Expectation vs Reality

We all have that moment where reality does NOT meet expectation.

I have been happily married for over fifteen years, but I have heard the horror stories about dating apps. I also know many people that have strong feelings about franchises *cough* Star Wars *cough* and how those may have played out in recent cinema.

While I can’t speak to dating apps or Star Wars, I play my share of video games. Rather than playing a broad base of games, I tend to play a few games very deep. Meaning, I will hours and hours of Skyrim in order to find every Daedra shrine, complete every quest, and totally have the most awesome house imaginable. With amazing armor on every armor stand.

Yeah.

My moment where reality an expectation collided was in a recent game. It forced you choose a path, and none of the paths were truly happy. You had to make choices and kill characters you may really like.

Romance reader and writer here. That isn’t my cup of tea. But, the series had done this before, and they had then released DLC (down-loadable content) that created a romance-writer-approved path.

So, when the game was released, I immediately purchased the DLC. I played all the paths presented and waited for the DLC which is when I was supposed to get the “happy path”.

Except, expectation did NOT meet reality.

I thought I was getting a unicorn with the DLC. I got a rhinoceros instead.

The DLC was almost half the cost of the game, so I had expectations. They released bits of extra content to keep those of us that had bought it appeased. It consisted of a few new outfits. Okay. Whatever. A few “new” battles that were really recycled from other parts of the game. Again, whatever, I bought it for the “happy path”.

I was *so* horribly disappointed.

The creators announced AFTER they released the final installment they had never planned to do a “happy path”. They did that in a prior game and didn’t want to do it again. Even though their fans really wanted it.

What did they give us instead for half the price of the game?

A handful of new characters, a storyline that made no sense and actually messed up the timeline of when certain things were revealed sooner to the main character, and horrible game mechanics.

And I mean horrible.

The designers didn;t like how gamers were playing the game or using the mechanics as they were. So they decided to “fix” them and maeke the game *way* harder. Of course this was a better idea that redoing the mechanics so they were useful and players would WANT to use them.

Sure, I beat it. That’s how I am. But it wasn’t fun. And this is a GAME I play in my free time. No point to it if it isn’t fun.

Add to this, beloved characters that featured in the DLC from the main story were flat cut-outs of themselves. I loved all three of them when I played the main game and was torn when I had to kill one. I couldn’t have cared less about them in the DLC. And this is after playing all of their paths and loving all three of them.

*sigh*

So disappointed. Maybe my expectations were too high. Not sure. But I can guarantee I will never buy the DLC from this company again until it’s already been released.