I hope like me you try your best to avoid bad video games. Migraines, foaming at the mouth and questioning one’s own existence is not how I want to spend my weekends, well for the most part… But I did scour the internet in search of bad games and I found a ton. I proceeded to do my homework on many of them and after several hours of reading articles and reviews, watching YouTube video reviews and raw gameplay, I think I have cancer… I mean… I think I have a list that showcases some terrible decisions and execution in the video game industry. I understand not every game can be a winner, we need to experience some terrible things to appreciate the good games, right? RIGHT?!

Well, I don’t know if causing myself irreversible brain damage is the way to go about all of this, but someone had to do it! After watching Dance Lucy! Dance! from GameCubes Charlies Angels, I just kinda blacked out… I woke up on the street behind a bowling alley and wished that there was a special place that we could discard all of these atrocities. Like a video game hell of some sort… like… like a landfill in Alamogordo New Mexico.

10. Pac-Man (Atari 2600)

Released: March 16, 1982

Let’s get this shitshow started! And what an awesomely terrible game we have up first! If you know video games you know Pac-Man, if you know Pac-Man you know its impact on the gaming industry. So, this game took something we love and abused it, it's like someone took your childhood dog, shaved its snout and kicked it down the stairs. What are we suppose to do with this? How do you even play with that ghost teleporting in and out of reality? Maybe this game is just very realistic? Maybe it is a depiction of how a ghost would really treat you if you were 90% yellow mouth trying to eat all of its ghost-pellets and devouring all things out of existence? Wait, who is the bad guy in this game?

9. Hotel Mario (Phillips CD-i)

Released: April 5, 1994

Again, I understand that in the early 90s, things were different and times were changing. No one really knew where the future of video games was going? CDs? Cartridges? A grilled cheese sandwich with computer chips hanging out of the bottom? I thought that a game where you run around shutting doors was just for dads trying to keep the heating bill down, but that is the entire point of Mario Hotel! Jumping over Goombas and Turtles and shutting doors! Shooting fireballs and shutting more doors! Go up and down elevators! Shut doors!

Who does this while sober with a license to the Mario characters? Phillips, I guess we can blame Phillips for this crap, them and their stupid platform.

8. Extreme Paintbrawl (PC)

Released: October 31, 1998

I think they were trying to cater to children here? Or people who loved playing paintball? Maybe they were pandering to people who were easily offended by video game violence? Oh, that’s right! It was 1998, not 2018! I don’t know what the purpose of this game was, except to make me laugh like an absolute madman at three in the morning because of the “death rattle” the surrendering player makes at 1:18 in the video! Oh man, I haven’t had a good laugh like that since I last saw my credit score. Anyway, I enjoy playing paintball, I enjoy gaming, I also enjoy first-person shooters, but this game made me question all of those choices…

Also, some pretty interesting music going on here, it’s like a metal jazz-fusion? 

7. Aquaman: Battle for Atlantis (Xbox, GameCube)

Released: July 23, 2003

The sweet action starts at 3:22.

Hey, sometimes you gotta get a 2 out of 10 or a one-star rating, and who better to achieve this than AQUAMAN! The “dry oatmeal” DC character has his very own game consisting of swimming around and punching dudes in scuba gear. Save a bunch of mermen and summon a dolphin who swims in and slams its face into the enemy’s dick! I’m actually really glad I hate all of this and have been spared the disappointment that seems to be Aquaman’s one true superpower.

6. Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing (PC)

Released: November 20, 2003

Over the road, under the bridge, through the house. Big Rigs: Who Gives a Shit About Physics While Going 80 Miles Per Hour Racing! Now that’s more like it. I’ve never driven a big rig in the real world, so I can't really judge if going 1000+ miles per hour backward up a 90-degree hill is the norm in the trucking industry, so I might be making an ass out of myself here. Speaking of making an ass out of one's self, the programmers for this game are either some master trolls or into some serious hallucinogens. Whatever the case, this game has some major issues.

Some versions of the game have your opponent not capable of even moving and sitting at the start line for the duration of the race. In other versions, the opponent does get moving and seems to have a massive stroke right before the finish line and dies two feet away from the finish line. Once you get truckin’ you’ll find to your surprise that your truck is invincible and immune to any collision or decreasing of speed due to pesky things like… buildings… or mountains… The game also has no borders, you can literally just drive off into the void as you try to escape the fact you spent any time or money on this piece of crap game. So select Large Marge get in your ghost truck and never lose, ever! Nothing can hold you back from winning! 

But just when you thought things couldn’t get any crazier, you can go in reverse! Apparently, reverse in this game makes you hit spacetime. As a matter of fact, the highest speed you can go in this game is 12.3 Undecillion MPH. Where you will immediately see the race end and get the coveted "You're Winner" message. Why? Because you are going so damn fast all points of the map are being simultaneously driven on as you approach black hole density and all checkpoints in the known universe are triggered at once ending the race… or this game is stupid and I hope to use a copy of it to one day start a campfire.

