15 of the Worst Video Games Ever

[martyrdrebel27]

Right, guys. I have taken the deserved criticism onboard and have now edited the piece to be more original: http://culturedvultures.com/15-worst-video-games-ever-made. I know that your opinion of me is tarnished but I hope this goes a little way to mending it.

Sorry for any contention or immaturity on my part during this thread, I lost my head a little bit but would still like to be a part of this community.

good shit man. i hope that people see your contrition and give it a second shot. people need the chance to learn from mistakes.

 

[Jimmy Donnellan]

thank you. no seriously, and not in a "oh good, this jerk's gonna shut up." way, but in a "thank you for taking the advice." kinda way. i understand, as a writer myself (though not as a journalist), that criticism can be hard to handle. but there are a few things to note. 1. putting yourself in public will ALWAYS draw criticism. even the most popular artists, writers, bloggers, etc. have their detractors. and even in the trolliest of posts, there can be learned just the slightest bit about how you may improve as a writer. and i think there's even a level of subterfuge in taking a person's hateful comment and making yourself better from it. you turned their negative shit into your positive change. as much as they hated you, they helped you. you have to find that satisfaction. and 2. i kinda think you kinda knew this might happen. you apologized for the low quality, meaning you knew it was inferior. so the criticism shouldn't have been a surprise. you're obviously motivated, interested in contributing to the community, and have some experience. that's half the battle there. and really, had you made your own comments on each, a brief snarky synopsis, the list could have been copypasted but we would have appreciated it more because you lent your voice to it.

and lastly, i get it dude, i've been tired, pissed about other things, and said some shit i wish i hadn't, ESPECIALLY on the internet. there's not a person in this thread who hasn't done the same. nobody here will hate you for all time because of what's happened here.

I can't say this without it seeming phoned-in, but thanks for the advice. I am not going to post half-assed content anymore, as much as it kills me to write after the working day.

Updated the article based on what you and some of the other guys were saying.

 

[Jimmy Donnellan]

Right, guys. I have taken the deserved criticism onboard and have now edited the piece to be more original: http://culturedvultures.com/15-worst-video-games-ever-made. I know that your opinion of me is tarnished but I hope this goes a little way to mending it.

Sorry for any contention or immaturity on my part during this thread, I lost my head a little bit but would still like to be a part of this community.

good shit man. i hope that people see your contrition and give it a second shot. people need the chance to learn from mistakes.

Thanks man, even linked back to this thread from the article.

 

[Flammablezeus]

I'm really surprised that Big Rigs isn't on the list. I mean all the other popular ones are on the list yet Big Rigs is probably more mechanically broken than any of those games.

 

[Mutant1988]

Right, guys. I have taken the deserved criticism onboard and have now edited the piece to be more original: http://culturedvultures.com/15-worst-video-games-ever-made. I know that your opinion of me is tarnished but I hope this goes a little way to mending it.

Sorry for any contention or immaturity on my part during this thread, I lost my head a little bit but would still like to be a part of this community.

Much better.

The reason why you drew ire is because you did make a considerable mistake and acted extremely unapologetic and dismissive when it was pointed out.

Fess up to it, sincerely and make amends and most people will give you a second shot. At least as long as all the internet doesn't have it out for you.

Had you been a couple of hundred times more popular then yeah, that would pretty much end that career. There is reasons to be vary of making these mistakes.

I still think you made a MASSIVE faux pas to upload that in the first place. But you've fixed it now and if other people like it, then I can just shut up.

I've seen, but never played, any and all of those games. And I'd say I feel good for doing so...

But Sonic 2006 is nowhere on this list, so I'm confused. Side-stepping EVERYTHING outside of gameplay; it's barely functional as a game at all. Shaq-fu is not worse than Sonic 06.

Oh yeah, Sonic 2006 is ridiculously bad. And no, that's not just people's disappointment speaking. It really, really is that bad.

It is pretty much a rogue-like. Because the bugs are so severe that it's a different experience each time it's played. It's essentially pre-alpha and that with a terrible design document (Because a lot of the things actually designed seem an absolute chore to play).

I can't say this without it seeming phoned-in, but thanks for the advice. I am not going to post half-assed content anymore, as much as it kills me to write after the working day.

Updated the article based on what you and some of the other guys were saying.

Hey, no one is going to kill you for not uploading an article every single day.

Put in a few days of work into the articles and you'll see that they will turn out better and be much better received when they get out there.

 

[Signa]

Wow OP, I wasn't going bother shitting on your article, but the adjustments you just made are incredible. Night and day man, night and day.

We had our Gallery of the Day here on this site, and there was many times where it's quality dipped as low as your original post. I remember one that said "why [game x] is still relevant" and it just posted a bunch of screens from other games in the series. I remember my reply was "why Castlevania is still relevant" and then posted the last 8 2D games they made that were great. It was just as "great" of an article, and I got several replies saying I should write for The Escapist since it was that similar.

