- 4 minutes ago
From negative numbers to 5 star.
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:00The games on this list planted themselves firmly in the Cyberpunk 2077 and No Man's Sky school
00:05of proving you can stumble out the gate and still score yourself a respectable placement,
00:10if not absolutely blow the haters out of the water with a, um, podium finish. While that
00:15sports metaphor well and truly fell apart, these games managed to come back together,
00:20thanks to the tireless dedication of their developers and publishers. While lesser studios
00:25may have abandoned their problem children as soon as the audience turned on them en masse,
00:29that wasn't the case with these games, and given what they became, that's very fortunate for us.
00:34I'm Jess from WhatCulture and here are the 9 Greatest Comebacks in Gaming.
00:399. Battlefield 4
00:41Kicking off with a game that really should have done better, Battlefield and Call of Duty have
00:45been battling for supremacy in the shooter realm for some time now. But Battlefield 4 really handed
00:50the win over to Call of Duty when it launched in 2013, because even saying that this game
00:55launched feels like an oversell. More accurately, it did whatever the video game equivalent is of that
01:00clip with the cat who goes for the jump and then second guesses it at the last minute and then
01:04it's
01:05like, woo, he like goes straight down with his arms out. It was like that for Battlefield.
01:09To say that Battlefield 4 launched pretty buggy doesn't quite hit the mark. The amount of game-breaking
01:14bugs and hilarious unintentional clipping and wild interactions with the environment, mechanics,
01:19and other players was nothing short of legendary. Developer DICE went as far as to halt work on
01:25all their other projects so they could get all hands on deck to fix Battlefield 4. The irate
01:30player base and criticism of the game's clearly unfinished shipped product went as far as to
01:34kick off multiple lawsuits investigating whether investors were intentionally misled by EA in their
01:39marketing of the game. The, and I think we can use these words, catastrophic disaster of a launch
01:45which took an entire year and the development of a community testing environment to turn around.
01:50Once DICE and EA were able to get a handle on it though, the core of the excellent gameplay loop
01:54and engaging refined mechanics, compelling game modes, and phenomenal multiplayer were able to
01:59properly shine. Ultimately, Battlefield 4 did manage to outperform Call of Duty Ghosts,
02:05which came out in the same year and when it was all fixed up, polished, and ready to go,
02:09proved itself to be one of the greatest FPS games of modern years.
02:12Number 8, Diablo 3. If the phrase Error 37 causes a bunch of unmistakable confusion,
02:20frustration, and rage to bubble up within you, then you were probably playing Diablo 3 back when
02:25it launched in May of 2012. Or more accurately, you were trying to play Diablo 3. The error code was
02:31one of a handful of horrifying number combinations that meant you weren't going to be able to play the
02:36new hotly anticipated Blizzard RPG, but instead would contribute to an infamous meme that resulted from
02:41the game servers being massively overloaded. Of course, as embarrassing as it was, this wasn't
02:46the worst thing for Blizzard, as it meant a lot of people were keen to check out the game.
02:50Unfortunately, there were more complaints once they did. The frustrations that even single-player
02:55mode was always online, overly grindy RNG mechanics, and a full experience that just couldn't match up to
03:01the masterpiece entries in the series that had come before it. Enter 2014's Reaper of Souls,
03:06and two years' worth of updates and patches in between, and Diablo 3 had become a totally different
03:12beast. From quality of life changes, including the way loot works, grinding works, and the addition
03:17of transmogrification, as well as the Crusader class, and a bunch of new narrative tidbits,
03:22this now felt like the fully-fledged Diablo experience we'd been hoping for.
03:26Seasons were added on top of new modes that let you play how you wanted, and most importantly,
03:31those bugs were being squashed, and quickly. Essentially, it elevated what was a promising
03:36and solid experience into an excellent one, and for a series with the pedigree of Diablo,
03:41it really deserved nothing less.
03:43Number 7. Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege
03:46Games as a service tends to get a bad rap, and that's for a lot of very valid reasons,
03:51but at least in the cases of many of the games on this list, it does mean there's a dedicated
03:56team
03:56that are going to make sure they can continue to fix things and respond to player feedback over time.
04:02There are a few games on this list that fall into that category, and Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege
04:07is certainly one of them. This one launched riddled with bugs and glitches, which has quickly become
04:11a trend on this list, and will absolutely be continuing that trend to the end of it.
