I like RPGs...I've played through FF IV-VII and X and some others but these ones didn't thrill me. I've never gotten into an RTS though.

Final Fantasy 8, Quake 4, Halo 3 and Metroid Prime 3 are the only ones I can think of off the top of my head right now.

Almost every Star Wars game since Tie Fighter...

For me it would have to be Spiderman 3 for the XBox 360, damn.

It got some brilliant "first peek" and "hands on" reviews, but the mediocre pile of unadulterated crap it turned out to be disappointed me beyond all hope for spidey games.

I got promised crackdown with the web-slinger, imagine my surprise...

TheLostSkeleton:
I'm not going to lie to you.

Sonic the Hedgehog on the Xbox 360.

/snip

Wow...

/comfort

FF12 was a big let down for me.

Half-Life 2: Episode 2, to an extent, was a bit of a let down. I personally think episodic gaming is a bad idea. It makes the experience disjointed and scrambled, and playing becomes more of a chore to get through to the next episode. Episode 2 just felt like filler until Episode 3 would be released. The NPCs aren't as well developed, the pace and combat isn't as good, and the plot feels like it was made out of bits of Half-Life and Half-Life 2 placed in a blender. The Hunters and Antlion Workers were good, but not as good as were previously described. The only real change was the graphics, which are now quite impressive, and definetely aid the outdoor settings.

Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty has been one of the biggest disappointments I've had since I started playing video games (too long ago). Raiden, the uninspired environments, and the ending I found frustrating and less than satisfying.

More recently, probably Supreme Commander. I was a giant Total Annihilation fan and had been looking forward to this title for a long time. It has one of the greatest User Interfaces of any RTS (the Strategic Zoom is wonderful) but the game got bogged down with a lot of generic units and a clumsy economy (mass fabricator farming became a must for competitive play after a game lasted more then a few minutes). A lot of these problems were "fixed" with the expansion Forged Alliance, but paying something like forty USD for an expansion to help amend these problems I found disheartening. I still like the game, but I think it could have been so much more.

Quake Wars was also pretty disappointing for something that was being hyped as a Battlefield killer, I thought

I've lurked and read for awhile, but I finally registered for the forum for this thread.

Half-Life 2 and its Episodes. Sure, it's pretty. It's an awesome technological jump. But it's missing much of the panache, depth, and most of all RESOLUTION of the original. There's basically one humanoid enemy, a couple of mediocre robotic enemies (manhack aside, that one's cool), and a couple of vehicle-bosses that lack character.

Bioshock. Where's the Deus-Ex or even System Shock 2-level RPG factors? Again, pretty but dumb. A total waste of time.

Halo 2, without a doubt the biggest disappointment in a game I've had.

Supreme Commander - I got all excited about this game. Left work for the afternoon to go get it, installed it and played it. The mouse setup sucked - C&C has it much better. I figure out to make huge forces to take over x base and watch as everything gets slower and slower and then crash. Too move my force from one base at the corner of the map to the other too so long i could comfortably cook a pizza and return to watch as they just arrived, decimated some force and then mission says move to the other side again.

more a comment on my slow machine than the game perhaps. C&C worked just fine though! wtf

Neverwinter Nights was a horrible game compared to Baldur's Gate 2. But I was completely suckered by Knights Of The Old Republic. KOTOR 2 was a little disappointing by comparison, but I'm used to that. I was so addicted to the concept by that point it was a guilty pleasure. Like buying another Strokes record.

Final Fantasy X-2: I just can't believe it exists. Comparing it to Charlie's Angels is pretty much like asking for similarities between two Battlefield versions.
Metal Gear Solid 2: It was nice seeing it. Metal Gear Next gen! Awesome! But as you go through, the quality just starts going down and down. A few years later, I still pickup my old MGS, and NEVER this one.
Mario Party VII: I wish it where more like Madden. You don't NEED to make ALL the mini games new, just a few ones and KEEP the good ones.
Halo 3: It's Halo 2 upgraded. Recording is fun the first week.

I find myself disappointed by games that had prequels, or at least spiritual prequels that were better:

Black and White II: I _loved_ the original, so I went right after II and once I discovered that the SP campaign is literally your only gameplay venue (no MP or skirmish) my initial and final reaction said 'go fuck yourselves you hopeless douches.'

NWN: I never played II because I couldn't stand the first, but the fact that I'd played BG I&II beforehand made NWN a huge disappointment. In BG we had a beautifully constructed plot and character development. NWN is a string of find-item quests. Pathetic let-down.

Half-Life 2 + Ep.s: I might very well get some flak for that, but I seriously didn't feel the utter ruthlessness H-L I brought upon me. The original opened my eyes to how awesome a story can unfold in the first person POV, but the sequel feels like a cliche movie lots of times. I also seriously didn't like the vehicle sequences at all. Didn't do it for me. Vehicle sequences should be smooth, fast, and exhillirating. You couldn't move for more than 20 seconds at a time before encountering another stupid, repetitive road-block. Look, road-blocks and chase battles are what vehicle sequences are all about, but you shouldn't have to stop every time you're on the brink of enjoying the speed.

