Games you didn't like, but you liked the idea of

[Krantos]

Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising.

Thankfully, the mod community picked up the slack here and significantly improved it.

Brink is another one.

Mirror's Edge

Fable.

Europa Universalis III.

 

[GiglameshSoulEater]

Spore. The Spore we saw in 2005 was amazing. The Spore we got, was not.

I'd say Spore as well. The concept is freaking brilliant. Unfortunately, they basically divided up the main game into 5 smaller chunks based on other genres and completely half assed them. Each stage of the game is seriously like a poor mans version of some other title/genre. Spore is pretty much the definition of terrible execution.

I remember seeing the first little video for spore, not even any gameplay, and thinking: that looks awesome. And they had promised so much, but in the end it came down to: Make friends or kill.

Fable.

Somewhat a habit of Peter Molyneux. I liked the first fable. The second was... acceptable. But neither had the depth we were promised.

 

[LiberalSquirrel]

Advent Rising.

The storyline had some real potential, and it had some really good moments. But between bugs, clunky combat, and... er... everything else... it averaged out to "slightly above mediocre" for me.

 

[lucky_sharm]

I Am Alive. It had so many great ideas but the potential was never fully realized. It honestly feels like they had their sights set on something greater, but then shit just happened.

 

[Raijha]

Guild Wars 2. I can see why people are liking it, I like some of what its doing instead of the "standard" mmo. I can't like the game itself, I've tried, a few times, it just doesn't click with me and I can't get into it or enjoy it at all.

The other major one was Alpha Protocol. That one had some neat ideas and could have been an amazing game. If most of the design and concepts of that game got moved into a really well done and polished game, I would enjoy it immensely.

 

[King of Asgaard]

Shadows of the Damned. The wacky premise and plot was enough for a purchase from me.
But it's short, and uninspired. The combat is alright, in fact everything was simply okay.
It's a shame because some of the dialogue between Garcia and Johnson was well-written and delivered, and had some genuinely funny moments. But those were few and far between.
Oh, and the final boss fight is a piece of piss.

Brutal Legend, saving the world with the power of my Metal? Hell fucking yes!
The actual game... no, no, noooo, that is not how we do that.

This too, though to a much lesser extent. Plus, Brutal Legend made me a metal head officially, so I have to give it some credit.

 

[Ando85]

Far Cry 2. I loved the original Far Cry, but this one I just couldn't get into. I thought having an open world fps taking place in Africa would be amazing. But, I found the gameplay mechanics not to my liking. Also save points and such were spread too thin.

 

[RADIALTHRONE1]

Dead Island
I liked the game, but i think it could have been alot better in many ways. Almost seems like it wasn't a finished product.

Halo Wars
Same deal as Dead Island really, it could have been a whole lot better.

 

[unindexedsearchengine]

Borderlands. I really loved the idea and premise of it, and then the amazing reviews came rolling in, and the community seemed to love it. I bought it, and after clocking up 4 hours i just can't bring myself to play it. It's just sooooo boring......

 

[SolanumX2]

Borderlands was definitely dull. I tried, no joke, five or six separate times to get through it. I eventually did after running into a good guy in a random match when I was dicking around. That's when it became fun. In short, it sucks playing it alone because of its repetitiveness.

Thankfully Borderlands 2 appears to alleviate all of that with more variety in enemies and locales. The gameplay is the same, but it wasn't the gameplay I had issue with.

My choice for game I liked the "idea" of was taken, which is Brutal Legend. I tried SO hard to like that game, but I just couldn't do it. Maybe if the gameplay was more akin to Darksiders, or really any other action game, it would've been better.

 

[dfphetteplace]

Bioshock. I thought the idea was great, but I just couldn't get into the game. I was bored by it. If it were a book, I would read the hell out of it, but the game just couldn't grab my attention.

 

[Matt King]

stormrise, it uses an interesting system with a nice story and if it had just a bit more polish and work it could have been awesome

 

[kortin]

The Secret World.

Premise and story sounded great. The game and its execution of the story, however, was astonishingly average.

 

[Twilight_guy]

Superman 64. I wanted my superman the animated series game! *Sniff* I miss you DCAU.

Recently, Alan Wake and Dear Ester. There not games I don't hate or dislike, more like feel meh towards, but they are games I feel fell far short of there potential.

 

[Sewa_Yunga]

The Secret World.

Premise and story sounded great. The game and its execution of the story, however, was astonishingly average.

It could have been so awesome... I really wanted to like this game, but I found myself unwilling to play after two or three weeks

 

[Justank]

Final Fantasy 13. I hated it the entire time I was playing it (~30 hours). It was so close to being incredible, if they had just executed everything in a better way. Also, don't make EVERY SINGLE character learn how to say I'm sorry. Seriously, Sazh is like 40 years old. He at the very least should know how to apologize.

 

[Woodsey]

Alpha Protocol was atrocious, but the concept remains appealing.

 

[RADIALTHRONE1]

Dead Island
I liked the game, but i think it could have been alot better in many ways. Almost seems like it wasn't a finished product.

Halo Wars
Same deal as Dead Island really, it could have been a whole lot better.

i often wonder how dead island could of been if they had of expanded the itial part of the island and had you building your own stronghold, reinforcing walls, etc the elements were there the odd collect supplies missions and rescuing the odd survivor but still the potential was wasted, i still love the thing though even if the cut scenes annoy the crap out of me

The fact that it was open world was a plus, but it got kinda bring without missions because each section was so small. Plus it was only fun to run around the Resort because all you would encounter were walkers, infected, and the occasional thug/suicider.

And in regards to the cut scenes-

Purna! What is wrong with your face?! Seriously, for some reason something about it just looks... off.

 

[BytByte]

Oddly enough...Kirby's Epic Yarn is high on the list for me.

Amazing Art, fun premise, lots of potential for creative gameplay based off the visuals...and then you actually start playing it.

I love several kid-friendly games but well...Mario can be enjoyed by anyone, so can Zelda, so can several older Kirby games. But oh god, this game feels like it was made for infants. The bed-time story presentations and the creepy narrator, the boring, risk-free gameplay, the overly cute and peaceful atmosphere with no emotional variation whatsoever.

*sigh*...it looks so pretty...and it's kirby. Why is it so bad?

I actually am the opposite of you. I came in thinking it would be a too cute slog, but the creativity of the entire world was just amazing. While the game may not be the most challenging, there was still plenty of fun variety to be had racing through the levels and finding all of the quirks in the presentation. Also, it had some of the best music I've heard this generation.