Ubisoft has just released Skull and Bones on PC and consoles. And, from the looks of it, the game wasn’t received well by some gamers. Not only that but it appears that Skull and Bones can be worse than Assassin’s Creed: Black Flag, a game that came out a decade ago.
VGChartz's Mark Nielsen: "In a year that was to a large extent carried by the game developers of Japan (and to some extent China), western games can rejoice that there was at least one category they managed to dominate: that of Most Disappointing. Sometimes disappointment comes from high expectations met with something middling, other times it comes from middling expectations met with something terrible. This year managed to deliver a bit of both, so either way there was enough disappointment to go around."
Why not mention the 19,000 Steam games of which 80% weren't good enough to merit "success" on the platform?
Replies(2)
Because the very *definition* of disappointment requires one has some kind of expectation for it. Concord was hoping to find its own niche in the crowded 'hero shooter' market, with ~8 years of development, $100 million+ funding, and marketable talent behind it, and went belly up in 2 lousy weeks. That's historical for a live-service game.
It's become a drinking game at this point. Disappointing games? It's the same games in every article with a similar title. Does no one have an original thought anymore?
@thorstein
**It's the same games in every article with a similar title.**
Because it's the same year? The games that got launched is a constant fact for everyone. And if the game was universally disappointing, then obviously everyone would echo the same thing.
Do you want for originality some writer would write up that instead of Concord and Outlaws, Silent Hills 2 was the most disappointing game, right? Coz, that'd be considered a click-bait article then.
And emphasis on the word "disappointing" games, not general bad games.
Veilguard was easily the most disappointing game of the year.
Highest expectation with Highest disappointment
Concord was just the biggest failure.
In fact it was not very disappointing.
Almost as expected.
@LordoftheCritics I disagree about Vailguard being the most disappointing game of the year. Going into the launch of that game, 90% of the comments I was seeing from this community were negative. Many also wanted the game to fail.
In my opinion, for a game to be disappointing, it would mean the game was highly anticipated for success going into the launch of the game only to bomb in the reviews and fail commercially.
I would say Hellblade 2 claims this title. I haven't played any of the games in the series as yet, however, the hate that game received was on another level. I am not sure if it was fanboys that felt threatened by it being the best-looking console game on the market or if the criticisms about it being a boring game were valid. I haven't played these walking games before so put it off since it doesn't seem to be my cup of tea.
Those 19,000 games have 80%. Dragon age is sitting at 70%, Star wars is at 75% and falling, Lego Horizon adventures is at 56%, Skull and Bones 65% and Concord was DOA. This would mean these games didn't even crack the top 19,000.
Replies(1)
Assassin's Creed Black Flag Remake looks to be all but confirmed, with some first official details being shared online.
Black Flags is great and all but they really should have remade the first game.
Like I said Black Flags is a fantastic pirate game but it's where, for me anyway, it started to drift away from it's Assassin roots and felt like a new IP they were too scared to do without something attached. It's funny because they could have called this Skull and Bones back then or just "Black Flags and it would have done well enough to start a new IP for them. Sometimes I felt Black Flags was held back in some places because it was attached to AC lore, if it was a new IP it would have been fun to continue Edwards adventures in multiple games as he was a really good characters.
Altair's AC1 deserves more of a reimagining than a straight remake ... The game's got pacing issue and is comparatively barren especially since the parkour ability surprise has worn of.
I loved Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag and so did many millions of other people. Ubisoft intentionally reduced the AC element so it was mostly a pirate game that had the broadest appeal.
Ubisoft should not have wasted time making the online Skull & Bones or this remake - it should’ve just made a new standalone single player pirate game that could become a franchise.
They are doing this because they just have to reskin Odyssey. The first one would take an actual ground up effort.
Odyssey? But that's totally different structure from the pre-Origins AC palette i.e of AC4 in this case.
That'd mean the AC4 Remake would be more akin to the RPG-ACs, which Black Flag was not and I'd definitely dont want that from the remake.
I am skeptical but am not totally dismissing the ^idea either, coz remakes like FF7 have totally reimagined the base game.
IF that's what they end up doing, then please Ubi, dont remake the other classical ACs. I want more of a modern graphics overhaul with some QoL changes, like the MGS Delta or RE4, than total reimagining.
They are going to repurpose Odyssey's water environments, islands, and a big part of the animations from the naval stuff.
I don't think they will do a FF7, it's not how they operate. But if they do, I'm with you. I would love to see those games too.
I had fun with the first game and I loved the setting, but holy shit was it repetitive. I'd be down for a remake but only if they seriously adress that part of the game.
I agree to the extent that I want a pirate game uninterrupted by periodic visits to the modern day. Hopefully the remake fixes that
I like Black Flag but I also liked Rogue too bad it's not a two for one deal.
Wish they remade ACII before Black Flag ... or even re-imagined AC1
ACII >>> AC4. ~ Its the best 'AC' game. Black Flag was a good pirate game, Odyssey is a good mythological RPG game. But are not better 'AC' game.
I never put anywhere near enough into Black Flag when it first launched.
Looking forward to giving it another go when the remake launches.
Ubisoft has added Steam achievements to several of its titles, including games in the Ghost Recon and Assassin's Creed series.
I wanted a Black Flag sequel so bad. It's still my favorite AC entry. The fact that they ignored everything that we loved about that game in this "spiritual successor" is making me enjoy watching this game crash and burn quite a bit. Either do it right or don't do it at all. (I understand the legal binding they got themselves into with the Singapore government to release this game at all costs)
/grabs popcorn
11 years of development. Multiple restarts. All the while people have been saying they don't want some pirate game where you can't even get off your ship. 11 years of people telling Ubisoft all they want is a pirate game that's basically Black Flag without any of the assassin or animus stuff. Yet they still served up this trash that no one wanted, charged $70 for it, and had the balls to call it AAAA.
The Guillemot family honestly needs to be forced out of Ubisoft. They've doubled down on everything players don't like about their games, they want AI to create "rough drafts" of their stories rather than letting their writers do their jobs, and they literally do not give a shit what their playerbase actually wants. 5-6 years ago their stock was worth more than 4x what it's currently worth. The company is dying.
What has happened to developers? How can you possible make a worse looking game 11 years later? It’s honestly mind boggling.
God, I'd love a remake of Black Flag.
Enough has been said about this game already. The gaming world shrugged when it was announced so many years ago, and instead of listening to all the criticisms from the community back then, Ubi just sailed on and kept making a game nobody really wanted. What a waste of money and effort.