T3 Ten: The 10 most over-hyped things ever.

In no particular order, here's the most over-anticipated, hyperboled mouth-frothing products ever made.

July 12th, 2008. The iPhone 3G got its UK release, and the world went mental. Fans queue for hours to be among the first to prod the thing's magical screen, and scour the web for scratch-resisting accessories.

8.02am, the doors open, people scream, buy, use, and then slowly but surely realise that - whilst the iPhone is a very good phone - it is just a phone. Don't get us wrong; we live for tech, but sometimes the hype machine can whirr round a little too quickly for its own good.

Call us cynical, but here's our favourite ever over-hyped thingamabobs.

1/The thing: Cadbury's Wispa bar

The hype: The best thing that was ever swindled from our deprived taste buds returns to turn the world into quivering chocolate slaves. It was so much more than just a chocolate bar, though... It was the 80s, it was that summer, and it was your entire childhood.

What happened: Turns out it was just a chocolate bar. Imagine our disappointment when Wispa touched down on Earth once again: there was no party in the streets, no upturned cars, no grass replacing the roads or collapse of government. What did happen was we all still had to go to work, except slightly more rotund and full of sugar then we were the day before. Long live the 80s.

2/The thing: Halo 3

The hype: Shooting aliens in HD is surely what the human race has been evolving to since Space Invaders first broke thumbs 30 years ago, and this was going to be 'it'. This was going to be the only justification needed for buying the 360, and retribution to those fools holding out for a ps3. This was a game that paid for itself.

What happened: Well it was fun whilst it lasted. Which wasn't very long. The single player campaign had about 6 hours playtime, with the only real difference from the previous game being slightly prettier graphics and a few new guns. The levels were shorter, more linear and offered nothing particularly interesting to the genre besides the age-old understanding that alien + bullets = dead alien.

3/The thing: PS3

The hype: 12 years of gaming experience as top dog meant Sony would no doubt put out the kind of dream machine no one thought possible. With the best graphics this side of your own eyeballs and a long catalogue of stellar game franchises behind it, no wonder people queued for days.

What happened: A console with astonishing graphics came out, but it took up an area of floor space akin to a dead horse. It played Blu-ray, but no one had Blu-ray DVDs, it played games, but Sony forgot to make any decent ones, and even if you were lucky enough to have an HD TV, you had to buy your own HDMI cable. Mint.

4/The thing: iPhone (Original & 3G)

The hype: The deity of handheld electronics. Lovingly carved out of charmed plastics and endowed with texting, calling, and iTunes - the musical equivalent of being endowed with very well organised and user-friendly genitalia. Not only this, but the interweb would be there in the palm of our sweaty little arm-roots.

What happened: Yes, it has a very clever interface, yes it has the internet, and yes it's probably the best phone out there, but so what? We love shiny things, but we don't love camping outside shops to get them. Nor, for that matter, do we enjoy having to type the words "frothing at the mouth" a lot. Bottom line is, mobile phones can be very good mobile phones, but they're still just phones. And you call that a camera?

5/The thing: OS X Leopard

The hype: The 'largest update of Mac OS X' promised us Time Machine, Spaces, Boot Camp, and revolutionary new features in Mail and iChat. Not only that, but it would no doubt be the best way on earth to interact with technology. A seamless bridging of human and computer.

What happened: Apple has a loyal and dedicated number of hardcore fans, who would rather eat their iPhones than say a bad word against them. These internet savvy, highly enthusiastic (read: partially crazy) types know exactly how to build and maintain a hype machine, because they themselves are the main components. The newest Mac OS is definitely a thing of beautifully simple wonder, but if we're honest it's not wildly different from Tiger.

6/The thing: Windows Vista

The hype: Ironing out the kinks in XP, and cementing itself as the best way of using a computer short of actually being one. Vista is beautiful, simple, and bright.

What happened: It looks slightly different, is expensive, doesn't do much more than XP, and crashes hourly (well it does for us, anyway). Microsoft tried to copy some of Apple's OS X finesse, but things are still generally the same, and even Bill Gates knows it. When asked which was the worst of MS's products, he replied "Ask me after we ship the next version of Windows. Then I'll be more open to give you a blunt answer." Now there's a man with pride in his work - no wonder he retired.

7/The thing: GTA IV

The hype: Probably the best game series ever made getting larger, better looking, and more real. A vast New York-alike city pumping with life, brimming with sin, and rammed with opportunity. The reason to own a next-gen console.

What happened: Lets be fair, it probably is one of the best games ever made. Our gripe is with the marketing types that prey on susceptible, hype-loving fools: fools that lap up slowly released dregs of info month on month, until the propaganda gears are turning themselves into the next world. They suck the souls out of fans, until all they care about in life is starting benign forum discussions entitled: "I hope Bigfoot's in it, ROTFLMAO." Tis only a game.

8/The thing: O2 Wallet

The hype: Being able to pay for items and travel just by waving your phone around represents everything we're moving towards as a species. 02 Wallet is robots, interstellar travel, and virtual reality. 02 Wallet is the future.

What happened: How willing are people to entrust their hard-earned to their mobile? We're not one for scaremongering, but with crime on the up, having your phone stolen on a daily basis is now basically a guarantee. If your precious wonga's inside it, you might as well just find a ditch, lie down and give up. Also, it doesn't really work, unless you've Robocop-esque precision when it comes to Oyster card swiping. We have wallets anyway, so what's the point?

9/The thing: Sega Dreamcast

The hype: 1999. The market leader - Playstation - is looking like a blithering old man; rancid drops of budget games dangling from its wrinkly chin. Enter the Dreamcast, Sega's glorious vision of things to come rammed into a solid white box. Four times more powerful than the Sony piffle station, it paves the way for the ultra-realistic gaming of tomorrow.

What happened: It had only a finger full of memorable games, and whilst the graphics were good for the time, everybody knew the PS2 was just around the corner. This was especially true for third party developers, who soon snuk off to focus on making games Sony's sequel - leaving the dream machine drifting in deep water, Sonic struggling with the oars.

10/The thing: Gizmondo

The hype: It plays games, movies, music, has a camera, GPS, sends SMS messages and would change the world with its 'augmented reality' control system. It basically had everything you're ever likely to need at any one time, and amazing 128bit graphics on par with the PS2. In short, you must own one.

What happened: It was a machine made to please investors - not gamers - and the deficit of decent titles was crippling. In the UK it sold just 5,000 units in its first five months of release (compared to the 87,000 the DS managed in its first two days), forcing developers to jump back off the bandwagon before they even had both feet on it. The company filed for bankruptcy a year later, which is a shame because we never got to play "Momma Can I Mow The Lawn?". Tragic, really.

As always, if we've forgotten any let us know below.