What would it take to get you back into the game you swore you'd never play again?

I swore off the Fifa Franchise in 2010 after years of playing it. I had N64 version, gamecube versions, xbox versions, and playstation. I had done pretty well with that until they decided to add a storymode in 2017. I was back on/off the wagon. Is there a game series that you vowed to never touch again? Being truthful with yourself, is there something that could bring you back? Or has something similar to my fifa experience happened to you?

An entire franchise? No.

A single game? Destiny 2, I suppose. It's not so dramatic as "I swore to never play it again", I just think that Bungie has handled that game in the worst possible way. The two major things that push me away from putting more time into that game, and money for expansions, are the microtransactions and the cutting out older pieces of content. There are large chunks of Destiny 2 I just can't play or replay anymore because they're simply removed from the game. I understand that the game takes up a lot of storage space, but that didn't seem to be a major concern for anyone in the community and I certainly didn't care. Besides, why can't they just set it up so that you can choose which bits get installed? The whole package, just the newest expansion, or some combination of those?

As far as microtransactions go, I'd have less of a problem with them if the game was free to play, or if the expansions and updates were free or something. But you have to put a lot of money into Destiny 2 to get all of the actual content. To be asked for additional money to make my character look cool or do any number of other things really rubbed me the wrong way. Some of this stuff can be earned, some of it can be grinded out, and a lot of it was timed (I really hate limiting stuff to events, sometimes I don't have time or I'm not interested in grinding out something during a limited event). However, frequently that grind seemed ridiculous. I bought Destiny 2 at launch, played a fair bit of it, then later down the line bought the expansions up to the one where you go back to the moon. That's a lot of money over the years and I feel like I shouldn't be nickeled and dimed in addition to all the buying-in I did. I don't think it's fair to charge $30 or $40 for every expansion or whatever and also load the game with microtransactions with little to no option for me to reasonably earn it in game.

The cherry on top of all this is that the moon expansion's story just ended on a cliffhanger. I wasn't super invested in the story stuff, but absolutely nothing happened until the end and then it just... ended. More expansions were coming, I was sure, but that's sort of the straw that broke the camel's back. I played it co op with some friends a little more, I grinded out a few missions because despite everything Destiny 2 looks amazing and feels amazing to play, but then I just dropped it. I didn't want to care or think about any of the issues I had with how Bungie was handling Destiny 2, I didn't want to put any more money into it ever again, so I uninstalled it. I think I started to play it once again a few months later, but then just uninstalled it again and I haven't touched it since.

What would it take to get me back? Allow me to access all of the game regardless of its install size and restructure the entire monetization system Destiny 2 uses. Either charge $40 for expansions every year or every other year or utilize a fair free-to-play microtransaction system and release the expansions for free, not both. And give players who spent all that money on the base game and expansions some kind of compensation, like lots of in-game currency for cosmetics or something. If they were to significantly change this up, I'd jump back in, because I enjoyed Destiny 2 a lot and I'd go back into it if I felt I was being treated fairly as a customer.

EDIT: If something like this has actually happened I'll jump back into it, actually. I haven't kept up with anything Destiny since, though I doubt Bungie has changed anything.

Destiny 2 is a pretty strong for me as well. I like everything about playing that game but the vaulting of content is just a fundamentally miserable practice. I just can't reinvest in it if that's what they're doing.

Well, @justin258 explained my reasons for me not playing Destiny 2 anymore in 666 words, and some of those points can also apply to why I don't play the free-to-play MMOs that I used to mess around in during the mid 2010's.

Other than that: I think I feel this way towards the Forza Horizon series. I mean, I'll go back to 3 for Hot Wheels, but playing 4 just inspired me to play Need for Speed: Heat for up to 80 hours, and not that I dislike Mexico, but I really wanted Japan in 5. I also don't like a vibe of those games. I get no sense of progress narratively since you're always the boss of the Horizon Festival, as opposed to starting form the bottom and working your way up in other racing games. I also don't get a sense of progress in vehicle selection since I rather put in some work and earn the hyper cars as end game achievements, not be given a Lamborghini within two hours eitehr because of RNG or "just because." And I don't like a music selection; not that everything has to be technical death metal, 2000's era metalcore, 2000's era pop punk, or gansta rap for me to like it, but Horizon's picks just add on to how milquetoast the Horizon series feels for me. So, unless Horizon at the very least goes to locations that I'd care about in the same vein of Assassin's Creed going to historical periods that are relevant to my interests, I'm done.

