The ABSOLUTE worst games of all time.

[retrorussell]

Yeah, there's no way Empire Strikes Back even comes close to qualifying for "worst game of all time".

Well, I remember disliking it quite a bit back in the day. It's been a while, maybe someday I'll pick it up again. Kinda busy with other games right now though.

 

Intellvision's Donkey Kong was pretty awful. As was Mousetrap.

[mbd30]

At worst, "Empire Strikes Back" might strike some as a bland, repetitive horizontal shooter. But it's too well made and playable to be a "worst game ever" candidate. It's even got rudimentary parallax scrolling.

[mtshark7]

Sega Master System - Psycho Fox makes me want to go psycho and smash the hell outta the game!

[Chuck D. Head]

Well, I remember disliking it quite a bit back in the day. It's been a while, maybe someday I'll pick it up again. Kinda busy with other games right now though.

 

Intellvision's Donkey Kong was pretty awful. As was Mousetrap.

 

I think the Inty Mousetrap was technically a pretty good port. But I found it impossible to play; using three buttons for the different color doors was just too much. I much prefer the 2600 version.

[Emehr]

Well, I remember disliking it quite a bit back in the day. It's been a while, maybe someday I'll pick it up again

 

Not liking the game is cool. There are plenty of good games that I don't like but this thread is about "absolute worst" games. I interpret that as games with no redeemable gameplay value, buggy programming, visuals that fail, and so on.

 

I haven't owned many games which I would put in this category. The only stand-out, and I'm sure I've already mentioned this in the thread, is Panic! for SegaCD. It's not just a matter of me not liking it. The "game" has absolutely no gameplay to speak of. For that, I rate it absolute worst.[/background][/size][/font][/color]

Edited June 7, 2013 by Emehr

[BrianC]

Sega Master System - Psycho Fox makes me want to go psycho and smash the hell outta the game!

 

I like this one quite a bit myself. It's far from the worst game of all time. It's definitely much better than the similar Kid Kool on NES (which I also like) and even fixes some of that games flaws (hidden items that are too easy to hit and throw off momentum and flip scrolling vertically). I had no problem with the three button scheme on Intellvision and Colecovision for Mouse Trap (though CV allows you to move and open doors at the same time, which isn't true of the Intellivision version. Too bad it didn't let you use one controller for movement and one for other functions like Night Trap and Tron Deadly Discs) and found both versions to be nice ports.

[+thegoldenband]

There's no way the Atari 2600 Empire Strikes Back can have a spot on a "worst game" list, because the Intellivision version is much worse.

 

Also, I like Panic. It's very "non-traditional" to say the least, but if you go into it with the right frame of mind, I think it can be entertaining. It's really not so different from other FMV games like Wirehead, or even (blasphemy!) Dragon's Lair. It's basically a maze of absurdist skits (some funny, some not), and the only real task is to find the path that gets you to the end.

[Gabriel]

Here's some more fuel for the fire.

 

A/X-101

 

This game isn't unplayable. I've even played it all the way through once. It probably doesn't deserve to be mentioned in the same sentence with Ballz 3d or the Make My Video games. But it's still bad. A/X-101 is like what Eugene Jarvis said Defender was like before he punched up the gameplay: "It's like staring at an aquarium." There is hardly any action in this rail shooter. Enemies are sparse, and the visuals are a grey, pixelated mess. The CGI which was used for this game looked embarrassingly primitive even when the game was new. I mean, it looked bad compared to Starblade on the SegaCD, and that game consisted of ambiguous wireframes most of the time.

 

 

Kartia

 

I'm probably being unfair to this game. In fact, I honestly don't remember what I found so objectionable about this one, but I LOATHED it. I hated it so much that it became a black hole in my memory. For a while, this game actually made me scared to buy TRPGs, and I almost passed up Brigandine and Vanguard Bandits because of it.

 

 

Defender (PS2)

 

Take Defender. Take everything fun out of it. Make it a 3d game where you wander around bland 3d environments almost devoid of enemies. You will end up with this game. I bought this game and was getting rid of it the very next day it was so bad. It simultaneously takes a dump on the legacy of a fantastic arcade game and arcade flight sims. It's ugly, only marginally playable, boring, and doesn't have much of any redeeming value.

 

 

Warhammer: Shadow of the Horned Rat

 

I suppose this is another which I'll get grief over. I found this game absolutely unplayable. The interface was almost completely useless. About all I could do was hint to my troops to vaguely do something akin to something I might want them to do and they MIGHT actually do it several minutes later. The difficulty spiked and became a vertical wall in about the second or third mission. I suppose I might have been playing it wrong, but it certainly didn't seem worth the effort of figuring out how to do things right.

[pixelated]

Karate (2600)

Dark Castle (NES)

Superman (N64)

 

The holy trinity of doom.

