10 Video Games Everyone Thought Would Fail, But Became Hits

Introduction

For decades now in video games, you've seen this happen. A game is revealed and the gaming public is skeptical. A lot of people look at a video game and think it might fail, think it might be a stinker. The gaming public, the gaming press, media, whatever, gaming enthusiasts often tend to look at games and think, "Eh, that one might suck."

But today we're talking about 10 games that were expected to fail but ended up turning things around and becoming cult or even mega hits.

10. The Witcher

Yes, before CD PROJEKT RED decided to make a game based on the, you know, well-regarded at the time, but mostly unknown to people outside of Poland, "Witcher" novels and short stories, there had already been one failed attempt to adapt the dark fantasy world into a video game.

That project fell through because the publisher assumed that because the West didn't know about "The Witcher," the games would fail. So it was canceled by a publisher, TopWare. Later on, in the mid-2000s, CD PROJEKT approached the author for the rights to the series to make a game, and even he assumed this whole thing would be a failure.

Initially, the developers offered Sapkowski, the author, a percentage of the profits of the game for the rights, but he refused, assuming that the game would just never make any money. So he just asked for a lump sum instead. He ended up selling the rights to the entire "Witcher" franchise for just under $10,000, which probably looked like a pretty good deal back then, thinking it would be set up to fail. 

But man, looking back now with the cultural juggernaut the franchise has become in the gaming and also, you know, the fantasy world, it's a crazy small number, 10,000 bucks. If he had taken the percentage of the profits, he'd probably be a wealthier man than he is now. I mean, he still has his novels and short stories, but still, he just didn't believe that the game would be a success.

Now, looking at that first game in the series, it's hard to imagine how big this series would end up being, but it's not like the first game was a big failure or anything. It actually ended up being quite profitable for the studio. The original version of this game was rough, like really rough. It was buggy, and the translation was pretty poor. But the bones of a really good game were there. That's where the Enhanced Edition comes in. It was one of the first of its kind, this total overhaul of a flawed but interesting game, which did a lot to cement CD PROJEKT RED's commitment to quality.

I mean, at least eventual quality. Their games are often messy when they come out, but they get fixed. It's not just always a "Cyberpunk" thing. This was going on way back in 2007 in a way. The important takeaway though is that the original "Witcher," while far from the runaway success of "The Witcher 3," ended up being a cult hit on its own, probably just down to the relative scarcity of these types of RPG experiences at the time. People were hungry for more. 

Still, before release their expectations of success were not high. To quote the writer of the books, "There will not be profit at all. Give me all my money right now! The whole amount. It was stupid. I was stupid enough to leave everything in their hands because I didn't believe in their success. But who could foresee their success? I couldn't." Well, I guess you live and you learn.

9. Demon's Souls

Next over at number nine, "Demon's Souls." Yes, the game is considered legendary now, but leading up to release and around the time it came out, opinions kind of oscillated between mixed and negative.

Nobody in the game development sphere seemed to really understand what they were dealing with here. The game flew in the face of many of the accepted design principles at the time where games were getting more streamlined and easier to understand. This game was obtuse, it was strange, and it had a lot of confusing and outright player-hostile systems. 

It was also extremely challenging, with a very punishing death mechanic where if you died, you'd lose half your health bar the next run. So you can see how certain people just wouldn't get it. Apparently, Shuhei Yoshida, the president of Sony's Worldwide Studios at the time, keep in mind Sony was From's publishing partner at the time.

The game was meant to be Sony's answer to "Skyrim," but the project was floundering, and that's when Miyazaki came in and did his thing in terms of leadership, and then the rest is history. So he's on the record, Shuhei Yoshida had the chance to play the game, and his impressions at first were not good. He said, and I quote, "This is crap. This is an unbelievably bad game.

" Not the sort of thing you want to hear from someone high up like that. That, along with the perception that the game wouldn't sell, was why Sony decided not to bring the game over to the West. There was already a lot of fan interest in the game. The hardcore crowd was interested. It was already available in English, so it was an import favorite, and then it became a bit of a cult hit based on the imports alone. 

It took a little while, but eventually Bandai officially released the game in North America, where it managed to make a decent amount of money. Of course, there's a learning curve. It had an uphill battle. Some people, even when they played it, still just didn't get it. But it did well enough that they greenlit a spiritual sequel called "Dark Souls." And then, of course, man, you know, the rest is history.