On the bright side, the Orange box had two games that I wasn't expecting too much out of initially that jumped out and pinned me down. Portal, first of all, is Half-Life's real spiritual sequel, and I enjoyed every last second of it thoroughly. The fac that it ended quickly didn't bother me because it ended well, and that is something much more important than game length. Portal was a delightful dessert. Team Fortress II was a feast, and I'm very much in love with it, right now. It is balanced beautifully and I found myself playing and mastering all the classes- something which I don't do in most class-based games.

Vampire: Bloodlines. So much potential, briliant story line but utterly unplayable due to technical issues. I returned to playing it several times and each time I gave up shortly afterwards, deeply frustrated.
Fortunately, the story has a happy end. The bugs have all been ironed out by very dedicated fans who keep issuing patches and after two hardware upgrades, there are no more performance issues for me.
I also agree on Deus Ex 2. A very shallow game compared to the original.

Vampire: The Masquerade. Redemption
Vampire: The Masquerade. Bloodlines

With all the hype these offered in previews, I just never could really pick them up for more than an hour. In "Redemption", I just cannot forgive how many shortcuts they took with the character Platte. The Right hand on ALL characters, either your player or NPC, is a tight-fisted ball. Meant to be holding a weapon, it's a shortcut that is just too tacky to forgive, especially when a nun has a large hand like that.

In "Bloodlines", it just was "Redemption" with a bit of a make-over... albeit a good makeover, but still the game fails to shine. It's so unbalanced that even though you have the choice to really make your character "unique" there are only really a few things you need work on, and if you don't invest in those attributes, you'll suffer the entire game, like in the firearms vs. melee. Melee is just so ungodly overpowered and firearms on the other end, that even maxed out in skill, you just won't hit the broad side of a barn with your guns, while if you had a sword and pumped up melee, you can bum-rush just about anyone and kick ass.

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

Biggest disappointment ever for me, I spent many-a-year playing the fantastic TES:Morrowind and thoroughly enjoyed it, its open-plan cities and towns and well set out dungeons, and just everywhere you turned there was a new storyline, but in Oblivion i found all of the atmosphere i wanted but it had taken all of the depth, its console-friendly armour and weapon systems and total lack of individuality in these areas, its horrible level scaling that meant no-where was unexplorable or remotely dangerous.. at level 45 i feel no stronger than i was at level 3 for example and bandits run around in daedric armour (???!!!).

Alot of the areas in TES:Oblivion feel more than instance like, the cities feel cut-off from the world and the fast travel was also a big mistake in my view, where in morrowind they were open and didnt have enormous walls at every turn. i hope TES VI will be more like morrowind with cleverness and a really 'hand-made' feel to it than the safe and serenely almost boredom ridden cyrodiil.

Halo, i had just bought an Xbox and was expecting it to be bigger than cheese(i rather like cheese), it turned out to be just another mediocre shooter with little to offer.

more recently, Hellgate: London.

i was more than hyped about it due to being compared to the Diablo series. I loved Diablo and started following developments. The game graphically even looked great! And when I got my hands on it, so plain.. so many bugs.. i actually found it so boring..

Star Trek: Legacy. Star Trek died for me that day not with a bang, but with a buggy whimper.

Deus Ex 2 was my biggest game disappointment. The first game is, without a doubt, my favorite game of all time. I love that game, replay it all the time. But from the moment I booted up Invisible War, it was one issue after another, from bugs to a bad control scheme. I was incredibly disappointed in that game.

Also, NWN2 was sad, I expected so much and ended up with something completely other.

Dark Sektor.

I know it isnt released yet but from what i have seen of it I dont even want it to be released.
The first preivew movie I saw of Dark Sektor made me believe there still was some hope for the gaming scene. The game itself promised me a kickass storyline, awesome character design, beautiful graphics, sci fi (awesome sci fi, havent seen it yet in a game), cool armor and robots.

For some reason (i dont even want to know) they decided to skip everything cool that i just listed and make something horrible instead.

Dark sector 2nd try: "Hey, lets do something crazy, lets make Xena the warrior princess a man and give him a stupid weapon and make him run around in a n isolated village full of inbreeds" "hell YEAH! Never heard of the idea before, lets do it! LETS ROCK THIS WORLD!"

Feel free to do search for the game Dark Sector and you will see what i mean.

*edit*
Forgot to list the games that sucked when i hoped they wouldnt.

Vampire the masquerade: redemption+bloodlines
Fallout tactics
Neverwinter nights 2 (the expansion made it somewhat playable)
Final Fantasy X: One word, HAHAHAHAHAHA.
Metal Gear Solid 3: I had hoped they would fix the aweful camera, controles and menus in the 3rd game.
Deus Ex 2: Illusion of freedom.
Xenosaga

FatRabidRamboCow:
Neverwinter Nights. Just didn't compare to the likes of Baldur's Gate.

