17 "TERRIBLE GAMES" THAT ARE ACTUALLY GOOD!

[@st1ka]

Please Consider Subscribing: kzbin.info You can also find uncensored versions of my videos on Patreon: www.patreon.com/St1ka

[@ExodusCore]

Simons Quest was considered bad? That's news to me. In my country it got one of the highest "game scores" of any Nes games and was considered an instant classic.

[@NinjaNezumi]

LOL omg I love your review of Dark Castle! THUMBS UP! SUBSCRIBED!

[@NinjaNezumi]

BTW I love Sewer Shark, I wish it was re-released.

[@MarkDeSade100]

Why is there an uncensored version of the video? I didn't see anything in this one that was censored, or looked like it needed to be.

[@ymeynot0405]

@st1ka I feel like your definition of "good game" is a little low. If you are a normal adult with kids, so you have 8-12 hours of video games per week... would you spend that limited time currency on ANY of these games? "Good" requires that it be a better use of your time than other games. Most of these games that you comment are "good", appear that they would be a very long time commitment for limited story/dopamine.

[@doctabaldhead]

Funny story about Superman 64. My grandpa used to pick games up for me and surprise me with them on visits. This worked out most of the time since that is how I ended up with amazing stuff like the N64 Goemon games that probably would have flown under my radar but after he got me Superman 64 he watched me play for a bit and vowed to never buy me a game I didn't personally pick out ever again. To this day 25 years later he still won't get me a gift on holidays without running it by me first.

[@antwango]

Yoooooooo! that is a proper wholesome relationship you still have with your grandad!!! You should value that and your family!!! seriously

[@st1ka]

Aww that's such a sweet story

[@waxknucklebearingjuice5592]

Yeah man , my grandfather sold the house out from under my grandma , remarried and gave his inheritance to the second wives grown children.

[@Gatorade69]

​@@waxknucklebearingjuice5592Oof. Kind of like how my dad/stepmom took in my grandma after she was in the hospital then became her conservator and then in the matter of a few years spent all her money and sold all her belongings (she definitely had some money). When they spent all her money they then allowed her to go back home. That's the only thing they didn't manage to sell, the house. Oh yeah, they also spent all the money my grandma had put aside for my college fund. :/

[@Ralkila]

Another fun fact is that it's one of the early victims of crunch development and limited time launch window date. Iirc they lost the license before they ended the game and they glued a A->B->Credits to launch. Maybe a roughly edged game for the time standards but it was not the game they wanted to deliver at least not entirely. Who knows what would have it been with enough time, however that's the story of most licensed games, they have the license for months only so they have to comply with the launch date.

[@KingBasewyn]

Suffering with feet damage from glass is the truest, purist canonical way of playing Die Hard.

[@st1ka]

haha

[@loutchi7981]

Castlevania 64 is almost the only castlevania where the vampires tend to act like...vampire.I loved the scenes where we meet vampire especially in the Villa.

[@st1ka]

100% agreed :P

[@Azuris190]

I agree, i also like the villa part. Pretty nice game.

[@thelokksdoomcorner8329]

It also has a great OST.

[@st1ka]

@@thelokksdoomcorner8329 and the storytelling is among the best in the series

[@neoqwerty]

@@st1ka Honestly what hurt it most was that it didn't get to be finished in time (the "semi-sequel" with Cornell was made with cut content from 64, and if someone with patience ever glued both games together with the cut sections from both sides and all the scenarios it'd be perfect. ...even if Cornell's story ALSO suffered cuts of its own)

[@JustWasted3HoursHere]

At a time when almost all games for the Atari 2600* took 6 months to make, Howard Scott Warshaw was given 5 *_WEEKS_* to create "E.T." to be ready for the upcoming holiday season. Considering that, I say he did an amazing job! Howard also made "Yars Revenge", widely considered as one of the greatest games ever made for the system, so he definitely knows how to make a good game when given the time. * The Atari 2600/VCS was a very challenging system to program for. It has almost no RAM (only 128 _BYTES_ of memory) and no video buffer (the program itself had to do almost all of the work). It's really amazing that programmers could get it to do anything useful whatsoever, but they did!

