9 Misleading Video Game Demos That Totally Lied To You

Silent Hills, the much anticipated collaboration between Guillermo Del Toro and Hideo Kojima, has been abruptly cancelled - and what made that news even more shocking was that its demo was one of the best in living memory. Showing off the developer's deftness at pacing and in-game atmosphere, P.T. (the Playable Teaser) did more to sell the game than a hundred trailers featuring Norman Reedus' face ever could. Its cancellation remains crushingly disappointing. But then, gamers are no strangers to this. How many times have games promised to be the 'revolutionise gaming as you know it' and failed to deliver? Assassin's Creed: Unity was a buggy mess, Watch Dogs received a considerable graphical downgrade by the time it came to retail and the less said about The Order: 1886, the better. However, being disappointed after watching beautifully crafted CG trailers is almost acceptable. It's happened enough that sensible gamers know to disregard any footage that isn't in-game, and even take that with a grain of salt. Depressing as it is, promising too much is just part of the business these days; it's all in the pitch. What stings harder however, is a deceiving demo. Being given early control over a game and having a blast, only to be disappointed with the final release feels like even more of a betrayal, simply because you weren't told something was going to be worthwhile and enjoyable -you'd experienced that potential for yourself. These are the games whose demos you played over and over, but down the line probably only played the full game through once - if you even finished it at all.