Top 20 Worst Pay-to-Win Video Games
Welcome to WatchMojo, and today, we’re counting down our picks for the Top 20 most egregious pay-to-win games ever.
#20: “Warframe” (2013)
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We’d like to preface this by saying that “Warframe” is by no means a horrible game. On the contrary, it is quite exhilarating! Thing is that each Warframe you acquire requires certain materials to build, and some of those materials either have really, really low spawn rates or are buried deep into later missions. So, you’re kind of forced to grind for dozens upon dozens of hours to get the Warframe you want for free, or pony up the ducats. It is not horrendous enough to keep you from enjoying the game, yet it is kind of shady monetization. At least buying the Warframes isn’t as expensive as some of the other games we’ll be getting to.
#19: “Mario Kart Tour” (2019)
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“Mario Kart Tour” was all kinds of offensively greedy from start to finish. What else would you expect from a gacha game, really? Certain drivers, karts, and gliders could give players an advantage on particular courses, and such drivers, karts, and gliders were often locked behind a paywall. Whether it was through seasonal passes that demand you grind for these unlockables or flat-out inflating prices in the shop, “Mario Kart Tour” made it clear that it was here for one thing and one thing only: your money. It didn’t help that “shooting the pipe” often resulted in duplicate items regardless if the pipe was green, gold, red, blue, turquoise, burgundy, redwood, or septic tank.
#18: “Star Wars Battlefront II” (2017)
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We will give EA and DICE credit where it’s deserved; “Battlefront II” did turn things around with a reworked Star Card system, reworked progression, and the addition of free expansions. However, no one can forget the early days when Star Cards, which could power up your character’s abilities, were locked behind grinding and loot boxes. Players quickly figured out how “Battlefront II” was really pay-to-win when EA offered players to pay for loot boxes instead of grinding to unlock them. Honestly, it makes us glad the publisher has made such a drastic shift back to single-player games. But why do we still not have that pink Darth Vader?
#17: “Marvel Snap” (2022)
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“Marvel Snap” is in the same boat as “Warframe.” It’s a fantastic game that is, unfortunately, pay-to-win. The difference between them is that “Marvel Snap” is pay-to-win by design. New cards are constantly getting locked behind paywalls. Need the new card? You have three options - A) pay the ten bucks for the season pass and grind for the next few weeks, B) grind the crap out of the game and hope your loot boxes give you Collector’s Tokens (the rarest currency in the game), or C) hope that card gets one of the many overpriced bundles that are shoved in your face every time you open the store. May God have mercy if one of the new cards breaks the game and births a whole new meta.
#16: “MapleStory” (2003)
Unlike most of the games we’ll be going over beyond this point, we’ll give “MapleStory” the recognition of at least being honest. Selling XP boosters can be pretty scummy in many scenarios, and here, it is almost just as scummy. Whales can quickly dump hundreds of dollars and be comically overpowered in a matter of minutes just by buying these boosters. If you don’t care about PvP crap, though, you can avoid this part of the playerbase easily. So, that’s why we’re not giving “MapleStory” too much flak. It sucks, but it’s avoidable.
#15: “Neverwinter” (2013)
Just like “Marvel Snap,” “Neverwinter” is basically pay-to-win by design. Once again, this a great game and all, and we can be thankful that the pay-to-win aspect is not in the most malicious method possible. However, this is another case of forcing players to buy boosters in order to properly keep up with the game’s scale of difficulty. Either open your wallets or get ready for grind sessions. If you have the time to spare and want to grind, have at it, but don’t be surprised if your drive starts to diminish.
#14: “Clash Royale” (2016)
“Clash of Clans” was already shady with how it made progression painful in later levels. So, how bad is this spin-off? Real bad. Arguably worse, even. In June 2023, “Clash Royale” saw a major update that introduced Card Evolutions. Use shards to unlock powerful versions of certain cards. How does one acquire these shards, you ask? With MONEYYYY!! Couple this with obscene amounts of gold needed to upgrade cards to level fifteen, and you have a game that does not value your time.
#13: “FIFA” series (1993-2022)
When looking at console and PC games shoehorning microtransactions and loot boxes, many point the blame to this football series of games. For years, the “FIFA” series would try to entice players to buy loot boxes in order to earn their favorite players or players that may have better stats than their current teams. Of course, this carried into the online portion of the game! It isn’t a real game unless it’s pitting whales against those with less disposable income. Thus, much of the gaming media and community ignore this sector most of the time.
#12: “Angry Birds Go!” (2013)
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Rovio has certainly fallen by the wayside in how it has turned the classic “Angry Birds” games into pay-to-win schemes. Case in point, the kart-racing spin-off, “Angry Birds Go.” Whereas “Mario Kart Tour” requested payment for season passes and maybe twenty bucks or so for some outrageous bundle, “Angry Birds Go” will charge you sixty, seventy, sometimes a hundred and twenty dollars just for a kart. And yes, karts do matter as they can determine whether you hold a candle to rival racers. Sixty to one hundred twenty smackaroos… for a kart. Let that sink in.
#11: “Ace Combat Infinity” (2014)
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After spending some time with “Ace Combat Infinity,” you would think the game desperately does not want you to play the game. Many players have reported how money-hungry the game gets, locking missions behind obscenely high levels and making every moment of play cost a limited resource. It doesn’t matter if you wish to do a single-player mission or play online against others, if you don’t have fuel, you don’t get to play. Good thing “uninstall” is just two taps away, which takes less time to execute than figuring out where everything is.
