Top 10 Worst Games MMN Has Played

Ok, every gaming website has their top ten list of the best games they’ve ever played. Then in 2006, things changed when James “Angry Video Game Nerd” Rolfe became an Internet phenomenon. His character reviews some of the worst games of all time. So, in tribute to the AVGN, I thought I’d compile my own list of the worst games I’ve ever personally played.

10. Sonic 3D Blast (1996, Sega, Genesis/Mega Drive)
I actually liked this game when it first came out, but it hasn’t aged well. Take all the things that make Sonic awesome, and get rid of them. Blast switched to an psudo-3D isometric view, was slow, and gameplay was clumsy. The basic premise was to rescue all the flickies from their robot prisons and return them to their dimension through power rings. I remember the most irritating part of this game for me when I first got it was it’s lack of a save feature, which Sonic 3 and Sonic CD had introduced. It’s Game Gear version was equally bad.

9. Echochrome (2008, Sony, PS3)
A real snoozer of a title that had you chasing “echos” in an MC Escher stylized environment. Tilt the screen to open new paths. No score, no time limits, no way of dying, no colours, no good music, no entertainment value. Echochrome is way too artsy and mind numbing for my tastes. It is just so unbelievably bland and pointless. I like to think of it as the Sinefeld of video games. It’s a game about nothing that everybody seems to love but me.

8. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (1992, Sega, Game Gear)
Sonic 2 for the Genesis was a great game, Sonic 2 for the Game Gear was not. I think the problem was that it was just too freaking hard. I never had a Game Gear myself because quite frankly, it was a load of crap itself. I had a friend who had one with Sonic 2. I could never even make it past the first level boss. One hit and you’re dead, there’s no room for error. You have to dodge these silver death balls that seem to come from all over the place. Unless you’ve memorized the pattern and know exactly where to stand, you’re in for some frustration. Even now, the only way I can beat it is by using an emulator with a save state function. I’ve never seen such a hard boss for the first level in a Sonic game. The second level introduced the infamous hang glider, which had awful controls. The later levels aren’t so bad but the first too are just so brutal, it really sours you off continuing.

7. Virtual Bart (1994, Acclaim, Genesis/SNES)
I love the Simpsons, I grew up watching it and I still watch it even if the newer episodes aren’t that good. Games based on the Simpsons have traditionally been quite poor but Virtual Bart is probably one of the worst I’ve played, though I haven’t played many. It’s a series of mini games, which seems like a good idea until you realize it has punishing difficulty and broken controls. The worst ones for me happen to be baby Bart, the Slaughterhouse (Krusty’s pork cannery!) and the Mount Splashmore waterslide.

6. Haze (2008, Ubisoft, PS3)
A lot of hype went into this game. It was supposed to be the must have game for Playstation 3 in 2008, aside from MGS4. We were promised fantastic visuals and revolutionary new FPS gameplay. What we got was far from it. Graphics were blurry, gameplay was dull, and it didn’t even run in HD! A classic overhyped title.

5. Sonic the Hedgehog (2006, Sega, PS3/Xbox 360)
Wow, what happened to you Sonic. You used to be rad, the blue blur, the most popular video game character in the world. Maybe it’s time you hung up your red sneakers after your dismal transition to 3D. The 15th anniversary of Sonic turned out to be the worst game the hedgehog has ever graced. Not only do the newer titles not even resemble the Genesis classics, they just are a plain mess. Crippled by bad gameplay mechanics, Sonic The Hedgehog 2006 was practically unplayable. The original Sonic games were known and purposely designed for their ease of gameplay. Sonic Team has certainly lost their way. But hey, Sonic Unleashed was pretty good, once you take out the warehog scenes. Well, maybe not.

4. Iron Man (2008, Sega, Xbox 360/PS3/Wii/PS2/PC)
I reviewed this game here, and it stunk to high heaven. Plagued with poor controls and blurry, awful graphics. It was overly easy and downright dull. Not much else to say that’s not in the review. The perfect example of a bad movie-based game.

3. Blazing Angels: Squadrons of WW2 (2007, Ubisoft, PC)
A game so bad, Ubisoft actually gave up on trying to fix it. The game worked ok, but I had no sound. After installing every single patch, I still had no sound. While I could still play it, there’s not much point if you can’t hear anything. Oddly, sound did work for the intro movies. I have a Soundblaster X-FI XtremeMusic, which is a pretty common and modern gaming sound card that works fine with every other game I have. A lot of people reported all sorts of problems. Ubi eventually announced they had stopped trying to patch the numerous errors and left gamers out on their own.

2. Bioshock (2007, Take Two, PC)
The console versions of the hit Bioshock were not without their problems but the PC version just was a god awful mess. Unlike the #1 on the list, it was playable, sort of, but it sure put up a fight. I had the demo repeatedly BSOD on me right when the bathysphere enters the city, so I didn’t get to enjoy any real gameplay. Those who bought the full retail version complained of similar problems. Bioshock was also one of the first PC games to include strict install limits through the controversial SecuROM DRM scheme. Electronic Arts would be sued for doing the same thing with Spore a year later.

1. Lock-On: Modern Air Combat (2003, Ubisoft, PC)
Here it is in all it’s infamy, the worst flight simulator game I have ever played and probably the worst flight simulator in the history of the genre. I had heard a lot of negative things about it but when I saw it on sale at the store, I thought I might try it out. Some people did say it was good after all. Wow, what an absolute mess. Despite exceeding the recommended system requirements (not just the minimum), the game ran like a slideshow, even on low settings. This what back when I had my Athlon XP 2000+ and a Geforce 6600 128mb, where as the recommended system was an Athlon XP 1500+ and any 128mb card. Patches didn’t solve the problem. LOMAC is the quintessential poorly coded game. It’s good in concept but it was just unplayable. The cherry on top was the inclusion of the now infamous Starforce copy protection scheme which installed unremovable malware (rootkits) on people’s systems and caused a lot of controversy back in 2005. For some reason, realistic modern combat simulators always seem to bomb.