Games that were obviously rushed to release

[peanutbutter]

Smackdown: Just Bring It always stunk of being a game that was raced out, between season mode being literally about three matches long, the save file taking 3.5MB at a time when 8MB memory cards were almost as much as a game (the next game bringing that down to about 400kb iirc) and that absolutely horrible commentary track. But what I always think of most is the fighting in the crowd bits, they were spectacularly shit, it's like they totally overestimated what they could do on a PS2, promised the feature too early and it was more hassle to write out the placeholder implementation so they left it in.

Not sure if it was rushed to release but my memories of the second half of Xenogears were along the lines of "oh, they either ran out of time or money here, didn't they? maybe both?"



Less of an issue these days that they can patch the hell out of everything, but what are some that stick in your mind

[Mister Six]

Was really disappointed at how quickly Brutal Legend wrapped up its plot. Seemed to rocket through gothic metal land and the final act because they'd run over budget or over time, or both (and given that it's a Tim Schafer game, that's probably exactly what happened).

[bgmnts]

Anything made by Obsidian.

[Cerys]

The two that felt like this for me were Soul Reaver 2 and Final Fantasy XII.  Both ended too soon - seemingly at the end of Disc Two, if you know what I mean.

[C_Larence]

I think someone mentioned in another thread that the otherwise sublime Final Fantasy 9 pretty much falls apart at the end due to an extremely quick turnaround. For example, the final boss is "death" and has never been mentioned once throughout the whole game, and multiple main characters' stories are basically over by the third disc (of four).

Edit: I found the post, by the very OP of this thread

Apparently FF9 only really started production as FF8 was wrapping up, which means it was done in like 18 months?! That seems mental but the development periods of major games were way shorter back then.

What's the expected length of development big budget game now? Like 3-4 years? Think this was the main issue with all those late PS3 releases, in fact, how many PS4 games were super delayed PS3 ones? FF15 and The Last Guardian immediately spring to mind. Was that just a very PS3 Cell Processor problem?

[Pink Gregory]

Was really disappointed at how quickly Brutal Legend wrapped up its plot. Seemed to rocket through gothic metal land and the final act because they'd run over budget or over time, or both (and given that it's a Tim Schafer game, that's probably exactly what happened).

I'm definitely in a minority, but I really liked the stage battles; only for there to be, like, 6 in the entire game. 

[Solid Jim]

This can sometimes manifest itself as obviously truncated content in otherwise polished games. Perhaps more common in the days when they couldn't simply finish it later and sell it to you as DLC.

The Wind Waker has a missing dungeon, where you just turn up and the guide character explains "someone blew this island up, oh well, onto the next place now."

The Big Shell facility in Metal Gear Solid 2 is conspicuously unfinished, given its structure. When you get to the second half of it, only a couple of areas are accessible.

[Hand Solo]

SQIJ on the spectrum.

[Thursday]

Metal Gear Solid 5 is an obvious one here as well, although really I find some of the choices made absolutely baffling even given the circumstances that they had to cut a lot of significant stuff.

[The Crumb]

Dark Souls games all have this to a certain extent. 1 with its second half going a bit ragged, 2 with the whole game being a bit ragged if full of interesting ideas, and 3 not exactly being a huge game despite being padded out with Bloodborne cast offs. Part of the charm though (except 3).

[magval]

The Big Shell facility in Metal Gear Solid 2 is conspicuously unfinished, given its structure. When you get to the second half of it, only a couple of areas are accessible.

Surely this is just the design of the game. It's explained perfectly and logically by events in the story.

[Solid Jim]

Surely this is just the design of the game. It's explained perfectly and logically by events in the story.

Any time a major location on a game's map is blown up before you can visit it, I become suspicious. There may be supporting information either way in the MGS2 Document.

[Mister Six]

I'm definitely in a minority, but I really liked the stage battles; only for there to be, like, 6 in the entire game.

Yeah, it felt like the whole thing was one massive tutorial for a full game that never arrived.

As I rambled on about at length in the Outer World's thread, that game has clearly had the last third (maybe even the last half) truncated into a single final mission, which is very disappointing.

[QDRPHNC]

Driver 3 is pretty much the gold standard here.

[Kryton]

Came here to mention Dark Souls 1 (but beaten to it) - Beautiful first half, but the latter half of the game is rushed and janky and loses its charm.

[Abnormal Palm]

Hey, did you know that SMB2 was actually originally a game called Doki Doki Panic

[popcorn]

Metal Gear Solid 5 is an obvious one here as well, although really I find some of the choices made absolutely baffling even given the circumstances that they had to cut a lot of significant stuff.

If anything they didn't cut enough imo!

[evilcommiedictator]

Phoenix Point lol