DS Daily: The unluckiest reviewer

by Alisha Karabinus { Jul 28th 2008 at 9:00AM }

So some dude (aka Matt Wadleigh of Thunderbolt) recently put up an editorial examining the ten worst games he ever had the misfortune of reviewing, and to our great surprise, several of them were DS titles. After a moment of outrage (and perhaps a hissy fit or two), we were reminded that reviewers are subjected to many more terrible games than the average discerning gamer, and suddenly, things made a lot more sense (also, he probably reviews a lot of DS games). Still, it made us think a little about the worst DS games we've played, both in the line of duty and in our off time ... which means we have to ask you about the worst games you've played. But not just DS games -- let's consider games from all systems, including PC, and then stack them against the worst DS offerings you've run into. Have you played more bad DS games than, say, bad PS2 games? Insert the system of your choice.

We're not surprised that a lot of bad DS games exist. With people looking to make money off the juggernaut that is the DS, people are willing to throw anything out there in the hope that it sticks. But how often have you been burned on games that looked good but simply weren't?

Tags: bad-games

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Christopher @ Jul 28th 2008 9:19AM

Well yeah, seriously. With more games than the PSP, the more shovelware you're going to get. For a site that complains about shovelware, I find this revelation a bit surprising.

tlronin @ Jul 28th 2008 9:30AM

Well my most recent and biggest disapointment was Leisure Suit Larry: Magna Cum Laude, a PC game. It makes the worst DS games (like Elf Bowling) look like diamonds. If you've every played a real Larry game that is.

TheCoats @ Jul 28th 2008 9:37AM

lets see....
-shaq-fu(sega)
-rampage(NES)
-ET (atari)
-Superman(N64)
-Aquaman(PS2)
-Any pet game besides nintendogs (DS)
-alone in the dark (Wii)

Brittany @ Jul 28th 2008 10:00AM

awww I have fond memories of playing rampage with a friend ...
now ET, hah I tried playing that again this weekend... Still don't understand what the arrows are trying to point me to...

Christopher @ Jul 28th 2008 10:06AM

Wait... you played Shaq-fu?? Ouch.

And Aquaman? I feel for you. :-P

Ashley @ Jul 28th 2008 9:43AM

Slow news day, huh?

tamriel @ Jul 28th 2008 9:43AM

Puzzle de Harvest Moon. Sorry, it really was on the DS.

JohnathanEnder @ Jul 28th 2008 9:54AM

Y'know, this would be perfect for the Angry Video Game Nerd. ^_^

Jacksons @ Jul 28th 2008 10:44AM

Looked good but wasn't, eh? I'd have to say Jak 2 (PS2) was my biggest offender. It even got good reviews, but compared to the others in the series, I found it absolutely abysmal. I haven't been burned on the DS, but I try my best to avoid crap. Jak 2 slipped under the radar.

There's some pretty popular titles on the DS that I've found mediocre at best, but I don't want to invoke any fanboy rage. :)

Danny F. @ Jul 28th 2008 11:09AM

Whaaaaat?? Jak 2 was awesome man. I'm surprised you hated it like that... If anything I think Jak 3 was worse, it felt like they tacked on the story and gave it the only crappy ending. But to each his own I guess.

One crappy game would be the DBZ games for the gba or ds that were adventure/rpg mode types.

Jacksons @ Jul 28th 2008 1:24PM

See? I swear I'm the only one that didn't enjoy that game. So many things just rubbed me the wrong way. If not for Daxter's antics, I doubt I would have finished it at all. But yes, I'm way, way in the minority on this one.

acefondu @ Jul 28th 2008 10:45AM

I don't play bad games. If you know enough about the developers, game-style, and production values you can easily avoid bad games.

Danny F. @ Jul 28th 2008 11:12AM

Yes and no, usually you can tell a crappy game from far away. But sometimes system seller looking games can turn up flat, the best exampe would be Haze for the PS3, they hyped that so bad that when it came out it ended up flopping for crappy story and soso gameplay.

That was a dark day for PS3 owners :-\

acefondu @ Jul 28th 2008 1:34PM

'Hype' is not in my equations for knowing if a game is good or not before it comes out.

Danny F. @ Jul 28th 2008 2:11PM

Its not just hype that can confuse ppl, Haze looked good without the hype and press release. Many games did infact, but once its gets to hands of gamers and the reviews come up is when they find how bad the game is and notify everyone else.

Sometimes you just never know until it gets released..

acefondu @ Jul 28th 2008 3:28PM

Can't argue with that statement. But this is one gamer who's hands that particular title did not fall into the hands of. Still, I'm not one to spend money on a game I know I won't like. Admittedly though, I like a lot of games so that helps, lol.

aj @ Jul 28th 2008 6:30PM

I've played a couple of games that I just flat out hated that had the hype and the good reviews (note that the hype and good reviews all come out before Joe Gamer actually gets to buy the game).