8. Sleeping Dogs

Now over at number eight, it's rare to see a game get canceled so close to the finish line. It's like if they've already dedicated years and years and millions of dollars and people's time and work into a game's development, they might as well release something to recoup their losses. But apparently, Activision thought that this "True Crime: Hong Kong" game was such a failure that they had no choice but to cut their losses even though the game was nearly finished.

Yes, that's right, "True Crime: Hong Kong" eventually became "Sleeping Dogs." But rewinding a little bit before that, it's not often that you get a comment on a game cancellation just as blunt and to the point as the one from Activision's Publishing CEO at the time, Eric Hirshberg, who said that, and I quote, "Even our most optimistic projections show that continued investment was not going to lead to a little or near the top of the competitive open world genre. 

In an industry where only the best games in each category are flourishing, to be blunt, it just wasn't going to be good enough." So that's Activision straight-up saying that they think the game was gonna suck, or at least, you know, be a whiff, a flounder, a flop, whatever. So when the game was miraculously saved by Square Enix, I don't think it would be unfair to assume that this was going to be a "Duke Nukem Forever" situation where a game that everyone thought was dead finally gets released, only for everyone to then collectively realize that it probably should have stayed canceled. 

But that is not the case for "Sleeping Dogs." Of course, like I said, Square Enix pivoted it from "True Crime: Hong Kong" to this. And this game, "Sleeping Dogs," was really good, not just good, it was great. It was one of the best open-world action games of the era.

It had its own unique identity, combat systems, and feel, and it managed to sell decently well and has been rereleased a bunch of times. Maybe not the insane level Activision expected; they were probably looking for a "Grand Theft Auto" or a "Call of Duty," but it was far from a commercial or critical failure.

7. Xenoblade Chronicles

Next, over at number seven, "Xenoblade Chronicles." Yes, the JRPG classic almost never made its way to the West or showed up in North America.

Yeah, it seems like Nintendo just didn't think it would land. Of course, now in hindsight, that looks absolutely silly because "Xenoblade Chronicles" is probably one of Nintendo's star RPG franchises. It's gone on to make tons of games, spinoffs, and show up in "Super Smash Brothers," you name it. But earlier on with "Xenoblade Chronicles" it seems like Nintendo was really skeptical and really had to be pushed to release it outside of Japan, then Europe, and then eventually finally North America.

There's a great quote from the "Kit & Krysta Podcast." They, of course, had previously worked at Nintendo. The quote is, "There was a team at Nintendo that made these sorts of decisions that we were not a part of. That was a very executive-heavy group, and they would analyze the market and the potential audience size. It was like flipping a coin. Sometimes these were the right decisions; sometimes they weren't." And in the case of "Xenoblade Chronicles," not planning a North American release is pretty crazy considering even the original "Xenoblade Chronicles" was probably a pretty big production and they really wanted to recoup things.

Still, thankfully, fans campaigned, and it seems some people at Nintendo campaigned, and eventually we got "Xenoblade Chronicles" in the West, and the rest was history. It wasn't the cleanest launch or the cleanest path to get there, but now we're here.

6. Sonic Frontiers

Next over at number six, "Sonic Frontiers." "Sonic Frontiers" is an interesting one because when it was first revealed, it did not look so hot.

And then once influencers, the gaming press, and people got their hands on a preview version of the game at Summer Game Fest, it was iffy. Opinions were really mixed. A lot of the internet was pretty harsh on just the overall look and visuals of the game. The worlds looked barren, the textures, the lighting, everything looked flat.

Objects were just floating in the sky. It looked silly. And when playing the game, I remember playing a preview version of it, I was pretty mixed. There was definitely some fun in there, but only playing the game for a little bit, like 30 minutes or so, you can only judge so much. Still, I thought there was enough there that Sonic fans would absolutely love it.

And I was right. "Sonic Frontiers" released and it was a success. Yes, a flawed game, not a perfect Sonic game. And honestly, that's the case with all Sonic games. But still, "Sonic Frontiers" was well received and seemingly sold very well despite the harsh previews, and some websites really ripped apart the game at first.

