History Main / BonusFeatureFailure

* The UsefulNotes/NintendoGameCube can output supported games in 480p. The caveat? Due to the way the signal is processed, you need a proprietary component cable to actually get 480p video. Said cables were produced in ''very'' small quantities, were bought by a ''very'' small number of [=GameCube=] owners, and were ''[[RuleOfThree very]]'' quickly discontinued. For a while, the cables were ''[[OverlyLongGag very]]'' expensive (topping off at $300 on eBay), though cheaper third-party cables have eventually entered the market. However, even if you do have the component cables, it occupies a special "Digital A/V Out" port on the console, which was removed in a 2004 console revision due to the low sales of the component cable. You're almost better off getting a UsefulNotes/{{Wii}}, which can not only play [=GameCube=] games in 480p (or at least the earlier models can), but is overall cheaper, with the component cables not being as rare and expensive.

** ''VideoGame/MarioKart8 [[UpdatedRerelease Deluxe]]'': If you make the grueling effort to complete the [[HarderThanHard 200cc version]] of all cups, you get rewarded with... Gold Metal Mario. A number of players will admit that they were expecting something more than just a PaletteSwap of an existing character for completing the game's hardest mode.
* The [[UsefulNotes/NintendoEntertainmentSystem NES]] version of ''VideoGame/KnightRider'' allows you to start with maxed out shields/gas/acceleration in Mission mode if you complete the Driving mode twice and play the Mission campaign. However, due to a GameBreakingBug, the game will crash at the upgrade screen before the UsefulNotes/{{Miami}} mission.

* Completing the first four gem cups in ''VideoGame/CrashTeamRacing'' unlock the first four bosses, so fans were incredibly incensed and let down when they beat the final cup, which was incidentally much harder to even gain access to in the first place, and were handed [[JokeCharacter Fake Crash]] instead of [[FinalBoss Nitros Oxide]]. Justified however, as the developers later explained they originally ''did'' intend to have Oxide unlocked in the purple gem cup but were forced to [[DummiedOut dummy him out]] when they were unable to adapt his unique kart and larger size for play without glitches or messing up the game: Oxide is almost fully functional if accessed via a cheat device, and you'll even hear unique lines from him when you control him, but he'll crash the game if used in multiplayer due to [[GameBreakingBug overflowing the game's memory]] and his huge hovering kart makes it difficult to see the track. The [[VideoGame/CrashTeamRacingNitroFueled remake]] rectifies this by scaling his kart down to roughly the same as everyone else's as well as [[PromotedToPlayable promoting him to playable]].

* ''VideoGame/MagicalStarsign's'' Glissini Caves, a BonusDungeon unlocked after beating the FinalBoss [[spoiler:Shadra]], stands out as not just incredibly hard, but also [[FakeLongevity incredibly tedious.]] Every floor of the 20-floor-deep dungeon is connected by a 100-tile-long ladder — and in this game, you can't run on ladders, forcing you to go down at your slow normal walking speed. With a few exceptions, enemies in the dungeon — even the {{Bonus Boss}}es — are nothing more than UndergroundMonkey clones of earlier enemies and bosses. However, their stats are inflated to the point that lots of ForcedLevelGrinding is required just to stand a chance; a level 60 or so party that can take on the afore-mentioned [[spoiler:Shadra]] will be ripped to shreds by the Ant Nobles and Clockwork Goats on the very first floor, and even a party at [[{{Cap}} level 99]] will struggle with the last few floors. And what's your reward for getting to the very end? [[spoiler:One Putty Pea, which does nothing other than give you another fragment of the game's backstory.]]

** ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaLamentOfInnocence'': Joachim mode (no item inventory, orbs have no effect, making the reward for defeating the BonusBoss a CosmeticAward). There's also Pumpkin (uses the same moveset as Leon but has an unique subweapon which mixes and matches Leon's subweapons).

** The infinite battery. It's obtained by defeating the Silver White Knight of the Azure Sky Tower, which is such a prohibitively difficult task it's for all intents and purposes impossible[[note]]You need to get your hands on all the emblems, take on 99 floors of DemonicSpiders, and then defeat the Knight. Three of the emblems can only be obtained via SocializationBonus, so you'd better hope you have three other friends who are doing this quest. The tower also only has 12 floors to start and every time you finish the tower a few extra floors are added, so you'll complete ''over one thousand floors'' before you finally get to 99. If all of that isn't enough, you can't [[SaveGameLimits save]] or [[CheckpointStarvation continue]] at any time in the tower, in a game meant to be played outside on battery no less, and the Silver White Knight is a brutally difficult BonusBoss to boot[[/note]]. Even as an easy unlockable the item would only be somewhat of a convenience at best, as item and ammo capacities are high and means of recharging are plentiful, and anyone who would cheat it into their inventory with a UsefulNotes/GameGenie could just as easily pop in an unlimited ammo code.

