Worst 4A game EVER?

[Opry99er]

I loved Indoor Soccer as a kid. For the 10 years I didn't have a TI ('95-'05) I had fond memories of that game. In '07, I got one in a box of TI carts and was amazed how crappy the game was. It actually prompted me to look for another soccer game for the TI... Maybe the one I loved was a different soccer game... Nope

 

It sucked back then too, I just didn't know it. My favorite TI games are Henhouse, Parsec, hunt the Wumpus, and Tunnels of Doom. All those stood the test of time for me. Henhouse and ToD are my top 2.

[Opry99er]

In thinking about this more--- I have to say another crappy ass game for the TI was definitely HenPecked... While it tries to use the "Joust" physics, it really lacked any creativity and had a terrible music score. While it's probably not the WORST game ever, it's pretty terrible. I have to say I liked ALL the Funware titles, even Ambulance. Video Vegas is pretty simplistic and a bit dull after a while, but it's certainly better than *The Attack and Indoor Soccer.

 

As a side note, St. Nick is a WEIRD ass game... A red label Funware cart, St. Nick is a Santa Clause-oriented game but there are witches(?) trying to steal Christmas?? I don't know man. A great game but someone must have been smoking something pretty strong to design that game.

[Willsy]

I'm frankly amazed that Miner 2049er has got no votes yet! It's an utter TURD of a game. A real howler.

 

I think I was spoiled as a child by all the awesome platform games on the ZX Spectrum.

[Opry99er]

Mark--- Many have never played Miner2049er. It was a later release and a sidecar cart... I have one now, thanks to Keith--- but never had it back in the day.

 

Popeye was a decent platformer...

[matthew180]

Well, I've never played Miner 2049er... The games listed in the poll that I have played, I like. The ones that probably suck I never owned or bothered the try via emulation. Thus my vote went to Parsec because, even though the technical aspects are great, the game is pretty weak.

 

Matthew

[Opry99er]

Hmmm.... Did you mean "Beyond Parsec" Marthew? Or are you referring to the Paul Urbanus game? The original Parsec game is what got me back into the TI in '06/'07. I happened upon a YouTube video of the game and couldn't believe how much I remembered. I remembered all the names of the ships--- selecting "1" for slow fuel tunnel entry, "2" for medium deliberate motion during the asteroid belts, and speed "3" for fighting. Man, in my top 5 for sure. But we all like different games for different reasons.

[Opry99er]

Wasn't Car Wars a 100% GPL game?

[InfernalKeith]

Hmmm.... Did you mean "Beyond Parsec" Marthew? Or are you referring to the Paul Urbanus game? The original Parsec game is what got me back into the TI in '06/'07. I happened upon a YouTube video of the game and couldn't believe how much I remembered. I remembered all the names of the ships--- selecting "1" for slow fuel tunnel entry, "2" for medium deliberate motion during the asteroid belts, and speed "3" for fighting. Man, in my top 5 for sure. But we all like different games for different reasons.

 

 

I can see someone finding Parsec dull - it's really repetitive and doesn't have a lot of features - but I think it's got that same hypnotic, zone-out-and-play-for-hours quality that Space Invaders has.

 

That HenPecked song haunts me, man! It's so weird I can't tell if it's like that by mistake, or it's in some weird prog-rock time signature that I'm just not sophisticated enough to get. And yeah, the game's pretty clunky.

[+remowilliams]

Beyond Parsec really struck me as an abomination. Probably due to what the name implied...

[Opry99er]

The Hen Pecked song... Also in Chicken Coop (which is the same exact game--- EXACT)--- it's just a terrible piece of music... I think a team of monkeys in a room just typed a bunch of BYTE data into the soundlist and they eventually came up with the monstrosity that was put into the game.

 

As to "haunting"... Yea--- took days to get it out of my head--- in a bad way... Kind of like that hampster dance song from 10 years or so ago... Ugh---

[+adamantyr]

The later Databiotics cartridges (Sold in Triton/TM Direct catalogs from the mid-80's to early 90's) were a mix of impressive work and utter crap.

