We’re back to our normal Friday Let’s Talk after some excessive Star Wars chat! Have you ever played a game that was just SO boring that you had to leave it, no matter the great level design or pretty graphics? Today we’re discussing those games that just got so dull we went and made a sandwich instead…

Dark. Just… Dark. To be fair, by the time I got around to buying and trying this game, it was a well-known junker, but I nevertheless went in with a shred of hope. I liked The Darkness, I liked Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines. I hoped this would be like, some very basic mesh of the two. My goodness I was wrong.

As Eric, you start the game fresh after a vampire attack has turned you. Stumbling into a bar that can only be described as the bastard offspring of of The Asylum and The Bronze, you find your way to the bathroom where you’re met by a literal angel. And after that you stumble your way into the VIP areas of the club and have an info dump from the club’s owner, Rose, that you’re a vampire like her, and that you need to drink the blood of the one who sired you or you’ll lose your mind.

If I recall correctly, the one who sired you is some billionaire megacorp CEO who is starting an end of the world prophecy or something, so getting to him would help you both. Oh, you also have amnesia because of course you do.

The game’s writing is basic, yet tedious – it thinks itself a noir and uses the most cringe worthy lines (“Eric. Eric Bane. That name shot through my head like a bullet. It was my name.”) and branching dialogue paths that serve only to waste your time. The sneaking is garbage. And I don’t mean sneaking in general is – Metal Gear Solid and other stealth titles rank among my favourites. But this is ‘hide behind a bush, hope they don’t see you’ nonsense.

The combat is forgetable – you have generic vampire powers that let you get a one up on guards, like teleporting, invisibility, other generic power here, which is good because Eric is weak and can’t do shit.

And then we get to the graphics…the whole game looks like a muddy sludge with thick lines around everything to try to blot out the poor quality of the models. Eric looks like Generic White Guy In His 30’s that haunted games of the late 00’s, and his VA sounds bored.

I think I made it into the lobby of the megacorp before I just uninstalled and never looked back. If a game is bad, it should at least be entertainingly so. But this was just a waste of time.

I’ve been immensely bored by two very promising games in recent years, both of whom had prequels that I really enjoyed. First up is Watch Dogs 2, whose characters I detested from the moment they spoke. San Francisco looks amazing in this game, and is the only thing about it that is tempting me to play it again until I remember how irritating DedSec are and I’m put off again. I also wasn’t keen on the remote controlled vehicles, as I found the moment they were spotted they would put the building I was infiltrating on high alert, and Marcus isn’t as much of a bullet sponge as Aiden Pearce from the first game to counteract this.

I also highly disliked Just Cause 4 for the fiddly controls and bland gameplay, map and characters. For the fourth game in a fairly successful series to be the weakest installment by far (cough, Mass Effect Andromeda, unconvincing cough) is a real shame, and the highly anticipated Apex Engine that Avalanche Studios harped on about during the games promotion went off like a wet firework to say the least!

So before anyone jumps on me… I have completed this game now, but for me it was The Last of Us. I think it’s because everyone hyped it up so much as being an amazing story and an amazingly built world… But I wasn’t seeing any of that. Early on it was just a tiring slog of little resources and stupid clickers and I honestly just wanted to give up completely! I’ve now played it, and whilst I think the story still isn’t as amazing as everyone says I guess I take back the boring remarks.

Okay this game didn’t actually make me leave because I’d put so many hours in and wanted the end credits for my work, but the first big game I thought of that bored me to death was Red Dead Redemption 2. I think I have to pick this one as technically it’s an incredible game which I began loving and actually enjoyed for the most part. Unfortunately it just outstayed it’s welcome for me, and come the end of the game I felt exhausted with Rockstar’s over the top realistic gameplay. To then find out I still had a 7 hour epilogue after already sinking in 60+ hours was very nearly enough to switch me off right at the end. Was it worth it though? No. All you do is walk around and build a house. BORING!!

I have never had a game that bored me enough to stop playing it. I’m quite picky about what games I choose to play. Some would even say that I was closed minded about it. And, at times, they were right and I played and enjoyed a game I wouldn’t normally play. Which leads me onto a game that intrigued me, but ultimately led to me deleting it without completion or even perseverance. And that rare and exclusive accolade goes to the rather controversial choice of Nioh. That’s right, the game some Respawning members would claim to be a brilliant game and would even find my lack of enthusiasm frustrating. I loved the setting of this game, and this made me try it. And it frustrated and annoyed me to the point of rage quitting on it for good. At one point I struggled to even draw my weapon, which inevitably led to my demise and one of many, many You Are Dead screens during my playthrough. I do want to stress, that I’m not saying it’s a bad game, it’s really not. I’ve witnessed someone with a (clearly) better skill and patience level, considerably above mine, play the game and make it look genuinely enjoyable. However, I quite obviously lack the skills and level of patience required to fully enjoy it. And the result of dying for an unspecified (deliberately vague) number of times? It was forever deleted.

A game that bored me to tears was The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion… Just everything about it the voice acting (sadly including Patrick Stewart), the presentation, the way you weren’t given anything to do and had to wonder around the world and listen to boring dialogue… The character create screens where dull as balls too… I mean there are more fun ways to create a character and older game looked prettier too… Oblivion is ugly to look at.

Ok I guess I’m being biased here as i had to watch the opening several times because a mate couldn’t decided what he wanted to play as bit still I played about 6 hours of Oblivion and shut it off never to play this apparent masterpiece again.

The one that popped immediately into my head was Prey, the developers of Dishonored were doing a sci-fi stealthy FPS which looked like a mash up of some of my favourite games. Plus it was one where you could do fun things like turn into a cup. Boy was I hyped to get my hands on this. I got it soon after it’s release and rushed home, I really enjoyed the set up of the game and perhaps the first hour and then… It just became empty.

The setting of this game is just big empty boring spaces with little atmosphere and no music, I was bored to death but determined to keep playing. Unfortunately I soon got to a point where I had to level up to keep going on, I really couldn’t be assed so I uninstalled it and traded it in! Screw you Prey you weren’t what you should have been!