite rave reviews, most people slept on Deathloop.
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00:00Making any piece of art is hard, but video games perhaps more so than most.
00:04Gamers are a fickle bunch, after all, and so it can be incredibly difficult for developers to figure out precisely what players actually want.
00:11As such, it must prove especially frustrating when publishers release a game that racks up rave reviews from the gaming press,
00:17only for general customers to prove utterly indifferent about it.
00:19More to the point, these ten games all stirred up their fair share of excitement right out of the gate,
00:24but struggled to translate all that hype into commercial gravy.
00:27On paper, each of these games should have been a soaring commercial success,
00:30and yet for a multitude of reasons, some of which still aren't totally clear,
00:33players weren't enticed to part with their money.
00:36I'm Cy for WhatCulture.com and these are ten video games everyone wanted, but nobody played.
00:41Number 10, Max Payne 2, Fall of Max Payne.
00:442001's Max Payne was a totally ground-breaking third-person shooter,
00:48which popularised the use of The Matrix's bullet time effect in video games,
00:52and in addition to high critical praise, it went on to sell 4 million copies.
00:56A sequel seemed like a total no-brainer then, yet when Max Payne 2, The Fall of Max Payne,
01:00released just two years later, it bafflingly cratered at retail.
01:04The sales were poor enough that Take-Two Interactive didn't even report actual figures,
01:07simply calling its performance disappointing,
01:09while industry estimates pegged it as selling roughly half of its predecessor.
01:13Given the expectation that sequels, especially superior highly acclaimed ones such as this,
01:18outperformed the original, this was a shocking underperformance by a game that deserved so, so much better.
01:23Even today, the reasons for its failure aren't totally clear,
01:25the marketing was fine and it didn't release alongside any direct competition,
01:29yet players were inexplicably uneager to swan-dive back into this gritty, action-packed world.
01:33Thankfully, the series could soar once again with the success of Max Payne 3 a whole decade later,
01:38and with a remake of the first two games currently in development,
01:41hopefully players won't sleep on Max Payne 2 this time around.
01:44Number 9, Deus Ex, Mankind Divided.
01:47Following the enormous critical and commercial success of 2011's Deus Ex Human Revolution,
01:53the sci-fi RPG series' first game in eight years, fans were incredibly eager for more,
01:58and so hype was immediately high out of the gate when Square Enix announced follow-up Deus Ex Mankind Divided,
02:03which ended up releasing in 2016.
02:05Though reviews weren't quite as enthusiastic for Human Revolution,
02:08Mankind Divided was nevertheless solidly praised,
02:11yet this failed to translate into sales as the game underperformed massively compared to its predecessor.
02:16It certainly didn't help that Mankind Divided faced several PR headaches prior to release,
02:20primarily with its planned tiered pre-order system receiving massive blowback from players and journalists alike,
02:25leading to its cancellation.
02:27Mankind Divided's disappointing sales led to developer EDOS Montreal being shifted onto the Tomb Raider franchise,
02:32and later Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy,
02:34ensuring the Deus Ex franchise was categorically put on ice.
02:37Square Enix and EDOS have both reiterated that the series isn't cancelled,
02:40but it still doesn't seem likely we're going to get another any time soon.
02:44Number 8, Batman.
02:45The Telltale series.
02:47In the mid-2010s, it truly seemed like Telltale Games was one of the most well-minted developers in the gaming industry.
02:53Their flourishing, episodic adventure game adaptations of The Walking Dead, The Wolf Among Us, Borderlands,
02:58Game of Thrones and Minecraft seemed to suggest that players couldn't get enough at that bite-sized,
03:02choose-your-own-adventure style.
03:04And so when Telltale announced that they were working on a Batman series,
03:07well, excitement was immediately extremely high that the studio could deliver a thrilling detective noir
03:12that melded the tone of the Christopher Nolan movies with the artistry of the comics.
03:152016's first season received mixed to positive reviews,
03:19though follow-up Batman The Enemy Within was met with considerably stronger enthusiasm.
03:24Yet the general belief that Telltale was one of the most commercially reliable entities in gaming
03:28was shattered in 2018 when the company suddenly announced its closure due to bankruptcy.
03:32Reports subsequently emerged that the Batman games tanked and were some of the studio's worst-performing titles,
03:37which, given the potential success of a Batman-themed episodic adventure game on paper,
03:41seemed absolutely ludicrous.
03:43The cut of it, though, was that Telltale spread themselves too thin with the various licenses they acquired,
03:47in turn both flooding the market with games and diluting the quality of their products,
03:51apparently enough that players lost interest.