[@marcosdheleno]

as someone who considers pretty much every game on the atari as mediocre at the very best. it doesnt matter to me, why the game is bad. its still something i have absolutely no desire to ever play.

[@st1ka]

Considering the short development time, ET could have turned out FAR worse imo

[@marcosdheleno]

@@st1ka cool, this matter why? was it not sold for full price on release? did the box point out that "hey, it was made cheaply, and fast, but it could've turned out FAR worse" as a selling point? as a player, all that matters is how good the finished product is. and while its mediocre, and not as terrible as it could've been. and to counter that point, it's also nowhere near as good as it SHOULD'VE been. but, like i said, "should've" and "could've" dont matter. what it IS does. and even back then, it IS at best, mediocre.

[@JustWasted3HoursHere]

@@marcosdhelenoIt has a different impact on people who grew up with it. Compared to even consoles and computers that came out even just a few years later it is primitive, yes.

[@JustWasted3HoursHere]

@@st1kaIndeed, I wonder how "E.T." would have turned out if Howard had had the typical development time to work on it. Say, 6 months or so.

[@crossmirage]

29:28 Oh hey i actually finished this game several times over so I can tell you how it works. So, stamina is tied to your moves, and it doesn't increase your input delay, but it takes away your options as it gets lower. Moves require a certain amount of stamina to execute. At 3 bars you cannot attack. 2 or lower you cannot do ANYTHING. You need to mash A/B to recover stamina. Wakeup is also affected by stamina, at 3 bars your robot slowly gets on its feet, 4 bars and up it does a kip up. Stamina regen rate depends on health remaining. You also didn't get into how you are fully invuln while crouching or flying. You can't throw someone who's crouching. You also cannot air to air. it simply does not exist. If both of you do a jumpkick it will mutually whiff. Oh also the round timer lasts like 6 minutes :)

[@st1ka]

Oh wow thank you for that

[@ideitbawxproductions1880]

That's a lot to keep track of...

[@crossmirage]

@@ideitbawxproductions1880 It sounds like a lot but it's not actually that much. The more pressing issue is that Heavy Nova just does not function as a fighting game. The one time i played it with another person they had the worst time of their life lol

[@XX-sp3tt]

You don't stop Dracula from resurrecting. You had a curse placed on you at the end of the last game. And you need to collect Dracula's parts, resurrect him yourself, and kill him again to remove the cruse.

[@st1ka]

Fair point ^^

[@fattkidgames1755]

Yeah. Geez. Get it right. Frickin gosh!

[@timmytonberry3246]

Yes, you need to PROCESS all the parts.

[@jeanbob1481]

There was something weird about the endings too I think the neutral one you killed him but you die but in the good one you kill him good enough that the curse is gone.

[@kinganarkzie]

Castlevania 64 was a flawed masterpiece. It got over shadowed by SotN and some how developed this really bad reputation over the years. It was not as hated at the time, people just noted its issues. I think Legacy, it's semi upgrade, is the best Castlevania in the series.

[@miketate3445]

Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde features peak 8-bit cat animation. Nothing can ever take that away.

[@st1ka]

Haha very true

[@princebloodgrave8097]

This was one of my favorite games, growing up. :)

[@Ze0do0Gas]

Wait, what are you talking about?

[@presidentsnow7315]

@@princebloodgrave8097 Me Too!!

[@presidentsnow7315]

@@Ze0do0Gas The evil cat depicted in the game moved very realistically. It had great graphics for an NES game.

[@arvinrunstein5707]

The villagers giving you false info isn't a translation issue. In both the Japanese and English manuals it states that some villagers will lie to you. The translation has issues though.

[@st1ka]

Aaah interesting! Thank you for that

[@scottydu81]

The closer you get to Dracula's castle, the more mad they are. It's actually kinda neat. The weirdo who says "come live with me" was the closest to the castle, so I imagine her completely out of her gourd

[@neoqwerty]

The main thing the translation got wrong was what was actually helpful hints making absolutely no sense in english because it was meant to be obscure and the translators had NO CLUE what the hints were trying to hint at. (they tried, and they tried very hard, but sometimes you just end up with something that makes no sense out of context and you're left with only a LOT of guessing.)

