10 Hated Video Game Sequels You Should Play

Very little on this planet comes under more scrutiny than a video game sequel.

As such it's a tough tightrope developers have to walk to make one that's successful. Give players more of the same and they might return in droves... or they might decide your game is a lazy cash grab and get bored of the series. Take a huge risk and you might win fans over with strong creative ambition... or they might criticise you for losing the core of what people loved so much in the first place.

As a result, there have been plenty of titles that have disappointed over the years, even becoming a source of Internet controversy. However, the Internet can be a pressure cooker, and often a title's perceived slights completely dominate the discourse and become incredibly overblown, with fans declaring it the worst thing ever with no redeeming qualities.

It's rare for a game to be bad from end to end though, and the following titles don't deserve to be completely written off. They're worth trying yourself, even if it's only out of morbid curiosity.

Mass Effect 3's infamously hated ending essentially did to the franchise what Game of Thrones' final season did for that show's reputation: it made fans wonder why they ever cared in the first place. Ten years later, it is true that ME3's out-of-nowhere anti-climax is disappointing, but do you know what? It's been a decade, and talking about this sequel's ending has been done to death - it's boring.

There's so much more to this title than just the final twenty minutes, and so much in there to love. While the ending may drop the ball in terms of paying off player choices, other story segments categorically do not. Tragic deaths, longtime conflicts finally coming to a head, cameo appearances, picked-up romantic relationships and more tantalising consequences of the player's decisions litter this title, providing satisfying conclusions to almost all the major arcs in the trilogy.

The combat is better than ever too, enough so that it was enjoyable enough to sustain an entire multiplayer suite many fans assumed would be a tacked-on mess.

Is Mass Effect 3 a perfect game? Hell no. The way the RPG elements are scaled back is incredibly disappointing, but its highs are undeniably high and combined with all the great DLC in the recent Legacy Edition remaster, makes for a fun, captivating final adventure.