The Most Disliked Video Game Trailers Ever

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Video game trailers are more than just advertisements – they’re a true art form. The best ones create huge excitement, getting people fired up whether they’re watching with a crowd or at home. A truly great trailer can drive initial sales, even if the game itself has some flaws or technical issues at launch.

A poorly made trailer can really hurt a game’s chances. While a single bad trailer isn’t always fatal, some trailers have been so disliked that the games they advertised never recovered. These games all suffered because their trailers were poorly received. Whether they missed the mark with humor, didn’t listen to what gamers wanted, or were released at the wrong moment, these trailers received a lot of criticism, and that negativity directly impacted how people talked about the games after they came out.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard – Official Reveal Trailer

What Have They Done To My Dark Fantasy RPG?

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Fans were kept in the dark and felt anxious about the fourth Dragon Age game. After the disappointing launch of Anthem, many questioned whether BioWare could still deliver a great single-player RPG experience. The long silence following the initial announcement of Dragon Age: Dreadwolf only added to those concerns.

In mid-2024, BioWare rebranded the game as Dragon Age: The Veilguard and released a cinematic trailer. However, this reveal didn’t go over well with fans. The trailer presented a very stylized, almost cartoonish, take on the typically dark fantasy series, with dialogue reminiscent of Marvel movies, and offered no explanation for the game’s six-year absence. BioWare later shared a gameplay trailer that was much better received, and many felt it should have been the first thing shown. Unfortunately, that initial negative impression stuck, and likely contributed to the game’s lukewarm reception from players, even though critics generally liked it.

Highguard – Official Reveal Trailer

Not A Great Way To Close Out The Game Awards

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The 2025 Game Awards were a surprisingly fantastic show, mirroring a great year for gaming overall. The event featured a lot of exciting game reveals, impressive trailers, engaging presenters, and heartfelt acceptance speeches. Many viewers felt it struck the perfect balance between showcasing upcoming games and celebrating the best titles of the year. Finally, the show reached its biggest announcement of the night.

Geoff Keighley built up anticipation for the final game announcement by mentioning the developers’ work on popular titles like Apex Legends and Titanfall 2, and promising a completely unique experience. The revealed game, Highguard, turned out to be a live-service hero shooter with some story-driven elements, blending sci-fi and fantasy. The announcement felt like an odd way to end the show, and gamers largely didn’t seem interested. It’s not that Highguard looks bad; it’s simply another hero shooter in a crowded genre, and it didn’t offer much to make it stand out.

Mighty No. 9 – Masterclass Trailer

“Let Me Ask You A Question: Do You Like Awesome Things That Are Awesome?”

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Trying too hard to attract younger audiences with humor can sometimes fail, and that happened with the game Mighty No. 9. It was one of the first games successfully funded through Kickstarter, aiming to modernize the classic Mega Man gameplay. Heavily influenced by Capcom’s popular series, the game suffered numerous delays, which ultimately caused excitement to fade.

In 2016, Mighty No. 9 attempted a comeback with a trailer called “Masterclass.” However, the trailer featured a painfully unfunny voiceover and only showed short clips of gameplay, offering no real explanation for the game’s long delay or what made it unique. Even amazing gameplay wouldn’t have saved it, because the awful narration immediately turned people away, long before the game was released. The line, “Make the bad guys cry like an anime fan on prom night,” became a notorious example of how not to introduce your game.

Diablo Immortal – Gameplay Trailer

Is This An April Fool’s Joke?

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BlizzCon 2018 generated a lot of excitement, mainly because people were expecting a new Diablo game to be revealed. These expectations dominated the conversation around the event, and when the Diablo team finally appeared on stage, the crowd erupted. Most fans anticipated Diablo 4, or perhaps a remastered version of the original games. Instead, they were surprised with the announcement of Diablo Immortal.

Okay, so instead of giving us a proper new Diablo game on PC or consoles, Blizzard released Immortal as a mobile-only title. Honestly, it felt like they just took a bunch of stuff – the skills, character classes, even the animations – straight from Diablo 3 and slapped it on a phone. But the biggest problem wasn’t that, it was how aggressively they pushed microtransactions. It was so pay-to-win. People weren’t thrilled, to say the least. I remember one fan joking it was a late April Fool’s joke, and that actually got more attention than the game’s announcement! But the thing that really killed it was when someone asked if Diablo Immortal would ever come to PC, and Blizzard’s Wyatt Cheng basically asked if we all had phones. That comment instantly became a meme about developers being totally out of touch, and the game never really recovered from that moment. It was a rough launch, and honestly, it left a bad taste in a lot of fans’ mouths.

Sonic The Hedgehog – Movie Trailer

What’s Up With Sonic’s Eyes?

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This trailer stands out because it actually shows a happy ending, which is unusual for videos on this list. While it’s not a trailer for a traditional game, it’s included because the negative reaction came from gamers. In 2019, Paramount released the first trailer for the Sonic the Hedgehog movie. It came out a few weeks before the Detective Pikachu movie, and fans were hoping the Sonic movie would be a good adaptation of the character.

The initial trailer for the movie quickly dashed any expectations of something truly special. It felt very much like a standard, family-friendly action film – similar to many popular Marvel and Disney movies from 2019. The biggest problem, however, was Sonic’s appearance. He simply looked strange, and not in a way that upset fans of the original game. His eyes were off, he was excessively furry, and his body proportions were oddly unsettling. The negative reaction was overwhelming, leading Paramount to postpone the film and completely redesign Sonic to better match his video game look. Ultimately, this decision proved successful. Sonic the Hedgehog has become a hugely popular movie trilogy, and is considered one of the best and most successful adaptations of a video game into a film – and some of the best Sonic the Hedgehog content in over twenty years.