Neverwtiner Nights 2 was even worse.

Very true. I still wish that they had never moved from the Infinity engine or removed the 'party' element.

Well i don't usually care about console games.. But the last years that every game that comes out for pc is a game made to fit 1 disc and be converted to a console..
What this means is that generally the disc space is just used for mega grafixx engine so the game will look high rez but everything else has as much depth as a puddle.

Every sequal has been a disapointment in general. so listing them all would be nonsense.
Like i'd rather play Red alert 1 then any of the sequals, command and conquer 3 was just a laugh.
I didn't like half-life 2 but then alot of people say they buy it just for css.
For me, a fps with 5 weapons choices and 5 different enemy's to kill through a whole 10 hour game is just like a mmorpg grind.
It's beyond me why game designers decide to cut down over 50% of content as in weapons, enemies, puzzle variety, areas could be a good idea.
Well there's one reason thats money.. Spamming the market with medicore to semi-bad games with a low attention to detail or fan requests seems to produce more money in the bank then one good game..

Civilization IV and Perfect Dark Zero. I dont think i'll bother elaborating any further.

.

Carbon016:
Pretty much everything I've bought in the last year or so - Flight Sim X (runs terribly), Portal (repetitive), Battlefield 2142 (sorta), HL2 (yes, HL2!), Sims 2 (runs terribly, just not as fun as the original), Civ IV (I wanted a RTS, not a bloody board game) and ESPECIALLY the Crysis demo (not a full game, though..the physics engine was mind-blowing but the whole thing felt like Far Cry meets Tech Demo and overrated graphics). Also World of Warcraft - I played SWG longer than that, and that's not saying much.

I don't know if you're just a gigantic troll or something else. I can understand some of your opinions, but to say that Civ IV is bad just because you didn't/couldn't read the description of the game before you played it makes no sense at all.

I was actually severely disappointed in the Halo series, but that might just be because I am more used to playing PC shooters and didn't have the money to buy an XBox or the patience to play through the story at a friend's house.

I also was disappointed by KOTOR 2. Maybe it was because I thought KOTOR was so amazing (amazing enough to play through it three times) that the bugginess and the characters that I just couldn't love ruined the whole experience for me.

I am currently trying to get Rome: Total War. Hopefully it'll be as fun as people say it is.

Ill list 3 games that disappointed me

1 KOTOR 2 I liked the lvl up to 50 and more skills to unlock but
please next time a better story

2 Metal Gear Solid 2 Raiden that's all I need to be disappointed with this game

3 Gothic 3 Bugs, Bugs everywhere hahahahaha.............

Most disappointing hmmm Gears of War is number one with DOA4 coming in second.

Guild Wars; I just thought it would be better. The whole 'personal adventure' thing REALLY threw me off.

Neverwinter Nights 2; Huge letdown to be frank.

Stronghold 2; I couldn't fit all the bad things in here.

I actually enjoyed Stronghold 2....

I think its something to do with the spearmens voices.

Sonic the Hedgehog 2, probably the biggest let down of my childhood. I should probably clarify a bit here, its not that I dislike it, I actually still think its pretty good fun, but it just wasn't what I thought it was going to be. After Nintendo released Super Mario World (which I thought was awesome and would still rate as my all time favourite game) I really thought Sega were going to hit back with a masterpiece to counter this gem taht Nintendo had produced, and sadly, like the gullible 10 year old I was, I bought into the hype surrounding the game.

I got it on the day of release (when I got back from school anyway) and played it for two straight hours in which I finished it with all seven chaos emeralds (which I had by the end of Aquatic Ruins) and was left just thinking "Is that it?" It was pretty crushing, it took me longer to get through the doughnut plains in Mario World than completing that entire game did and the game was just so drawn out. Even to this day no game has left me with the kind of disappointment that it did.

Hey, is Neverwinter Nights supposed to be the sequel to the Baldur's Gate games?

snitchy:

I don't know if you're just a gigantic troll or something else. I can understand some of your opinions, but to say that Civ IV is bad just because you didn't/couldn't read the description of the game before you played it makes no sense at all.

Not a troll! Granted - expecting a traditional RTS was stupid - I knew it was turn based, though I primarily picked it up because a few of my friends said the series was good and on no other grounds. I actually play a very similar game on a forum I frequent with turn-based production of units and territory invasions, and that's pretty fun. But Civ IV's mechanics were boring and poorly put together, the UI was one of the least intuitive I've ever used, and it just didn't feel like it had any sort of idea what it tried to be. In a sense the letdown was probably more because of the hype than the mechanics, though the latter was very broken.

For me it would have to be Spiderman 3 for the XBox 360, damn.

I rented it for the Wii. I share your pain.