 

Good ones are:

- Spot Shot (Dragonflyer)

- Red Baron Flight Simulator

- Junkman Jr.

 

A very bad one, though, is Star Trap. I bought this game expecting a cool Star Wars type simulation game... instead I get something I could write in TI Extended BASIC and with about as much excitement as watching mold grow.

 

Adamantyr

[Opry99er]

What!? Hunt the Wumpus is one of the best games EVER.

 

Agreed

[S1500]

I'm amazed Parsec(not Beyond...) is getting such a bad rep. Yeah, looking back it's no R-Type, but it had a bit more depth than say, Car Wars. The Atarisoft games were a sight for sore eyes back then. They were significantly better than the usual round of games we're used to.

 

TI-Runner was good, even though you had double-height dudes.A pretty darn good LodeRunner clone.

 

What amazes me are the games I discovered only a few years ago. A Boulder Dash clone? Oh heck yes.

[+save2600]

The Hen Pecked song... Also in Chicken Coop (which is the same exact game--- EXACT)--- it's just a terrible piece of music... I think a team of monkeys in a room just typed a bunch of BYTE data into the soundlist and they eventually came up with the monstrosity that was put into the game.

 

Hen Pecked/Chicken Coop... besides the terrible music, what's up with the collision detection and sprites that would just disappear for no reason? lol For decades, I thought I just had a bad cartridge, but nope. They're all like that.

 

I tried so hard to like that game back in the day because I really loved Joust. Too bad Atarisoft never released it commercially. Anyone have a ROM of it they've played? Be nice to see some screen shots and see the game in action, but last I read (IIRC), none exist.

Edited October 26, 2010 by save2600

[Opry99er]

Sorry--- double post.

Edited October 26, 2010 by Opry99er

[Opry99er]

I played a game in the mid-90s that has stuck in my head for 15 years... It was a Joust-like game for the old Macintosh 7.something OS. It was freeware, and called "Moth!". It is the game by which all joust-ish games are measured in my mind. Geez, wish like hell I could play that game again.... One of those life-long memories. For me, up there with The best of em.

[Opry99er]

I played a game in the mid-90s that has stuck in my head for 15 years... It was a Joust-like game for the old Macintosh 7.something OS. It was freeware, and called "Moth!". It is the game by which all joust-ish games are measured in my mind. Geez, wish like hell I could play that game again.... One of those life-long memories. For me, up there with The best of em.

[Opry99er]

I remember loving Alpiner because I had a speech synth and it was hilarious hearing the "commentator" say "stepped right into that one.". Hahahaha!!! Hours of playing!!!

 

I recently gave "Tombstone City" another go, after reading and participating in this thread... I remember that game VERY fondly, but when I played it the other day, I could scarcely believe it was the same game! The visuals were the same, but I remembered so much more interactive action. Of course, that is from a flawed perspective--- 25 years later and spoiled by "Halo" and "Red Dead Revolver."

 

I still can't say Tombstone City is the worst.... About a year ago I started typing in the Tombstone City source code-- didn't get far though... None of it made sense to me at the time---

[+retroclouds]

I tried so hard to like that game back in the day because I really loved Joust. Too bad Atarisoft never released it commercially. Anyone have a ROM of it they've played? Be nice to see some screen shots and see the game in action, but last I read (IIRC), none exist.

 

I didn't know that Joust was to be released by Atarisoft. Then again, I didn't know that about Robotron 2084 as well

[snume]

My Mom was the one in our house you seemed to really like and was really good at Tombstone City. I vividly remember getting off the bus after school and coming in to the house and seeing her sitting at the TI with her coffee cup and a heaping ashtray on top of it and being at level 80 or so having played it between her household chores for the whole day! It was not an uncomon site. She did the same with the Attack and Chisholm Trail. She would have been in her early to mid Forties at the time. Seemed wierd at the time as she never grew up with video games like our generation did, but it's not too long before I'll be in my mid Forties myself and if I had the time, I'd easily spend the entire day playing a game like Gears of War, Halo, Mass Effect, Red Faction Guerilla, etc.