#10: “Counter-Strike Nexon: Zombies” aka “Counter-Strike Nexon: Studio” (2014)
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Why “Counter-Strike” was enlisted in a pay-to-win scheme we will never understand, and we aren’t going to try to. “CSN” was obnoxiously greedy, and the burn was worse given the abysmal state the game launched in. Not only was it an incredibly buggy mess, but it also made starter weapons extremely weak, weaker than a peashooter! Looking for the real potato cannons? Well, what’s your credit card number? Even under the new “Studio” brand, “CSN” still features a ridiculous pay-to-win model that is still garnering negative reviews for the game today.
#9: “NBA 2K18” (2017)
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Though some players played the “well, actually” card at launch, there is no hiding it - “NBA 2K18” was, and still is, pay-to-win. See, “MapleStory” at least sections off the PvP. Wanna play some basketball with friendly randos online? Prepare to be annihilated because if you didn’t pay up to get beyond level eighty or ninety, the grind was going to be more painful than it already was. Pay-to-accelerate is still pay-to-win, guys. When it's at this scale for a game that costs sixty dollars, folks aren’t going to have it regardless of what you prefer to call it.
#8: “The Simpsons: Tapped Out” (2012)
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EA was getting really dirty with mobile gaming back in the day, and “The Simpsons: Tapped Out” was not afraid to demand your dollars. It starts out simple - have characters perform tasks to rack up currency which you can use to buy more buildings, some of which may unlock a new character to help you earn more money. Problem is that the buildings you can get through natural gameplay eventually give menial payouts. To make any real progress, you need to dump money into enough premium currency so you can nab higher-end buildings with bigger payouts. Still feel like dumping twenty bucks into a bowling alley for Barney? Yeah, we didn’t think so.
#7: “Metal Gear Survive” (2018)
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It was bad enough that Konami was jumping aboard the awful business bandwagon that was demanding constant internet connection from players for access to a game. How could they possibly make this any worse? Microtransactions? Nope, worse than that. How would you feel if you paid sixty bucks for a game only to be asked for more money just for save files? Oh, and are you feeling like you’re grinding too much for resources? Well, why not buy some “Survive Coins” so you can purchase boosters? No thanks. We’d like a full refund of the game, please.
#6: “Marvel’s Avengers” (2020)
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An Avengers game made by Square Enix? Should have been easy money. Alas, the more we heard about “Marvel’s Avengers,” the worse it became. First, it was a live service. Then, there was talk of gear and loot. Then, the power levels crept in. Before we knew it, we were being told to grind our heroes’ power levels or pay for freakin’ boosters! This alienated so many players that few bothered to go beyond the first hour of the game. Now look where we are, Square - the live service is now a dead and delisted game generating no revenue of any kind!
#5: “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2” (2022)
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On the surface, “Modern Warfare 2” doesn’t seem as pay-to-win as the other entries. Besides, most of the paid stuff is cosmetics and operators, right? Not just operators and cosmetics, no! You can straight up pay to unlock weapons, weapon blueprints, and even “tactical pets” to give you an extra buff in the fight. Need the proof? Well, that “DOOM” Super Shotgun seems to be offing dudes in one or two shots from a fairly comfortable distance, wouldn’t you say? “Modern Warfare 2” was fine for a while, but man, it has declined in keeping things fair.
#4: “Candy Crush Saga” (2012)
We ain’t done with Activision Blizzard King yet! “Candy Crush Saga,” as popular as it supposedly is, is amongst the most money-hungry mobile games on the market. Sure, it looks innocent with its bright colors and cartoon characters. But once you get past the first dozen or so levels, everything comes down to luck. Your moves become more limiting, and you’re expected to meet goals at the mercy of whatever random candy drops onto the board. All of sudden, the story is “Aw, such a shame! If you had this power-up that costs a couple of bucks, maybe you can get through the rest of this level.” In other words, it's forcing impossible goals on you just so it can sell the solution.
#3: “Final Fantasy All the Bravest” (2013)
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Speaking of games that force problems to sell solutions, “All the Bravest” is unabashedly greedy. It is so easy to be sold on the idea of building your ultimate team of “Final Fantasy” characters until you see how much of this game is one obnoxious price tag. Oh, you eyeing this character? Pay a buck for A CHANCE to get them! Oh, they suddenly died in battle? Well, pay us another buck to revive them instantly or wait three minutes. Oh, you chose to wait it out and another character died in the process? Well, wait until your first character who died is revived, and then pay us, or wait for the one who just died to revive. See how this game is just constantly demanding money?
#2: “Diablo Immortal” (2022)
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Activision Blizzard King gets the slimy silver medal for greed for this travesty. We remember the outrage that occurred on launch day. Players were crowing about how fun and addictive “Diablo Immortal” was right before they realized how very pay-to-win the game was. Unless you wanted your butt handed to you on a silver platter, your only way to enjoy the game was to either avoid PvP altogether or cough up the dough and buy some absurdly powerful gear. The power-grinding got equally egregious in the regular gameplay later on. Yet, so many YouTubers and streamers decided to spend their dollars to prove the pay-to-win theory right. Because Content. Ain’t that funny?
#1: “Dungeon Keeper” (2014)
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Even after experiencing all of these awful, greedy games, none have come close to the same level of sleaze as “Dungeon Keeper.” For those who may not remember or were not around at the time, “Dungeon Keeper” had players build their own devious dungeons and command minions to gather resources. One catch, though - cooldowns. Whether you wanted to expand your dungeon by one tile or saw a rare resource, you were forced to wait an exorbitant amount of time. Of course, you could always fork over your cold, hard cash. Ugh. Here’s hoping EA has put those dark days behind them for good.
What game do you think was the worst when it came to pay-to-win mechanics? Did it make the list? Let us know down in the comments (in a civil manner).