** In ''VideoGame/DragonQuestVIII'', you can get the Gospel Ring, an accessory that prevents ''all'' random encounters, as a reward for completely filling out the monster list. The problem with that? You have to beat all 8 forms of the BonusBoss in a row to get their entries on the list. By the time you're tough enough to do that, you don't need the ring at all; not only will any random encounter cease to be any sort of challenge, but the other methods of reducing encounters, Holy Water or the hero's Holy Protection spell, will also prevent all encounters while they last, for the low cost of a very cheap item or a couple MP.

** The protagonist's ultimate Persona, Izanagi-no-Okami, can be fused on a NewGamePlus. [[BraggingRightsReward Except you need to be Lv 91 to summon him and he can't be registered to the Compendium.]] So all you can use him for are the FinalBoss and the BonusBoss, and at Lv 91 it's very likely you don't even need him.

* The original ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyTactics'' has the Byblos. He joins you as a GuestStarPartyMember when you fight the BonusBoss, and if he survives, he joins your team afterward. Is he any good? Well... he's a monster unit, which means he can't use equipment or change classes. He's nowhere near as strong as the other special monster unit you get, Worker 8, and doesn't have Worker 8's innate magic immunity. His skills are thoroughly mediocre, and (being a monster unit) he'll never learn more. The best thing you can really say about him is that he has innate Poach, but teaching that to human units is easy. Waste of a character, to be honest.

[[folder:[=4X=]]]
* In ''[[VideoGame/{{Civilization}} Civilization V]]'', the Iroquois unique ability, ''The Great Warpath'' allows you to traverse between forests and jungles as if they were roads but that feature only works if you traverse through the forests and jungles, entering them still requires full movement points making this bonus virtually useless. Another downside is that forests do not really provide that much food for your own city thus making growth difficult. Their unique building, the longhouse also lacks the scaling production bonus effect in favor of a measly production bonus on forest tiles meaning that for the longhouse to work, you need to keep almost all of the forests alive meaning your cities will rarely grow tall. All in all, they are one of the few civilizations whose bonuses directly detriments the civilization growth. Compare the Celt's ''Druidic Lore'' ability which gives +1/+2 Faith per city near unimproved forests (which gives them an edge as a Religious Civ) and Brazil's unique "Brazilwood Camp" improvement, which gives a +2 Gold improvement on the Jungle tile (and +2 culture with acoustics as Brazilwood is used for instruments) while ''keeping the Jungle tile intact'' which gives the tile a total output of 2 Food, Science, Gold, and Culture.
[[/folder]]

* ''VideoGame/MetroidPrime3Corruption'' had some unlockables, such as bumper stickers and a Mii bobblehead for Samus's gunship, that were only made available by trading friend vouchers over the internet. The limited-edition ''Trilogy'' version of the game also had friend vouchers, but ''Trilogy'' vouchers could only be sent to other copies of ''Trilogy''; you couldn't send vouchers to or from regular copies of ''Corruption''. Subsequently, since the servers shut down in June 2013 due to the Wii's production life ending, it's now impossible for ''anyone'' to unlock the friend-voucher features if they haven't yet done so. Fortunately, some people have uploaded new save files that have all the vouchers.

*** There are hidden keys in every level that, once you get them all, unlock a secret door for that level. While most of the doors have powerful weapons or enable shortcuts, the door in Lost Impact gives you an armored car... in a close-walled, cramped space station level. And you can't even take it very far, as there are walls you have to spin dash under, and rail segments where the car can't go, almost immediately after you get the prize. In fact, most of the unlockable weapons/secret doors are like this in Shadow. Particularly egregious are the secret doors for Westopolis (similar to Lost Impact, it gives you a bad-controlling lowrider with no special weapon which you get 75% of the way through the level) and Lethal Highway (a minigun with 80 ammo, which is pathetic if you were hoping for a MoreDakka rampage). The worst is Mad Matrix, which just opens an alternate path to the Goal Ring. This is only remotely useful if you're trying to save some time to A-rank the neutral mission, and even then it's far from necessary.

* ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil6'' has Ada's campaign that used to be single player only until fans complained about it and Capcom patching in a second character named Agent to be Ada's co-op partner. Almost no effort was made in making Agent actually work like a proper player character; Agent does not possess the grappling hook, thus an Agent player has to wait for the Ada player to move ahead and get teleported next to her. Agent also cannot solve any of the puzzles nor open any briefcases since only Ada can do that. Overall, Agent is just being strung along since they can't do anything besides kill things and they don't even appear in cutscenes either.

*** The Master Cycle Zero, a magitech motorcyle that Link can summon almost anywhere in the world, making it a useful alternative to a horse. However, it can only be unlocked after clearing all four Divine Beasts, by which time most players will have unlocked fast travel points in every corner of the map, making the Cycle redundant.

* In ''VideoGame/Doom3: BFG Edition'', it has the [[VideoGame/{{Doom}} first]] [[VideoGame/DoomIIHellOnEarth two]] classic ''Doom'' games (based on their Xbox 360 ports) bundled together. While a nostalgic novelty for its time, and on PC it gave players a legitimate way to access the previously Xbox LIVE Arcade exclusive ''No Rest for the Living'' expansion for ''Doom II''. After the turn of 2020, the ''BFG Edition''[='=]s version of these games on PC would be eclipsed by their newer and enhanced Unity ports after they became available on Steam, GOG.com, and Epic Games Store, which offers improved visuals and sounds, many quality-of-life improvements (e.g. the option for 16:9 presentation, support for higher frame-rates), and the ability to download curated mods (including ''No Rest for the Living'', ''VideoGame/FinalDoom'', and ''VideoGame/{{Sigil}}'' among many others) plus sideload other vanilla-compatible [=WADs=] over the ''BFG Edition'', making their inclusions on PC quite inferior by comparison nowadays.

* In ''[[VideoGame/NintendoWars Advance Wars]]'', unlocking every single other [=CO=] in the game, an act which requires beating the game multiple times while meeting [[GuideDangIt extremely specific criteria]], lets you purchase BigBad Sturm to play with. Unfortunately it's not the +30 Attack/Defense Sturm whose [=CO=] power lays waste to his enemy's forces you face in the final battle, but a watered down -20 attack +30 defense version with an inferior [=CO=] power that is more likely to fall on ''your own forces''. Quite literally ''every single other character in the game is more useful than him'', as using him with any level of effectiveness requires a specific and difficult-to-master defensive style of gameplay. At least the developers learned their lesson in the sequels, where not only are the secret characters much more straightforward to acquire, but the unlocked Sturm and especially Caulder are every bit as deadly as their final boss counterparts and will break the game beyond all belief.

** ''VideoGame/FireEmblemShadowDragon'' has the Elysian Whip item in the game's online shop. When used on a female unit in the Pegasus Knight class, it promotes them and causes their Dracoknight promotion to be replaced with Falcoknight, its promotion from other games in the series. The trouble is, Falcoknight is ''worse'' than Dracoknight; it trades off Strength and Defense (both highly useful stats its users very much want) for Resistance (situational and easy to increase), and trades off axes as a secondary weapon (best base damage and a TacticalRockPaperScissors advantage against half the enemy roster) with swords (worst base damage and disadvantage against that same half). The only thing Falcoknight has going for it is a slightly higher Speed cap, which only comes into play against a handful of enemies on the highest difficulties of the endgame; even then, said Speed cap matches the Paladin, which does everything the Falcoknight does without any special trouble. ''New Mystery of the Emblem'' buffed the class to make it more of an actual tradeoff, but also made the Whips available in the main game, making them no longer a bonus.

** ''VideoGame/MarioKart64'' introduced the ability to save Time Trial ghosts to race against later. However, you need the Nintendo 64 Controller Pak to use this feature, and it takes up ''all but two pages'' on the Pak for only two ghosts. In addition, you can't save your ghost if you crash into anything, fall off the track, take too long to complete the race, or even pause the game. Finally, the feature flat-out ''doesn't work'' in the Virtual Console version since it doesn't emulate the Controller Pak.
** By getting a star rank in all 150cc Retro Cups in ''VideoGame/MarioKartWii'', you unlock the Jetsetter/Aero Glider as a kart. Unfortunately, said kart also has terrible stats in everything except top speed and weight, meaning anyone who unlocks it will likely never find a use for it in the actual game.

** If you make the grueling effort to complete the [[HarderThanHard 200cc version]] of all cups in ''VideoGame/MarioKart8 [[UpdatedRerelease Deluxe]]'' you get rewarded with...Gold Metal Mario. Needless to say, a number of players will admit that they were expecting something more than just a PaletteSwap of an existing character for completing the game's hardest mode. And not just because {{Palette Swap}}s of Mario (and Peach for that matter) are [[BrokenBase a point of contention anyway]].