Look, it seems like the development team really turned things around and released a pretty cool title. "Sonic Frontiers" may not be the number one Sonic game, but it was enjoyed by fans and it seems like we're getting more of it in the future. So I count that as a win.

5. Mad Max (2015)

Next, over at number five, we have "Mad Max" from 2015.

"Mad Max," this game just really had an uphill battle. First, they had been trying to get a "Mad Max" game off the ground for years. "God of War" guy, you know, the brainchild behind "God of War" 2018, Corey Barlog, he actually was working with "Mad Max" Director George Miller on a "Mad Max" game. But eventually, that fell through.

They just couldn't really get it together. Then finally, when this new version, this Avalanche-developed "Mad Max" game finally hit the scene, pre-orders, and stuff like that, people weren't really sure what to think for a couple of reasons. First and foremost, it's kind of a game based on a movie, and those don't always have the best track record.

Also, it was hard to compare to the absolutely incredible "Mad Max Fury Road." This looked nowhere near as cool as "Fury Road." Still, that aside, it also had the uphill battle of releasing the same week as "Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain," the game that a lot of people were gonna play. So "Mad Max" kind of fell to the wayside.

That being said, it released and it was actually really good. And over time it kind of bubbled up as a fan cult favorite. Lots of people praise the game. User reviews were good. Content creators were making videos. I will say I want my flowers at this point, I have been banging the war drum for this game for years now.

I've made quite a few videos about it. I think it's absolutely underrated, and it seems like it's taken off. And it seems like we were not alone. People really enjoy the "Mad Max" game. It's not perfect, you know, it's not like a 10 out of 10 incredible, forever memorable thing. But for some people and for some "Mad Max" fans, it is absolutely the definitive "Mad Max" experience and it scratches the right itches. Driving around in a car in the wasteland is so much fun here.

4. Metroid Prime

Next down at number four, "Metroid Prime." Yes, it sounds crazy, but the lead-up to "Metroid Prime" wasn't looking so hot, man.

This was definitely expected to fail because think about it, it was an unproven American studio working on "Metroid." Apparently, development behind the scenes was a nightmare, it took the game a long time to release, and a lot of people out there like to suggest that Nintendo mostly just gave the project to them because it didn't matter if they screwed it up.

They weren't really interested in "Metroid" at that point. Of course, Nintendo has had such a back and forth with "Metroid" in general. They support it for years, then they forget it exists, and yeah, at this point they were like, "Here you go, guys. Work on your weird little 'Metroid' game. We'll see what happens."

Expectations were low across the board, especially once fans got a whiff that they were taking a "Metroid" game and making it a first-person shooter. That honestly still sounds like blasphemy, absolute crazy talk. You're talking about a game that like invented a genre, a sub-genre, whatever you wanna call it, the iconic series, suddenly seemingly being cynically converted to just another dime-a-dozen first-person shooter.

Something that was very popular at the time. And somehow the team managed to pull it off and made an incredible game. A beloved "Metroid" game that feels distinctly "Metroid," plays distinctly "Metroid," while also happening to be one of the best and most unique first-person shooter games ever. Look, sometimes these things, these genres switch up, like a franchise moving to the 21st century seems like impossible feats, but "Metroid Prime" is the perfect example of a talented, passionate group of people really pulling it off and winning everybody over. This is a perfect example of why I personally try not to judge video games like a book by its cover.

Everything is worth a shot. Everything is worth evaluating. That's why we talk about games here like this. But yeah, anyway, "Metroid Prime" rules, and we hope for eventual releases. Let's just move on to number three.

3. Doom (2016)

"Doom" from 2016 was a weird one. At the time, if you were very plugged into gaming news, people were kind of iffy on this one. It was really just like the news cycles were not very kind to it. First of all, there were low expectations just because Doom had been dormant for years.

You know, "Doom 3," while at the time kind of divisive, people eventually came around to it. But you know, there had been leaks of a new project where they were trying to turn "Doom" into a "Call of Duty" clone. Thankfully, that project never got off the ground, but the fact that people saw the leaks and saw that Bethesda was even thinking of converting "Doom" to something like that was pretty insulting.

