Genesis Doesn't

[VinnyT]

I hate Arch Rivals simply because EVERY basket you make is followed by a cutscene of the crowd cheering. It just ruins the games flow.

Some clunker from my collection:

The Simpsons: Barts Nghtmare
Cyberball
ESPN Baseball Tonight
Joshua
The Simpsons: Virtual Bart
Barneys Hide and Seek game
Hardball '94
NFL Quaterback club '96(box)
Global Gladiators
NHL All Star Hockey*
La Russa Baseball
Mighty Morphing Power Rangers: The Movie

And I have to defend the R.B.I. series(except '94). That's a great series, even though theres not MLB liscense.

[Doonzmore]

Super Hydlide
Judge Dredd


Music was decent in Super Hydlide but the gameplay and graphics are pretty damn hideous and pathetic.

[ManekiNeko]

It's just carrying on the Hydlide tradition of extreme mediocrity. There was another game in the series, released on the Sega Saturn early in its life. Virtual Hydlide was a Hydlide game, except in 3D and with an overly burly knight as the star. I heard it was better than the first two games, but only marginally.

As for Subterrania, I thought you could reconfigure the buttons on that game, but perhaps I'm mistaken about that. It's a tough, frustrating game, certainly, but not a complete failure. Anyone who enjoyed Gravitron or its spiritual successor Solar Jetman would get a kick out of it. Furthermore, developers Zyrinx really blew away Genesis owners with its next game, Red Zone. It's a really stylish Desert Strike clone with advanced graphics you wouldn't expect on the system (full motion video, on a barebones Genesis? So much for the Sega CD!). For that reason alone, I think Subterrania had its place in the Genesis library.

Finally, I'd say that just about every game released by Ballistic (Accolade's brand name for the Genesis) was rotten, ESPECIALLY Turrican and its thinly disguised sequel Universal Soldier. It took a lot of hard work from Factor 5 to get that series back on the right track after those two disasters.

JR

[Vroomfunkel]

Back in the day, I had a fat ol' booklet of reviews of Megadrive games from some magazine or other. I must have read it through a few times and was always intrigued by Dark Castle, as it got the lowest score in there - 13%. Mainly for extremely poor collision detection and the already mentioned impossiblity of actually aiming your rocks correctly ...

Other bad uns ..

Hard Drivin' Judge Dredd and Spiderman vs. X-Men all seconded.

Jurassic Park was an almighty stinker. As far as I can tell, Beast Wrestler is possibly one of the worst fighting games I have ever played in my life. And I have played Dragon Ball Z Legends on the Saturn, so that is saying something.

I cannot agree with the Punisher being one of the worst games ... I really quite liked it. I do quite like that style of game, and I never played the arcade so I can't compare .. but surely it can't plumb the same depths as crap like Shaq Fu?

If you want a bad scrolling beat 'em up, then try Street Smart. Now that is really shite. Possibly I am biased against it because the first time I encountered it I was very excited because I had just got hold of Shining Force 2 for about £10 ($20). Really nice condition. Only when I put the cart in the Megadrive, I just got Street Smart .. talk about disappointment!

Vroomfunkel

[Ed Oscuro]

I think I was the one who suggested the game you were looking for was Dark Castle.



Could it perhaps be Creepy Castle instead? There were, I think, a few games in the Dark Castle series, but if the main character was much larger then it's probably something else. If it's not Creepy Castle, are there any other details you can give to narrow it down?

Looks interesting, but that's not it either. The main character, as I remember, was much plainer and less well defined (not to say the graphics sucked, that's just the style used).

Man, Mac folks put up with an ungodly amount of junk. :/

[ManekiNeko]

If you want a bad scrolling beat 'em up, then try Street Smart. Now that is really shite. Possibly I am biased against it because the first time I encountered it I was very excited because I had just got hold of Shining Force 2 for about £10 ($20). Really nice condition. Only when I put the cart in the Megadrive, I just got Street Smart .. talk about disappointment!

