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Wii U

This.

 

[gothmog]

ET literally crashed the video game market. I think that counts as the biggest bomb. The rest are completely forgettable.

 

[EverydayBeast]

Screw up’s happen we see it all the time, they call it bombing.

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Screw up’s happen we see it all the time, they call it bombing.

Gears of War dude in Socom 4!

 

[Ashler]

The biggest bomb in video games is surely a ... GiantBomb?

Can't believe i'm the first to say it!

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Wii U

Virtual Boy has to be up there too. Google says it sold less than 1M units and pulled after a year. At least Wii U sold 13M units.

 

[King Dazzar]

For me its still ET. How many other failures have led to a landfill that later gets excavated? Its a legendary slice of gaming history that goes beyond numbers and stats.

Concord would be my second choice, simply because it crashed so quickly and was in development for so long. 8 years graft for two weeks sales to then all be refunded.

 

[poppabk]

Where's Redfall?

Also Starfield should be mentioned, as actual copies sold was probably extremely low like all Day 1 Gamepass titles

Starfield? Not sure if this is intended as satire on fanboy warring or is fanboy warring.
Redfall or Hellblade 2 could be in the conversation but Starfield was one of the top sellers on Steam

 

[ManaByte]

One of the worst games ever, Sold 1.5 million copies but had 3.5 million unsold, contributing to the 1983 video game crash.

E.T. is often wrongly blamed for causing the crash. It was a garbage game, but it sold to 12% of the 2600 userbase. The real cause of the crash was the absolute garbage shovelware that was WORSE than E.T. that was polluting the store shelves. There was just too much trash out there and people lost interest in videogames as a result.

That's why Nintendo made the "seal of quality" and severely limited third parties in how many titles they could release every year (causing companies to make shell brands to release more games, Konami made Ultra for example). Nintendo earned the reputation of being Hitler, but they were doing it because they saw the mountains of shit games that caused the crash earlier.

 

[jshackles]

A lot of these games wouldn't have "flopped" if the publisher's expectations were in check - especially E.T., since it released in an era where you had to produce physical copies in order to sell them. They spent so much of the game's budget on famously overproducing cartridges, when if they had chosen to make the initial run one or two million the game would have been a huge success. Nowadays, publishers can anticipate digital sales, and in some high profile cases like Alan Wake 2 - can skip the physical production process completely to minimize their risk further. Stand out indie titles are successful for this very reason. Games like Balatro or Vampire Survivors are massive success stories (and are able to exist at all) simply because there was almost zero risk in releasing them.

Concord has to be the biggest flop of all time - right up there with the biggest movie flops of all time (I believe this distinction is currently held by The Marvels with it's $237M loss). Even if all 8 years of its development was just one person making a median Seattle wage, it'd still be considered a massive failure. Sony outright bought the studio in the middle of the game's development, and now the game did so poorly that the studio's name itself is synonymous with failure. Sony's losses have to be somewhere in the $300-$400M range all told. I doubt we'll see another bomb this big from a game that actually gets released to the public, at least not for a few decades.

 

[NeoIkaruGAF]

E.T. was actually quite successful. The problem was that, allegedly, they literally produced many more cartridges than there were consoles to play the game on. And anyway it only took what, six weeks to program? It’s the overproduction of the carts that made the game legendary, making it the symbol of an era when too many games were shoddily made for a quick buck. Also, there were too many different incompatible platforms at the time, contributing to consumer fatigue.

Now compare that to a game that took EIGHT YEARS to make, cost tens of millions of dollars, and made literally nothing on two different platforms.

Oh, and apart from the aforementioned game, the Virtual Boy was very likely a bigger bomba than any other game in the poll.

 

[ManaByte]

E.T. was actually quite successful. The problem was that, allegedly, they literally produced many more cartridges than there were consoles to play the game on

There were 12 million 2600s, they only produced something like 4-5 million copies of E.T.

 

[NeoIkaruGAF]

There were 12 million 2600s, they only produced something like 4-5 million copies of E.T.

Thanks for the correction. I’m pretty sure I read that rumor somewhere.

 

[ManaByte]

Thanks for the correction. I’m pretty sure I read that rumor somewhere.

It's an urban legend. Same as saying E.T. caused the crash. It's easier to blame one notorious game than to explain the actual nuanced context of what caused the crash (glut of garbage software no one wanted to buy).

 

[Rudius]

Just to set the record straight on ET, Atari had to pay millions of dollars for the ET license, the programmer of the game (Howard Scott Warshaw) got paid a shitload (by the standards of the day) to make the game, and they had to deal with something like 50% of the games being returned. And it's not like today where you just process a refund on a computer. It's a big supply chain problem, which is why they ended up in the landfill.

Still, with Concord we are talking about, probably, a $200 million live service game that lasted three weeks. Even Babylon's Fall got a year. It's the biggest bomb. I don't even know how possible it is to miss that badly.

ET still sold close to 2 million, so it recouped some of those licensing costs.

