What are some of the most notorious video game launches of all time?

Infamous launches include *Cyberpunk 2077* (2020) for its severe bugs and console performance issues, *No Man’s Sky* (2016) for missing promised features, and *Fallout 76* (2018) for technical problems and lack of NPCs.

Why do video games often launch in a broken or unfinished state?

Games frequently launch with bugs or missing features due to tight publisher deadlines, development crunch, overambitious scope, or the pressure to meet a fiscal quarter, leading to incomplete quality assurance.

How do bad video game launches affect a game's long-term success?

A disastrous launch can permanently damage a game’s reputation and player trust, causing low sales and negative reviews, though some recover through months of patches and free content updates (e.g., *No Man’s Sky* and *Final Fantasy XIV*).

Can a game with a terrible launch ever become successful later?

Yes, several games have turned around after a poor launch by releasing substantial patches, adding promised features, and rebuilding community trust—notable examples include *No Man’s Sky* and *Cyberpunk 2077* after major updates.

Video Game

Top 10 Worst Video Game Launches

The most disastrous, broken, and insulting game launches in history. These titles shipped in states so appalling that they sparked refund campaigns, regulatory investigations, and permanent damage to studio reputations. A monument to corporate greed and crunch culture.

2026118 viewsMar 12, 2026 Updated Sep 7, 2026

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#1
Cyberpunk 2077
CD Projekt Red's December 2020 launch was so broken on PS4 and Xbox One that Sony pulled it from the PlayStation Store entirely—a fate worse than No Man's Sky's initial removal from digital storefronts in 2016. The game crashed constantly, NPCs T-posed, and the police system was functionally nonexistent at release. Within weeks, refund requests exceeded 30% of copies sold, and CDPR's stock dropped by 57%.
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#2
No Man's Sky
Hello Games' August 2016 launch became synonymous with broken promises after Sean Murray's ambitious pre-release interviews. The game shipped without multiplayer, base building, or most advertised features, though its redemption arc is now legendary. Compared to Cyberpunk 2077's launch, No Man's Sky had a smaller player base but a bigger trust gap—only 10% of pre-orders stuck around after month one, versus the industry average of 40%.
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#3
Fallout 76
Bethesda's November 2018 online survival game launched with game-breaking bugs, a barren world devoid of NPCs, and a canvas bag controversy that led to an FTC investigation—triggering 150% more support tickets than Anthem's launch month despite lower player counts. The Nylon Bag scandal alone became an industry cautionary tale, with 72% of customer reviews in the first week being negative.
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#4
Anthem
BioWare's February 2019 looter-shooter launched with a broken loot system, loading screens between loading screens, and PS4 crashes that bricked consoles—issues that, per user polls, occurred 60% more frequently than Fallout 76's most common bugs at launch. EA officially killed the promised Anthem 2.0 overhaul in February 2021, leaving a development budget over $100 million wasted.
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#5
Diablo Immortal
Blizzard's June 2022 mobile entry was technically functional but morally bankrupt. Analysis revealed it could cost over $100,000 to fully gear a character, a 50% higher ceiling than the average mobile pay-to-win game, earning it the lowest Metacritic user score of 0.2 and bans in Belgium and the Netherlands.
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#6
SimCity (2013)
Maxis' March 2013 reboot required an always-online connection for a single-player game, and the servers immediately collapsed under demand—a problem that outperforms #9 on this list for day-one failures. Cities were limited to plots that were 80% smaller than those in SimCity 4, and the traffic AI was fundamentally broken.
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#7
Battlefield 2042
DICE's November 2021 launch stripped out staple features like a server browser, voice chat, and a traditional scoreboard. The 128-player matches ran terribly, specialists replaced classes, and the game lost 90% of its Steam players within a month—a faster decline than the average triple-A title sees in six months.
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#8
Halo: The Master Chief Collection
343 Industries' November 2014 compilation promised seamless matchmaking across four Halo games, but it was slower to fix than Halo: The Master Chief Collection's own later updates. Instead, multiplayer was essentially nonfunctional for months, with players waiting upwards of 30 minutes to find broken matches—a wait time 10 times longer than the industry standard for online shooters.
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#9
WWE 2K20
2K's October 2019 wrestling game launched with character models that looked like melting wax figures, gameplay glitches that sent wrestlers flying into the stratosphere, and a bug that crashed the game every time the real-world date hit January 1, 2020.
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#10
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
The resulting game was so incomprehensible and unsellable that millions of cartridges were buried in a New Mexico landfill, symbolizing the 1983 video game crash. Its 3.5 million unsold units, buried 30 feet deep, exceeded the total production run of many contemporary hits like Pac-Man.
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Current Rankings

Cyberpunk 2077

No Man's Sky

Fallout 76

Anthem

Diablo Immortal

SimCity (2013)

Battlefield 2042

Halo: The Master Chief Collection

WWE 2K20

E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial

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Current Rankings

Cyberpunk 2077

No Man's Sky

Fallout 76

Anthem

Diablo Immortal

SimCity (2013)

Battlefield 2042

Halo: The Master Chief Collection

WWE 2K20

E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial

Lists like this

Top 10 Worst Game Sequels

Top 10 Most Overhyped Games That Flopped

Top 10 Worst Game Endings

Top 10 Worst Gaming Community Behaviors

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Top 10 Worst Gaming Trends