Final Fantasy XII is an example of a game that I would consider really, really bad. And there was no way to avoid it, really. Sometimes that'll happen.

Gonzo @ Jul 29th 2008 3:38PM

The problem with the bad DS games is that they come from two directions. You get the shovelware/webgames that should be free downloads (elfbowling) then you get the games that are amazing on every other platform but fall short when they try to cram everything into the DS (Burnout, Resident Evil, and probably GTA).

The more popular the console the more shovelware you should expect. The Wii has been bogged down as expected. At least the DS games are cheaper.

Patrick @ Jul 28th 2008 12:00PM

Well, Chameleon is less than spectacular. My wife was unhappy with Rhythm and Notes. But I don't think I've ever been completely burned on any DS title. Maybe it's because I usually read the reviews and ratings first.

What I do notice, however, is that DS games seem to all be dumbed down. Clubhouse Games includes may children's games, and the AI in many games is pitiful. Thus, potentially great games end up being mediocre in some respect.

Even a classy game like Chessmaster, which is likely to appeal to more serious gamers, gets published with some fairly silly, simple minigames like "fork the fruit."

So, although I haven't been utterly disappointed yet, I do wish some publishers would raise the bar and produce a higher-quality game.

LeMi @ Jul 28th 2008 11:13AM

I took an entire list form metacritic a few months ago and found this:
(score) (%) (no. of games)
85-100 2.9% (24)
75-85 9.6% (79)
65-75 17.6% (145)
50-65 19.6% (161)
35-49 11.3% (93)
01-35 5.7% (47)

Critics can be harsh sometimes and i like most of the games at 65-75 range but there are a lot of bad games.
Most of the developers tries to cash out on popularity of the ds and hope that the pretty picture will lure the kids or the parents. Instead they should try to actually develop a good game.

Danny F. @ Jul 28th 2008 11:31AM

Whats sad is that formula ends up working..

Developers would spend for example maybe 50k on a game with a nice look on the cover and a brand name series on it to get it hyped. Then with the amount of DS owners out there you figure they sell about 4-5x what it cost to develop it and they still make a quick profit on top of their cost.

Wish there was a law against games like that man... :-\

Mike97 @ Jul 28th 2008 11:13AM

I am pretty good at avoiding out and out bad games, but there are some games that have reviewed reasonably well but that I just don't like. Kingdom of Paradise on the PSP sounded pretty good - until I played it. Laughable acting combined with boring gameplay and criminal underuse of the abilities of the PSP combined for a very poor experience. On the DS, I sometimes get annoyed at games, like Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales or that Mario and Luigi RPG. Both of them just kept annoying me more and more until I sent them back - thank goodness for game rentals.

Mr Khan @ Jul 28th 2008 1:35PM

I tend to be charmed in that i rarely pick up a "bad" game, even if its a blind purchase (no experience in the franchise/genre, never played/rented)

However, from what i've seen: The 10 worst games

1. ET (2600/Atari)
2. Plumber's Don't Wear Ties (3DO/Kirin Software)
3. Superman 64 (N64/Titus)
4. Daikatana (PC, N64/Ion Storm)
5. Pac-Man 2600 (2600/Atari)
6. Custer's Revenge (2600/Mystique)
7. Shaq-Fu (Genesis, SNES/EA)
8. Bomberman: Act Zero (360/Konami)
9. Elf Bowling (DS/N-Storm)
10. Ping Pals (DS/THQ)

Mitch @ Jul 28th 2008 2:55PM

Woah woah woah, you played Custer's Revenge and it's not at the top of your list? I know ET is famous for being awful, but, as I recall, Custer's Revenge left me feeling "dirty" to say the least, while ET just left me feeling dumb. You'd think the art on the box would have steered me away from Custer's Revenge, but no, I dove in. I understand that other Mystique games like Bachelor Party and Beat 'em and Eat 'em were equally poor, but they didn't sell nearly as well.

BlackDS @ Jul 29th 2008 7:18AM

Someone actually bought Daikatana ... after all the horrible reviews. LOL.

Zealot @ Jul 28th 2008 2:06PM

I haven't had a run-in with what I'd call a truly bad DS game, considering that I research my purchases far in advance of their release and know the warning signs for shovelware. The closest I've come to disappointment is Lost in Blue, which might be made worse because I paid above retail for it when it was second to Electroplankton in rarity. I do own Ping Pals, but that was actually out of curiosity for just how bad the game was. It didn't disappoint.

As far as worst games of all time go, it's pretty cheap to go back to early systems for examples, but I can attest that the absolutely worst game I've ever played is Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde for the NES. I dare anyone to last ten seconds between the fact that Jekyll's weapon does NO DAMAGE and, upon transforming into Hyde, you're pursued by a killer thundercloud that moves faster than you do. I've actually made it through the first two levels with much persistence, and miraculously surviving those first ten seconds only succeeds in being bombarded by seagulls in a graveyard who shoot giant coiled poops at you and unavoidable rabid dogs. There's no way to accurately describe how horrible it is to someone who hasn't played it.

