Worst... game... EVARRRRR...

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

Inspired by the comments re LOTR:Gollum on another thread, being a nostalgic bunch we talk a lot about the games we remember as kids, ones we came back to after years away, ones we'd like back.

 

But there are some that misty-eyed recollections still can't save.

 

In your humble opinions... what is the single worst, most toxic, unsalvageably horrific title you've ever played, let alone forked over perfectly good moolah for?

 

For me: I never could afford a console, and have never bothered to get one as a grown-up. However: many college-era friends had them , and Michi brought one game along specifically for a laugh and to torture his friends with: SNES T2:Judgement Day. (Contrary to popular opinion, Germans DO have a sense of humour, but it's quite odd. Maybe that was just him. Dunno.)

 

I'm not a hugely talented console controller player to start with, but was reassured that it wasn't me when Ahnold went haywire (including through a wall clip) under everyone else's command too. It was at least hilarious (with some light herbal assistance).

 

How about everyone else? 

 

Ladies and Gentlemen... start your flamethrowers.

[Techwright]

That I've played?  Hmm...I'll have to think on that.  I've played a lot over about 50 years. The Atari 2600's E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial that I joked about in another thread would certainly be in contention: full of bugs (which couldn't be fixed in a cartridge era, a very confusing story and control system, and all thrown together almost overnight.  The one good thing I can say about it is that it wrecked Atari so bad that all those cartridges I could not afford as a young teen, suddenly went into the bargain bin and I was able to pick and choose to my heart's content.

 

But there is one game I did NOT play, or even see, that became a legend in the Atari community for being just beyond awful.  That would be Custer's Revenge, made to be an adult game (on a prominently family & kids console, I would note) where you played Custer trying to make it to an Indian woman tied to a stake so you could rape her in revenge.  I wish I was joking.

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

I’m aware you’re not joking. The equivalent from my era would be Night Trap, which apart from being filled with technical failures was on quite dodgy ground.

 

…boy that escalated quickly…

[TheOtherTed]

16 hours ago, ThaOGDreamWeaver said:

what is the single worst, most toxic, unsalvageably horrific title you've ever played, let alone forked over perfectly good moolah for?

The two that I can think of were, ironically, both Middle Earth games.

 

Back in the early 2000s, I made the mistake of telling my oldest sister that I wouldn't mind a Tolkien-themed video game for Xmas.  She gave me "The Hobbit" produced in 2003.  It was basically Super Mario Bros, but 3D (sort of) and with Bilbo, who, for some reason, tossed out a lot of Sonic-style banter.  I tried to give it a fair shake, but never got past the Troll Cave - in no small part because it was unrecognizable as the troll cave from the book.  Slimy slippery floors, multiple side-tunnels, and a whole ecosystem of various beasties that I still don't know what they were supposed to be.  I was already largely done with platformers anyway, but to have this HINO game (Hobbit In Name Only) just killed that whole mode of play for me.

 

The other game was "War in Middle Earth."  Not absolutely terrible as games go, but it had one fatal flaw - if you found one particular MacGuffin and give it to one particular group of people, you'd basically won.  All that was left was to take a leisurely walk around Mordor and get to Orodruin from the East.  I think I discovered that on my second playthrough, confirmed it with a third, and realized there was no point in trying out all the other strats that I thought could be neat to pull off.  I did run a fourth playthrough to see if the MacGuffin strat would work if I handed over the MacGuffin and did nothing else, and, lo and behold, it did.

 

Writing about it now makes me realize that the developers hadn't given a single thought to any sort of stealth mechanic.  Seeing how sneaking was a fundamental part of the whole quest, this makes me very angry at people I've never met.

 

As for moolah, one was a gift and the other was a bargain bin deal from Electronics Boutique, so no great loss.

 

 

Edited May 28, 2023 by TheOtherTed
VERY angry.

[InvaderStych]

Night Trap and Custer's Revenge pretty much win this thread. 🤣

[Techwright]

On 5/28/2023 at 6:54 PM, InvaderStych said:

Night Trap and Custer's Revenge pretty much win this thread. 🤣

 

Okay, 3rd worst game ever.

[Glacier Peak]

Halo: The Master Chief Collection upon release and upwards of five years after release it was not a playable game. I don't mean that in the exaggerated way that some folks say something isn't polished or is missing features - it would literally not work and I was given a free game from Xbox for the developer's poor showing.

 

Halo Infinite - good lord, where do I start? I should've learned my lessons with the aforementioned game, but I had such hopes for 343. For anyone who has played the multiplayer beta for the past year and a half, it still isn't what the developers promised over four years ago.

 

Assassin's Creed Unity: Another example of a game releasing that didn't work and I was given a free game from Ubisoft. After a few patches, it was playable and enjoyable.

[InvaderStych]

38 minutes ago, Techwright said:

 

Okay, 3rd worst game ever.

 

Ironically/coincidentally when I first opened this thread I was going to mention E.T. for the 2600. Never did get past the pit when I was a kid. 🤣

 

In pure code/game-mechanics E.T. probably takes the title, the other two are just so cringe though that they've got to be the worst. 🤣

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

Night Trap wasn't just cringeworthy. Sega CD titles generally worked better when they just used it as a storage medium to make bigger, better games (Sonic CD etc.)

FMV tech at the time wasn't up to the job of pulling off the gaming experiences they wanted, so Night Trap - according to reviews you can find from the time - was also fairly unplayable because of the timing required vs response lag and bugginess of the video. 

 

Sewer Shark dodged the technical issues (mostly) by using the tech to make a straightforward rail shooter, with superimposed sprites as targets, and somehow also getting legendary VFX dude John Dykstra and Devo's Mark Mothersbaugh in on the deal.

 

"Adult" games also generally tend not to be brilliantly designed, since they're focussing on... er... other assets to get through. Having surfed the Worst Games Of All Time wiki, Lula 3D shows up, as does at least one Leisure Suit Larry entry. 

 

Also on that list is Dungeon Keeper: iOS,  and sweet Freya knows I love a dungeon. But. Aside from being quite hard to play, this was the moment EA found out what micropayments were for. Shortly afterwards, they found out what the word "free" is for, courtesy of a painful set of lessons from the UK Advertising Standards Authority.

Edited June 1, 2023 by ThaOGDreamWeaver

[InvaderStych]

6 hours ago, ThaOGDreamWeaver said:

Night Trap wasn't just cringeworthy. Sega CD titles generally worked better when they just used it as a storage medium to make bigger, better games (Sonic CD etc.)

FMV tech at the time wasn't up to the job of pulling off the gaming experiences they wanted, so Night Trap - according to reviews you can find from the time - was also fairly unplayable because of the timing required vs response lag and bugginess of the video. 

 

Back in the early 90s there Phillips briefly entered this market with their CD-i device.  Video rental place down the street from me had one and the lady-friend and I rented it for a weekend with its full compliment (read: handful) of games. Performance wasn't horrible for the era, but the best game offering was a golf game that was only entertaining because the Aussie "color commentator" would talk trash every time a player botched a shot.

 

"That was limp, mate!"

 

... and similar stuff. It was hilarious, even more-so as I am pretty sure it was an actor doing a bad imitation of an Australian accent. 🤣