Most Unplayable Open-World RPGs Of All Time, Ranked

When hearing about the “most unplayable” open-world RPGs, I believe everyone would think of something different. Indeed, it can mean pretty much anything: technical disasters that turn progression into a never-ending battle against bugs, online games shut down and never fully preserved, an intimidating learning curve where even the basics and controls feel like an ordeal, compatibility problems, and much more.

Instead of choosing just one direction for this open-world RPG list, let’s mix it up and cover different cases that fit into the “unplayable” bucket. I’ll rank the games below by how severely their listed version prevents you from experiencing the intended vision. So, what are we absolutely NOT playing today?

6 Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead

Even Learning the Controls Is a Survival Challenge

Kicking things off, Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead’s inclusion isn’t suggesting that the game is badly made. On the contrary, CDDA has 85% positive Steam reviews and incredible depth — but only for the chosen few. What makes it suitable here is that it’s among the most hostile and difficult open-world roguelike RPGs ever made. Sure, there are decent competitors, like UnReal World, but Cataclysm might just be too deep and complex for its own good.

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It’s not just that Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead is demanding for the average modern player; it’s practically unplayable unless you study it and graduate as an expert. Even understanding its controls demands extraordinary commitment, so your own knowledge is the real progression system here. Simple survival requires mastering interconnected systems for equipment, crafting, injuries, vehicles, and daily needs, all through a command-heavy interface and numerous menus.

CDDA’s rich simulation further complicates things, creating scenarios where your past video game experience can actually be more harmful than useful. I salute those who take their time to appreciate Dark Days Ahead’s enormous depth, but for the rest of us mere mortals, perhaps this one is far too complex to even approach.

5 Ultima 9: Ascension

A Broken Finale Fans Spent Decades Repairing

Ultima 9: Ascension is one of the genre’s most infamous technical disasters, taking awards like ‘Most Disappointing Game of the Year’ back in the day. The final single-player installment in the iconic series brought Britannia into full 3D, but arrived badly damaged and unfinished. And we aren’t talking about a lack of polish here: Ascension had serious progression blockers, including disappearing quest objects, stuck elevators, and more.

The thing is, at least four distinct versions of Ultima 9 were developed, differing drastically in both story and technology. The final “result” inherited the worst of all worlds: this Frankenstein monster of a release was raw and buggy, had extremely high hardware requirements, and showed a total disregard for previous chapters.

While the team improved things in the following months, official support ended far too quickly, leaving Ultima 9: Ascension as a long-term community repair project. Series fans literally spent decades bringing it closer to a “final” version and fixing its many faults. Today, Ascension is playable, and you can definitely complete it. How much fun you’ll have in the process is a completely different question.

4 Cyberpunk 2077 (PS4 and Xbox 1.0 version)

A Launch Disaster That Belongs in a Museum

One of the greatest open-world RPGs of all time, Cyberpunk 2077 also manages to occupy a confident spot among the genre’s “most unplayable” titles — well, at least its notorious last-gen console launch version. It was so troubled that Sony pulled it from the PS Store for several months, which was probably easier than issuing refunds non-stop.

Before launch, it was easy to get swept up in the hype: the marketing was so loud you couldn’t hide anywhere, the studio had earned its reputation with The Witcher 3, and the first reviews were stellar. There were alarming signs, including repeated last-minute delays and the press reviewing only the PC version before launch. Still, many console players were completely unprepared for day one. Extremely poor performance, an array of bugs ranging from hilarious (remember those disappearing pants?) to progression blockers, constant crashes — yeah, it was bad. Cyberpunk 2077’s last-gen launch was such a technical catastrophe that it probably outshone even Fallout 76 or Ghost Recon Breakpoint.

The massive 1.5 update arrived more than a year after release, marking a major milestone in the recovery. With how good Cyberpunk 2077 eventually turned out, and meaningful updates still arriving on newer platforms almost six years later, bringing up its earliest days might even feel like a cheap shot today, but hey — it’s just history.

3 Raven’s Cry

Even the Rescue Couldn’t Save This Ship

But not every unfinished open-world RPG is lucky enough to make such a comeback. The pirate-themed Raven’s Cry has a more interesting story than “bad launch eventually turned good.” Troubled development, a change of team midway through, and a total reorganization of the project promised nothing good, so it’s no surprise that Raven’s Cry quickly earned a reputation as one of the worst games of its time.

The game was clearly unfinished, with missing content and an even bigger pile of technical issues, including frequent crashes. Beyond that, it wasn’t particularly interesting to play, with questionable mechanics, a convoluted plot, and rough writing involving sensitive themes. To the devs’ credit, they attempted to fix the biggest issues, resulting in a full re-release later that year. Vendetta — Curse of Raven’s Cry (what a fitting name!) arrived with substantial repairs, followed by patches until 2017. Even then, serious problems survived.

Players reviewing the final patched version still reported disappearing NPCs, broken enemy AI, missing scenes, characters getting stuck, and a world map that could prevent travel between islands. Re-released, patched for years, but never fully fixed, Vendetta’s attempted rescue remained a technical minefield, so maybe it’s better to abandon this ship for good.

2 Final Fantasy 14 (2010 Original)

The Original Eorzea Remains Out of Reach

Few MMORPG launches can match the disappointment of the original 2010 release of Final Fantasy 14. Its lengthy development was beset by problems, and when the game finally arrived, it had too few redeeming qualities to make it worth touching. The experience was buried under interface and performance issues, resulting in a shallow, slow, grind-heavy RPG full of weird limitations. Some critics doubted whether even fixing its apparent problems would make FF14 fun.

You probably know the rest of the story, a redemption perhaps even more impressive than Cyberpunk’s: FF14 was completely reborn, flourishing into one of the best MMOs ever made. But its troubled launch isn’t what earns the original FF14 a place here. Many closed MMOs are still playable on fan servers, but the original FF14 isn’t quite there yet. Active fan restoration projects exist, yes, but remain incomplete, with key combat, progression, inventory, and quest features only partially implemented.

As such, the original experience has essentially disappeared from the gaming landscape, making it one of the clearest fits for being “unplayable” today. Not that anyone would be too sad about it, anyway. Years later, director Naoki Yoshida even joked that the idea of a legacy FF14 1.0 server, like WoW Classic, would be a “nightmare.”

1 The Matrix Online

A Ghost World Without Combat or Leveling

But there’s one open-world RPG that surpasses even FF14 in how literally unplayable it is nowadays. The Matrix Online, the official game intended to continue the films’ storyline with the Wachowskis’ blessing, made a fairly ordinary debut. It had technical problems of its own and struggled to stand out in the genre. Around four years later, Sony pulled the plug, with active player numbers reportedly falling below 500 by the end.

Shutting down an MMORPG doesn’t always make it truly unplayable, as fan communities most of the time swoop in to restore unofficial servers. The same happened with The Matrix Online, but only partially. Years of community work still haven’t restored the full original experience, leaving an explorable shell of the former game.

As such, The Matrix Online is “playable” in the loosest sense. You can revisit its city, enter buildings, use traversal abilities, and socialize, but the current emulator still lacks combat (in a Matrix game!) and leveling. The setting survives, while the functioning RPG itself does not, setting it apart from substantial fan revivals like Star Wars Galaxies, Shin Megami Tensei: Imagine, and even Anthem.