10 Video Games That Punish You For Playing Well
1. Realm Divide Pits Everyone Against You - Total War: Shogun 2
Total War: Shogun 2 is a fantastic game, albeit one which also includes the somewhat controversial Realm Divide mechanic, where players who end up controlling a large amount of the available territory or manage to capture Kyoto will become the enemy of, well, everyone.
When Realm Divide is activated - by reaching a certain level of Fame - every other non-allied clan will team up to take you down, while your relationship with allies and vassals becomes fractious enough that they're likely to turn on you in due course.
Realm Divide can often be triggered when players are far from able to take on the might of numerous large forces, nor shoulder the economic burden of your trade operations suddenly being obliterated.
Though the mechanic makes a certain amount of strategic sense, that the non-dominant parties would combine their forces to take out the overarching threat to their power, it can still result in players receiving a punishment that doesn't really seem commensurate to their actions.