10 Ways Video Games Keep Lying To You

As we learned time and again with Peter Molyneux, Will Wright and Sean Murray, it's usually not best to let the artist lead the marketing of a game.

Developers - especially the ones in charge - are extremely passionate about what they do. And that's a good thing, obviously. We know what happens to big games when things like passion and morale just aren't there - Mass Effect: Andromeda, for one.

But it's always a bad idea to sell a game based on the developer's vision alone. A passionate creative will pursue their vision relentlessly if given the chance, but too often that ambition exceeds reality. When certain figures get excited they aren't considering things like budgets, deadlines or how much of the game is yet to be coded - they're just stoked to be talking about this thing they're so in love with.

Fortunately, when given the time and space necessary, some developers can, eventually, deliver on all those ambitions, No Man's Sky being arguably the most famous example, but not the only one.

Games like Final Fantasy XIV, The Elder Scrolls Online and Destiny are just a few others showing what can happen when developers have the freedom to eventually reach their potential.

All the same, stop trying to sell us on hypothetical concepts and be FAR clearer about the reality of production.