 

[Mutant1988]

Wow OP, I wasn't going bother shitting on your article, but the adjustments you just made are incredible. Night and day man, night and day.

We had our Gallery of the Day here on this site, and there was many times where it's quality dipped as low as your original post. I remember one that said "why [game x] is still relevant" and it just posted a bunch of screens from other games in the series. I remember my reply was "why Castlevania is still relevant" and then posted the last 8 2D games they made that were great. It was just as "great" of an article, and I got several replies saying I should write for The Escapist since it was that similar.

Got a good example of that from a recent featured article:

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/video-games/features/galleryoftheday/12869-8-Video-Games-That-Are-Better-Than-The-Movies-That-Spawned-Them.3

Hey, Schuyler J. Dievendorf. You might want to do at least one google search to actually check if the screen shot you add is actually from the right game.

I'd also suggest a footnote/caption for the image that tells everyone where you got it from. Basics people - Basics.

 

[Rayce Archer]

You know what's funny is I got a warning from the mods in one of the gamergate threads for suggesting that a guy should think of his daughter being treated the way he was talking about Zoe Quinn, but JD there is using the forum to promote articles he's basically stealing from a real website and nothing.

I think the Escapist just hates me.

OH GOD I WAS JUST JOKING PLEASE DON'T BE MAD I LIKE IT HERE AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH

 

[Mutant1988]

You know what's funny is I got a warning from the mods in one of the gamergate threads for suggesting that a guy should think of his daughter being treated the way he was talking about Zoe Quinn, but JD there is using the forum to promote articles he's basically stealing from a real website and nothing.

I think the Escapist just hates me.

OH GOD I WAS JUST JOKING PLEASE DON'T BE MAD I LIKE IT HERE AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH

The moderation seems rather haphazard and inconsistent.

I've been even more confrontational (Which is bad, I suppose) in all my other discussion than I were in the one where I got moderated.

Chalk it up to moderators being human too.

Watch me get moderated for having the gall to suggest such a thing.

 

[Elvis Starburst]

Now I'm curious bout the original article that helped rip you a new one to the point of change. But, I at least enjoyed the edited version for what it was. I enjoyed it less when I found out the screens were already taken from elsewhere, but, there's always gonna be that sort of thing if you don't go out and get them yourself. I read every post here, and I can at least say you made a good improvement in general. Like someone suggested, don't be afraid to post an article once every few days. Take some time, put it together, structure it, put in some care and effort and it'll become something much better than any slapped together mess.

Keep posting. Throw these early posts to the underground depths and come back with several hundred, to the point we don't even remember when ya came around.

 

[Yopaz]

Starting your tirade with sarcasm is a really effective way of getting your point across, kudos on that one.

I cited the source, so I really am struggling to take anything you lobby at me about plagiarism seriously. Do you honestly think I would be stupid enough to post an article here with my name on it if I had claimed to write the whole thing despite quoting a source? Seriously, look at the bottom of the article. It is a dofollow link and everything.

As for the "plugging" you speak of, pageviews mean nothing to me. I see no personal benefit from a few extra clicks from jaded forum trawlers. I was just trying to start a conversation.

I'll accept that I didn't add anything new to the "article", and that's my bad. It is shitty journalism and I would make excuses, but they would probably just add fuel to your fire.

Let me explain something to you here. There's is citing and there is plagiarism. Just because you cite a source that doesn't exempt you from plagiarism and just because you do nothing but take information from various sources that doesn't make it plagiarism.

When I write an article I will start off by explaining my goal. I will then present relevant background theory, citing every relevant source that I have used to form my hypothesis. I will then explain my methods, again citing sources to explain why I chose those methods for my setup. I will then discuss my results, compare those with other sources, use previously known similar experiments to explain what my findings mean and then draw a conclusion that can not contain more than what the accuracy of my methods and result allow.

Now that's a lot of sources and if I do things right then that's not plagiarism. However if I take something directly from an article, a graph, figure or quoting a paragraph directly I explicitly have to say that this is taken directly from that source with no modification at all. If I am caught doing something like that my entire article will be retracted, I will most likely get blacklisted which means that I will no longer be trusted to publish articles and I will not be allowed to do research for years to come.

You did not state that you had taken things directly from another list, you cited a source, but that's still not good enough to avoid plagiarism. Your article contains a few lines of text that's your own and 15 pictures from games ripped directly off another site with no explicit mention of the fact that it's taken directly from another site. The fact that you have only played one of those games is also quite telling when it comes to the overall quality. This isn't your opinion, it isn't your thought processes. We get a list where you have seemingly just chosen random entries of another list and presented it as your own.

