WORST arcade games of all time? [Archive]

Anonymous

07-10-2002, 09:37 PM

Seems like a natural companion to a "best arcade game" thread.

Here are a few nominations:

TATTOO ASSASSINS
http://www.bunnyears.net/tattoo/

CHILLER
http://www.klov.com/C/Chiller.html

TIME TRAVELLER (aka HOLOGRAM)
http://www.klov.com/T/Time_Traveler.html

NAME THAT TUNE
http://www.klov.com/N/Name_That_Tune.html

NARC
http://www.klov.com/N/NARC.html

HANGMAN
http://www.klov.com/H/Hangman.html

MICHAEL JACKSON'S MOONWALKER
http://www.klov.com/M/Michael_Jackson's_Moonwalker.html

PROFESSOR PAC MAN
http://www.klov.com/P/Professor_Pac-Man.html

TRIVIAL PURSUIT
http://www.klov.com/T/Trivial_Pursuit.html

ROAD RUNNER
http://www.klov.com/R/Road_Runner.html

voltaic

07-10-2002, 09:41 PM

No! Michael Jackson's Moonwalker was sweet.

Anonymous

07-10-2002, 09:44 PM

The gameplay wasn't bad, but IT'S A GAME IN WHICH YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO HELP MICHAEL JACKSON TOUCH CHILDREN!

Ben Sones

07-10-2002, 10:20 PM

Lest we forget, the little-known variant of Q*Bert that featured the ability to fire wads of snot out of Q*Bert's nose. Called, appropriately, "Snots and Boogers."

Best game name ever.

Kool Moe Dee

07-10-2002, 10:26 PM

I'm Sorry. (http://www.vgmuseum.com/pics/imsorry.html)

If you haven't played it, it's worth your effort.

BTW, Moonwalker wasn't a bad game if you pretend you're not Michael Jackson.

Aszurom

07-10-2002, 10:58 PM

Anything in an arcade that spits out tickets that you can redeem for a keychain or pencil topper.

Actually, the winner is...

Boong-Ga Boong-Ga!!!!!!!!

http://www.monzy.com/intro/boong-ga/brochure.jpg

Now, the brochure is a bit misleading - since it says "spank" rather than the proper english translation which should read "cram a plastic finger up the ass of" the characters onscreen. The game even features a mannequin posterior hanging out the front.

Tell me, is this man spanking or fisting?

http://www.syberpunk.com/images/misc/boonga/boonga3.jpg

Erik

07-11-2002, 04:19 AM

How did NARC get on the list?

Sebmolo

07-11-2002, 05:34 AM

now, the important thing to remember about MW is that, a little way in, you run into the penis guys. remember them? Little bald men in two legged hopping machines with MASSIVE METAL RAMMING COCKS between their little hopping legs? All the little men try to ram michael (ie you, are you feeling dirty yet?) with their RAMMING COCKS and you have to zap them with your zapping dance step.

I'm going to take a quick shower and try to wash the memory away.

sml

Dave Long

07-11-2002, 06:46 AM

How did NARC get on the list?

No kidding. NARC rocked.

--Dave

Ben Sones

07-11-2002, 07:05 AM

I was almost as cool as Snots and Boogers.

But it's not as good as EverQuest.

Robert Sharp

07-11-2002, 08:54 AM

Well, I had a sort of campy fun with it (I was only like 8 or 9), but Journey was a bad video game. The premise was ridiculous and the gameplay pretty sad. And I still played it!

Anonymous

07-11-2002, 09:00 AM

"How did NARC get on the list?"

Something about games that promote indiscriminate, ultraviolent death to drug users while flashing "just say no" messages rubs me the wrong way, if not done as parody. I don't use drugs, but dislike propaganda.

Samuel Bass

07-11-2002, 09:07 AM

Hey, dodgy subject matter or no, Narc was endless bloodsoaked, limb-scattering fun - shallow, yes, but stiill as good a time as you could get for a quarter in '88, at least at the tender age of 11. The ending, however, blew...

As for worst Arcade Game of all time, my vote would go to the winning combination of Time Killers and Bloodstorm, two fighters that made Tattoo Assassins look like a shining example of puglisitic art simulation in comparison.

Erik

07-11-2002, 09:24 AM

Well, I've been known to use and sell drugs, and I still thought it was pretty rad. It came out at a time when every arcade game - and pretty much everything else - was stamped with the phrase "Just say no!" Plus, contrary to your claims, there was no indication that the prostitutes you were killing had any involvement in the drug trade. I'll concede that the bald perverts and the guys who threw giant syringes were probably selling drugs. Though the syringe guy was actually kind of giving them away. You might want to add Mortal Kombat to the list, because even though it wasn't explicitly stated in a splash screen, one of the clear subtexts of everything people say or do is "Please don't rip my spine out", which is pretty hypocritical in this case.