5. Catfight (PC)

Released: December 31, 1996

I picture some guy seeing Mortal Kombat II and thinking “All this game does is take pictures of people and animate them to fight... I can do that in like 37 minutes!” I mean, us dudes don’t really like fighting game mechanics or the ridiculous amount of violence that comes with them, obviously. We only care about half-naked women and are willing to purchase anything involving them doing things, now this may be 100% true, but give us a damn break. You can’t just open up a game developing program and just start smashing your forehead into the keyboard and make a quality game. Perhaps smashing one's forehead into the keyboard is how this game was meant to be played? Perhaps throwing one's self into traffic is also an acceptable alternative to playing this game? If all games were like this my hobbies would probably consist of birdwatching, pottery and stuffing dry leaves into my pants.

4. The Crow: City of Angels (Sega Saturn, PlayStation, PC)

Released: February 28, 1997

If you ever wondered what it would be like to walk around with an eighty year olds stride while you fight one, two or even three random dudes at a time with an awesome array of devastating attacks including punch, kick and stab or a skill set of legendary defensive techniques such as block and duck, then your about to have your mind blown! And blowing my brains out is exactly how I felt watching this game being played…

Listen to the same four seconds of music on loop for the duration of the game as it kills enough brain cells for you to make it from room to room fighting and picking up bottles. Wow! This game was beyond its time!

The last 23 seconds of this video really sums up the game as a whole…

3. Bubsy 3D

Released: November 25, 1996 (PlayStation)

This game and I have a history… It was the only game I took back to the store and didn’t lie about my secret ferret chewing it up or that the factory had somehow messed up my copy and I just simply wanted my money back, no, I looked the poor clerk in the eyes and told them this game was so shitty I had developed autism and couldn’t stop punching cats.

I was a crazy ass little kid who has easily amused and usually just bit the bullet when I made a poor gaming selection. But I really couldn’t accept this game. The part that killed me the most was that none of my friends saw it as a bad game? Maybe I had bad friends? When someone told me “Meh, it’s not so bad. I kinda like it!” I really wanted to possess the power to remove their teeth from their skulls one by one with my mind! All because of this game and its butt-ass one-liners and unbelievably bad graphics, controls, and overall gameplay.

I hate you Bubsy 3D. I’m glad you kept your stupid franchise dormant for twenty plus years… I heard there was a newer version of Bubsy for PS3 made in 2017, this was all new news to me, but unless coupons for free Chocolate Zingers come shooting out from the system I could give a crap less.

2. E.T. The Extra-terrestrial (Atari 2600)

Released: December 1982

This game is bad. Like abandon your family and drive into the ocean bad. Like almost singlehandedly cause The Video Game Industry Crash of 1983 bad. Like drying off a wet hamster in the microwave bad. Like thousands of copies are buried in the ground in New Mexico bad.

I will take a step back and give the poor bastard who programmed the game some slack here, he only had 5 and a half weeks to make this game. I can barely gather the strength to get up and go shopping for new trash bags to wear in 5 and a half weeks, so I will give him that. What in the hell was anyone in charge of this project thinking? Don’t people test these things? Who is responsible for games that make people addicted to meth? Who bitches about a game made before they were born? May the world never know? Rest in peace E.T. rest in peace.

1. Superman 64 (Nintendo 64)

Released: May 31, 1999

Well, here we are at the cherry on top of the asscream sundae. Superman, Superman 64, Superman: The New Superman Adventures, Superman: Fly through rings until you smash your television to pieces in a fit of rage? Who the hell knows? Can we only guess since the developers didn’t put a damn title on the cover? Just a picture of Superman ripping his shirt open. Everything about this game is bad. Everything… I mean, they couldn’t even get the cover right, at least E.T. had a title on the cover.

Around the time of Silent Hill, Mario Party, Final Fantasy VIII, Unreal Tournament, Super Smash Bros., Counterstrike and Quake III Arena were being released, someone thought it would be a good idea to let one of the overnight janitors produce a video game! And here it is!

If you have ever wondered why someone in their late 20s early 30s is always pissed off and mumbling obscenities to themselves while purposely burning dinner, it’s probably because they played this game. It was the pinpoint moment we all had been lied to and had our preadolescent hopes and dreams crushed. We wanted this game to be great, we wanted to shoot lasers out of our eyes, we wanted to fly high like an eagle, we wanted to throw cars and watch them explode in epic fashion, we wanted to be Superman… but instead, we got this. A huge dose of heartbreak and disappointment outside of the dating scene. We were just too young. We just weren’t built for that kind of mental torture.

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Well, there you have it folks, the worst games ever! How many of them have you actually played? Which games did I forget? Which game do you think is the worst? How many times did you dry heave watching these videos? Let me know in the comments and as always thanks for viewing!