 

That's one of my favourite memories of the TI.

 

And my sister would always yell back at the TI when it made fun of her in Alpiner or Parsec when she died or fell down the mountain. We thought it was hilarious.

 

We never got a Cassette Recorder or a Disk Drive with our TI, I only got them this past year (as well as a CF7+) so I would spend days writing up a program on graph paper or copying it out of a book or magazine and then spend an hour or 2 typing and debugging it on the TI, then we'd run it and play for an evening and then when it got turned off at the end of the night, poof. That happened countless times. When we got our Coleco ADAM, it was a godsend that I could save my programs and essays for homework on the data packs. Never got as much into programming on it as the TI, the basic just wasn't as good for simple games, etc.

 

I never had Miner 2049er for the TI but we DID have it for the Coleco and I enjoyed it a lot. Probably one of the better Coleco games I played, along with BurgerTime.

 

I will load up each of the games on the list and have my 2 girls play them with me and then I'll post our rankings as well as vote then for the biggest turd. But it may not be for a few weeks.

Edited November 1, 2010 by snume

[Vorticon]

I was truly disappointed by Alpiner. I didn't like that. Of course Zero Zap was a heaping pile too... But some of your choices I quite liked (Miner 2049'er & Car Wars). And, Indoor Soccer could've been done better in XB. Dunno who got that job, but they should be fired.

 

Funny Alpiner is one of my all time favorites The vagaries of human likes and dislikes never ceases to amaze me

[+Lee Stewart]

I'm not much of a gamer, but I do fondly remember TI Invaders and, especially, Super Demon Attack. It's actually pretty difficult for me to play SDA because of the memories it always evokes of the illness and death of my first wife from cancer in 1984. I would play it for long periods of time to take my mind off of reality for awhile.

 

As for the worst game, I always thought Tombstone City was a little lame, but I played it anyway, back in the day---from the disks that came with the EA cartridge.

 

...lee

[GratedTopping]

"Espial" was one of the biggest stinkers to me. The graphics weren't the smoothest and the small music-bit repeated forever and it truly got on my nerves.

"SUPER Mario Bros." was up-there as being quite bad, too. I appreciated having something that was based on a popular game, but it was really confusing and not enjoyable. The countdown timer was too fast; everything would scroll crazy; the music was annoying; you couldn't go down a tube; nothing really worked.

Now, "Beyond Parsec" was a complete turd in the garbage and gets my vote for a worst game. It was two-players only and all you did was shoot asteroids, that didn't explode, and try to make your opponent hit one. The screen didn't scroll; the laser never overheated; there was no lift selection (though it wasn't necessary); no voice; no other enemies to avoid. It was so dull and I still remember my first time playing thinking "What the heck is this?" I was suprised that it was from John Phillips. His "4A Flyer" was pretty-much a toy flight simulator. His "MoonMine" was fine and the "MunchMan II" was a correct example of a followup.

I actually liked "Zero Zap" a lot and still think it's good to play. I thought it was creative and I felt it was neat being able to set up the playing field when I wanted. It was cool never knowing if a zero would appear and you'd lose one of the players. I also thought "The Attack" was alright. The numbers counting down...trying to shoot down the spores before they'd combine to form an enemy...it made it a bit intense, knowing something was about to happen, and it was fun to me. I'm surprised so many didn't like them.

Edited January 6, 2014 by GratedTopping

[Omega-TI]

I decided to bring this up to the top...

There may be new people who've never seen or voted in this TOTALLY AWESOME survey!

[+OLD CS1]

"Miner 2049er" by far. Playing that game was like seeing blood in your urine. It is horrid. The music is horrid. The graphics are terrible. Yet it received such acclaim back in the day, perhaps because it was available on every platform in existence. I have to say I played it once on the Atari and thought "eh, it's okay."

 

I finally got my hands on one last year sometime. I finally got rid of it this year in a batch of other games. Lost money on the deal, over-all, but I just cannot keep a polished turd just because it might be "rare" or whatever; it be a turd, still.