10 of the biggest video game failures of the past decade –

There have been some colossal failures and missteps in the video game industry over the years, so many in fact that if we were to look at gaming history as a whole, this article could be pages and pages long. Whether it’s Atari dropping Nintendo, Sega jumping the gun with its console launches, the Wii U, Xbox ‘s misunderstanding of what gamers wanted with the Xbox One, Sony launching the PS3 with the same price tag as that of a new car, the Wii U, Konami splitting with Hideo Kojima, the Wii U, the Wii U, the Wii U… You get the point. Therefore, we focus instead on the past decade and the failures and mistakes that have defined this industry since 2015.

Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League nearly kills Rocksteady

One of the best and most respected video game developers of all time known for making excellent single-player action experiences with an emphasis on melee combat, with the task of making a multiplayer, live-service, ranged combat-focused project. On paper it never got it right, and in practice it wasn’t much better. In fact, this is such a hard thought to return to, since anyone who has played Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League knows there are some good elements in this game, showing that beneath the surface of everything else that doesn’t work is still the Rocksteady we know and love. Bring back the Arkham days and for God’s sake, get Rocksteady cooking!

The evolution of Overwatch to Overwatch 2 decimates the potential of a former Game of the Year winner

Some will say that Overwatch in 2016 robbed Doom and even Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End of a Game of the Year title, but regardless of your point of view on that, there’s no denying that Blizzard’s hero-shooter pretty much redefined what we were used to from this type of game. It presented a charismatic cast and a hopeful world with so much opportunity and depth, and a good direction was taken with additional support that seemed to set this game up for a long future of success. But then Blizzard decided to make a sequel, a project that took far too long to make and stalled any progress of the original game, before launching with a lack of meaningful new content and too much focus on the parts of the experience that players couldn’t care less about. Cut to today, and Overwatch 2 is a fraction of the hit sensation that Overwatch was even a few years after its launch.

BioWare … Everything about BioWare…

The 2010s actually started quite well for BioWare. The famous developer presented Star Wars: The Old Republic, Mass Effect 3, Dragon Age: Inquisition and a few other projects as well. But then things went sour and very, very quickly. Mass Effect: Andromeda arrived and turned out not to be one of them, with Anthem expected to be a return to form for the studio. But this game was even more of a colossal failure and proved to be a complete lack of what fans expected from this developer. Then, as recently as last year, Dragon Age: The Veilguard arrived and also failed to land with fans as BioWare games so often did. It has reached the point, especially after the big Saudi-backed buyout of EA, that many see the upcoming Mass Effect as a do or die game, and frankly, any studio that survives four back-to-back flops should consider itself incredibly lucky, so it’s hard to disagree that the planned game is nothing but the most important launch in BioWare’s history.

MindsEye looks to be the flop of 2025

It’s not that fans expected MindsEye to knock Grand Theft Auto off its throne, but there was reasonable hope that a developer, led by the same man who helped make GTA what it is today, could, with good financial and publisher support, produce something worth celebrating. This was not that game at all. MindsEye turned out to be an immeasurable disaster. The game was a technical wreck, it lacked substance, the story was unimpressive and ultimately it proved to be such a failure that the developer was soon hit with layoffs with many former employees coming out and actively criticizing the leadership and toxic culture they fostered.

Concord looks to be the flop of 2024

When you think of video game failures as recent, no title stands out in the same way as Concord. Published by Sony Interactive Entertainment, Firewalk Studios’ hero-shooter received incredibly mediocre impressions and a complete lack of fan interest that it struggled to crack even 700 concurrent players on Steam upon its debut in late August…. Data for PS5 players was never shared, but it clearly didn’t fare much better on the platform, as just a few days after its arrival, Sony pulled the plug on the game, pulled it from storefronts and refunded buyers, and there has been no word on Concord since September 2024.

Redfall single-handedly destroys Arkane Austin

Arkane Austin was once a developer you associated with the best. It led the development of the beloved Prey and also helped bring Dishonored and Deathloop to life. But it also created the disappointing Redfall, a game that, while nowhere near as messy as Concord and MindsEye, deserves its place on the list because it virtually killed this studio. Yes, almost a year after the arrival of Redfall and months of trying to get the game back on track and up to par with what it promised fans, it was decided that enough is enough and shortly thereafter the studio closed and Redfall now remains a completely mediocre action-adventure title and a sad tombstone over the grave of this once talented developer.

Saints Row reboot is not something fans of the series wanted

The reboot of Saints Row was something fans were excited about for a long time. A more chaotic and less down-to-earth alternative to Grand Theft Auto ? Sign us up! But what Volition and publisher Deep Silver ended up presenting was far from expected, instead offering a strange and misunderstood experience about hipsters becoming gangsters. It never felt like Saints Row from the first moment, and on top of that, the launch was hampered by performance issues, ultimately making this an expensive failure that soon led to Volition’s closure after they became part of the broader Gearbox Entertainment family under the reign of the always lovely Embracer Group.

MultiVersus doesn’t capture lightning in a bottle a second time

This is an odd one, because MultiVersus was actually quite a hit when it arrived and it seemed to be an aptly consistent part of the broader fighting game landscape. But here was the catch; This was during a beta period that was never meant to last. So when Player First Games finally removed the title to finish it – a process that took much longer than expected due to upgrading the game engine and such – fans were simply no longer interested in the game. The once lightning-in-a-bottle title was completely launched to near zero fanfare, which ultimately meant that the project was permanently shut down for nearly an entire year until launch day.

Electronic Arts serves up a consumer-friendly hit with the “surprise mechanics” of Star Wars: Battlefront 2

Electronic Arts has done some truly diabolical things over the years, design choices that just seem bad from a consumer perspective, and it’s these kinds of things that consistently get the company treated as an antagonist by savvy gamers. Before the disaster fest that was Battlefield 2042, DICE had another train wreck on its hands when it served up Star Wars: Battlefront II in 2017, as this anticipated shooter contained what EA executives lovingly “surprise mechanics.” called. These were loot boxes and fans hated everything about them. In fact, they almost single-handedly destroyed an otherwise pretty strong game, proving once again that EA is very hard to trust when it comes to making good decisions for its fans.

LawBreakers had all the hype and none of the sales

Finally, we have to mention Boss Key Productions’ LawBreakers. This was a fascinating game because before launch it really seemed to be a great innovation and an exciting turning point for the shooter genre. It had a huge marketing campaign, promising gameplay and positive reviews, but then failed to sell and land with consumers, which in fact was such a disaster that about a year after its debut it closed its servers and disappeared off the face of the earth. It was a clear example of how cutthroat the video game industry can be.

Honorable mention: Diablo Immortal’s “don’t you guys have phones” reveal

As a final, final note, we must not forget one of the most infamous moments in recent video game history. The day when Blizzard took the stage at BlizzCon 2018 to reveal a new Diablo, only for it to be a mobile counterpart that the rabid audience really couldn’t reveal any enthusiasm about. When Diablo Immortal was first presented to the world to crickets and eerie silence, it quickly led developer Wyatt Cheng to deliver a phrase that would echo to eternity – as Maximus Decimus Meridius would say – the famous “Don’t you guys have phones?” Of course, this became a meme and another solid example of how disconnected gaming managers and fans can be on the spectrum of what they hope for from their favorite developers.

Did we miss any other major failures of the past decade? Let us know in the comments below.