5 Games That Were Nearly Ruined by Constant Nerfs and Balancing

by

Game balance should help games thrive, but it’s often become overly restrictive. Many developers of ongoing games now seem to view player strength as a problem to be constantly fixed. Instead of allowing popular strategies to evolve naturally and players to try new things, they release frequent updates to quickly address anything that seems too powerful or effective.

Many games have been negatively impacted by a trend of excessive balancing. Developers became so focused on avoiding anything potentially problematic that they stifled creativity and fun. While these games are still playable, supported, and have fans, they don’t feel as good as they could because exciting, innovative ideas were sacrificed in favor of constant adjustments and playing it safe.

5. Overwatch (Post-Launch / Overwatch 2)

The original Overwatch was exciting because of its unpredictable nature. While heroes like Cassidy, Roadhog, and Mei could be challenging to play against, they each had a unique style. Games often changed quickly due to powerful abilities, smart positioning, or a single player making a great play, which made each match engaging. This unpredictability made mastering the heroes feel rewarding and defined what made the game special.

Over time, Blizzard focused more on minimizing player frustration with Overwatch than on maximizing fun and exciting moments. They reduced abilities that heavily disrupted gameplay, smoothed out big damage bursts, and when redesigning heroes, prioritized addressing complaints over maintaining what made those heroes unique. Overwatch 2 took this approach even further, creating a game that’s easier to understand but feels strangely bland. While these constant changes didn’t destroy the game, they removed the distinctive qualities that made Overwatch special, resulting in a technically sound game that lacks emotional impact – a visually vibrant game with surprisingly dull gameplay.

4. Destiny 2

Destiny 2 often hints at being a truly amazing game, especially when it lets players use powerful, unique items to create unexpected and fun strategies. Each new update introduces gear and abilities that briefly make players feel incredibly powerful. These are the moments when Destiny shines – when players get creative and discover surprising ways to play.

Usually, a few weeks or a month after new content is released, changes are made to balance the game – often weakening powerful items and abilities. Sometimes, entire strategies become useless overnight. The practice of removing items from the game entirely – called ‘Sunsetting’ – even targeted enjoyable gear used in popular modes. This has taught players not to get too invested in anything they earn. Instead of encouraging creativity and trying new things, Destiny 2 has conditioned its players to anticipate being let down. As a result, people still collect loot, but with much less enthusiasm, because they know that anything truly enjoyable is likely to be temporary.

3. Diablo IV

I’ve always loved how over-the-top Diablo games are – building crazy strong characters, mowing down enemies, and feeling almost too powerful is just what makes them fun! When Diablo IV first came out, it really felt like we were getting back to that. Finding those awesome combinations of skills and items made playing the endgame feel exciting, not like a grind. It was a great feeling!

Blizzard’s attempts to balance the game felt heavy-handed and often missed the mark. Rather than improving weaker options, they consistently lowered the power of the strongest ones. They even made big changes to entire character classes during the season, which erased player progress. This not only created balance issues but also eroded player trust. When players are penalized for playing well and maximizing their characters, the fun of finding better gear disappears, and Diablo IV becomes a game where players are afraid to try new things instead of experimenting.

2. The Division 2

As a longtime fan of The Division 2, I’ve always felt like it’s been hard to really feel powerful, even after putting tons of time into perfecting your character. It’s frustrating because whenever the community figured out a way to make things run smoothly at the highest difficulty levels, the developers would often quickly nerf it. They’d weaken talents, completely change how gear sets worked, and lower the overall damage potential, all in the name of balance. It just never felt like our effort was rewarded.

Eventually, the game became too uniform. Character builds lost their unique feel, and focusing on specific skills felt pointless. Instead of celebrating players who really mastered the game, The Division 2 encouraged everyone to use similar, reliable builds that were okay in all situations, but great at none. While the gunplay stayed solid, the endgame gradually lost its spark because the game didn’t allow players to experiment and push its limits.

1. World of Warcraft (Modern Expansions Especially)

Today’s World of Warcraft is in a constant state of adjustment to achieve balance. Classes are tweaked frequently, sometimes even during a season, which can make it feel like there’s no real reward for becoming truly skilled with one. A character build that’s powerful one week might be weakened the next, forcing players to quickly change strategies or start a new character just to remain competitive.

Constant adjustments to the game have weakened the unique feel of each character class. Over time, these classes have become bland and similar to each other. Abilities are either toned down or removed because they’re seen as too complicated, making different character builds feel pointless. Strong, defining features rarely last through an entire game expansion. Blizzard’s worry about making things unbalanced has led to a game where nothing really feels powerful or special. This is especially noticeable because the game used to be known for its diverse and memorable classes and abilities.

What do you think? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!

Read More

2026-01-27 00:19