@facelessvixen: We are on the same wavelength about assassins creed. It's not that i don't care about that franchise it's about not caring about the location. At this point i don't think there is a location i care about, they've plumbed the death of them all. Maybe something like Gang's of New York or something during World War 2 in Berlin that doesn't devolve into aa first person shooter, per usual. I really don't want Assassins Creed Japan because that's going to give you SIFU or even Ghosts of Tsushima. Which aint exactly F.U.B.U.

As far as racing game go progression is almost as important as controls or a sense of speed. I remember the orginal Burnout 1 and 2 offered different cars very slowly. You might have only ended up with 7 or 8 cars but they all felt earned and slightly different. I think there has yet to be a racing game to nail story maybe Need for Speed The Run or Need for Speed Payback (speaking of games deemed bad by social media and me taking that at face value) could have done story in a racing game in a way GT7 never will.

Destiny 2: How about...Destiny 3?

Apex Legends: Honestly, I still look at this game quite fondly because it was the first competitive FPS I seriously got into since the original Modern Warfare, with dashes of Killzone 3 and Destiny slapped in the middle. But I don't think the game could bring me back at this point...I really loved the simplicity of the first map, and the more fantastical/complicated the game got the less I wanted to keep up with it.

MLB The Show: I swore off the game this year after 5 years of 700-1,100 hours each year...but then they released the game and I bought it. So for now, they just need to keep releasing it, unfortunately.

NBA 2K: I also swore off of this franchise back in...2018? And yet I still own every iteration of the game since then, because I love basketball, I used to love this series and it's always on deep, deep discount during All-Star or Finals week so I cross my fingers and hope they've recaptured the magic. Only, nope, it's still all about MyPlayer and MyTeam. Someday I'll stop...

The lesson? I have absolutely terrible impulse control.

They would have to make it so Donald and Goofy stop talking about the darkness in peoples' hearts. And make them act like Donald and Goofy actually act, you know clumsy cartoon characters, since that's what made them famous in the first place. Get rid of all the characters with stupid names like Xehanort and fucking Xigbar WTF dude... fire that person who made those names and give them a pie filled with poop as an award for worst contribution to gaming. And also make it so Sora has regular sized feet and clothes that a normal person might wear because he looks like a total fucking chode. Totally get rid of the keyblade because it is stupid, either that or since it's really a heavy, large metal stick, make it look like it hurts when it hits things, like it breaks bones or something instead of stupid colorful stars flying out of things when it hits them; either that or give Sora a fucking sword with a serrated edge that can slice the shit out of shit. Not no fackin baby stars popping out of people thats dumb. Also, they'd have to rewrite the entire storyline to make it not suck, like maybe reboot the whole thing and take out all of the squaresoft characters, OH and put Nomura in a dark hole where he can't talk to anybody about any of his ideas any more.

Then id play it

I swore off clickers in general after spending hundreds of hours getting all of the Xbox achievements in Clicker Heroes. My time is worth more than that.

@shaunage: game developer here, what would it take for YOU to get back into my game?

@mistersims: Yeah it's crazy that Epic Mickey was pretty okay. I'll go back to it one day. I want absolutely nothing to do with Kingdom Hearts. If they had done anything than what they did I might have played through all the 3.14 and 6.66 versions they came out with. That game should interest me. I do have the original on PS2 and if i do ever play one it will be that. I guess i'll give it a fair shake one day but someone went full geek on that series. Shame.

For me and the Soulsborne games, apparently the answer was "swallow your pride and just have a wiki walkthrough open on another screen at all times."