Then when this new "Doom" 2016 project came around, it was a time when people were getting pretty contentious with Bethesda as a publisher with microtransactions and stuff like that, and how they would state things. Plus, they really were only showing off the multiplayer for this, which sucked. It wasn't really that great after release, it was fine, but it wasn't what people were really interested in.

They didn't want to see multiplayer and all the little things you could do, with the things you could potentially buy. So everyone assumed it would be crap because it seemed like they were afraid to show too much single-player. They were kind of quiet on a lot of the single-player. It was like a less-is-more type of thing.

They also didn't give out review copies. At the time, Bethesda was refusing to give any reviewer, content creator, whoever, early access to the game. So a reviewer, streamer, or YouTuber couldn't even give a player base a heads-up that the game would be bad ahead of time. But after all was said and done, it turned out to be absolutely awesome.

"Doom" 2016 is a classic. A lot of people were skeptical, especially just looking at headlines at the time before release. But thankfully, maybe we were all just a little cranky. "Doom" 2016 is so awesome.

2. Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle

Now, down at number two, just another example of not really judging a book by its cover, it's "Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle."

First of all, people were writing this off as junk just because it was Ubisoft. A lot of people were fed up with Ubisoft games, plus it was a Mario collaboration with the Rabbids, a kind of spinoff from "Rayman," a franchise that's pretty dormant, and Rabbids were kind of like bootleg minions. Nobody really cared about them.

They were trying to make them a thing, but I don't think a lot of people gave a damn. They were literally nobody's favorite mascot teamed up with people's favorite mascots, Mario, Luigi, and Friends. Plus put into a weird strategy XCOM-style game where Mario and Luigi and Peach get guns. It's just a really, really weird choice.

There was not a ton of hype for this one, just like weird morbid curiosity, but it released and the rest is history. I mean, look at reviews, look at sales numbers. "Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle" is absolutely awesome. Incredible music, compelling gameplay, great use of the Mario universe.

The Rabbids, they're still just the Rabbids, they still kind of suck, but whatever. The game was so good, it didn't matter. It was a damn good time and good enough that they greenlit a sequel. So I think that speaks for itself.

1. Silent Hill 2 Remake

Finally, down at number one, the "Silent Hill 2" remake. The developer Bloober Team felt like everything was working against them. First of all, they had never made an action game before, and the last game they made before that, "The Medium," dealt with difficult themes but was kind of a dud.

And they also kind of had a reputation among "Silent Hill" fans at that point as copycats. Looking at "The Medium," some people felt that "The Medium" kind of ripped off "Silent Hill." It felt like they were advertising that they would want to make a "Silent Hill 2" remake.

And Bloober Team, as a studio, had made some good games and some not-so-good games. For a studio like that to take on a legendary "Silent Hill 2" remake, people were rightfully skeptical. I absolutely was. I just wasn't sure if they could handle the subtle themes of "Silent Hill 2."

"Silent Hill 2" is a very delicate game made by a Japanese studio that felt like it was lightning in a bottle. How could you recreate that? Plus, I was nervous and a lot of gamers, people who'd played the original "Silent Hill 2," felt like it couldn't quite be remade, let alone by Bloober. And especially once they started showing off the game and we got glimpses of gameplay, people weren't really sure, but thankfully the game released and it was pretty damn great.

Even as early reviews were coming out, some people just didn't want to believe it. When I put out my review videos, people were like, "No, you're wrong. It's still gonna be bad." But then people played it and sure enough, it was pretty damn good. Is it a perfect recreation of the original game? No. But does it respect the original perfectly? In my opinion, yes.

Does it nail those themes and that, you know, very, very subtle, interesting, fascinating story? Yes, I think Bloober absolutely proved themselves with this one. A lot of people were skeptical, some people just wanted this to downright fail, but the "Silent Hill 2" remake ended up nailing it. Do we know if it's a cult hit or a super success? No, not yet.

We don't have tons of sales numbers, but at the very least we were worried about a game turning out bad and it turned out to be pretty good. And that's the point of this list.

Conclusion

So those are 10 games that were expected to fail, either by fans or analysts or, you know, the press, whoever, but ended up turning out to be pretty damn good. If you have more examples, there are plenty more out there. This is kind of subjective, of course. Let us know your thoughts. Let's talk anything about these games and any other examples you got down in the comments. But as always, thanks for reading, and we'll see you guys next time.