I'm really picky when it comes to buying games and with the trend of demos getting rare and short I'd thought I go through all my experiences playing demos and finding out which demos was the worst marketing scheme.
I'd also like to point out this list of the worst demos has nothing to do with the quality of the game but the quality of the demo containing it.
Dead Space's 'Dismemberment' Demo.
Don't start the show with the show stopper but this demo was punishingly cruel and unfair. In this demo the main character is in a hallway with only one room being available to "explore". I used quote marks on "explore" because this one room is about the size of a living room with nothing of interest besides the few enemies. When said enemies are killed, the door you came through unlocks and you able to open the door to see a scripted event of your character dying.
Then the demo ends.
When I got the Dead Space demo I'd expected a few weapons, couple of nasty looking monsters and some rooms and hallways to shiver my way through. What I got was a debug room and a stupid ending. If you want me to buy your game don't let your main character be unavoidably killed during the demo.
Skate 2
The first Skate demo was well crafted in every aspect, great little sandbox area, 40 mins of playtime and a few challenges which weren't required to complete. Sure it didn't have any customizable skater or board and you had to go through training every time but it was exactly what a free roaming game demo needed to be, plenty of your time at your own freewill.
Skate 2's demo is the opposite to that and one of the killing factors is the Time Limit. The Time Limit is messed beyond belief which all sorts of problems. You start the game with 8 mins. That is all of your training which rounds of at 6 - 7 minutes. Now the challenges around you give you extra time but not alot, 1 - 2 minutes each. Now if you rush through these you'd get around 9 minutes of freeroam time. Adding all the playtime it required to get the extra time and the begining and end results you'd get about 15 mintues of total playtime and half of that is doing objectives around the small skatepark.
What the hell happened? Did EA think that undercutting the first demo for the second would get better sales? What was going through EA's mind when the suggested 'Hey, let's cut the demo time from the first demo in half and make the player do stupid missions?".
But they didn't stop there....Oh no they didn't my friend as the time limit reaches zero an annoying seemingly unskipable cutscene comes on and you now have to watch this awfully put together montage of plot and gameplay. I just do not see how EA went from hit to shit.
Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix's trial.
Fighting game: Awesome. Only 2 Selectable Characters: Understandable. They're Ryu and Ken: Disapointing. Verses Mode Only: Annoying. No Online: Angry. Second Controller Required to Even See The Game: Fuck This Is Shit., Dashboard.
YOU DO NOT RELEASE A DEMO IN WHICH IT ONLY HAS LOCAL MULTIPLAYER CAPCOM.
Ninja Gaiden's Xbox Demo
I have one problem with this demo. It's not the unforgiving difficulty, odd bugs or useless save point which was seemingly lfet in the demo, it's that when you die once you get thrown right back to the demo screen. Not the game start screen, all the way back to the demo disc main menu. I think this is a bit rare seeing how you had to have a copy of OXM but this is an unforgiveable demo sin.
I can think of anything else, but if you have a horrid demo you would like express about put it in the comments section. Cheers!
The Worst Video Game Demos
I'm really picky when it comes to buying games and with the trend of demos getting rare and short I'd thought I go through all my experiences playing demos and finding out which demos was the worst marketing scheme.
I'd also like to point out this list of the worst demos has nothing to do with the quality of the game but the quality of the demo containing it.
Dead Space's 'Dismemberment' Demo.
Don't start the show with the show stopper but this demo was punishingly cruel and unfair. In this demo the main character is in a hallway with only one room being available to "explore". I used quote marks on "explore" because this one room is about the size of a living room with nothing of interest besides the few enemies. When said enemies are killed, the door you came through unlocks and you able to open the door to see a scripted event of your character dying.
Then the demo ends.
When I got the Dead Space demo I'd expected a few weapons, couple of nasty looking monsters and some rooms and hallways to shiver my way through. What I got was a debug room and a stupid ending. If you want me to buy your game don't let your main character be unavoidably killed during the demo.
Skate 2
The first Skate demo was well crafted in every aspect, great little sandbox area, 40 mins of playtime and a few challenges which weren't required to complete. Sure it didn't have any customizable skater or board and you had to go through training every time but it was exactly what a free roaming game demo needed to be, plenty of your time at your own freewill.
