Better to be unplayable than uninspired - adventures in terrible gaming.

No idea why, but over the years w/the exception of some of the big AAA titles (skyrims and fallouts and batmans and bioshock) i find myself way more interested in the weirdo/seedy/stupid/fucked up side of the console gaming coin. So I've actually started to go out of my way to dig through the games that are failures, sometimes commercially and sometimes just failures in the sense of not being games at all.

This thread is kinda dual purpose I guess - first i want to know if other people do this to the extent that i do, and second, maybe my pain can stave off the pain of others by telling you if its an awesome piece of shit or just a straight up piece of shit. Most of my expertise is on 360 w/a little bit of wii thrown in there (although man a terrible game with wiimote added is almost never fun). also if people have stuff they recommend, id love to expand my horizons.

I had planned on getting some shitty games while I was on Gamefly but never got around to it. Man vs. Wild is supposed to be pretty bad.

Plz note: a lot of these I don't think are terrible, in fact some of them are among my favorites - and not in a "so bad it's good" sort of way, which rarely happens w/video games. It takes a pretty fantastic concept to overcome terrible controls and camera nightmares.

if you are going to start extolling the virtues of Heavy Rain I am removing my bookmark

oh god no

one of the best arguments for console exclusivity is that thx to only having a 360 i never had the chance to own heavy rain. tried it at my friends house and was pretty O_O about how terrible it was.

so off the top of my head, a list of the stuff that qualifies that i currently own:

Splatterhouse
Brink
Bulletstorm
Deadly Premonition
Nier
No More Heroes
Dead Island
Alone in the Dark reboot
Earth Defense Force: Insect Armageddon
50 Cent: Blood in the Sand
Rage
Alpha Protocol
El Shaddhai
Madworld
Fuel
Command and Conquer: Red Alert 3
Army of Two
Kane and Lynch: Dead Men
Metro 2033

i know there are more but i am not at home at the moment

stuff i dont have anymore but played

Clive Barker's Jericho
Shadows of the Damned

Whenever I visit my brother he seems to have dug up something on the Wii Virtual Console that fits this bill. I recently got a kick out of China Fighter (TG16).

Back in the day I somehow managed to accumulate a bunch of games like this for SNES (Bram Stoker's Dracula!) and NES, but I don't really have any contemporary examples.

I'm totally into this sort of thing. In fact, I have two games in your list I still have to get around to, unopened.

I'm not sure something like Dead Island counts, though - by most accounts it's just sort of mediocre?

Also, do the Suda 51 games count when they are so self-conscious? (Lollipop Chainsaw included, I presume)

Speaking of which, KILLER7.

oh man, stop trying to get me to get Nier

God I want to play Tokyo Jungle so bad

http://www.eurogamer.net/videos/lollipop-chainsaws-suda-51-plays-tokyo-jungle

dude at this point nier must be all of what $4? thats the great thing about all of this

also yeah i wasnt sure if dead island really fit, but it is a total mess in a lot of ways. #1 being that if you allow their vaunted online coop, you end up finishing a bunch of story quests without even getting a chance to see them because some online psycho is off hardmanning through them solo, but if you dont play online there is some stuff that is basically impossible to do.

there was a totally hilarious review of Nier where some dude gave it zero stars because he spent a stupid amount of time on the fishing minigame trying to unsuccessfully catch a fish; something like an hour and a half later he realized he was 2 feet away from the spot where he supposed to have been fishing and caught the fish on the first try

can we talk about dos games here

WarTech Senko No Ronde (360) plays like a mixture of one-on-one fighter & bullet hell shmup? oh and lots of animu bollocks. you can get this really really cheap. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icf6lPiPyFc
Trauma Team (Wii) worth it just to play the Diagnosis & Pathology sections, which are Phoenix-Wright-esque. you get to tell an old guy he's got an incurable disease! controls for the Endoscopy section are broken, thankfully you can skip those bits.
Recettear (PC) the dungeon parts are clumsy, the shop bits ridiculous - and yet it's just so charming, the localization probably counts for 90% of the goodwill towards this game.

stuff i am currently considering as future entrants:

that conan game
homefront
red faction: armageddon
the CSI game

stuff i will never stoop to i dont think
naughty bear

how amazing would it be if there was a Conan O'Brien video game

the entire thing should be QTE minigames where the goal is to do the most awkward-looking time-killing lurchdance

http://www.coverbrowser.com/image/dos-games/1051-1.jpg

Conan O'Brien Kinect Adventures!