[@scottydu81]

@@neoqwerty The death star translation was especially pernicious. Requires deep knowledge of Japanese culture

[@dansmith16]

Graveyard duck!@@scottydu81

[@NucleaRaptor]

I'll actually throw my hat in the ring for MK Mythologies. The unforgiving gameplay is really the only major issue with the game, because everything else surrounding it is great. The dark moody atmosphere is perfectly complemented by Dan Forden's stellar soundtrack, the FMV cutscenes are delightfully goofy, and if you care about the MK story even a little bit, it honestly cannot be understated what a treasure this game is. It's the best lore that John Tobias has ever written during his tenure, and there's so much of it that it didn't even completely fit into the manual (!); there's some real juicy tidbits that only exist on the game's old website, which has thankfully been archived. It's a real shame that it failed, because it was clearly Tobias' passion project. If you read some of the old interviews, he was convinced that nearly every MK character deserved to have a story told about them and was really excited to start revealing some of the backstories stewing in his brain. Mythologies was supposed to be a whole side franchise, with 5 or so more story-focused solo games in the works, but MKM's failure and Midway's complete butchering of Special Forces during development put an end to all that. A shame, really.

[@st1ka]

Oh the game has tons of potential. The moody atmosphere and the sountrack are definitely good. It's the controls and level design that I couldn't get into, but those are things that could have been fixed

[@kibble113]

I blame AVGN. A lot of people watched his reviews and declared certain games "bad" without ever having played them, simply because he reviewed them on the show. The thing is, AVGN gives bad reviews for comedy purposes, and James Rolfe doesn't even dislike a lot of the games he featured on AVGN.

[@pokepress]

The real issue (which I don’t blame James for) is how that style is used unironically to criticize everyday things (including regular people) as a form of entertainment, sometimes with real world consequences.

[@st1ka]

I don't blame James but people don't seem to get he's just playing a character:/

[@54raynor]

James has even said on multiple occasions that Castlevania II (his first-ever review) is actually one of his favorite games from childhood.

[@TheRealNameless1]

I agree with AVGN about Hydlide, that game was awful. I played that game with spite, I wanted to beat it but never could. The world would be the same each time but the items were randomized. So some playthroughs would be soft locked because there's no way to get the chests guarded by creatures you don't have a chance against. The password was long and a pain, just make sure you got it right or it's time to start over (keep old passwords). I was just glad you could continue after dying (only until you turn off the NES). If I had to enter a password that long each time I died I would have just never played it. Combat it also pretty clunky, flak an enemy and ram into it while pressing A. You never got a sense of being powerful the whole game, simple fights could end you pretty quickly. This game has a bad wrap because it is pretty bad.

[@kaybee4850]

I blame the parents

[@xerokitsune]

Hotel Mario had one additional issue that most people that play it currently would not run into. The CDi original controllers were a mixed bag, playing it on a emulator with a good controller goes a long way into improving the game.

[@scottydu81]

The Zelda sister games have been fixed, it's playable now

[@st1ka]

Yeah the CDi controllers are terribad, thankfully emulation has come a long way ^^

[@Vanity0666]

Limited Run Games sells a reproduction CDi controller now as a result of publishing Arzette, it's never been better for Hotel Mario and Wand of Gamelon enjoyers

[@GarryGri]

I have a CDi and the game and never understood the hate. I assumed it was just because it was not what was expected from a 'Mario' game. But yes playing it with the normal CDi controller s bad, playing any acrade type game with that controller is bad. Playing it with the joystick is ok though.

[@masteryoraerasante]

Fun fact, apparently the original Dark Castle was not just aiming with the mousebut it was the first known game to use WASD control.

[@st1ka]

Oh wow that's awesome

[@nvfury13]

I remember when IJKL were the default movement keys…

[@Trialwolf]

Loved Castlevania 64 back in the day, really enjoyed the side characters and it's the first time in a Castlevania game you save the soul of a Vampire and fight Death with genuine anger rather than the typical boss encounter.

[@st1ka]

The storytelling in castlevania 64 is some of the best in the series

[@mattalan6618]

@@st1ka it s. but from a gameplay point i just cant get back into it no matter how many times i tried

[@brennanballard745]

What I really like about this video is that I can often NAME the early 2010s gamerboy KZbin video that created the dominant narrative around the game in question, but you never once name the video or refute them point by point. You let the qualities of these games speak for themselves and what they were trying to do in a really honest way. It's a refreshing contrast from the videos that brought us all here.