Argue all you want about the fact that you provided a source, but if you had tried to do something similar in an actual article you would have lost all your credibility and maybe your job.

Edit: I see that you have edited the article since the first time I saw it. That's good, but I'd still argue that it isn't really your list. Keep all the criticism you have received here in mind.

I'm sorry... where's "Big Rigs" on the list?

It's in the original article he got all the images from. Big Rigs should always be on the list considering the game is barely functional.

 

[Mutant1988]

The fact that you have only played one of those games is also quite telling when it comes to the overall quality. This isn't your opinion, it isn't your thought processes. We get a list where you have seemingly just chosen random entries of another list and presented it as your own.

This is something to take to heart. It's not interesting to read an article which is just a compilation of other people's opinion and it's really not that interesting to write such a thing either. Even if it's not literally copy pasting it, it's still not a reflection of your views.


What we want, what you should work on, is to present your opinion on these games (Or games you have played you consider bad) in a way that makes it entertaining and interesting to read. If that takes more than one after work session to write then it's worth it.

If you have to cut the selection down to 5 games, some which really aren't that bad, then so be it. It's still going to be a much better article than the alternative.


And it is okay to make mistakes, but a person needs to fess up to mistakes they have made and not just lash out. Doing so can be disastrous. If you are uncertain about how to cite and properly format quotes, then google it. If in doubt, insert a link to where you found whatever you are using. Be especially careful about using content created by other people if you make ad revenue. Even if no one can claim copyright of a screenshot, it's bad style to use theirs instead of creating your own.

And past a certain point, you can't afford to make these kinds of mistakes at all, like Yopaz explained, it can permanently kill your credibility as a writer or as a professional in general.

 

[Jimmy Donnellan]

The fact that you have only played one of those games is also quite telling when it comes to the overall quality. This isn't your opinion, it isn't your thought processes. We get a list where you have seemingly just chosen random entries of another list and presented it as your own.

You know what's funny is I got a warning from the mods in one of the gamergate threads for suggesting that a guy should think of his daughter being treated the way he was talking about Zoe Quinn, but JD there is using the forum to promote articles he's basically stealing from a real website and nothing.

I think the Escapist just hates me.

OH GOD I WAS JUST JOKING PLEASE DON'T BE MAD I LIKE IT HERE AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH

I enjoyed it less when I found out the screens were already taken from elsewhere, but, there's always gonna be that sort of thing if you don't go out and get them yourself.

Sincerely, thank you all for the critiques. I am quite ashamed for my previous "effort": it is far below what is expected of me as an editor for Cultured Vultures. My behaviour towards you guys has also been reprehensible and I understand if my earlier arrogance paints me in a bad light in your eyes.

I have now edited the piece to a standard which I hope is somewhat agreeable. Have been slaving over it on Valentine's Day as the girlfriend grinds her way through Destiny. Some of the edits include:

- 1634 words of original copy
- Removal of the publication ratings
- Added a further ten games that I have actually played
- Added a poll
- Quoted image sources

Please provide any further feedback you would like as it would be welcomed. As an aside, would you suggest also adding video embeds to enrich it?

 

[kalakashi]

I hate to just jump on the bandwagon but this is not a good article. I was expecting some detail on what made the games bad, specific examples that might demonstrate why the game sucked, not "it was a bad game and has bad graphics".

Rambo -
"shoddy graphics, poor mechanics and painful cutscenes". What about the graphics, anything particularly outstanding? Which mechanics, and how? Painful cutscenes - guess I'll take your word for it?
Oh also "one of the worst games of the noughties" - it isn't the noughties anymore. That was 2000-2009.

Dragonball: Evolution -
"What could go wrong? Oh yeah, everything." But you don't name a single thing.

Batman: Dark Tomorrow -
"The poor, inexcusable AI and drab design" perhaps describe the inexcusable AI?

Catwoman -
"insipid gameplay" again, I guess I'll take your word.

Link: The Faces of Evil -
"Here?s a prime example of too much of a good thing. The fact that Nintendo had nothing to do with its production should tell you enough." I mean, that's everything you have to say on the game? You have literally not communicated any information about the game whatsoever.

Superman 64 -
"There?s little else to be said about Superman 64 that hasn?t already been said a billion times." is what you've written. What I read was "other people have written about this and I'm going to assume you've read what they said, so I won't bother."

Ethnic Cleansing -
"A game which I haven?t played and have no intentions of ever doing" why the hell is it on the list then? Maybe the gameplay is fantastic!

If I were to run through the rest I think I'd just be repeating points I've already made. As far as I can tell from the thread, this article previously was just the titles and pictures. You've basically added words, but no actual content.