E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial for Atari 2600

VGChartz - extensive game chart coverage, including sales data, news, reviews, forums, & game database for PS5, Xbox Series, Nintendo Switch & PC

www.vgchartz.com

Concord recouped 0 (Zero), given the refunds.

Also, Concord was a waste of money and time, taking many years to be develop by hundreds of people, while ET took one man just over a month.

 

[Evil Calvin]

Op forgot skull and bones, the first AAAA game.

Oh....that came out didn't it?

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Thanks for the correction. I’m pretty sure I read that rumor somewhere.

I thin youre talking about 2600 Pacman. That game according to google checks is the one that had more game copies made than consoles at time of release.

 

[Rudius]

Concord. would've had more devs who worked on it than players.

That aspect is absolutely insane and true. What a massive failure!

 

[Rudius]

Surprisingly, I played a good amount of those titles from OP's poll.

The only ones I haven't played are E.T., Concord, LawBreakers and Suicide Squad. And for the latter, I do plan on playing since the gameplay looked fun, I'm just waiting for the price to drop to like €15.

The fact that you will be able to buy that crap of Suicide Squad tells me it didn't fail as hard as Concord. It's so bad Sony is trying to erase it from existence.

 

[geary]

Bruh, have you played Babylon's Fall? That's the biggest bomb ever.

 

[AJUMP23]

I think Anthem was probably the biggest. Fundamentally changed BIOWARE and they have yet to recover from it.


Duke Nukem Forever, has the longest development time, to severe disappointment.

Poll is tainted by recency bias.

 

[Sethbacca]

That Suicide Squad license can't have been cheap, so even as bad as Concord was I have to think Suicide Squad would win on a dollars lost basis.

 

[Bruno_Arrais85]

Concord of course. None of these games were pulled of sales after 2 weeks.

 

[Rudius]

While Concord was bad, there was only one game that had more cartridges manufactured than consoles were in the market. The landfill, the worst video game ever created tag, I doubt it will ever be surpassed.

Think about this than:

To make ET one man accepted a lot of money and worked like crazy for 5 weeks. One guy locked away for one month.

To make Concord hundreds of developers and adjacent people worked for many years, even if not the full 8 years; it was enough for them to forge friendships, maybe even marriages and kids during that time.

In the end at least a million people played ET, while Concord one week after release had less people playing it than the number it took to make it for those many years.

 

[StreetsofBeige]

A lot of these games wouldn't have "flopped" if the publisher's expectations were in check - especially E.T., since it released in an era where you had to produce physical copies in order to sell them. They spent so much of the game's budget on famously overproducing cartridges, when if they had chosen to make the initial run one or two million the game would have been a huge success. Nowadays, publishers can anticipate digital sales, and in some high profile cases like Alan Wake 2 - can skip the physical production process completely to minimize their risk further. Stand out indie titles are successful for this very reason. Games like Balatro or Vampire Survivors are massive success stories (and are able to exist at all) simply because there was almost zero risk in releasing them.

Concord has to be the biggest flop of all time - right up there with the biggest movie flops of all time (I believe this distinction is currently held by The Marvels with it's $237M loss). Even if all 8 years of its development was just one person making a median Seattle wage, it'd still be considered a massive failure. Sony outright bought the studio in the middle of the game's development, and now the game did so poorly that the studio's name itself is synonymous with failure. Sony's losses have to be somewhere in the $300-$400M range all told. I doubt we'll see another bomb this big from a game that actually gets released to the public, at least not for a few decades.

Always interesting to me how an industry like software is mostly digital. So as you said no cost and hassle of manufacturing (rom chips back then cost a lot), and also the cost and logistics of shipping, warehousing, inventory costs, the store taking their cut etc...

That entire segment is a non-issue with software companies for the most part. Yet, they still fuck up majorly with other cost issues. Just imagine if gaming was still old school and all these modern high budget games required cartridges or disc copies printed like the old days. You could double the losses alone just by adding on unsold copies tossed in the garbage like ET.

 

[adamsapple]

Concord of course. None of these games were pulled of sales after 2 weeks.

Yep.

Recency bias aside, I don't think any other game on that list, including E.T, was disowned and discontinued in 10 days.

 

[Bitstream]

alright, you win. Mom says its my turn to post a thread shitting on Concord next!

 

[MudoSkills]

If the budget estimations floating around are anywhere near accurate it's Concord by a large margin. May as well have set the money on fire.

 

[Rudius]

Concord and its not even close.

ET selling 1.5 million copies and Concord sold around 25k?

What are we ever talking about here?

One last point of comparison between those games:

The single developer of ET was certainly very happy with the money he made, lol. He probably wished he had more time to make a good game, just 3 or 4 months would do. But still, considering the very insufficient time, he could derive some pride in the product he made.

As for de developers of Concord, I'll leave to your imagination how they are feeling about it...

 

[JackMcGunns]

ET wins in terms of embarrassment, but it didn't cost anything to make and sold millions regardless. I would say the biggest disaster has to be Concord, going by how long it took to make and how much it cost, plus how fast it was taken down.

