There’s been a lot of talk about rushed games recently. Scroll down to the comment section of any modern game, and you’re likely to see talk about “cut content,” and “rushed development” as reasons for why games aren’t good.

But are all rushed games really that bad?

Rushed Games, Bad Launches 

There’s no need to mince words. Many rushed games are bad, oftentimes to the point where their quality suffers. There are still many who will remember Assassin’s Creed Unity and its terrible launch, with glitchy multiplayer, constant disconnections, and disembodied heads frequently plaguing its 1.0 release.

Courtesy of Polygon

Even some games that people now call good (like Cyberpunk 2077) had many early launch issues. These were the result of rushed development, a clear sign of a game that was pushed out to release. Plenty criticized its poor launch, with reviews praising its potential while lambasting its buggy launch. Its poor quality severely affected its players’ ability to enjoy its gameplay. As seen in Crowbcat’s video, the plethora of bugs, glitches, and unfinished content severely hampered what could’ve (and should’ve) been a fantastic launch

Rushed Quality, Unfinished Content

This lack of quality doesn’t just stop with buggy launches either. Many good games often have entirely bad sections that can bring an experience down. Infamously, an interview with Dark Souls creator Hidetaka Miyazaki had him apologizing for a particularly terrible boss, called the Bed of Chaos.

For the unaware, many categorize Dark Souls’ worst area as the Demon Ruins, and the Lost Izalith section afterwards. Both featured reused enemies, copied and pasted everywhere, with a boring level design that betrayed its rush quality., The Bed of Chaos’ frustrating gimmick boss encounter was the icing on the cake, culminating in a final lap that Dark Souls fans would call frustrating. What should’ve been a good lead-up to the final boss instead marks the low point where its quality dramatically drops.

Bed Of Chaos

In the GiantBomb interview, Miyazaki says “Those situations were the hardest because I knew something was wrong, but couldn't express what I wanted and couldn't give a solution. That was difficult, both for me and for the artists I was working with. I suppose the Bed of Chaos is the principal example of this.”

And that’s just with regards to missing content. Data miners have plenty of evidence of other content that simply didn’t make the cut. Notably, DLC boss Artorias’ cut dialogue shows that the DLC could’ve had so much more to it. It begs the question of just how much content truly failed to get implemented. How many ideas never came to be? How much quality and additional content was culled before release, either as a result of insufficient time, or lacking quality and polish?

Knight Artorias

Whatever the case is, it’s clear that when games don’t have the time and resources available to them, the quality and quantity of content gets compromised, and the game begins to suffer for it. Knowing all this, surely then we can conclude that all rushed games are bad, and doomed to buggy launches?

Diamonds in the Rough

The quote “Pressure makes diamonds” is often used to justify a bad situation. Just as pressure squeezes atoms together to make diamonds, so too are supposed tough situations needed for people to truly display their quality.

The surprising thing though, is that there ARE cases where this is true, where a game’s rushed development actually created something fans enjoy. Resident Evil 3’s development history is no secret, with the game being rushed to release just to make sure an entry comes out before the Playstation 1’s end of life cycle. What would normally be a buggy, terrible game, is instead one of the Resident Evil community’s classic favorites.

Resident Evil 3

The same is true for a Zelda title as well. Majora’s Mask had a very short timetable, and its team worked under extreme conditions to get it out, putting it together in a mere 15 months of development time. Its team banded together, and a masterpiece of suspense, adventure, and horror that even today is hard to match. Fitting, that a game created under time pressure, revolves around the story of a looming disaster in the form of a falling moon.

Majora’s Mask’s Moon

Still, we shouldn’t fool ourselves into thinking that this is always the case. Games like Obsidian’s Fallout: New Vegas are well-known to have worked under strict timetables. While many adore its writing and its atmosphere, it still had an incredibly buggy launch that could’ve been avoided had their development been given more time.

Fallout: New Vegas

It’s safe to say then that while not all rushed games are bad, even these can suffer under strict deadlines. Timeless classics these games may be, but they should still be left to cook instead of being pushed out to serve.

Consistency Is Key

As gamers, if we want our games to be consistently good, we should always demand the highest quality, but give way for development teams to delay and produce at their leisure. In a world where live-service games and buggy launches are the norm, we’re the ones who have to push back against these exploitative practices, and make our discontent known.

The easiest way to do this is to actually support game devs that care about their games. Movements like Stop Killing Games are a wake-up call for publishers, but the only way to get things done is to put our money where our mouth is, and to start supporting developers who actually want to make good games.

In this regard, supporting early access games is one of the easiest ways to do it. Early Access might have the stigma of being unfinished products, but plenty of passionate game devs struggle every day to produce some top-notch video games. Indie games like Gloomwood, Fallen Aces, and Selaco are what should be the golden standards of modern video games. Their development is fueled by passion, and they’re given enough, money, and support to see the project through with no cut corners.

Gloomwood

Similarly, supporting reliable Kickstarter projects will help greatly. Kickstarters like the ZPF Team’s ZPF, which was successfully funded on Kickstarter with over 2,108 backers pledging $204,670 to help bring the project to life (an impressive 1364% funded), are a great way to publicly fund a game’s development. This not only guarantees a heap of goodies for supporters but also gives talented game developers the ability to work at their leisure.

ZPF

There are so many passionate game devs eager to make their games a reality. The only thing that stops them is a lack of support. Let’s do our best to stop rushed game development, and let developers and publishers know that we want complete games at launch, even if it takes them more time to make it.

If you want to support more independent developers, consider browsing our own collection of retro-inspired games. Who knows? Something may catch your eye. Each of our games are made with care and love, and done by developers who live and love the art of gaming, and yearn for the older times when passion is what brought games to life.