04:16While a single-player game like Skyrim launching riddled with bugs is bad, occasionally funny,
04:21but ultimately lets you play the game so long as you don't hit anything game-breaking,
04:25it's a different ballgame with multiplayer. Hit a snag with connection issues while you're playing
04:30a game that's multiplayer only, and the game is literally unplayable, which I think is the only
04:35time I've ever used that phrase earnestly. On top of that issue, the initially promising
04:40team-based shooter was peppered with balancing issues, rampant cheaters and no way to deal with
04:45them, and it was disappointingly thin on content. Flash forward 9 years, and the game is as strong
04:50as it's ever been, thanks to a diligent team constantly tweaking, balancing, and injecting a
04:56slew of both free and paid downloadable content to bulk out the maps, modes, and operators, among
05:01other things. In what's a really interesting move, both IGN and GameSpot actually revised their initial
05:07review scores of the game to better suit the game in its current state, IGN bringing its 7.9 to
05:12an 8.5,
05:13and GameSpot bumping the 8 out of 10 to a 10 out of 10. These adjustments were made as the
05:17service model
05:18turned the game into a totally different beast, and both outlets praised the game for being one of
05:23the best multiplayer shooters on the market, due to its tense and fast-paced matches. This has made all
05:28the more enticing through its unique requirement in mastering not only its combat mechanics, but also
05:33tactics, strategy, as well as team composition, cooperation, and communication. A wild 29 seasons in,
05:40and the game seems to be hit with a bunch of different players. However, of course, there's still
05:44glitches and bugs like every live service game that's constantly getting new updates. Although,
05:50in this particular circumstance, at least fans who aren't happy with the way things are going
05:54came up with the fun phrase, Rainbow Fix Siege, which is honestly just fantastic.
05:59Number 6, Sea of Thieves. Sea of Thieves, or the pirate game, just not the one made by Ubisoft,
06:05or Sid Meier, or the one with LeChuck, falls pretty neatly next to Rainbow Six Siege, in that they're
06:10both examples of games that have benefited enormously from the divisive games-as-a-service
06:15model. And not only that, they've made it far more worth your while if you dropped your dollars
06:19on them when they first hit storefronts. When Sea of Thieves set sail in 2018, a bunch of people
06:24were saying, sure, this looks cool, but what do I actually do here? To which developer Rare said,
06:29hold my banana. Because, because you eat bananas in the game. I realized phrasing that came off
06:35really weird, but I'm two lines down in the Google Doc now, so we're gonna have to keep going.
06:39That made more sense in the scripted version than the video version, but again, we're too far in.
06:44Let's keep going! As you'd have expected by now, if you didn't experience it for yourself,
06:49this one launched with more than a few dings in the hull. The bones of a solid experience were there,
06:54but without any skin or flesh or blood on them, yep, sorry, that got weird, players were lamenting
06:59that there was little of substance driving them to play beyond messing around with friends,
07:03having the odd cool emergent gameplay moment in a ship battle, and eating the aforementioned bananas.
07:08Two years down the line in 2020, an IGN would chuck the No Man's Sky Classic phrase at the game,
07:14stating it's the perfect time for players to give it another go as a result of a number of
07:18infrastructure fixes, bug patches, and buckets of new content. All of this was looped under the
07:23anniversary update, which was seen as something of a relaunch for the game as a whole.
07:27Come 2024, and that improvement train has kept on chugging, introducing new modes,
07:32free expansions, a seasonal format, and story-driven live events called adventures.
07:37Like Siege, constant updates will always lead to constant bug fixing, but for those who wanted
07:42to see the game become what Rare originally intended, it's certainly done just that.
07:46I'm sure the 30 million players in 2022 and 5 million units sold didn't hurt either.
07:51Number 5. For Honor
07:53Skipping all the way down from shooting times and pirate times to the times of good old sword
07:58and board, or whatever the other 33 heroes in this game were wielding, let's talk For Honor.
08:03Ubisoft's very first strategy action attempt didn't launch to the level of criticism that many of the
08:08other games on this list received, but its respectable sales and respectable review scores
08:13weren't exactly setting the game up to make waves for years to come either. For Honor is again a game
08:18as a service, but it uniquely requires a high level of finessing, tactical know-how, and precision
08:23combat maneuvers from its players, something bound to alienate certain groups looking for a more casual
08:28experience. What also alienated pretty much everybody from the outset was the way the game appeared to
08:34launch unfinished, with bugs aplenty, more server issues than you could point a great sword at,
08:39and consumer-unfriendly nickel and diming. It was when Ubisoft released a $15 starter edition that
08:44drastically cut the price of entry, delivered a bunch of free updates, as well as substantial paid
08:50DLC that it ensured its dedicated players would have reasons to keep coming back. Two new factions
08:55totalling nine new combatants later, all with different weapons and play styles, and the game has proven
09:00itself to be a great entry in the fighting genre, as well as having a pretty avid competitive scene.
09:06Number 4. Star Wars Battlefront II
09:08I keep running down these games and thinking I've hit the one that had the worst launch ever, but it's
09:14really hard to top Battlefront II in terms of hitting what can only be described as a perfect
09:19rhythm game streak of whacking every development, marketing, and launch faux pas on the head one
09:24after the other. That game with the really horrible microtransactions, as it was known for at least the
09:29first six months of its existence, EA fumbled a great IP yet again by getting a little too ambitious
09:35and a lot too gritty. Synonymous with such an extreme level of lootbox controversy that it kicked
09:41off US lawmakers discussing if the mechanic should be classified as gambling, and some countries even
09:46banning the game outright after deeming the inclusion so insidious it couldn't be on shelves,
09:52EA couldn't have put themselves or Star Wars Battlefront II in a worse position.