PS.

Where's Redfall and Haze?

 

[diffusionx]

ET still sold close to 2 million, so it recouped some of those licensing costs.

E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial for Atari 2600

VGChartz - extensive game chart coverage, including sales data, news, reviews, forums, & game database for PS5, Xbox Series, Nintendo Switch & PC

www.vgchartz.com

Concord recouped 0 (Zero), given the refunds.

Also, Concord was a waste of money and time, taking many years to be develop by hundreds of people, while ET took one man just over a month.

I'm not trying to say ET wasn't a failure, just to be clear. It needs to be placed in context. ET did take one guy a month, but the rumor is he got paid $200,000 for that month, if you consider the average programmer at Atari at the time was making maybe $5,000 or even $10,000 a month, well then you start to see the scale of the issue.

Like I said I still think Concord is the biggest failure.

 

[tmlDan]

Drawn To Death, from the critically acclaimed god of war creator Jaffe lol

 

[Nitty_Grimes]

Went for ET cos that crashed an entire market.

 

[SkylineRKR]

Concord has been taken off the shelves in 2 weeks man.

 

[Plague Doctor]

Of the list, definitely Concord and this isn't recency bias.

Hefty price tag, first party game, long development time, and speedrun death cycle. For all the rightful shit talk about ET, ET according to reports sold a decent amount. Concord sold >25k units.


Of the list of the ones that could have been something good if key decisions weren't objectively fucking dumb: Anthem probably. I don't think it would have been great but that game did everything to fuck up what should have been a mediocre layup.

 

[Sentenza]

Bruh, have you played Babylon's Fall? That's the biggest bomb ever.

It didn't cost a FRACTION of what Concord did and it didn't bomb equally hard, either (but close enough, admittedly).

 

[Rudius]

Just one more comparison between ET and Concord

The developer of ET made some great games, like Yars' Revenge:

If he had 4x the time he would probably have made a good ET game for the 2600.

But if the developers of Concord had 32 years to work on the game it would still be shit.

 

[Guerilla Munch]

Is this a Concord damage control thread? The answer is Concord, and nothing else is remotely close.

 

[Mephisto40]

TBF on Concord, at least it wasn't a broken mess on release like some of these other games

 

[StreetsofBeige]

It didn't cost a FRACTION of what Concord did and it didn't bomb equally hard, either (but close enough, admittedly).

Babylons Fall servers lasted a year too.

 

[MarkMe2525]

Andromeda was incredibly anticipated and straight up broken in many respects. Has to the "biggest" bomb out of those listed. Anthem is pretty close.

 

[ResilientBanana]

Too Human was great, albeit short.

 

[Revolutionary]

ET nearly killed the entire industry. It isn't even close.

 

[Arsic]

Concord is the king of shit mountain.

If it comes back , no matter what they fix, the decision has been made that this game is liquid diarrhea.

Cut your losses and the whole industry can learn : go woke go broke. But also you can’t charge $40 for this barebones project, you can’t just make ugly as sin characters the norm, and you can’t allow a team to work on a game for 8 years.

If a team is taking more than 5 it’s time to cut your losses.

 

[MarV0]

Starfield? Not sure if this is intended as satire on fanboy warring or is fanboy warring.
Redfall or Hellblade 2 could be in the conversation but Starfield was one of the top sellers on Steam

Indeed. On Steam Starfield did 47349% better than Concord. Starfield did better than Skyrim while also being available on gamepass.

Redfall did 778% better than Concord while Hellblade 2 did 471% better. Bare in mind both games are also available on gamepass.

It's hard for the human mind to comprehend Concord's level of failure. It's most likely the biggest flop in the history of entertainment.

 

[bundylove]

Halo infinite

 

[Bumblebeetuna]

You're really not comparing like with like.

Concord has had a disastrous launch, and if that ends up being the end of the story then I'll agree with you.

However, they've pulled the plug pretty quickly and decisively and I would be shocked if there wasn't a relaunch. A relaunch could still flop but that remains to be seen.

They can relaunch it with a new monetization scheme and new content and new designs and probably a new name but that would be a new product, not Concord.

Concord launched and died within a couple of weeks. What they do down the line with a relaunch is irrelevant.

 

[Bumblebeetuna]

Screw up’s happen we see it all the time, they call it bombing.

This game should be on the list. So should Redfall.

 

[Roman Empire]

I'd put Aliens Colonial Marines in the poll but nothing gets close to E.T., Duke Nukem Forever, Lawbreakers, Suicide Squad, and Concord. And Concord is the new low, they did something unprecedent for a game of its caliber.

 

[phant0m]

Brink was a pretty big bomb back in the day and relegated Splash Damage to being a support/porting studio

But I think official support lasted at least a year there.

Concord getting pulled this fast is something else, especially considering the game wasn’t broken/non-functional, it was just straight up rejected by the community largely for art design.