has anyone played DayZ yet? it looks kinda messy but interesting.

ok fuck it, im buying duke nukem forever tonight. i think gamestop has it for under $5, so why not

hahaha whoo boy, this is really something

john, you know - earlier this morning, i was gonna respond to that post with something in the order "man, maybe there are some games that might not be worth the time"

then i walk into Best Buy today, and i see DNF brand new for three dollars, and i cannot resist

That game has a demo, there is no reason for anyone to play that game :)

John, you should post a video/audio review

ok finished it. i know you will all think i am crazy, but it was infinitely better than i thought it would be. this is not to say that it isnt the most stupid and peurile game i have played in years because whoa it sure is, but the single player campaign is long and not actually bad. multiplayer is hilariously dated in a way that is hard to even describe, and painful to play, but you will be glad to know that there are still devoted maniacs for this just like every other shoot you in the face game on the planet. some particularly classy moments include slapping "wall boobs" until milk shoots out of them and the fact that if you hold up the ego boosting porn mags at just the right angle to the light, there are jizz stains on them. a couple of knowing moments where you say some horribly lunk-headed one liner and one of the space marine grunts in the area will respond with "uh. ok duke."

well worth $5, do not pay a penny more.

also, brink is turning out to be way way better than expected. of particular note is that the online crowd seems way less creepy than your average cod/halo/l4d peeps - no griefing, no attempts to fuck over new players, lots of avenues to feel like you arent shitty, even though i am sure that i am since ive been playing for a whole 5-10 hours. the vault mechanic or whatever is kinda meh, but the level design so far seems really solid, and the integration of changing objective based gameplay is pretty well executed. seems a little unbalanced in the sense that defensive chapters are way way harder than offensive ones, but that again might just be the way that the random allotments work. again, its sub $5 level now used, and although its no bulletstorm, its worth a look.

I'm quite tempted to get Nier at the moment.

Resonance Of Fate might qualify. Endless grind, almost no variation, really odd characterisation yet strangely addictive.

a couple of knowing moments where you say some horribly lunk-headed one liner and one of the space marine grunts in the area will respond with "uh. ok duke."

!

there are plenty of times that you can feel the pain of some poor dude stuck with this ancient terrible character and letting his misery and distaste seep through.

I enjoyed Bulletstorm, I must say.

I have to say, my sense of humour has me wanting to play this just for the crying with laughter value:

http://youtu.be/pU84Da4gqF8

lolll. is the game bug-ridden or is that some kind of comedy mode or what?

skate 3 wonky physics videos are basically my favorite thing ever, cannot imagine the game lives up to the youtubes

I think its just bug ridden from what I can understand! It is so fucking funny to watch. Sort of like a Gary's Mod, only on accident.

Every time I watch one of those it makes me wonder why I've never picked it up.

it is on my list. no surprise there i guess.

Yeah, that looks totally Garys Mod.

Why yes, I am playing Red Faction: Armageddon. Much much better than expected, but still a huge bummer if you go in expecting Red Faction : Guerilla part 2.

I think I convinced my friend to buy Skate 3 after sharing that video w/ him over the weekend.

xp the prospect is just too sad. Guerilla was wonderfully smashy.

well theres still plenty of smashy, the magnet gun in particular is v v satisfying and is working with some pretty impressive behind the scenes physics and mass calculations. the big issue is that its very linear, and the destructo is less fun in the underground crawl sections (although not always!)

feels weirdly dead spacey in some ways? also, if you see a mech, use it. plz note: i would be less happy with this if i had not picked it up for $5 at the pawn shop

word, word

I bought Skate 3 on Monday. It's awesome but I haven't had any cool glitches.

I just enjoyed a nice, long bout of Skate 3 video induced laughter. Thank you so much for that gift.

future entries in this thread: http://www.gameinformer.com/games/lococycle/b/xbox360/archive/2012/08/29/lococycle-debut-trailer.aspx

the saboteur is properly great, don't put it in this cruel cruel thread :(

oh man you have me tempted to run out and buy this right now

saboteur was fabulous, gtfo

No, I know, but it was a horrendous flop. Unfairly! I think it's awesome. But it still fits my criteria.

I mean BULLETSTORM is on my list but still got my number one spot that year. Deadly Premonition is also all time great. I do this out of love.