*** The Master Cycle Zero, a magitech motorcyle that Link can summon almost anywhere in the world, making it a useful alternative to a horse. However, it can only be unlocked after clearing all four Divine Beasts, by which time most players will have unlocked fast travel points in every corner of the map, making the Cycle pretty much redundant.

** In ''VideoGame/FireEmblemTheSacredStones'', you can earn several special party members by going through the two bonus dungeons, the Tower of Valni and the Lagdou Ruins. These characters are all characters who existed in the main story as [[NonPlayerCharacter Non-Player Characters]], some of whom were even bosses. Sounds cool, right? Unfortunately, you can only unlock these characters after playing through the entire main campaign, meaning all you really can use them in are the dungeons in which they are unlocked and random battles on the world map. Worse still, the vast majority of them are some of the worst units in the game, due to coming with high levels, poor base stats, terrible growth rates, and being unable to support other units; even the best among them are easily outmatched by units you recruited in the main campaign. The only ones with any useful equipment or skills are Ismaire (who comes with a unique weapon), Valter (who has an exceptionally rare item), Caellach (likewise) and Lyon (who has a unique class capable of summoning phantoms, as well as a unique infinite-durability tome and a rare staff); the others come with various generic weapons and VendorTrash. Even for completionists, recruiting Lyon may be more trouble than it's worth, because getting him requires you to fight through the [[BrutalBonusLevel Lagdou Ruins]] ''three times''. Just to rub salt in the wound, they are, for whatever reason, unable to be used against other players in the Link Arena.

* In ''[[VideoGame/NintendoWars Advance Wars]]'', unlocking every single other [=CO=] in the game, an act which requires beating the game multiple times while meeting [[GuideDangIt extremely specific criteria]], lets you purchase BigBad Sturm to play with. Unfortunately it's not the +30 Attack/Defense Sturm whose [=CO=] power lays waste to his enemy's forces you face in the final battle, but a watered down -20 attack +30 defense version with an inferior [=CO=] power that is more likely to fall on ''your own forces''. Quite literally ''every single other character in the game is more useful than him'', as using him with any level of effectiveness requires a specific and difficult-to-master defensive style of gameplay. At least the developers learned their lesson in the sequels, where not only are the secret characters much more straightforward to acquire, but the unlocked Sturm, Von Bolt, and Caulder are every bit as deadly as their final boss counterparts and will break the game beyond all belief.

*** Defeating optional boss Kaiser Dragon in the Advance release rewards you with the Diabolos Magicite. Its summon and the spells it teaches are all bound by the damage limit, so he'll never do more than 9999 damage, a limit you're already pushing against if you're strong enough to beat Kaiser in the first place. The only use Diabolos has is his level up bonus "HP+ 100%", meaning your HP increases twice as much when you level up, which is good, but other Espers give "HP+ 50%", so ultimately Diabolos does nothing you can't already do with the other Magicite pieces.

*** A larger HP increase means that low level runs let you get even better stats than usual, and Gravija is unique in that it cannot be resisted even by bosses, making it an eminently spammable all-target 9999 damage nuke.

** The Dino subtitle, which allows you to see the subtitles in Dino, the game's substitution cipher. However, it doesn't replace "[Dino Talk]" with what is actually said, and the subtitles are actually significantly ''wrong'' in spots. And it's not even included in the PAL version, so there's a Cheat Token that does absolutely nothing.

** ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsII'' Unbeknownst to most players, pressing the Select button activates a First-Person mode. It works fine, except the game is forced back into third-person whenever a [[PressXToNotDie Reaction Command]] is activated, making playing only in first-person practically impossible.

* In ''[[VideoGame/NintendoWars AdvanceWars]]'', unlocking every single other [=CO=] in the game, an act which requires beating the game multiple times while meeting [[GuideDangIt extremely specific criteria]], lets you purchase BigBad Sturm to play with. Unfortunately it's not the +30 Attack/Defense Sturm whose [=CO=] power lays waste to his enemy's forces you face in the final battle, but a watered down -20 attack +30 defense version with an inferior [=CO=] power that is more likely to fall on ''your own forces''. Quite literally ''every single other character in the game is more useful than him'', as using him with any level of effectiveness requires a specific and difficult-to-master defensive style of gameplay. At least the developers learned their lesson in the sequels, where not only are the secret characters much more straightforward to acquire, but the unlocked Sturm, Von Bolt, and Caulder are every bit as deadly as their final boss counterparts and will break the game beyond all belief.