Command And Conquer: Rivals – Official Reveal Trailer

Let’s Take A Long-Dormant But Beloved Franchise And Make It A Mobile Game

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Electronic Arts (EA) has earned a reputation for being a difficult company to support. This is supported by multiple issues, including being named “Worst Company in America” twice by Consumerist, their tendency to heavily monetize games, and a history of buying successful game studios only to shut them down. But perhaps their most frustrating move was briefly teasing a new Command & Conquer game to fans, then abruptly canceling it, all within a matter of minutes.

The announcement of Command and Conquer: Rivals at E3 2018, even with just a cinematic trailer, initially excited fans of the classic series. However, the reveal of actual gameplay quickly dashed hopes. It became clear the game was designed for mobile devices and featured simplified graphics reminiscent of Advance Wars – a far cry from the look and feel players expected from Command and Conquer. To make matters worse, the game included microtransactions. Many felt this trailer marked a new low for EA’s relationship with its player base, and it proved difficult to see how the company could recover.

Call Of Duty: Infinite Warfare – Reveal Trailer

The Most Disliked Gaming Video In YouTube’s History

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Many people forget now, but the Call of Duty series struggled between 2013 and 2018. The problems started with Call of Duty: Ghosts, which received poor reviews and wasn’t popular with players. Advanced Warfare was a brief success, but then Black Ops 3 underperformed, followed a year later by Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare. This decline was mostly due to players getting tired of the same formula. Infinite Warfare didn’t help, and it actually pushed the series even further into a futuristic setting that fans weren’t excited about.

Despite receiving generally positive reviews, Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare didn’t revive interest in the series. Players who preferred more realistic military shooters were still let down, though it wasn’t a poorly made game. The next installment, Call of Duty: WWII, attempted to address this feedback by shifting to a historical setting, but it wasn’t until the Modern Warfare remake two years later that the series truly regained its popularity with fans.

Hatred – Gameplay Trailer

Pandering To Shock Value

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Some games attempt to gain attention not through creative gameplay, compelling stories, imaginative worlds, or impressive graphics, but by being deliberately shocking. Developer Destructive Creations took this approach with their game, Hatred. It’s a top-down shooter where you play as a disgruntled vigilante who embarks on a violent rampage throughout New York City.

The game features extreme and unnecessary violence, and its story is practically nonexistent. The black-and-white graphics reinforce the feeling that Hatred is designed to shock rather than provide a meaningful gaming experience. Players and critics quickly recognized this, with outlets like Kotaku and The Guardian labeling it a “mass murder simulator.” Upon release, those concerns proved accurate. While the violence was over-the-top, the game was actually criticized for being repetitive, having poor artificial intelligence, and ultimately being a dull and unengaging experience, despite its attempts at shock value.

Metroid Prime: Federation Force – E3 2015 Trailer

Please Make Another Metroid Prime Game… Oh, Not Like That

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By 2015, fans of the Metroid Prime series were eagerly awaiting a new installment. The last game had come out in 2007, and while a collection of the original trilogy was released in 2009, the series had been silent for six years. When Nintendo’s E3 presentation arrived, many were curious about what the company had planned, especially given that the Wii U and 3DS were nearing the end of their lifecycles. What they got was Metroid Prime: Federation Force, a game that wasn’t what anyone expected. It wasn’t a first-person adventure in the style of previous Prime games, and it didn’t even feature the series’ protagonist, Samus. Instead, it was a multiplayer game that blended action with elements of sports gameplay.

The trailer for this new game was incredibly disappointing for longtime fans of Metroid. It starts by showing four colorful marines, leading viewers to believe it wasn’t a Metroid game at all. The reveal of the title was a shock – a really unwelcome one. Like other recent releases such as Command and Conquer: Rivals and Diablo Immortal, this game seems to completely miss what fans actually want. Between the simplistic graphics, the absence of the iconic Samus, and the timing of the launch during the Metroid series’ 30th anniversary, many fans would have preferred if the game hadn’t been made at all.

Aliens: Colonial Marines – “Contact” Trailer

False Advertising That Led To Real-World Lawsuits

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Many gamers feel that promotional trailers sometimes don’t accurately represent the final game. While games like The Last of Us Part 2, Cyberpunk 2077, and Marvel’s Spider-Man have faced similar complaints, the backlash surrounding the “Contact” trailer for Aliens: Colonial Marines was particularly strong. The trailer was presented as actual gameplay footage, but players quickly discovered the game looked much different – and significantly more polished – in the trailer than it did when they played it.

While a complaint to the UK’s Advertising Standards Agency from Reddit user subpardave only resulted in Sega adding a disclaimer to promotional materials stating the game was a “work in progress,” it was still a noteworthy response to fan concerns. However, Aliens: Colonial Marines faced much bigger problems. Critics pointed out issues ranging from inaccurate sound effects from the Alien series to inconsistencies in the game’s story. The criticism started before the game even launched and continued through reviews and player feedback – it was a complete failure. Thankfully, the negative reception likely forced Sega to rethink its approach to Alien video games, ultimately leading to the excellent Alien: Isolation just over two and a half years later.

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2026-01-15 02:38