09:56This is a massive shame, as ultimately this became a game that was absolutely worth playing.
10:01Once EA and DICE swung back up from their rock bottom, illustrated by the most downvoted Reddit
10:07comment ever, where they suggested that making users unlock heroes gives them a better sense of
10:13pride, things started looking up. The pay-to-win mechanics were eliminated, and the game had its
10:17own Sea of Thieves-style relaunch by way of the Celebration Edition in 2019. Excellent free updates
10:24that have added new content and ways to play have gone a long way to earning back the trust of
10:28players,
10:29as has the fact that underneath EA's bulls**t, there's actually a really great core game in there,
10:34particularly the thrilling battles, impressively restrung progression system, and the pitch-perfect
10:39capitalization on the Star Wars IP.
10:42Number 3. Fortnite
10:43The middling launch and then explosive success of Fortnite is a story that pretty much everyone
10:49on Earth knows at this point, but if you missed the battle bus, then let's talk about this cash cow
10:54that somehow even outmatched the next game on this list.
10:56The $26 billion revenue-generating Battle Royale game with the Llama began life as a humble,
11:02mission-based tower defense game, where you would build up your defenses in the hopes of holding
11:07out against those who would see your destruction. This was all totally fine, albeit fairly mediocre,
11:12but upon seeing the success of PUBG in its Battle Royale format, Epic said,
11:17we could do that, and do that they did, amassing an unfathomable number of players and led the pack
11:22in pressuring the video game Big Dogs to enable cross-play between platforms. Between its emotes,
11:27esports competitions, constantly updated content, and undeniably enjoyable gameplay loop, Fortnite
11:33has done a stunning job of capturing a market that was clearly hungry for just this experience.
11:39Whether it's your thing or not, Fortnite is an epidemic. Or an icon. Or both. Either way,
11:44I think we can all agree, this is a moment in video game history we won't be forgetting
11:48any time soon, so it's certainly a wonderful video game comeback.
11:522. Grand Theft Auto Online
11:54On to a game that would have a wildly impressive revenue stat for a live-service property,
11:59were it not for the cartoon juggernaut I just mentioned dwarfing every other online offering
12:04around, Grand Theft Auto Online also had to claw its way up to where it is today.
12:09The biggest issue here was that Rockstar decided they would release this online component just a
12:14couple weeks after they launched Grand Theft Auto 5, meaning it wasn't at all ready for the
12:18server slam, and it was, say it with me, riddled with bugs.
12:23Patch after patch couldn't help this leaky-ass ship from going down, as players started losing
12:28their characters due to back-end bugs, and player outcry was at an all-time high.
12:33Making matters worse, trolls were an enormous headache to players just trying to enjoy the
12:37action-adventure playground, and even when that wasn't an issue, there wasn't anything
12:42compelling to do in the multiplayer city. Luckily, like every other dev team on this list,
12:46Rockstar decided to put their heads down and get to work, handing out free updates,
12:51new enticing modes, more ways to play, extra content, plenty of patches, events, and features,
12:56which all served up a super compelling platter that players could return back to.
13:01All that said, I feel like this is an important moment to point out that a lot of live-service
13:05games really badly gear themselves towards crunch culture in video games, which, if you don't
13:11know, is basically running devs into the ground, making them work way too hard to continue
13:15to get these updates out. That said, apparently it's getting better, but I just feel like
13:19we should put that out there.
13:21Number 1. Final Fantasy XIV A Realm Reborn
13:24In what is probably the greatest comeback story in video games, even if we had put No Man's
13:30Sky on this list, the MMORPG Final Fantasy XIV launched spectacularly failed for two years.
13:36Square's CEO stated the game damaged the entire brand, then they burned it all down, built it
13:42all back up again, rebranded, relaunched, and absolutely nailed it on the second attempt.
13:46Though the reveal that this second attempt A Realm Reborn would require players to subscribe,
13:51since that whole going back to the drawing board thing wasn't exactly cheap, it turned
13:55out to be an experience that was well worth paying for.
13:58The game offered cross-platform support and loads of small additions, as well as four incredibly
14:03substantial updates. 2015's Heavensword DLC, 2017's Stormblood, 2019's Shadowbringers,
14:11and 2021's Endwalker. These expansions both brought with them expansive and compelling
14:16campaigns consisting of hundreds of hours of new content, as well as new jobs, locations,
14:21dungeons, raids, and playable races. The reasons to return became relentless in the best way.
14:27Heavensword in particular literally doubled the amount of content from the base game. Of course,
14:31the game is also ridiculously lucrative for Square Enix. The gorgeous, sprawling setting,
14:36refreshing and engaging progression systems, and exciting lore-rich story more than worthy of
14:41its lofty franchise are just the tip of the iceberg in calling out the fan-favorite features of A Realm
14:46Reborn. Not only is A Realm Reborn now one of the best MMOs ever made, it's also one of the
14:52best
14:52Final Fantasy games ever made, even if multiplayer isn't your usual way to play.
Comments