An honorable mention goes to Superman 64, which I rented after it came out and returned upon being unable to make it through Lex Luthor's foggy ring maze. Worst game I ever paid retail for was Glover, an N64 game that was nothing but collecting crystals in expansive, poorly-designed levels.

aj @ Jul 28th 2008 6:34PM

I don't think I've played a really, really bad DS game.

However, I have had some painful experiences.

Superman 64 on the N64 was just.....bad.

Quest 64, the first RPG on the N64, was like slamming your head into a wall repeatedly.

Time Stalkers on the Dreamcast was more confusing and aimless than anything else.

Unlimited SaGa on the PS2 was terrible and unplayable, but at least the developers set out to make a terrible, unplayable game, so can it really be a failure if they did what they intended?

But I've been pretty good about avoiding flat-out terrible games lately. I think it's because shovelware on the DS is pretty easy to spot from about a mile away.

J.K. @ Jul 28th 2008 6:48PM

Sticking to the theme of sucking DS titles I happened to formerly work for 2 years doing DS/GBA reviews/stories online for a well known site.

Two games on DS that stick out as rusty coat hangar type abortions would be the hideously rotten Pac-Man World 3 and the TMNT game (not the movie one, the original DS release.) The first had a really bad camera, visual issues, control sucked, and the gameplay was between broken and boring. The Turtles title was a super cheapo Final Fight clone but no depth so you got hit, a lot, and unavoidably so. Worst of it was it was just a GBA game shoveled over, and not even a quality one, and it had some awful tacked on mini game touch rottenness to go along with it.

The GBA pos I had the misfortune of doing was Teen Titans. While the gameplay at the core was fundimentally sound and the a/v package for GBA was better than the usual...it was incomplete. The game has numerous progression stopper bugs, including a fairly often one happening on the final boss that locks the game up tight causing a restart of the entire stage. Not Cool on any of the 3, but that GBA one is just sloppy.

Kimiko @ Jul 28th 2008 7:15PM

DS games that looked good but weren't:
Myst - bad graphics, bad sound, bad controls, crashes; this game shouldn't have passed even the first five minutes of testing; guess they never did any.
Insecticide - part nice adventure, part not so good FPS.
Picross - played this game a lot about ten to five years ago; the DS version isn't so good though; it solves things it shouldn't, and the controls are cumbersome.

chibi_wings @ Jul 28th 2008 7:52PM

Hmmm....either I'm really good at avoiding bad games, or I just have really low standards, because I've never played a game I hated. WAIT, I take that back, when I was yet a wee little one, I got a genesis and it came bundled with Sonic Pinball, since I was little, I thought it would be an actual Sonic game, so boy was I disappointed. The game probably wasn't as horrible as a remember (since I was so disappointed).

Now that I am an adult, I usually check out as many sources as possible before buying a game and I tend to know what I will like and what I won't like. Even games that usually have an average rating (60-79%) I tend to like as long as they fall into the genres I love to play. I have still to play a horrible DS game.

aj @ Jul 29th 2008 4:42AM

My rule of thumb seems to be that anything at a 50% or better at Metacritic is decent. I've absolutely LOVED games with mediocre reviews, but I have never enjoyed a game at 49% or lower.

No, that's not true. I really, really love Shogun Empires, despite the fact that it's at 35% on MetaCritic. But I will admit it's a crap game. I just enjoy it. It's weird and makes no sense, but that is the only exception to the rule, so it must be a good rule.

BlackDS @ Jul 29th 2008 7:41AM

Worst Game (for me) ... easily Dragon's Lair (PC). I was expecting all the beauty & goodness of the arcade version ... but I received a horrible looking, badly controlling game with NO save point(s) and/or no ability to save (come on ... all PC games have save points).

Poor controls + no ability to save = Colossal FAIL.

The worst DS game I ever played was Hotel Dusk: Room 215 (I want those hours of my life back!). After enjoying Trace Memory (another DS game from Cing) so much (such a satisfying ending, all loose ends were tied up nicely), Hotel Dusk: Room 215 left me feeling empty and betrayed.

Hotel Dusk: Room 215 was super LINEAR, overly verbose (endlessly pushing the "A" button through dialog), very PREDICTABLE (once you realized all the characters are actually the OPPOSITE of what you would expect by your initial expectation), and the ending felt empty, without tying up the loose ends (like Cing was planning a sequel or something). I felt Kyle Hyde's treatment of Iris was appalling BTW.

Honorable Mention goes to the song "Canned Heat" in Elite Beat Agent. The beat doesn't match the song at all, the developer clearly mailed this one in. Someone posted on the old Nintendo Forums saying he beat "Canned Heat" with the sound turned OFF. LOL. All the other songs on Elite Beat Agent are well done, which makes "Canned Heat" all the more puzzling. I now hate this song. :(

Peace.