[@ehhorve857]

a thing you should know about heavy nova: you NEED the manual. why? because it tells you the attacks, and that you have to mash the bottuns to refill your bar. (the input delay thing.) it's not so much a fuel gauge as it is a stamina bar, better attacks empty it faster, and keep away is the other way to refill it. this message has been brought to you by the guy who beat the game.

[@EdmondDantes224]

Correction about Hydlide... it DIDN'T remove the ability to save at any time. Just pull up the menu and the option is right there. Although there is one caveat: .. this isn't the "turn your game off and come back later" type of save (that would be the password system). This more just creates a restore point you can pull up after dying (that's what the "restore" option in the menu is for). So it works more like an emulator save state.

[@st1ka]

Yep! I should have clarified that. My bad!

[@fitnessabcvideo]

Was this example of very early quick save which only appeared after your death but had no continuity once the system was turned off, I guess this due to the cartridge having a battery?

[@EdmondDantes224]

@@fitnessabcvideo Yeah exactly. If you turned the console off, that's when you needed a password.

[@cogitoergodumm]

Yes, this is very important, because it means that you don't have to input the password over and over again after dying. Just start a new game and chose the option Load. The password is only for turning off your console and resuming after that. Also, for the combat you want to change between the attack and defense stance. Some enemies are easier to deal with while defending, like the dragon or the final boss. Combine this with the direction of your attack and the enemies and it becomes a somewhat deep combat system for such an old and seemingly simple game.

[@greenaum]

@@fitnessabcvideo Due to the cartridge _not_ having a battery, otherwise it could have saved in more details and wouldn't need passwords. The save feature mentioned, I presume just saves the details in the console's RAM. Lost after you switch off. The password just encodes certain variables into letters, for maybe a dozen bytes of data.

[@RaposaCadela]

Virtual Hydlide runs on a GOLF ENGINE??? Oh my god that's so jank I LOVE IIIITTT ...plus these old golf games always had super interesting pseudo-3D engines that no one ever talks about

[@st1ka]

Haha right?!

[@marafolse8347]

Right? Ive always wanted to understand how those engines work but there doesnt seem to be any interest in looking into it.

[@RaposaCadela]

@@marafolse8347 finally someone who agrees, I never even seen anyone awknowledge that they exist

[@marcosdheleno]

and? that's make it better how? game runs like trash. being a golf game or not. and even IF you could run it at the best fps possible, the gameplay is still terrible! being a 3d game, with terrible camera, atrocious dungeons, and absolutely no 3d perspective making you nauseous just from the jank movement alone!

[@PaulSpades]

Looks to me like a 3d engine with sprites. Normally, this can be done just with a "mode7" transform on the floor, and scaling sprites. But there's some stuff going on in this one - the bridge looks like textured polygons, the interiors look like there's at least raycasting with arbitrary segments and texturing. I assume they also calculate occluded items since there are textures with transparency and the fps drops inside buildings. It might be a full polygon engine, it's slow because the hardware at the time couldn't really handle textured polygons even with no lighting. Which is why the doom, quake and duke3d engines were genius. Polygonal engines used very little textures, 3d engines with textures needed to simplify geometry and sprites with no lighting, some games use pre-rendered backgrounds and polygonal characters, some used voxel terrain with sprites and polygons. The doom and duke3d engines struck the best balance, but everybody was trying to get this stuff to work, and there were different solutions for each platform and each game. Meanwhile, game devs had offline raytracing renderers with per-pixel lighting, color bleed, bounces and reflections, refraction, caustics, ambient light and soft cast shadows. It's not that we didn't know how to do 3d graphics, it's that the hardware wasn't capable. And still isn't, we just fake it better. And real-time 3d was considered anything between 12 and 25 fps.

[@lostxj]

St1ka I am starting to get the impression you have an alarming high threshold for game frustration.