No, we're not. I'm fine with Assassin's Creed being National Geographic. Their takes on historical Italy, America, the Caribbean, France, England, Egypt and Greece are interesting to me. Forza Horizon on the other hand; if you were to show me a screenshots of 3's environments next to 5's, I wouldn't be able to tell the difference.

@mistersims said:

They did that in Birth By Sleep.

A complete and total overhaul of the Destiny 2 user interface. Just absolute nonsense.

You know I don't think I'll ever understand their insistence on those crystal lizards in Dark Souls that would run away and disappear if you startled them without knowing where they were ahead of time. They only respawned a few times and were pretty critical for item upgrades so it seemed like you kind of had to have a walkthrough and read ahead if you didn't want to miss them! Glad they got rid of that kind of thing (for the most part).

Interesting, I found online people complained when the racing games felt old and you earned cars over a long time. People today tend to like being rewarded often but i can see how the dopamine feel is dieing out, short spouts of videos and what not online. Grand turismo got called out for long progression even though yes the big cars are expensive (may need real money) but you kinda can get a few good ones by playing for a while and feel good about it. People seemed to want all the cars unlocked day 1 (worth a buy review) or be able to get them all fast withing the month of purchase. The opposite is also true...people say they like the fast progression the your always the winner celebration like feel of forza vs the dry turisomo. Maybe need for speed is the balance. I dont know how they can cater to both parties. I guess overall most like forza progression and music (generic is like lack of spice in michilan star restaurants...everyone comes back saying its good since its so inoffensive). Destiny 2 seemed cool but onboarding new players now that the original story is taken out makes me not wanna go back, i dont know WTF is going on when i enter that game...where to go...i just wanna play a story line start to finish...am i suppose to grind...IDK. First few missions were fun then it dropped me in the overworld and said f off. Do i need the real 60 buck game. Its on gamepass. I dont get what the free version is for. why not unlock everything and make destiny 3.

@topcyclist: I honestly wish Destiny would do a rollback like they did with World of Warcraft. I've heard so much about these games and in some of my game reviews from years ago I said Destiny 2 might be my favorite game of all time. I have a bad habit of saying every game is my favorite of all time. Still, I think if i could play the content and know a roadmap was coming over the course of a year. I would love to consume everything on the exact same time table of Destiny 1 and Destiny 2's roadmaps. I've played enough other games and am so sick of the marketing, podcasts, streamers, and my urge to consume it all. I just want one game that will fit on any stock harddrive with updates that already exist and are bug free. All of tears have been spilt about something not living up to the hype and have been fixed or the opinions to have turn a 180 (like they all do). Can we get a Destiny 1 reboot?

Grand Theft Auto V: If Rock Star insist on supporting that game forever and not release GTA 6, at least they can add some good additional single player story content like they did with the previous entries in the series. Instead of constantly focusing on the Online mode.

I think it’s too late to save the game but Battlefield 2042 is starting to make some actual changes the fans have requested. It’s heartening to see but I won’t go back (on console, anyway) until they stop PC to console crossplay and just leave it at PC to PC or console to console. I have friends on other consoles but I am not going to open myself to that kind of savagery just to play with them.

I got burned out on CoD towards the start of the PS4's life time. CoD: Modern Warfare (2019) had so many positives talking about it that I picked it up and had a lot of fun. I didn't get as obsessed as I did in CoDs of old though. I'm not sure what they could do to get me back again, because I just don't enjoy MP games like I used to.

easy mode in any of the From games

I have been waiting for Square to reboot Kingdom Hearts with a new original cast of characters since everything they've been putting out post-KH2. At this point, I have found it convenient to believe that they are paying Vince Russo to write for them in secret, like Dixie Carter in TNA, and that the madness will never end. I'm not sure I have the stomach to touch the next installment (I've only played the three main games, and it took lockdown to get me to finish KH3), so I think I'm going to peg it here. 😂

I was a fan of the Final Fantasy series since I played it on a PlayStation console, so I found this game Mobius Final Fantasy that can be played on PC and on mobile. If only they manage the payment issues and secured it, then I guess it will not be closed.