GregB

07-11-2002, 11:30 AM

DJ Boy. Ug.

Matthew Gallant

07-11-2002, 11:54 AM

DJ Boy. Ug.

They have one of those up and running at a permanent flea market sort of place near where I live. I spent a little bit of time watching the attract mode, it crossed the line of wacky fun to creepy melange pretty quickly.

They also had Final Fight there. But the jump button was broken.

voltaic

07-12-2002, 10:37 AM

The problem with NARC is that there were about a thousand buttons plus an eight-way joystick to control the character. I mean there wasn't even a nice layout like on later 6-button games... NARC had a horrible interface!

Dave Long

07-12-2002, 10:44 AM

Jeez... four buttons and an eight-way joystick /= horrible interface. Oh...but you were kidding, right?

--Dave

Anonymous

07-12-2002, 12:03 PM

It's hard to control four buttons and a joystick when you're high on crack. So how is this game going to reach its intended audience?

Anonymous

07-13-2002, 07:49 AM

Here's a secret some of you may know...Midway has been working on a 3D update of NARC for some time now. It is rumored to be for all three platforms. However, they also worked on a 3D update of Joust for two years and couldn't get it to fly (sorry for the pun).

Ben Sones

07-13-2002, 08:01 AM

It's hard to control four buttons and a joystick when you're high on crack. So how is this game going to reach its intended audience?

Perhaps the intended audience does not include people that are high on crack.

Anonymous

07-13-2002, 10:25 AM

Perhaps the intended audience does not include people that are high on crack.

Now who's being naive,Ben? :P

Anonymous

07-13-2002, 12:50 PM

"Midway has been working on a 3D update of NARC for some time now."

I hope it takes place in Amsterdam, so you can kill all of the legal prostitutes and customers at the marajuana "coffee shops" while wearing a big leather American flag jacket.

Anonymous

07-13-2002, 01:03 PM

What was wrong with Narc? I had it for my Amiga (still have it, actually) and thought it was a blast (in a stupid sort of way).

Peter

Dave Long

03-17-2003, 09:53 AM

Thread revival!

I just ran across this link...

http://www.n-philes.com/php/epuzaevkfkezkkuakzev.php

NARC is a one-player action game and will be released in Q4

It looks like that NARC sequel is for real. Yahoo! Killing drug dealers, dogs and everyone else you can see in glorious 3D. :wink:

--Dave

Lee Johnson

03-17-2003, 10:06 AM

Well, I had a sort of campy fun with it (I was only like 8 or 9), but Journey was a bad video game. The premise was ridiculous and the gameplay pretty sad. And I still played it!
Me, too. I think the Journey game was just a cheap way for them to recycle Tron machines. The basic structure of the game was even the same!

Jason McMaster

03-17-2003, 10:13 AM

Mike Cathcart

03-17-2003, 10:19 AM

I guess we're not considering Dragon's Lair an arcade game? Cause that was a piece of shit, pretty graphics or not.

Also, any game whose theme was covered by the Pixies rules.

Tyjenks

03-17-2003, 10:49 AM

I guess we're not considering Dragon's Lair an arcade game? Cause that was a piece of shit, pretty graphics or not.

Also, any game whose theme was covered by the Pixies rules.
What is not fun about waiting for an arrow to show up and then pushing the joystick in that direction and the exact right moment?

Without Dragon's Lair, there would be no PaRappa and no Dance Dance Revolution. Now that I think about it, what a wonderful world that would be.

Brian Rubin

03-17-2003, 10:49 AM

Worst arcade game I ever played was Sega's Time Traveler (http://www.yesterdayland.com/popopedia/shows/arcade/ag1156.php). After the "wowee" factor wore off (which took about ten seconds), what you had was a terrible, terrible game.

Andrew Mayer

03-17-2003, 11:42 AM

Spy Hunter 2 had to be the greatest let down of all time.

"But, but, but, it's not Spy Hunter!"

Your Power Pill (http://www.levelupdesign.com/gamelog)

graller

03-17-2003, 11:51 AM

To defend Dragon's Lair - But Princess Daphne was HOT! :P

Brian Rubin

03-17-2003, 11:58 AM

Spy Hunter 2 had to be the greatest let down of all time.

"But, but, but, it's not Spy Hunter!"

I have to agree with this one. When I first saw SH2, I was like, "They made a sequel to Spy Hunter?! Cool!" Then I played it, and said, "What the hell is this crap?"

XPav

03-17-2003, 01:07 PM

Catfight!

Jupiter Jones

03-17-2003, 01:25 PM

I find the most disappointing games were sequels to my favorite games:

1. Time Pilot 84 (http://www.klov.com/game_detail.php?letter=T&game_id=3398)
2. Galaga '88 (http://www.klov.com/game_detail.php?letter=G&game_id=1161)
3. Galaga 3 (http://www.klov.com/game_detail.php?letter=G&game_id=1162)

Mike Cathcart

03-17-2003, 01:32 PM

Without Dragon's Lair, there would be no PaRappa and no Dance Dance Revolution. Now that I think about it, what a wonderful world that would be.