Vroomfunkel

Agreed. Street Smart is anything but. I don't know what's worse about that game... its being a watered down conversion of an already unsatisfying arcade game, the fantastically stupid game description on the back of the box, or the enemies who all look like they've stuffed their underwear with rolled-up socks. Maybe if these guys spent more time practicing their martial arts and less time taking overdoses of Enzyte the game would have been marginally entertaining.

Speaking of oversized genetalia, Divine Sealing on the Japanese Mega Drive has got to be THE worst shooter on the system. It's five minutes of excruciating boredom, followed by five pictures of anime girls in various states of undress. Divine Sealing is yet another example of why pornographic video games simply DON'T WORK.

JR

[dendawg]

How about the all time Tengen classic:

Awesome Possum Kicks Dr. Machino's Butt!

As far as I'm concerned, the absolute worst side scroller EVER!

[dethink]

Speaking of bad shooters, add Subterranea to the list. I found that game extremely difficult, especially with the control setup. If I recall, you basically had to hold one button down to thrust and the directional pad to steer your ship to keep it from falling/crashing, while at the same time use another fire button to shoot enemies. If I am using the control pad to steer away from cavern walls etc, how the hell am I suppose to aim at the enemy chasing me down and firing at me!!! Argh!!!!!

no way, subterranea rules! then again, solar jetman was probably one of my top 10 favorite NES games...

sure it's like controlling a ball bearing on a steel plate, but that was the fun of the game, IMO. once you master the controls, it just flows so nicely...

[Moon Patrol]

The crappiest game that comes to mind has to be Sword of Sodan.

I mean, who couldn't hate a large, slow moving target? Something that moans like a retard, and swings their arms as if someone just jumped out of a bush and said "BOOOGA BOOGA BITCH!"

The enemies sucked, and the level with the zombies sucked even more! I mean, not only do you have to have 300 enemies in ONE level, you have to have like 20 of the slow moving bastards coming at you, from the OTHER side of the screen. On top of that, they SLOW YOU DOWN EVEN MORE! As if the gameplay wasn't bad enough.

Don't forget though, you can use those potions! WOO! But wait, out of the 30 bazillion kinds you can make, you made the POISONOUS ONE! Yeap! Now you're fucked! You're being fondled by zombies, running around like a retard, AND you're going to die a very slow (yes, it is possible) death! Congratulations, you just experienced the giant steaming pile of shit that is Sword of Sodan! Which, might I add, is an ELECTRONIC ARTS game! Woo! Go EA!

[suppafly]

It's just carrying on the Hydlide tradition of extreme mediocrity. There was another game in the series, released on the Sega Saturn early in its life. Virtual Hydlide was a Hydlide game, except in 3D and with an overly burly knight as the star. I heard it was better than the first two games, but only marginally.

As for Subterrania, I thought you could reconfigure the buttons on that game, but perhaps I'm mistaken about that. It's a tough, frustrating game, certainly, but not a complete failure. Anyone who enjoyed Gravitron or its spiritual successor Solar Jetman would get a kick out of it. Furthermore, developers Zyrinx really blew away Genesis owners with its next game, Red Zone. It's a really stylish Desert Strike clone with advanced graphics you wouldn't expect on the system (full motion video, on a barebones Genesis? So much for the Sega CD!). For that reason alone, I think Subterrania had its place in the Genesis library.

Finally, I'd say that just about every game released by Ballistic (Accolade's brand name for the Genesis) was rotten, ESPECIALLY Turrican and its thinly disguised sequel Universal Soldier. It took a lot of hard work from Factor 5 to get that series back on the right track after those two disasters.

JR

Ballistic released some good games:

1) Super Off Road: I L-O-V-E-D this genesis game. Great arcade conversion, nice control, nice graphics, good music...perfect

2) Double Dragon: Arguably the best port of the original arcade game

´Nuff said!