03:54Number 7, Titanfall 2.
03:57Titanfall was released in 2014 amid hype touting it as a Call of Duty killer,
04:02and while it certainly didn't fail Activision's mammoth FPS franchise,
04:06it was nevertheless a critical and commercial hit.
04:08Excitement was high then that the sequel would tighten up its predecessor's issues and deliver fully on its promise.
04:13Critics largely agreed it did,
04:15especially heaping praise on Titanfall 2's arguably best-of-generation single-player campaign.
04:20Furthermore, whilst the first Titanfall was a PC and Xbox exclusive,
04:23the sequel also made the leap to PlayStation 4,
04:26seemingly guaranteeing that its sales would eclipse those of the original.
04:29So jaws were dropped when, as it turns out,
04:31players en masse slept on the game,
04:33with it going on to sell less than half of the original's 10 million copies.
04:36But for anyone paying attention to the gaming market in late 2016,
04:39the reason should have been obvious.
04:41EA arrogantly released Titanfall 2 within spitting distance of a bevy of anticipated games,
04:46namely Battlefield 1, Call of Duty Infinite Warfare,
04:49Gears of War 4 and Destiny expansion Rise of Iron.
04:52Players only have so much disposable income and available time,
04:56and unsurprisingly, these well-established franchises all took precedent over Titanfall 2.
05:00Though the game did enjoy something of a resurgence when it was released on Steam in June 2020,
05:05its overall retail failure ensured that a third Titanfall never materialized,
05:09with developer Respawn Entertainment moving onto Star Wars Jedi Fallen Order instead.
05:13Number 6, Resident Evil Remake.
05:162002's remake of Resident Evil is one of the most acclaimed entries in the entire franchise,
05:20serving up a visually stunning retelling of the classic survival horror game.
05:24And while just about every Resident Evil fan thought the game looked incredible,
05:27Capcom had signed a deal to release it exclusively on the GameCube
05:30shortly after the console's launch.
05:32Given that Resident Evil was predominantly a PlayStation franchise,
05:35and the GameCube sold far less than expected,
05:37it wasn't terribly surprising that Remake grossly underperformed,
05:41selling just 1.35 million copies on the platform.
05:44Seemingly not appreciating why the game flopped,
05:46Capcom was then convinced that Resident Evil needed to be more action-centric,
05:50leading to not only the brilliant Resident Evil 4,
05:52but a slew of increasingly action-y sequels that stripped the survival horror elements away,
05:56at least until Resident Evil 7, that is.
05:58Resident Evil Remake may have flopped on launch and forever altered the series' trajectory,
06:02but it was ultimately vindicated in 2015 when an HD remaster was released,
06:07going on to sell an impressive 3 million units.
06:09Still, it's curious to consider what would have become of Resident Evil
06:12had Capcom not initially released Remake exclusively on the GameCube.
06:16Number 5, Prey 2017
06:19There's perhaps no video game studio more unlucky than Arkane Studios,
06:22who have a history of producing quality, well-received games
06:25that don't find a way to connect with the wider player base.
06:28It first happened to Dishonored 2,
06:29and then it happened again to 2017's reboot of Prey,
06:32which was anticipated as one of the boldest and most ambitious FPS of its era,
06:36in a period where the FPS genre was waning,
06:38and went on to score strong reviews from most outlets.
06:41Prey debuted at number 2 in the UK charts,
06:43behind the Switch port of Mario Kart 8,
06:45but to make matters worse,
06:47first week sales were said to be down 60% from Dishonored 2,
06:50which again was itself a commercial disappointment.
06:53Many journalists cited Bethesda's decision to withhold review code from critics
06:56until the game's release day as instrumental in it flopping,
06:59while others pointed to a low-key marketing campaign
07:02and the decision to name it after a 2006 FPS that few people actually played.
07:06Had Bethesda given out review copies pre-release,
07:09leveraged their marketing to focus on the game's unique gameplay and aesthetics,
07:12and given it a different, more compelling title,
07:14then it might have actually struck a chord with the mainstream.
07:17Number 4, Shenmue 2
07:19The original Shenmue was far from a commercial success,
07:22despite receiving near-universal praise for its groundbreaking gameplay and rich open world,
07:26largely due to a budget that would have required every Dreamcast owner to buy it twice
07:30for it to turn a profit.
07:31However, Shenmue 2 was developed in tandem with the first game,
07:34meaning that Sega basically had no choice but to take a punt on the sequel
07:37no matter the original's dire straits.