Hey, just cause you're an uncoordiated freak doesn't mean you have to ruin the fun for the rest of us ;)

But at least with DDR you have a rhythm to tell you when to hit the button. Dragon's Lair apparently required some kind of arcade ESP. Did anyone ever finish that game? And if so, how much did it cost?

Most of the other games being mentioned were pretty bad, but at least they were games. If Dragon's Lair counts, I don't think anything comes close in badness. Hot princess or not.

Tyjenks

03-17-2003, 01:39 PM

It was basically a memorization of the order of jerks on the joystick. <joke tells itself>

But how much money did you funnel into it? Maybe you saw it for what it was and invested those quarters in your college education, but at the time it was something fresh and different. Like playing a Disney cartoon which we all grew up on. Admit it. Your just pissed now cause you blew all that cash on an interactive game of Memory.

Xaroc

03-17-2003, 01:40 PM

Bob Violence

03-17-2003, 02:11 PM

Something about games that promote indiscriminate, ultraviolent death to drug users while flashing "just say no" messages rubs me the wrong way, if not done as parody.

Well, you know, I'm 99% sure it was done as parody. The killer clowns and the giant tongue-shooting evil head boss were the main tipoffs for me.

graller

03-17-2003, 07:09 PM

I could finish Dragon's Lair on a single quarter - yes I have good memory. I never "got" the Pac-Man craze...loved Defender and Robotron though...

Mike Cathcart

03-18-2003, 07:17 AM

But how much money did you funnel into it? Maybe you saw it for what it was and invested those quarters in your college education, but at the time it was something fresh and different.

It was a damn tease, is what it was. How could I not put a quarter into that thing after seeing it running in demo mode? It looked amazing. Then of course, I died because it doesn't control the way I'm used to*, and I thought that maybe it was my fault. I was determined to beat that damn game for about five minutes. Then I realized it wasn't spitting out tickets and went to play skeeball. The end.

* As in, like a videogame.

Mike Cathcart

03-18-2003, 07:21 AM

Dragon's Lair was a lot of fun Even thought it had limited interaction it had great graphics and a nice payoff at the end. And it didn't cost that much compared with what I would pour into Missle Command or Donkey Kong back in the day.

I could finish Dragon's Lair on a single quarter - yes I have good memory. I never "got" the Pac-Man craze...loved Defender and Robotron though...

Are you guys trying to put together evidence to support your pleas of insanity for some upcoming trial?

Tyjenks

03-18-2003, 07:35 AM

Raife

03-18-2003, 08:33 AM

Well it wasn't just Dragon's Lair. There were Space Ace, Cliff Hanger, and probably others (http://www.dragons-lair-project.com/games).

I have to agree, though... DL didn't really flip my trigger. I played it maybe three times, then just occasionally watched someone else to see how far they'd get. I had a friend who was obsessed with both DL & Space Ace, though. Drew pictures of them at school and things. Mapped out what to do where, etc.

Cliff Hanger I did put some coins into, maybe a couple of bucks. Probably because it was a grittier presentation.

graller

03-18-2003, 10:42 AM

Didn't get Pac Man? Pay-off at the end of Dragon's Lair and it was fun getting there? I'm with Cathcart, you guys are loons,

Next you'll tell me you did not have the Pac-Man Fever album, you did not "Do the Donkey Kong" and you did not want Froggy to "flap his magic twanger". :roll:

Sorry - Pacman just never interested me all that much. I guess I will have to turn in my official Arcade Geek card. I lived in one for 3 years. From the time I got my license in 81 till I got out of high school in 84 I would drive to local arcade every afternoon from the time classes got out at 1 or 2 until I had sports practice sometime between 4 and 7. Every day...I played everything under the sun - in fact Crystal Cavern - a game oddly pacman like that I did enjoy was another favorite - Galaga, Spy Hunter all good....just did not love Pacman :roll:

Xaroc

03-18-2003, 02:16 PM

Pac Man was ok, I played it some but never got into it like Donkey Kong or Missle Command or any number of other video games I played a lot.

-- Xaroc

Aszurom

03-18-2003, 04:08 PM

Donkey Kong 3 sucked eggs, a carton at a time. And I'm talking about those extra large grade-a amish brown eggs too.

Jazar

03-18-2003, 04:43 PM

DK3? With the bug spray? That game rocked. :P

I'd have to say Popeye.

Tyjenks

03-18-2003, 05:37 PM

DK3? With the bug spray? That game rocked. :P

I'd have to say Popeye.

Now you're talkin' crazy. Grabbing those hearts all over the place was great. We are talking worst games. Popeye was the shiznit back then.