1UP ranks botched PC game launches

I knew the type of article this would be as soon as I saw the Ultima IX screenshot. Biggest. Disappointment. Ever.

Doesn't WoW belong somewhere on that list? Its early days were enough of a mess that they stopped selling it for a while until their server situation was cleared up.

I only game on the list I have is HL2, but I got it a couple weeks after release, and I don't remember having any problems.
I do remember having Fallout, and getting stuck on some bug (I can't remember what). The patch finally was released, but of course, wasn't compatable with the old save games. That sucked.

What? No Anarchy online? That game was unplayable at launch.

Unreal gets an honorable mention for its useless netcode at launch as well.

Wow, that Ultima 9 business was a nightmare.

The problem was that people like me were never able to get our heads around the idea that the same studio that produced gaming milestones like Ultima 3-7 were able to produce an unmitigated monstrosity like Ultima 9.

We were absolutely convinced that this was a rushed product, and that we were one patch away from getting the real game, the final masterpiece that would conclude the Ultima series.

It was the original message-board meltdown, right until the final thread-locker that stated they would not be providing any more patches or support for this abortion.

I'm surprised SiN isn't on there - it was the first serious "must patch before playing" offender in PC gaming history. And to make matters worse, it was a huge patch for downloaders to grab, too, at a time of 56k modems...

My favorite was the Neverwinter Nights launch. Of all the people that had the game from day one, only a handful could actually play it, the rest just crashed to desktop. They had a patch out that night to disable the "feature" that was behind that mess: the copy protection.

Probably the earliest cockslap on DRM in gaming history. Well, if you ignore that anytime the copy protection has caused problems for people trying to play the game, it hasn't been the pirates having said problems.

Daggerfall needs to be on this list.

Battlefield 2 was the game for me. I loved BF1942 and was VERy eager to play once I put it in. It had so many browser/lobby issues, crach to desktop about once an hour, was you actually got into the game it seemed fien, but getting into one was a huge hassle. It took EA/DICE a while to fix it also.

lol..I knew that Vanguard would make that list..lol. Hellgate London too..

Battlefield 2 was the game for me. I loved BF1942 and was VERy eager to play once I put it in. It had so many browser/lobby issues, crach to desktop about once an hour, was you actually got into the game it seemed fien, but getting into one was a huge hassle. It took EA/DICE a while to fix it also.

While it wasn't as big of a title as Ultima 9 or Hellgate, any list like this that leaves off Sierra's FootballPro '99 is an Epic Fail (just like FB99).

Wheres Daikatana?

Don't forget the recent Bully botch... Man, I was really looking forward to that too :-\

Don't forget the recent Bully botch... Man, I was really looking forward to that too :-\

(hope this isn't a double post)

How can anyone forget Daggerfall? A game with huge promise pathetically buggy at release. They fixed it in a patch later and it became one of the best games ever... but at release it was a huge unplayable turd.

I'll never forget how BIG of a hype there was for Diablo 2, yet on-line was UNPLAYABLE for like 3 weeks straight upon launch, due to huge demand, bad netcode, etc...

That said, in the long run Diablo 2 was an amazing game.

Yeah, wow really deserves to be on that list. With server problems preventing play, authentication, and many many bugs, it was also one of the games laughingly refered to as "paying for the beta".

HL2 didn't have as much a problem on release as WOW did.

And this is why PC gaming is dying.

Aside from the Smash Bros Brawl issue with my Wii, I've been able to play every console game I've ever bought within MINUTES of getting it home.

Playing a PC game generally involves updating drivers, Windows update, viruses, disabling services for better performance, installing the game, downloading patches, and any combination of the aforementioned drudgery that takes anywhere from an hour to all day to get out of the way before having the privilege of playing a game you just shelled out $50 for.

I'm just happy I didn't pay money for Dikatana.

And this is why PC gaming is dying.

Aside from the Smash Bros Brawl issue with my Wii, I've been able to play every console game I've ever bought within MINUTES of getting it home.

Playing a PC game generally involves updating drivers, Windows update, viruses, disabling services for better performance, installing the game, downloading patches, and any combination of the aforementioned drudgery that takes anywhere from an hour to all day to get out of the way before having the privilege of playing a game you just shelled out $50 for.

I'm just happy I didn't pay money for Dikatana.

And this is why PC gaming is dying.

Aside from the Smash Bros Brawl issue with my Wii, I've been able to play every console game I've ever bought within MINUTES of getting it home.

Playing a PC game generally involves updating drivers, Windows update, viruses, disabling services for better performance, installing the game, downloading patches, and any combination of the aforementioned drudgery that takes anywhere from an hour to all day to get out of the way before having the privilege of playing a game you just shelled out $50 for.

I'm just happy I didn't pay money for Dikatana.

as far as mmo releases go, WoW wasn't that bad. They couldn't have anticipated the traffic and because of that couldn't get reserve servers online fast enough, but atleast the game as it was shipped worked fine. It was just a problem of sheer volume.

Gears of War PC.

The game worked, I imagine. But the Games for Windows crap that was required in order to log in didn't. So you couldn't play the game. The only thing wrong with the game was the update feature, which meant that Games for Windows couldn't update itself.

Lots of other people suffered crashes and stuff, autodeleting savegames, and all that jargoin-- I already knew how to tweak the config file because it was almost 100% the same as Ut3's, so THOSE problems didn't take long to fix.

1up should be ranking their own botch-ness...their community is practically broken by the endless server problems resulting in lost blogs, fubar-ed friends lists , server timeouts, etc etc etc.

I hate that apparently everyone is drinking the Steam Kool-Aid now, and all the gaming blogs and commercial websites say it's the best thing ever. I'm sorry, but Steam SUCKS. It's a bad precedent to set, and the fact that gaming journalists have all accepted the idea of online verification for single-player games as the norm is just pathetic. It's like all the gaming journalists were either bribed, or simply lost their testicles at the 2005 CES.

Steam is a bullshit idea. Online distribution is fine, but the whole idea that you have to have a server client of any kind running in your OS in order to play any non-online game is as unwelcome now as it was when it launched. I do not keep Half Life 2 on my hard drive anymore. Frankly, I'd rather just play it on the Xbox 360 at this point (if I bother at all-- Valve is getting kind of repetitive and boring) because at least I expect the Xbox to be connected to Live (and by the way, HL2 in The Orange Box works just fine if you aren't online, so it makes it even more nonsensical that you're required to be online when you play it in Windows.)

Damn 1UP and EVERY OTHER GAMING SITE that gives Steam a pass and "forgets" about the invasion it represents. When it comes to Valve, if I buy their games at a retail store, I *still* cannot trade them or sell them because of the draconian Steam tendency to personalize every game. Once you bought it, it's yours for good. I hate that.

I expect that with an online purchase. That's fine. But making me have to do an online verification, ala Windows XP, every time I play a game? That's control I do not like, want, or accept. It's why I won't buy any Steam games, and why I won't purchase any Valve titles for Xbox 360 at retail stores-- I'll trade for them, instead.

Valve and Steam are not getting my business-- Ever again.


--As to the article, I had Ultima IX at launch. Oh, boy. . . That game was such a wasted opportunity. The joke at the time was that Origin were designing games on computers that wouldn't be available to the public for another four years. Every game they made required a top-of-the-line rig.

Man, that sucked. I loved the Ultima series.

In other news, Xbox Live is still down.

Yay, more Hellgate:London bashing...this always leads to a good time. I would like to participate in this too for my own gratification.

"Hellgate:London sucks. That is all..."