I'm sure many of you have seen James Rolf, better known as the Angry Video Game Nerd. Well, aside from being the person who inspired me to begin collecting video games, he's also the one who inspired me to buy shitty video games. Ask yourself the following: What's more fun to show to/play with your friends, even if only for ten or twenty minutes, an incredibly average game like Bubsy, or a hilariously shitty game like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde? Now, I know I was leading a bit with that question, but honestly, if we break video games down into three basic categories - the great games, the shit games, and the average in-between games, which ones are most fun to play with friends? The good ones and the awful ones, but because they're good, your friends have probably played the good ones.
When I want to have some fun and laughs playing my NES with my friends, they've probably all played Super Mario Bros, Legend of Zelda, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. You know what NONE of them have played, though? Bible Adventures. You know what is probably the crappiest NES game I own (aside from Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, which has cemented itself as "Worst NES Game Ever")? Bible Adventures. I've tried this, and it's true; Bible Adventures offered more laughs than just about any other NES game I have. Don't get me wrong, playing great games like Battletoads and Medal of Honor: Rising Sun is a lot of fun, too, and will stay fun for longer, so I'm not advocating buying bad games instead of good games. What I'm saying is that you should have some of both. No one watches American Idol for the good singers; people watch is for the nails-on-a-chalkboard singers. Games follow the same principle.
So, I'm going to give my Top 10 suggestions for crappy games to play with friends based on what I own or have played a considerable amount.
10. Dragon's Lair (Nintendo Entertainment System)
Angry Video Game Nerd did a great video about this game, and he's actually the only reason I know about it. It's brutally difficult, but that's not what makes it bad - after all, Battletoads is amazing, and it's one of the hardest games ever made. What makes Dragon's Lair truly craptastic is the controls. Seriously, if you drank an entire gallon of Everclear and tried to drive in Grand Theft Auto III, it would STILL be better than trying to play Dragon's Lair completely sober.
9. Corpse Killer (Sega Saturn)
I don't think I need to say too much about this game since I just wrote a blog about it a week ago. The quality of the acting in the FMV is just TERRIBLE, but it's a LOT of fun to play with friends.
8. Super Troll Islands (Super Nintendo Entertainment System)
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This is one of the most bizarre platformers I've EVER played. You're a troll (the creepy naked ones with funky hair), and you have paint a colorless world to purge it of evil. Seriously. That's the whole damn game. It's fantastically stoneriffic.
7. Bible Adventure (Nintendo Entertainment System)
Wisdom Tree must be a giant video game producing anus, because the only thing that ever comes from it is crap. Bible Adventures is another game about which I know because of Angry Video Game Nerd, and I actually managed to get it for $5 at a flea market a few years ago. Want to teach kids about God? Why not make the crappiest game most of them will ever play? There are actually three games on this cartridge, by far the best of which is Noah's Ark. You're a guy who's GOT to be like 70 at least, and you can stack two cows, two oxen, two pigs, and two horses, lift them up over your head, and still sprint so fast that you outrun the screen. PLAY IT. If you have any religiously cynical friends (-ahem- Grant -ahem-), make sure they're there when you play this; they'll enjoy it even more than you will.
6. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
This game was actually the subject of the first AVGN video I ever saw. The line from his theme song "Why don't the weapons do anything?" is about this game. You play as Dr. Jekyll initially, whose cane weapon LITERALLY does nothing to any enemy in the game, until you take enough damage to turn into Mr. Hyde. AVGN dubbed this the worst Nintendo game ever made, and I certainly agree, hence why I had to buy it as soon as I saw that video. It really is a terrible game, and you have no clue what to do.
5. Shaq Fu (Super Nintendo Entertainment System/Sega Genesis)
Why? That's all I can say. Why? I've read numerous "Worst Fighting Game Ever" lists, and Shaq Fu is almost almost number one. The controls are dreadful, but seriously? A Shaquille O'Neil fighting game, let alone one that takes place in a spirit world where you fight demons? Yeah, although this isn't number one on this list because there are games that suck more, this might just be the most fun game to play with friends if you're going on the basis of Crap Factor.
4. Pac-man (Atari 2600)
I know what you're all thinking. "But Pac-man's awesome!!" No, the arcade Pac-man is awesome. The 2600 version is that game's bastard red headed step child. The controls are terrible, the graphics flicker so that you always think the game's messing up, and it's just...awful. It really does ruin Pac-man just a little bit.
3. Cool World (Super Nintendo Entertainment System)
Don't let the name fool you. There's nothing cool about this game. It's based on a movie (I haven't seen it, but I'm scared to if it's anything remotely like the game). I've played a lot of games that didn't make the least bit of sense, but this game is right near the top of that list. I honestly don't have too much to say about the game; I couldn't figure out how to get past the first screen, so I haven't seen too much of it. It makes that little sense.
2. Superman (Nintendo 64)
Ah yes, Superman (or Superman 64 as it's more commonly known, even though "64" was never actually anywhere in the title), my generation's standard for crap. It was by far the most infamous game of the 1990s, and for good reason. Hell, I've seen site give "Superman 64 Awards" for especially terrible games. Plagued by some of the most horrendous controls in gaming history and some of the most absurdly pointless and difficult stages ever, it's a miracle this game wasn't banned by Congress for crimes against humanity. But in all honestly, that honor should be saved for the last game on this list.
1. E.T. (Atari 2600)
Ladies and gentlemen, you are looking at what it widely accepted to be the single worst video game ever made. It is frequently blamed for being the "point of no return" or the "straw that broke the camel's back" of the Video Game Crash of 1982. In the developer's defense (who honestly was an amazing programmer and made some fantastic games), it did go from concept to store shelves in five weeks. That's barely enough time to do a final project for a class, much less make a video game based on a HUGE blockbuster movie. The quality was SO bad, though, that a lot of people already pissed off at Atari's lack of quality control finally snapped. The aforementioned crash sent the video game industry from (correct me if my numbers are wrong) a $2 billion per year industry to a $10 million per year industry. Adjusted for inflation, that's a drop from almost $5 billion per year to less than $24 million per year. Although ET didn't cause that by itself, I do think it's fair to say that it finally kicked the plunge into motion.
HONORABLE MENTION
There is one game that, while not bad enough to be worthy of this list, was just an absolute crap heap. That game is Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter for Playstation 2.
This is the only version that I've played since I'm not a big fan of these games, and I've heard that the Xbox 360 version is much better, but this is just painful to play. It's on the best selling console in history and in the 6th generation of gaming when dual analog was standard, but you know what? You can only move in four directions. No diagonal movement even though there were games that had that in the 1980's. I think the controls really do single handedly kill this game. It's not bad enough to be on my list, but I had to give it a sidenote.
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