10 Worst RPG Video Games Of All Time

If you’re forced to wipe your game from the face of the Earth and start again, that’s probably a good indicator that you’ve created something pretty awful. This one ends well but Final Fantasy XIV was dragged through broken glass to get there.

Performance issues were one of the biggest problems that caused FF14’s downfall, although that's not forgiving the game’s frankly terrible interface. It looked nice, and there was clearly some degree of fun to be had, but it was buried under technical troubles as well as what appeared to be a pretty severe degree of grind. Square-Enix extended the game’s trial period multiple times to keep players involved but behind the scenes big changes were happening to try to save face in the long run.

Players that stuck with Final Fantasy XIV saw the in-game story culminate in a world-ending event that resulted in the servers being turned off. A month later, the alpha test for Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn began. Built from the ground up and helmed by a new director, this 2.0 version of the game was much more in line with player expectation.

Since its rerelease in 2014, Final Fantasy XIV has gone on to become one of the successful MMORPGs of all time: a rather large pendulum swing considering the original version cost Square a lot of money and a lot of player faith.