** ''VideoGame/FireEmblemShadowDragon'' has the Elysian Whip item in the game's online shop. When used on a female unit in the Pegasus Knight class, it promotes them and causes their Dracoknight promotion to be replaced with Falcoknight, its promotion from other games in the series. The trouble is, Falcoknight is ''worse'' than Dracoknight; it trades off Strength and Defense (both highly useful stats its users very much want) for Resistance (situational and easy to increase), and trades off axes as a secondary weapon (best base damage and a TacticalRockPaperScissors advantage against half the enemy roster) with swords (worst base damage and disadvantage against that same half). The only thing Falcoknight has going for it is a slightly higher Speed cap, which only comes into play against a handful of enemies on the highest difficulties of the endgame. ''New Mystery of the Emblem'' buffed the class to make it more of an actual tradeoff, but also made the Whips available in the main game, making them no longer a bonus.

* In the ''VideoGame/{{Neptunia}}'' series, following the release of ''VideoGame/MegadimensionNeptuniaVII'', its newest protagonist Uzume was added as DLC to the UsefulNotes/{{Steam}} versions of the earlier-released ''VideoGame/HyperdimensionNeptuniaReBirth1'' and ''VideoGame/HyperdimensionNeptuniaReBirth3VGeneration''. In ''[=Re;Birth1=]'', she serves as a CrutchCharacter at best, able to join early and build up EXE meter quickly but with skills that are quickly outclassed[[note]]Uzume's most powerful skill is a single-target with 180 Power, while Neptune's is an [=AoE=] with 492 Power[[/note]]. But in ''[=Re;Birth3=]'', she's also stuck with her default weapon, quickly making it near-impossible for her to deal any damage at all.

* ''VideoGame/BaldursGateII'':
** druids have a polymorph special ability that lets them to turn into bears or wolves. They deal very low melee damage compared to magic weapons (which the game throws at you), while they prevent the character from using spells.
** further along, the shapeshifter kit for druids allegedly allows to turn into werewolves. Except this lycantrope form is very lackluster in terms of rolls and other abilities, at the expense of renouncing to armor and many weapons that would be much more useful. Many players consider the shapeshifter the worst class in the game, to be picked only if you want to roleplay a werewolf Charname.
** rangers can pick a racial enemy against which they get a bonus in damage and THAC0, but if it's your first game, you might select an enemy that is worthless (or that you won't even encounter!).
** zigzagged with the undead hunter kit for paladins: all of its innate strengths against the undead can be easily replicated through many spells and equipment that you will find along the way, making the kit redundant compared to other selections which have more all-around useful abilities; however, its power are passive, meaning that you might still want to avoid bothering with protection spells or disliked weapons (and newbies that don't know the game yet will find it more forgiving during their first run against vampires).

** ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaBreathOfTheWild'': The Tunic of the Wild set, aka ''[=BotW=]''[='=]s rendition of Link's classic green clothes. It's obtained by beating all 120 shrines in the game, at which point Link is completely overpowered. And even if he wasn't, this Tunic is ''not'' the best armor set of the game, stats-wise. That's still the [[DiskOneNuke Champion's Tunic]], and there are other two armor sets that have the exact same defense stats as the Tunic of the Wild that are infinitely easier to find, namely the Hylian Armor and the Ancient Armor. You'll also probably have those armor sets fully upgraded at this point, and to get the Tunic of the Wild up to par with them you'll have to upgrade it as well, which requires tedious grinding to find dragon parts. The fact that a lot of people find the clothes design [[WTHCostumingDepartment bafflingly underwhelming]] doesn't help either.

*** ''[[VideoGameRemake Super Mario 64 DS]]'' is ''worse'' than the original in this regard: Since Yoshi is playable in this version, no one appears on the roof, there's no upgraded Triple Jump to be unlocked and only three extra lives to be found, and worst of all, the only thing of interest on the roof is Luigi's final rabbit... which gives you [[https://www.mariowiki.com/Super_Mario_Slot a virtually unchanged version]] of [[https://www.mariowiki.com/Mario_Slot another mini-game you're most likely to have unlocked by that point]].

Compare DummiedOut, where the extra stuff was axed entirely. Contrast ShowWithinAShow, where the extra content is a full-fledged game in and of itself. When the unlocked item or character seems clearly intended to be bad, it's likely
a JokeItem or JokeCharacter. Characters afflicted with this tend to devolve into {{Quirky Bard}}s. And also compare BraggingRightsReward, where you obtain extra content but only past a certain point where you probably won't have much use for it.