Top 10 Gaming Disappointments of 2007

Some say 2007 has been the greatest year ever in videogamehistory. We've had some top games spread generously throughout theyear, a console launch and some pretty amazing headline-grabbingannouncements. But not everything that made the news in 2007 has beenblessed with brilliance. So in memory of this, we've compiled our picksfor 2007's biggest disappointments in a special VideoGamer.com Top 10.Strap yourself in, take a deep breath, and ready yourself for sometruly shocking stuff.
Assassin's Creed was good, but it wasn't 10 out of 10 good

Theonly reason Ubisoft's stealth assassination sci-fi historical actiongame is one of 2007's top 10 disappointments is because it was hyped somuch we all thought it was going to be game of the year. The gorgeousscreen shots, the adrenaline pumping teaser trailers and the promise oftrue open world gameplay made most of us shake with excitement. In theend, we got a fairly boring, repetitive, but lovely-looking action gamethat didn't live up to the expectations everyone had for it. We're notsaying it's not a good game, indeed Tom gave it an eight out of 10 inhis review, but it just wasn't everything we had hoped. Sigh.
GTA IV delayed from 2007 to sometime between February 1 and April 30 2008

Ohcrap. That was the collective gasp from every gamer in the world whenit emerged that super hyper advanced alpha hyped gangster sandboxkill-em-up Grand Theft Auto IV wouldn't be coming out until parentcompany Take-Two's second financial quarter of 2008. Queue girly TakeThat have broken up wailing from every GTA fan with a PC and anInternet connection. Aware of the storm the news would stir up, StraussZelnick, Chairman of Take-Two said: "We all recognize that perfectingthe game is vital and I can assure everyone it will be worth the wait.We owe it to the game's millions of fans, to our dedicated developmentteam, and to our shareholders to make sure that Grand Theft Auto IV isa groundbreaking gaming experience that takes maximum advantage of nextgeneration technology". All we can say is, if GTA IV isn't 10 out of 10stuff, it'll be making an appearance in VideoGamer.com's Top 10 GamingDisappointments of 2008.
The first six months of the PS3's life

Sony became the butt of one or two jokes in the months after the PS3 hit UK stores, despite it setting recordsand Sony giving away 46 inch Bravia TVs to everyone who queued insideVirgin Megastore on Oxford Street. One, it launched at such a highprice only Bill Gates and his hangers on could actually afford one.Two, it had rubbish games for the first half-year of its life. Terribleexclusives (Lair) and sloppy multi-format releases (I'm looking at you PES 2008 and Sonic the Hedgehog)and three, it came out over here a shocking five months after everyoneelse. It all contributed to make for one of the most disappointingconsole launches in recent memory. Sure, now the PS3 is looking muchnicer, with a price cut in tow and some decent games, but for a longtime there was absolutely no reason to buy a PS3. There's only one wordto describe that - and that word is criminal.
Mega-hyped triple-A PS3-selling dragon flying game Lair turned out to be utter balls

Hasthere been a game as far away from what you thought it would be qualitywise? Sure, we didn't think it would be game of the year or anything,but it was a PS3 exclusive that was intended to be a system seller.We're still scratching our heads on how Lair's developer, Factor 5,made such a shockingly bad title given their track record with theglorious Star Wars: Rogue Squadron games on N64 and GameCube. The worstthing about Lair? The controls were completely broken - there was nooption to play it other than use the Sixaxis' motion controlling tech -and it didn't work. Dear oh dear.
E3 turned out to be a damp squib

E3used to be a nuclear explosion of gaming excitement, with more new gameannouncements and megaton news than us poor game hacks could cope with.But that was then, and now is now. 2007's scaled down E3 was about asinteresting as an accountancy firm's Christmas party. Let's go throughit - there was a distinct lack of announcements, there was hardly anyexcitement and there was too much focus on 2007 instead of what'scoming later on. Come on guys, this is the video game industry. This isentertainment! Here's hoping 2008's E3 will feature a bit more, well...life.
A lack of gamers' games for the Nintendo Wii

Beforeyou Wii fanboys self combust, we'll lay down a disclaimer: we love theWii. We love Super Mario Galaxy, Metroid Prime: Corruption and TheLegend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. But what we don't love are theacres upon acres of rubbish third-party mini-game led titles that wehope are piling up in a warehouse somewhere gathering dust. We wouldn'tcare normally, but it looks like these rubbish casual games aredrowning out the excellence that could be happening on Nintendo'smotion sensing console. Apart from the aforementioned games, we canonly think of maybe Super Paper Mario that will be of suitable qualityto long-standing Nintendo fans. Here's hoping some third-partydevelopers will start to see the light and make games to compare withNintendo's stuff in 2008.

Windows Vista sucks balls for gaming

Vistawas hailed as the next big thing in PC gaming and perhaps its saviour.How foolish we were for believing the hype. Other than the odd gamefeaturing some nicer graphical effects when running under Vista and atop end graphics card, Vista has been a complete nightmare for gamers.We thought that we might see some improvements to game performancetowards the end of 2007, but we've had no such luck. If you're a gameryou're better off sticking with XP, which no one could have predictedwe'd be saying when that launched all those years ago.
Kane & Lynch: Dead Men turned out to be just a little bit rubbish

Allthe previews talked up Kane & Lynch as an intelligent, cool,cinematic heist game with two central characters you'd end up loving tohate. In the end what we got was a solid enough video game, but anunspectacular one that didn't live up to the hype. Its controls areclunky, it looks quite dated and the action can't compare with otherexcellent shooters released in and around the same time. Ah well, I'llguess we'll have to wait a little while longer for the Reservoir Dogsstyle video game we all know someone somewhere has to get righteventually.
No game has managed to challenge World of Warcraft as the world's undisputed number one MMO

Welove WoW here at VideoGamer.com HQ. We love it so much we even dedicateone evening a week to playing it as a group (I'm an Undead Priest btw).But sometimes we tire of bashing the crap out of orcs and elves withswords and spells. We want something a little... different. Andunfortunately, while there are some solid MMO alternatives out there,nothing has really grabbed us by the balls and made us star jump inexcitement. Not Lord of the Rings Online, which is too similar to WoWfor us, and, while Guild Wars, Tabula Rasa, Final Fantasy XI and Cityof Heroes are solid, they haven't captured our imagination in the sameway Warcraft has. Fingers crossed something steps up to the MMO platein 2008.
XBL Arcade and PSN

Youknow what's missing from Xbox LIVE Arcade? Actual arcade games - and wedon't mean arcade games so old that they were ported to our Mega Drivesand Super Nintendos. We're talking about the golden age of arcademachines, when the likes of SEGA Rally, Daytona, Virtua Fighter, RidgeRacer, Virtua Cop and Time Crisis were the business. Surely this lotwould go down a storm on Xbox LIVE Arcade or PSN. We can't be the onlyones desperate to see Scud Race again or Crazy Taxi with onlineleaderboards. Make it happen SEGA and Namco. You ruled the arcades onceand you can rule the virtual arcades with a little effort.