9. Ubisoft Takes EA's Place As The World's Most Hated Video Game Publisher
The Moment: Not so much one moment but a series of embarrassments for Ubisoft, who had one of the most memorably awful (if still massively profitable) years of any games developer-publisher in recent memory. Firstly, Watch Dogs fell well beneath most players' expectations (despite still being a decent game) and the graphics looked scaled-back from the original E3 demo, then they embargoed critics reviewing Assassin's Creed Unity until 12 hours after the game was already available. The reason for this? The game was incredibly glitchy, and they wanted to stop the word getting out. Then there's the whole "parity" controversy with Unity, where the game's resolution was apparently gimped on the PS4 to keep it consistent with the Xbox One, the numerous glitches that troubled Far Cry 4's release, and the mess that was open-world racer The Crew. Why It's WTF: Ubisoft still developed and published a few genuinely great games this year such as South Park: The Stick of Truth and Child of Light, but to see them showing utter contempt for consumers so frequently over 2014 shone a bright light on the exact reasons why pre-ordering games is a terrible idea. Don't give developers your money until you've done your research and the game is confirmed to be working as it should be. On the plus side, their 2015 probably can't be any more unfortunate.
Stay at home dad who spends as much time teaching his kids the merits of Martin Scorsese as possible (against the missus' wishes).
General video game, TV and film nut. Occasional sports fan. Full time loon.
