(ThyBlackMan.com) We live in a decade where “Game of the Year” can be scooped up several times a year by different games. The quality of development and storytelling has picked up since the 1990s. Gameplay mechanics have gotten more involved but are applied to games as needed. Sometimes you had games with great stories but bad gameplay, great gameplay but bad stories, and great graphics but bad gameplay and story. Here are ten bad or trash video games you never have to play in your life.
Action 52 (1991, Active Enterprises – NES/Sega Genesis)
You can’t get into a trash video game list without mentioning one of the infinity stones of garbage games: Action 52. For years I was fortunate enough never to come across this game. I knew no one who owned it or played it. Hell, I never saw it in the video store as a kid. It seemed like the kind of game my dad would pick up for us to play so he could enjoy Tecmo Super Bowl in peace.
I first saw it on an episode of Angry Video Game Nerd and figured “Let see if I can find it.” It’s the internet so of course I could find it and I wish I didn’t. I really should’ve left well enough alone. These games should’ve been on a multicart because they wouldn’t have survived on their own.
The story behind it is that the owner of Active Enterprises was in Taiwan and saw his kid playing a bootleg console or handheld that came with 40 games on it—something that continues to this day. “Eureka!” he thought before returning to the U.S. Once back he found several money marks to pool $20 million to develop Action 52, pulled three college students to the do the game, and gave them a three-month deadline.
Oh, and there was no playtesting done to make sure the game was playable. And thus, Action 52 hit the original Nintendo in 1991. Thank the ancestors I missed it.
Mario’s Time Machine (1993, Nintendo – MS-DOS/NES/Super NES)
As a kid, I enjoyed this game. I was a big history nerd, a big Super Mario fan, and I had held it down for Nintendo since 1990. There was little Nintendo and Mario could do wrong. When I decided to play it again when I was older, I realized eight-year old me was wrong. He was a mark and shouldn’t have been in charge of selecting anything to play.
If educational games are your jam, this isn’t a bad game at all but there are better ones such as the Carmen Sandiego games. The 90s Oregon Trail remakes are good picks as well. You know what? I’d say the old maze-quiz game that came with Encarta would be more funucational than Mario’s Time Machine.
Superman 64 (1999, Titus – Nintendo 64)
This is the first game where I just wanted to say “unburnable trash” and keep going in this list. However, I can’t do that because you won’t know why unless you played Superman 64. To sum this game up, it had: bad controls, a bad idea for a storyline, bad level design, it was unreasonably difficult, it lacked any incentive to continue playing or try it again. It’s just a terrible game.
Now, I played it several times in high school because I figured it was just me. Maybe I wasn’t as good as I thought I was. Years later, I saw that it wasn’t me and everyone else thought the game was trash as well. I mean, seriously. The kicker is that it had the Nintendo Seal of Quality on it. Someone was asleep at the wheel.
Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero (1997, Midway/Avalanche – N64/PlayStation)
This could’ve been a dope supplemental franchise for Mortal Kombat but it dropped the ball out the gate. It happens, just like giving the license to make a game on the most popular superhero on Earth at this time to a French developer known for making bad to decent enough games.
As for Mythologies, it was a great idea as a title to build on the canon of Mortal Kombat but the game’s execution left a lot to be desired. I wouldn’t have been bothered by the graphics if the gameplay itself was good and the controls did as they were supposed to do but it didn’t pan out like that.
Sleep soundly knowing you can live your whole life and this game will never pop up as a “must play” title.
Michael Jordan: Chaos in the Windy City (1994, EA – Super NES)
You know what? I checked this out often when my dad would take us to the video store. Now, I couldn’t tell you what it was about the game that I liked at the time but I remember finishing Michael Jordan: Chaos in the Windy City and checking it out again.
Having played it this year, I can say it was likely the power ups that kept me in. For the most part, this was a bland, bland, bland game and you missed nothing if you never played it. As a matter of fact, the game would’ve probably been better if LJN got the license since they did two pretty good Spider-Man beat ‘em ups in the early 90s.
