Watchdogs probably the most unappreciated game so far for next gen, and a victim of its own hype.

[Shiken]

I feel like I need to make this thread, even if just to see if I'm the only one that feels this way.  Watchdogs was hyped to hell and back from day one, and ultimately had set itself up for disappointment from the start.  First it was the graphics downgrade, very justifiable to be a little upset.  However this was no reason to totally write the game off, and even the haters knew that.  It didn't take long before everyone came to terms with this and started looking for EVERY little thing they could to justify saying the game sucked simply because of one minor detail totally derailing a raging hype train.

But still people bought the game, unfortunetly the damage was already done to their opinions.  I saw endless topics of negativity and disappointment in the game and some even went as far to say that it was a failure (despite scoring an impressive 80 on meta critic on the PS4, the only version that had 71 total reviews while the PC and X1 version didn't even clear 20 reviews, which makes the 77 scores negligible to me).  I was still planning on getting the game, but the reception had me looking more forward to Wolfinsein (probably because the game had no hype and turned out very good with positive reception).  Exibit A on how hype affects how you enjoy a game.

So the time comes to play Watchdogs, and I gotta say I was quite impressed overall.  By the time I played it I wasn't really expecting anything, actually I was expecting to be let down.  But what I found was a solid game with DECENT visuals and a DECENT plot with some unique hacking abilitys that set the game apart from others in the gener.  The game had flaws no doubt, but nothing game breaking.  The sloppy driving mechanics was the FIRST thing I noticed, but once you got past the learning curve it really wasn't that bad.  The game has a ton of content, which is a huge plus.  However there are some flaws here as well.  While the main missions are fun and feel unique, the side content was repeatitve and unoriginal to say the least.  These two factors however are the ONLY thing keeping me from giving it a 9/10.

After finishing the game, I realized that the reason that I enjoyed myself so much was because I was off the hype train and was able to enjoy the good points of the game and get past the flaws.  It seems many were unable to do that and ONLY focused on the flaws of the game without looking twice at the good points.  I always knew overhyping a game was bad, but this game showed me just how bad it can be.

Overall I give the game an 8/10 and believe the meta score of 80 is very justifiyable.  The franchise as a ton of potential and I really hope people can get past the hype disaster that accompanied it to realize this.  So am I the only one here who believes this?  Was Watchdogs really a bad game or was it set up for disappointment by the unreal hype that it was forced to endure?