20 Disastrous Gaming Launches Everyone Saw Coming
5. Battlefield 2042
It's no understatement to say that fans well and truly had their pitchforks sharpened for Battlefield 2042 long before it came out, and honestly with pretty damn good reason.
The FPS sequel came to market with a ton of eyebrow-raising issues, from the lack of a single-player campaign to reliable leaks about its rushed development, a poorly received beta, and overpowering sentiment that its 128-player matches were a gimmick.
Outlets that previewed it even encouraged EA to delay the game further, but they stayed the course, and so Battlefield 2042 went on to receive the worst reviews in the mainline series' history.
The game was primarily criticised for its bugginess, the baffling absence of countless basic, expected features - like a scoreboard and server browser - as well as a widely-loathed overhaul of the class system, and again, the lack of a single-player campaign.
Within barely a month, Battlefield 2042's player count had been dwarfed by that of Battlefield V, a game released three years earlier, and EA later confirmed that it failed to meet sales expectations.