Nier is the only game this gen that i've gone back and replayed (twice!), just love running around the world listening to that amazing soundtrack while the companion characters bicker behind me. Drakengard 3 is coming out in the west next year and has the same writer/director and sound team, so hopefully it retains some of the atmosphere (Nier was a spinoff from the Drakengard series after all)

i keep thinking about picking up Nier

Does 50 Cent: Blood on the Sands fit into this niche? the voiceovers push it into it IMO, the game itself is just totally uninspired.

Charlie Brooker is entertainingly vitriolic about that game

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGC8fO8uAOA

btw, Marlow Briggs and the Mask of Death is a self-aware-ish budget title that looks fairly enjoyable if you are so inclined

When it hits a budget price I think I'll bite on Dragon's Crown

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SURg-VSIq7M

Ha, Ride to Hell dropped to $10 at BestBuy. I'm really tempted to get it from jjjusten's review here but... i've probably got enough legitimately good games in the backlog that it would be unwise

Love this review
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-07-10-ride-to-hell-retribution-review

god I love Cara Ellison

Contender:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5drSYII5mFY

man. he didn't even kill anybody in First Blood!

Ooooh, Catherine is hitting this sweet spot. Not so much terrible as just super super weird

Onechanbara: Bikini Samurai Squad on sale on PSN. Thoughts?

Was on sale on XBL today too, grabbed it. Will report back... eventually.

Not available on ps3 in America god damn it

On the plus side flash sale on deadpool so uh oh

Ha never mind, on sale for less in physical format. Tomorrow you will be mine, terrible terrible game.

hm.
http://www.metacritic.com/game/xbox-one/fighter-within/critic-reviews

also:
ride to hell: retribution - $7
defiance - $7
aliens: colonial marines - $9
http://www.gamefly.com/Store/PS3/

Aliens - that's the broken one that looks like a PS2 game?

true of so many games, but yes

a friend picked up the Alone in the Dark reboot mentioned way upthread as a gag and oh my god this is really something

Aliens: Colonial Marines for PC download, $1.99 just for today. Comes with coupon for $5 off an Amazon download next month, they're usually pretty good with their "Best Of" selection in January.

dudes i want to talk about Anarchy Reigns

so its a sequel (kind of?) to madworld, closed world beat-em-up that is also apparently a 20ish character fighting game as well - im hot garbage with regards to fighters, so i am not a good judge. dumb as a brick in many ways, weird "why is this here" vehicle timed lap racing sections, no attempt at even vague coherency, interspersed with completely out of character and hamfisted "touching" dead kid storyline. its a glorious god damn mess so far, not as broken as ride to hell (which well jesus i dont know if anything in recent memory is that broken) but so bafflingly out of step with videogames of the modern day that it is quite refreshing. its no bulletstorm, but its cheap as dirt and solidly in the spirit of this thread.

sounds fun, will wait for $5

just learned about this stinker recently
http://www.gameinformer.com/games/dark/b/xbox360/archive/2013/07/09/a-vampire-who-sucks-at-everything.aspx

lol the voice acting

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vczVtwQi8LY

jesus that music

Ride to Hell won GB's worst game award last year

ORION: Dino Horde is free this weekend (and if you really like it permanent ownership is on sale for $1 )

http://cf.shacknews.com/images/20130326/003_25155.nphd.jpg

u know u want to

supposedly really really awful

The first good argument for me to own a gaming PC. Which I don't, so infinite sadface.

daikatana only $1.5 right now on steam:
http://www.gog.com/game/daikatana

noooooo

jjjjusten if you like bad games and you don't have even a mid-level PC that can run garbage from 2006ish then you're missin out.

I know! Curse of Mac owner. And it's a shitty "old" mac, but that still means nothing came out for it ever.

Ohhhhh yeah, grabbed Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard for 90 cents on that recent flash sale, let's get stupid

I kept seeing these two Skylight games (for Vita) pop up in PSN sales and became curious enough to look into them. And, well...holy jesus:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRtn_KG9jAw

Just to be clear, these are pretty much brand new games and not something someone made for their high school computer class in 1996.

Ah ha ha ha. Just saw that this is currently on clearance sale in the PSN store and came here to post a gameplay vid, totally forgetting that I'd already ragged on this irredeemable POS. Thanks for saving me some work, Younger Lunch.

jeeze louise

Ah heck, why not another, it's pretty funny to hear the reviewer get pissy about trying to 'play' the godforsaken thing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQ41J-sGyXs

To be clear, someone is responsible for making three entire games that look/play like this.

i'm definitely planning to do a adventure into this world on the switch but waiting another year or so for the library to 'mature'