07:39Nevertheless, the furore surrounding Shenmue ensured the hype for its sequel was sky-high,
07:43and with Shenmue 2 also releasing on Xbox shortly after its Dreamcast launch,
07:47there was cautious optimism that its sales would perform better.
07:51Ironically, Shenmue 2 ended up selling just 100,000 copies on Dreamcast,
07:54a mere 10% of the first game,
07:57while Xbox owners, who at the time were more interested in FPS games like Halo
08:00and likely hadn't played the first Shenmue, just didn't give a damn.
08:03This financial failure resulted in the series effectively going to a near 20-year hiatus,
08:07leaving fans hanging with an overarching plot,
08:10including an agonizing cliffhanger, infuriatingly unresolved.
08:13A cliffhanger which, hilariously, 2019's wildly divisive Shenmue 3 didn't even bother to resolve.
08:193. The Order 1886
08:22Sony's track record for exclusive AAA titles since the PS4 era has been extremely strong,
08:28so when Ready at Dawn's third-person action-adventure game The Order 1886 was announced,
08:33it immediately became a hugely anticipated title.
08:36The marketing did a solid job of presenting it as a cinematic, ultra-atmospheric title
08:40with state-of-the-art graphics that primed it to become Sony's next big franchise.
08:43Yet The Order was a colossal critical and commercial letdown,
08:46scoring wildly mixed reviews for its repetitive gameplay
08:49and especially its short 5-hour length.
08:51With few players willing to fork out a full RRP for a game that they could literally beat in an afternoon,
08:56The Order sold horribly, enough that Sony permanently cut its price by 33% just a month after its release.
09:02Sales topped out at 1.7 million units, a dire result that's a mere fraction of most PlayStation-exclusive titles,
09:08for comparison's sake, even the relatively divisive Days Gone sold at least 5.8 million copies on PS4 alone.
09:16One suspects that many simply opted to borrow their friend's copy, rent it for a weekend,
09:20or sell it on after playing, if they even bothered playing it at all once the reviews came out.
09:24The Order certainly isn't a terrible game,
09:26but it clearly should have been priced in a manner reflective of its scope and length.
09:302. Deathloop
09:32Arkane Studios' latest title was, like Prey, an intriguing AAA blockbuster game
09:36that turned a lot of heads when it was first revealed.
09:38Deathloop's time-centric premise immediately earmarked it as a unique title
09:42amid a throng of more familiar tentpole releases,
09:44and it went on to score strong reviews when it launched last September.
09:47Yet, bad luck struck once again for Arkane,
09:50with Deathloop opening to lower sales in the UK than either Dishonored or Prey,
09:54and specifically physical sales were said to be the lowest for any Arkane game yet.
09:58There isn't a clear indicator of why Deathloop didn't click with the mainstream,
10:01beyond perhaps the marketing's failure to sufficiently explain and sell the game's creative premise.
10:06It may also be indicative of the struggle faced by single-player-only games
10:10that aren't part of an existing popular franchise.
10:12Whatever the prevailing reason,
10:13it's an unfortunate fate for a game that stoked so much initial excitement from its reveal,
10:17and yet struggled to sustain it to launch day.
10:201. The Last Guardian
10:22For many players, The Last Guardian was their White Whale,
10:25a game trapped in development hell that they never actually expected to play.
10:29Team Ico's spiritual successor to Shadow of the Colossus was first announced at E3 2009,
10:34but delays and lengthy periods of radio silence caused many to assume it would never be finished.
10:39At E3 2015, Sony shocked the world by reintroducing the game as a PS4 title,
10:44and lo and behold, it finally ended up releasing to enormous fan excitement in late 2016.
10:49Reviews were generally positive, albeit with some mixed opinions on its finicky gameplay systems,
10:53yet The Last Guardian sales ultimately failed to reflect that pre-release hype.
10:57The game debuted at number 7 on the UK charts,
11:00and within three weeks had largely vanished from these kinds of lists globally,
11:04indicating that it failed to stir up much interest at all beyond Team Ico's passionate fanbase.
11:08Yet, given The Last Guardian's ludicrously lengthy development time,
11:11one can only imagine the numbers it would have had to have shifted
11:14in order to be considered a commercial success.
11:17And that's the list!
11:18Let us know what you thought of this video down in the comments below,
11:20and any other games that you can think of that perhaps you or other people were excited about
11:24that released with a bit of a whimper instead of a bang.
11:27Make sure you like and share this video,
11:29subscribe and hit the notification bell.
11:31I've been Sy for WhatCulture,
11:33and have a good week!
11:34You
11:36If you Bye
11:39The Lastuation
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