[chrisbid]

time to revive this puppy

Strider Returns - probably the biggest disappointment of all time. Strider was such a fast paced, kickass sci-fi futuristic game, and what does US Mold give us? "Grand Master kidnaps your girlfriend, go through the forest, cave, and a bunch of other generic stages to save her... but dont move as fast as you did the first time you beat me"

Beast Wrestler - slow, choppy one on one fighter

Technocop - already mentioned

Double Dragon - looked great, horrid controls... though i guess you could say the same thing about the arcade version

[davepesc]

Since we're reviving this, here are the worst games on my favorite console:


Heavy Nova: This is the worst game ever. Period. You "control" a robot as it slowly walks down a straight corodor dodging falling rocks that explode if you punch them.

At the end of the corrodor, you square off against another robot in a street fighter-type showdown. Unfortunately, while there are animations for punching and kicking, your limbs don't actually project forward, so you have to be roght on top of your opponent to hit, and it's a gamble at that point too.
Luckily, you can jump to avoid attacks. Did I mention that once you jump, you are invincible. That's right, the jumping animation can not be interrupred by anything.

Rubbish.


After that, I never liked any of the Genny football games, but a lot of people did, so whatever.

[crazyjackcsa]

BOOO! to the person who said subterrania was no good. that game was fantastic!

Worst on the System for me: Batman Forever, Eternal Champions (I know, I just don't dig it) and Toy Story was Pretty Looking, but it was also pretty bad.

[B - Mark]

My list of worst games for Mega Drive / Genesis.

Genesis doesn´t!

- Back to the Future III
- Barney Hide and Seek
- Double Dragon III: The Rosetta Stone
- Double Dragon V: The Shadow Falls
- Shaq Fu
- Street Smart
- Sword of Sodan
- World Heroes

[7th lutz]

Am i the only person who loved pit fighter for genesis? I think its the best conversion of the arcade game, and i enjoyed it thoroughly.....it even got almost all Red-happy-faces on gamepro....I LIKE that game

I liked it myself.

[B - Mark]

Am i the only person who loved pit fighter for genesis? I think its the best conversion of the arcade game, and i enjoyed it thoroughly.....it even got almost all Red-happy-faces on gamepro....I LIKE that game :)

I liked it myself.

Me too.

I like Pit Fighter for Genesis / Mega Drive.
In my opinion, this is the best version of this game after the original Arcade version.

In my opinion Pit Fighter for Super NES is the worst version of the Arcade game.

[GiantPooka]

It's one of my favourite consoles, but there are some real stinkers...

* Awesome Possum (Kicks Dr. Machino's Butt)- Looks like someone finally got round to making a mascot character even more annoying than Bubsy. He talks too much, he cannot be controlled like a normal person, and only Sparkster can get away with being a possum and having his own game.

* Strider II- Yay, let's get rid of any of the redeeming factors from the original Strider and make it slower, choppier, and make it not fun to play at all! Rock on!

*Back to the Future Part III- I suspect the first level was made impossibly hard to cover up for the fact that there's only 3 levels afterwards. In the end, I had to cheat to see how long the game went on for. Absolutely terrible.

* Insector X- Personal vendetta here- it's nothing like the arcade game it's based on, replacing the vibrant colourful graphics with dingy, ugly ones. And messing up the gameplay in the process.

[DigitalSpace]

A couple more I don't care for:

Cosmic Spacehead - Decent concept ruined by bad controls.
Air Diver - Mentioned earlier, and indeed bad. And boring.

And I actually like Joshua & The Battle of Jericho a little. It gets tough a bit too early but I wound up spending more time with it than I thought I would - and I didn't regret a single minute of that time.

Sub-Terrania had its flaws but I thought it was decent... worth at least the buck I paid for it, anyways.

[theshizzle3000]

The genesis port of Pirates of the Dark Water it was completely a let down compared to what was on the SNES.

[Three-P]

Shaq Fu suckz for both SNES and Genesis.

I make it a point to never argue with someone who's right. *pimp-slaps a copy of Shaq-Fu.*

Another real disgrace for the Genesis was Sword of Vermilion. That game should've come with a pre-written suicide note, reading, "To whom it may concern, I can't take the pain, anymore! Good-bye, cruel world! Sincerely, 'sign here.' P.S.-Don't play Sword of Vermilion. That's what drove me to this!" *pimp-slaps a copy of Sword of Vermilion.*