Ubisoft's Watch_Dogs might not have delivered on the visual front compared to the previews, but you wouldn't say it's a terrible game.
In fact, we were very pleased with the gameplay in general.
The same can't be said for the games on this list, which touted some fantastic visuals but didn't deliver at all on the gameplay front.
Shrek (Xbox)
Yes, yes, movie-based games are generally considered to be mediocre - but you can't deny that Shrek for the original Xbox looked amazing back in 2001.
The game was the first to use deferred rendering graphical techniques, which later became a key technique in many games, from the Uncharted franchise and LittleBigPlanet to Halo: Reach and Infamous.
However, beyond the visuals, Shrek was a repetitive game that offered a ridiculously stiff challenge for many gamers.
Lair (PS3)
It's not often that you can say one game was responsible for an entire studio's collapse, but Lair has been cited as one.
Developed by Factor 5 and heavily touted as a demonstration of the PS3's capabilities, Lair looked the part most of the time, featuring a ton of enemies on-screen at once and great lighting effects.
It wasn't perfect though, owing to the dodgy textures and poor water effects.
But what really brought Lair down was its mandatory use of motion controls though, which simply weren't very good at all. Lair was later patched to include traditional controls, but the damage was already done by then.
Throw in a dodgy lock-on system and shallow gameplay and you've got a game that wasn't worth even a half-price purchase at the time.
Jurassic Park Trespasser
Few games can claim to be ahead of their time, but Jurassic Park Trespasser was definitely one of them.
The game stood out back in 1998 for its use of ragdoll effects, real-time shadows and cleavage if the player looked down (seriously), but as for gameplay, well...
It's clear that far more time was spent on Trespasser's technology than the gameplay itself, with dumb AI, silly manipulation mechanics and a lack of polish.
In all fairness, the community has been tweaking the game, releasing patches for it over the past few years.
Backbreaker (2010)
We've included American football title Backbreaker in our previous feature, but it definitely warrants inclusion here too. Backbreaker's main selling point wasn't that it was an unlicensed football game, but rather its emphasis on tackles.
This was all made possible by the Euphoria engine, and you know what, the game's tackles actually looked fantastic and rewarding.
However, aside from this, there wasn't much depth to the game, being panned for its shallow single-player mode and weak multiplayer suite.
Assassins Creed
A glorified tech demo for the then-new console generation, Assassins Creed featured beautiful visuals, lively crowds and fantastic parkour.
Unfortunately, aside from these features, Assassins Creed had little to offer in the way of gameplay, with those pesky flag missions being the only real meat on this plate.
Fortunately, the sequel and subsequent games fleshed out the series in a big way, offering more than just pretty visuals.
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