Who knows, EA might erase this blemish if they drop LeBron James: Chaos in the City of Angels.
Shaq-Fu (1994, Delphine – Super NES/Sega Genesis/Amiga/Game Gear/Game Boy)
You would think EA would get enough of putting its name on anything not bolted down with a popular basketball player license but here we are in the same year. Not only that, but they did it for multiple versions. I played Shaq-Fu around the same time as Chaos in the Windy City since they were both available and folks in my class gassed this game up.
In short, it’s a bad fighting game. At the time, you didn’t need much to be a decent American fighting game. Just excessive violence, memorable characters, and solid gameplay. Not even good or great, just solid and Shaq-Fu couldn’t do that.
Barkley Shut Up and Jam! was better received and was actually fun. It wasn’t NBA Jam: Tournament Edition-fun but it was still a blast to play.
Duke Nukem Forever (2011, Gearbox Software – PS3/Xbox 360/PC)
I love Duke Nukem. In middle school, Duke Nukem 3D, Doom II, and Wolfenstein 3D were all games our shop teacher let us play. Zero Hour was my jam on Nintendo 64. For the most part, I enjoyed the franchise but then you get something like Duke Nukem Forever.
Honestly, it’s something that ZeniMax’s other studio id Software or Bethesda itself should’ve tackled. Instead, it went through a few other studios for years—including the studio that brought Duke to the dance—before it was finally released. The result was a game that didn’t live up to the wait at all. It wasn’t awful at all it’s just—it was supposed to come out a decade earlier.
There were more detailed games released before and during and Duke Nukem Forever just came off as dated. I mean, we got remakes to original studio mates Wolfenstein and Doom that were dope. And here’s Duke Nukem Forever. Bringing up the rear.
Nightmare Creatures II (2000, Kalisto – PlayStation/Dreamcast)
When it comes to Nightmare Creatures, I played the Nintendo 64 version which had its own problems off the bat. I mean, I still finished it and I liked the storyline but it need a ton of work. The Dreamcast version of Nightmare Creatures II was just…basic. It didn’t improve much from the original and if you played this first you wouldn’t even want to bother with the original—which wasn’t bad at all.
You could honestly go through PlayStation or Dreamcast’s library doing retro plays, skip Nightmare Creatures II and not miss a thing. Personally, the series should get a shot at redemption and be rebooted. But that’s just me.
Unlimited Saga (2002, Square – PlayStation 2)
Trash in the first degree. Unlimited Saga and I go way back to when I was a bright-eyed and optimistic at 17 and giving games second chances. Unlimited Saga was the game that broke me with its broken combat mechanic and that wheel that determined conditions and whatever in battle. I hated this mechanic.
It’s really a shame because this could’ve been a straight up, turn-based JRPG without the gimmick and been one of my favorite PlayStation 2 RPGs. It had amazing artwork and graphics and I loved the board game travel on the over world map but that combat just ruined the package. That element of the game took it from what could’ve been B+ game all the way to an irredeemable F with me.
It doesn’t even encourage me to be patient and learn the mechanic when you lose a battle and you don’t know why. Or you’re stuck in drawn out fights with no actual indication of your progress. Trash.
Evergrace (2000, FromSoftware – PlayStation 2)
FromSoftware has had more hits than misses since 1986. This is especially true now with the successes of Dark Souls, Sekiro, and Bloodborne in recent times. They have gotten a reputation for difficult games with little to no hand holding. If you came to play a game, then play the game and learn along the way. Very old school.
Evergrace isn’t a particularly difficult game at all. That isn’t a bad thing but the difficulty comes in with the controls. Yes, similar to Unlimited Saga and its trash game mechanics. It isn’t even that bad of a game, it wasn’t going to be a great, Greatest Hits title but its flaws dropped it from a respectable C- at best to a D solid.
Staff Writer; M. Swift
This talented writer is also a podcast host, and comic book fan who loves all things old school. One may also find him on Twitter at; metalswift.