BONUS ROUND - spelling/grammar/typos
Shaq-Fu -
"More-so"'More so' has no hyphen. It is either 'moreso' or 'more so'.
"Shaquille?s O?Neal"

Batman: Dark Tomorrow -
"It?s easy to forgot"

The Slaughtering Grounds -
"on a early"

Duke Nukem: Forever -
"completely slipped me being, what with me being"
"I thought, ?why not?." - this is a question without a mark.

The Mission -
"stands out like a thumb" - you mean like a sore thumb?

Also generally lots of commas where none are needed, or commas where there should be a semicolon. This might seem a little petty but y'know, if your job is writing.

 

[Jimmy Donnellan]

I hate to just jump on the bandwagon but this is not a good article. I was expecting some detail on what made the games bad, specific examples that might demonstrate why the game sucked, not "it was a bad game and has bad graphics".

Your comments are probably the most critical of all so far, so I can't help but be a little bit hurt. Thanks for the feedback though. Have amended the article for the typos (didn't have a proofreader to hand) and expanded on some of the worst offenders.

 

[Elfgore]

A few of these games, Superman 64, E.T., and Big Rigs, should no longer be on these lists. Pretty much everyone and their mother knows those games are terrible. And I also have to wonder how many of the people who put them on the list have even played those games? I rather have a personalized list than one I've seen a dozen times before.

 

[kalakashi]

Your comments are probably the most critical of all so far, so I can't help but be a little bit hurt. Thanks for the feedback though. Have amended the article for the typos (didn't have a proofreader to hand) and expanded on some of the worst offenders.

Having read some of your edits after my post (some of them good and informative, some of them seeming a little filler-y) I think the main problem is actually this type of article in general. The enjoyment of a "worst games" article is derived from very specific detail about individual games, usually needing some visual aid like a gif or video so that readers can laugh at the thought-processes behind certain mechanics and/or imagine the frustration of playing themselves. That requires at least a couple of paragraphs per game I'd reckon, and so doing "25 worst games" seems an insurmountable task. You simply can't list that many games and include enough information to make a quality article, unless you're going to have a ridiculously long article, spending weeks writing it. What would be better is just 5 games, but a number of different examples from each.

In short, you want an article which, after reading, somebody can say "did you ever play Rambo? apparently there's a mission in which such-and-such-ridiculous-thing happens, a cutscene that looks like blah-blah, and the ending, man, you've gotta see it!"
With 25 games, you just can't get anything more than "did you ever play Rambo? Apparently the graphics were crap".

 

[Jimmy Donnellan]

In short, you want an article which, after reading, somebody can say "did you ever play Rambo? apparently there's a mission in which such-and-such-ridiculous-thing happens, a cutscene that looks like blah-blah, and the ending, man, you've gotta see it!"
With 25 games, you just can't get anything more than "did you ever play Rambo? Apparently the graphics were crap".

Thanks for getting back to me, you're on the money with the length comment. Though I think limiting it to just 5 might result in people saying, "where is ABC?" and, "how could you miss out XYZ?". Maybe ten would have been better with 500 words for each but then you have to consider time constraints again. It's especially disheartening when you put a lot of effort and don't reach the audience you think it deserves so it's important to find a happy medium. I have a lot of respect for the guys at WhatCulture and the lengths they go to with their lists but it's just not feasible for Cultured Vultures.

I know I may not be the best writer and have never professed to even being good, but I enjoy it. I'm not going to edit this article any further, it's fair to say I've been a little obsessive over it since the critiques poured in. It's actually the first article I've written which has had negative feedback, believe it or not.

 

[kalakashi]

Thanks for getting back to me, you're on the money with the length comment. Though I think limiting it to just 5 might result in people saying, "where is ABC?" and, "how could you miss out XYZ?". Maybe ten would have been better with 500 words for each but then you have to consider time constraints again. It's especially disheartening when you put a lot of effort and don't reach the audience you think it deserves so it's important to find a happy medium. I have a lot of respect for the guys at WhatCulture and the lengths they go to with their lists but it's just not feasible for Cultured Vultures.

I know I may not be the best writer and have never professed to even being good, but I enjoy it. I'm not going to edit this article any further, it's fair to say I've been a little obsessive over it since the critiques poured in. It's actually the first article I've written which has had negative feedback, believe it or not.

Yeah, I can imagine it's a bit of a balancing act between providing detailed content and reaching a sizeable audience. Something that's very difficult to do but very easy to criticise when not done correctly.

I took a very brief glance at some of your articles, and that's what cemented my thinking that this '25 worst games' might be a bit anomalous. Like I say, it was only a brief look so I can't say much, but nothing struck out at me the same way this article did, so I wouldn't put too much stock into the critiques in this thread (at least as a marker of your overall ability). Good luck in the future!