Skate 2's demo is the opposite to that and one of the killing factors is the Time Limit. The Time Limit is messed beyond belief which all sorts of problems. You start the game with 8 mins. That is all of your training which rounds of at 6 - 7 minutes. Now the challenges around you give you extra time but not alot, 1 - 2 minutes each. Now if you rush through these you'd get around 9 minutes of freeroam time. Adding all the playtime it required to get the extra time and the begining and end results you'd get about 15 mintues of total playtime and half of that is doing objectives around the small skatepark.
What the hell happened? Did EA think that undercutting the first demo for the second would get better sales? What was going through EA's mind when the suggested 'Hey, let's cut the demo time from the first demo in half and make the player do stupid missions?".
But they didn't stop there....Oh no they didn't my friend as the time limit reaches zero an annoying seemingly unskipable cutscene comes on and you now have to watch this awfully put together montage of plot and gameplay. I just do not see how EA went from hit to shit.
Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix's trial.
Fighting game: Awesome. Only 2 Selectable Characters: Understandable. They're Ryu and Ken: Disapointing. Verses Mode Only: Annoying. No Online: Angry. Second Controller Required to Even See The Game: Fuck This Is Shit., Dashboard.
YOU DO NOT RELEASE A DEMO IN WHICH IT ONLY HAS LOCAL MULTIPLAYER CAPCOM.
Ninja Gaiden's Xbox Demo
I have one problem with this demo. It's not the unforgiving difficulty, odd bugs or useless save point which was seemingly lfet in the demo, it's that when you die once you get thrown right back to the demo screen. Not the game start screen, all the way back to the demo disc main menu. I think this is a bit rare seeing how you had to have a copy of OXM but this is an unforgiveable demo sin.
I can think of anything else, but if you have a horrid demo you would like express about put it in the comments section. Cheers!
"YOU DO NOT RELEASE A DEMO IN WHICH IT ONLY HAS LOCAL MULTIPLAYER CAPCOM."
Yeah, actually, you do.
Giving you single player, even a few fights, would be pointless nobody buys a fighter for single player, not even me, somebody who refuses to participate in 98% of multiplayer modes. Giving you online multiplayer, again, what would be the point in that? You'd get a bunch of people quite happy to play Ryu and Ken just playing the demo online all the time, not to mention the cost of setting up the online code for the demo. Besides, the game's available in such a myriad other forms anyone who doesnt know what it is by now probably doesnt want it in the first place.
A demo is supposed to be a small taster, not a starter course.
You want to talk bad Demos? Alright, here are my two picks:
Unreal Torunament III (PC)
They released a "beta demo", which basically means that it sucked. It was unpolished to say the least, had no usable server browser, forced you to register an account (dude, it's a demo!) and so forth. It's one of the major reasons why this game is practically dead these days, aside from the whole "that's not our beloved UT, that's a mod for God of War!" issue.
Pure (PC)
A huge download for a horrid demo. They fixed it to 800x600px and low settings. Who thought that was a good idea? It looks downright awful and nothing like the full version, which is a lot of fun (albeit a bit simplistic).
" Burnout Paradise had a terrible demo which I think scared many people away from the game initially. How they turned it around, man they were just playing us for fools. "Yeah, I nearly passed up this stellar title because the demo was so freakin' bad. Nearly everything I loved from the Burnout series seemed to have been either removed or muted in the demo. But people kept saying "screw the demo, play the full game because it is so much fun." Eventually I rented it from Gamespy and bought it. I haven't regretted that purchase since. It really is a great game but (WOW!) what a disappointing demo.
Also, I don't know how the main game played but there was a lot of controversy over the demo for Resident Evil 5. I, personally, hated the demo and never tired the game. Nothing anyone has since said has convinced me to try it especially since I would almost certainly be playing solo.
"@The_A_Drain: That seems stupid to do. At least if the game had a SP element to the demo, people could actually 'play' the game."
Like I said, anyone who doesnt know what SFII is by now needs to shoot themselves in the head, they only put out a demo to prove to people all was well and that it wasnt a shoddy port like the last one, and to the people that matters to, no online and local multi only is just fine. To anyone else, well, they should know by now if they want Street Fighter or not, the things like marmite you know if you do or do not like it you dont need a demo of a re-release to tell you that.
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