10 Major Missteps By Video Game Companies
6. Not Delaying When You KNOW It's Necessary - No Mans Sky
Hype For No Man's Sky had been building for years, with claims of a never before seen experience being created by Hello Games.
It seemed like an impossible task to create a game with such potential, it seemed too good to be true. Unfortunately that's because it was.
People playing pre-release versions of the game began to notice massive inconsistencies with what they were experiencing and what they had been promised. Multiplayer was missing, the game was far shorter than claimed, and many of those who played for several hours felt the game had reached its end.
No Man's Sky is actually a great game today, with content expansions, patches and bug fixes being periodically applied. If Hello Games just admitted the game was not up to standard and insisted on a delay, then people may have been annoyed, but would have received an excellent game with critical praise eventually.
Ultimately their decision to hide issues instead of delaying the launch made things much worse. Reviews were terrible, players were in uproar, and even years later players are still bitter about it, even as they enjoy the now finished game.