Fortunately, when Team Fortress 2 was finally released as part of the Orange Box compilation in 2007, it quickly became one of the most popular online shooters in the world and is still going strong over a decade later. Development began on The Last Guardian in 2007, with plans to release it as a PlayStation 3 exclusive. First announced in 1999, the title was originally in development for the PlayStation before developer Silicon Knights signed an exclusivity deal with Nintendo the following year and switched gears by making Too Human a GameCube game. Silicon Knights pivoted yet again when they signed an exclusivity deal with Microsoft, with the plan this time to turn Too Human into a trilogy. Trilogy plans were quickly scrapped and Silicon Knights ended up declaring bankruptcy in 2014 after losing a protracted court case with Epic Games, with a federal judge ordering the developer to destroy all copies of Too Human. A year later, the game ended up with 2K Games, soccer kits who chose Borderlands developer Gearbox Software to put the finishing touches on the game and finally get it out the door. Noire was one of the most expensive video game productions at the time and fortunately for publisher Rockstar Games, the game was a sales success with over five million copies sold.
A massively multiplayer online role-playing game set in a fantasy world, Darkfall Online was announced in 2001 in the wake of early successful massively multiplayer online role-playing games such as Everquest and Phantasy Star Online. Following the departure of project lead Tom Hall the following year, a new team took over development duties and over the next half-decade, Prey had a number of false starts until the whole project was rebooted in 2001 under Human Head Studios. An action-adventure game overseen by Tomb Raider creator Toby Gard, Galleon cycled through a number of different iterations and publishers before finally landing on the original Xbox in 2004. Galleon suffered from having the goalpost shifted throughout development, as game design had evolved considerably since the late 90s when the game was initially conceived as a PlayStation release. Surprising many, the game was reintroduced at E3 2015 and released the following year to mostly positive reviews, with the general consensus being that Team Ico had crafted another beautiful, artistic experience held back by some technical and gameplay issues.
Although it wasn’t officially announced until 2008, development on Diablo III actually started way back in 2001, just a year after the release of Diablo II. Not to be confused with the 2016 shooter of the same name, the original Prey was first conceived of all the way back in 1995 by 3D Realms as a flagship title for their in-house engine. The brain operates in much the same way. Noire (the latter of which appears later on this list), but the downside of course is that waiting for anticipated games is not much fun. Valve has built something of a reputation for frequently delaying its games – if Half-Life 3 ever actually comes out, it will likely have endured the longest development in video game history – and its most heavily delayed title that actually made it to release is beloved class-based shooter Team Fortress 2. As many know, the original Team Fortress began life as a popular Quake mod, with Valve eventually hiring its creators to come work for them.
Work began on Spore in 2000, but development hit several snags along the way, mainly involving gameplay as the team went through several iterations before landing on the five stage structure seen in the finish product. A year after the game was first announced at the 2007 Blizzard Worldwide Invitational, Blizzard revealed that development on Starcraft II was only about a third of the way done (bear in mind that the game was five years into development at this point) and that the initial release would be missing single player campaigns for two of the franchise’s factions, Zerg and Protoss (these were eventually released in expansion packs). In 2011, Duke Nukem Forever finally released and was widely considered a colossal failure; an outdated, ugly, and not particularly entertaining game that should have been axed somewhere along the way during its absurd 15 year development. Team Bondi’s 1940s-era detective game may not have been the most engaging open world game when it released in 2011, but L.A. In the end, whether Mafia II was worth the wait is a toss up, as the game’s engaging story was diminished by its boring, linear open world design. Team Ico had a tough act to follow after releasing the critically-acclaimed Shadow of the Colossus on the PlayStation 2 in 2005, but no one thought we’d have to wait over a decade to play the team’s next game.