[Mxyzptlk]

Karate (2600)

Dark Castle (NES)

Superman (N64)

 

The holy trinity of doom.

Yep, at least 2 of those are complete garbage. I have never played Dark Castle and I probably don't want to.

[BrianC]

Yep, at least 2 of those are complete garbage. I have never played Dark Castle and I probably don't want to.

 

I don't think anyone has played Dark Castle on NES.

[SoulBlazer]

I don't think anyone has played Dark Castle on NES.

I've never even heard of the game, and I'm a huge NES fan.

[The Dord]

Batman: Dark Tomorrow for the GC/XBOX. Atrocious gameplay, bad controls and ugly graphics. This game was widely panned at the time and I made a mistake of renting it.

[high voltage]

Club Drive on Jaguar, some people like it, but I think it stinks

[xDragonWarrior]

I've never even heard of the game, and I'm a huge NES fan.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y4-7mWeY_Cs chose the AVGN video because the others don't show how shitty this game really is .There is also a shittier CD-I version which is also in the video

Edited June 10, 2013 by xDragonWarrior

[xDragonWarrior]

Sorry double post but Now thinking about it,Plumbers Don't Wear Ties is the worst game of all time,case closed,end of discussion.With the other games you guys mentioned, at least you can play it and it has at least one redeeming value,With Plumbers Don't Wear Ties has none.It claims to have full motion video but is only has it for the first 2-3 minutes.The rest is a slideshow of what's happening.Even when you have to pick up your controller to choose how to story unfolds is a pain(you only pick up your controller like 3 times the whole game).Each choice has to be read so if you want choice D you have to listen to choice A,B,C,and D.So it's unbearably shitty.If this game had some good jokes than i would give it some credit for having some good jokes and wouldn't be as bad but the acting and jokes are horrible.E.T.(2600),Aquaman(GC),Club drive(Jag),Dark Castle(Gen/CD-I),Psycho fox(SMS),karate,Defender(PS2),Panic!(CD),Empire strikes back(2600) and even Superman 64 has some sort of interactivity and is "playable", Plumber Don't Wear Ties dosen't.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyaF_gCKWsI

Edited June 10, 2013 by xDragonWarrior

[pixelated]

Oh I forgot about Deadly Towers for NES. That's worse than a lot of the games we're mentioning.

 

[CatPix]

Sorry double post but Now thinking about it,Plumbers Don't Wear Ties is the worst game of all time,case closed,end of discussion.

IT'S NOT A GAME.

 

Dammit, that's an interactive movie! Not because it's on the 3DO means it's a game! Calling this a game is like calling a "choose your own adventure" book a board game because you have to use a dice!

 

You can't even call it a FMV game or a slideshow game. Even the worsts FMV/slideshow games requires you to have memory and reflexes, or to look around to find things.

 

"Plumber don't wear ties" is just an interactive story (and a really bad one) but it certainly doesn't even get close to be considered like a game in any way.

[+thegoldenband]

^Ha, I was just about to post about PDWT, since my fiancée and I "beat" it tonight (and had a few laughs along the way). I think your argument has real validity -- and in addition, you can't "lose" at PDWT, you just retry until you find the right path.

 

In any event, I think PDWT isn't even the worst release on the 3DO -- Alfred Hitchcock Presents gets that title in my book. PDWT at least made us laugh with its bizarro, half-assed sensibility, while Alfred Hitchcock Presents is just a horrible, cheating fraud of a game.

[Lentzquest]

Plumbers Don't Wear Ties has redeeming qualities, even if it's just the WTF novelty factor. I chuckle at how awful some of the scenes are that AVGN put into his video. Something like Sssnake or White Men Can't Jump doesn't even have that.

[BrianC]

Title Match Pro Wrestling. It's from Absolute and it's bad.

[SoulBlazer]

Oh I forgot about Deadly Towers for NES. That's worse than a lot of the games we're mentioning.

 

Now I liked this game. Yes, it's a simple game with graphics and control. Yes, it's frustrating. Yes, you have to map everything and spend about 6 months on it to get anywhere. But if you give it the time, it's a fun game. Of course, today, I understand no one wanting to look at it. It hasn't aged well.

Edited June 12, 2013 by SoulBlazer

[Segataritensoftii]

Dark Castle (NES)

Are you sure you don't mean Dragon's Lair? The two games do look kind of similar to each other. Maybe you confused them.

[pixelated]

Are you sure you don't mean Dragon's Lair? The two games do look kind of similar to each other. Maybe you confused them.

 

I confused the systems. Dark Castle is on the Genesis. But yeah, Dragon's Lair on the NES is a steaming bucket of pus, too. I guess I forgot about that one...on purpose.

[high voltage]

Man Enough on PC