9 2018 Video Games That Wasted Their Biggest Selling Points

With the average game budget reaching into the tens of thousands of dollars, it's imperative any developer/publisher combo gets you talking about their latest work as soon as possible. That comes in forms ranging from surprise trailers to live-action reenactments of key moments, to even Rick & Morty teaming up with Fortnite streamer Ninja to promote Fallout.

Because video games.

The flip-side to sheer wide-eyed excitement is trying to find an angle on the game's story or gameplay mechanics... that might still be in active development.

More than any other medium, the full scope of a video game often doesn't come together until those closing months, and the results are an entire populace putting down premium prices on pre-orders or investing in certain worlds, characters etc., only to find the finished article is completely different.

Thankfully, because of the nature of gaming, a lot of features can be patched in after-the-fact (just look at the actually-quite-staggering No Man's Sky now, vs back in 2016), though that comes with a lot of angry consumer feedback.

In the end, gaming's relationship with hype continues to be fascinating, but 2018 has seen a good handful of casualties.