[@st1ka]

Well I have played a wide range of games, both good and bad :P

[@marcosdheleno]

i dont think that's a treshold, im starting to belive its an contrarian point of view. i can accept that some of those games arent bad, specially castlevania 2 with its mod, and castlevania 64. even E.T. i can see it being playable, even though i genuinely dont think any atari game gets above mediocre at best. but superman 64, virtual hydlide and mortal kombat mythologies? nah, that's where i draw the line. i played those suckers. i also owned a sega cd, and played sewer shark. which was another incredibly boring game at its best. so yeah, cant disagree more on this video.

[@Kingshadowac]

@@st1ka Yeah no. there something wrong with you.

[@st1ka]

@@Kingshadowac Yes, I like videogames.

[@Godzilla1982]

That god awful "nitro" crap in CastleVania 64 is enough to relegate it to the toilet bowl of gaming IMO. I do love Simon's Quest though. The biggest strike against it to me IMO is the lack of bosses.

[@raddastronaut]

“Just forget this hole and go on to the next one. “ -priceless life advice.

[@st1ka]

Haha

[@Godzilla1982]

Based.

[@braillynn]

🤣

[@braillynn]

🤣

[@hitcher82]

In the early 90s i remember finding the nes Hydlide game semi buried in the back yard of my moms best friends house while visiting them. I decided to swipe it since it seems to me that they didn't want it if it was just thrown out there to rot. After cleaning it up i was amazed it still worked. After playing it for 5 minutes I realized why it was semi buried in the backyard 😂.

[@st1ka]

Hahah

[@orektez]

sure an adult can play superman 64, more so with a modern controller on a emulator, but 5 year old me broke the thumbstick trying over and over to get through those rings. ruined my whole summer because my parents didn't get me another controller. so that game has been up at the top for games i dislike for quite awhile.

[@st1ka]

Understandable ^^

[@Countsmegula]

Can confirm that Die Hard is pretty decent, it just takes a bit of know how on how to actually finish it. Castlevania 64 has been on my list for some time, but don't know if I should go with it or Legacy of Darkness.

[@st1ka]

Technically you should go with Both castlevanias. Legacy of Darkness is part remake but also part sequel / expansion pack. I think they complement each other rather than replace on another

[@loutchi7981]

i loved castlevania 64 and i had the two versions.I surely recommend you the legacy of darkness who look like a more definitive one, and you get in it the possibility to get the campaign of Carrie and reinhardt, the characters of castlevania 64, even if a few element(different levels configuration and some boss) stay exclusive to castlevania 64

[@Artican]

I agree wholeheartedly. It is such a creative survival game that hews closely to the original film. And the "fog of war" element is something almost unheard of in an action game, but adds significantly to the tension.

[@neoqwerty]

@@loutchi7981 If they're buying the games on cartridges, Legacy of Darkness, but if they're playing on a flashcart or emulator, then I'd say the Carrie/Reinhardt campaigns are best played on the original, even if it lacks some of the control polish from Cornell's version. The parts that aren't in Carrie and Reinhardt's campaigns in LoD are seriously worth THAT much.

[@Femaiden]

dunno why he says die hard, when total recall is legit one of the worst games ever made

[@irontobias]

Superman 64 was the first game I ever got right around release, and was a birthday present from my grandma; my brother and i had enough fun despite the clunky controls. Of course I eventually gave up when, after hours and hours of frustrating progress, I finally got to the very last level, and promptly glitched into the floor. I turned it off, and never turned it back on again after that. The happy ending is that the same grandma a few years later took me to pick out a PS1 game for another birthday, and I spied a chunky box set with some anime art which she agreed to grab for me despite the slightly higher price - Lunar 2 Eternal Blue. I managed to hold on to it in the years since (during which every other game I owned was stolen), and it's the most expensive game in my collection now 😁

[@st1ka]

Aww that's such an awesome story

[@ventiankraus777]

Rented Lunar 2 several times. Awesome game and wholesome story. Have a blessed evening.

[@PsychoNerd92]

I don't agree with you on some of these (you didn't even mention one of the most annoying parts of Friday the 13th: the fact that you can be walking left while actually moving right on the map), but I always love hearing different perspectives. Either way, I agree that none of these games should be considered the worst of all time when you have games like Big Rigs that are straight up unfinished.

[@st1ka]

Is the map thing bad? I thought the map easy to navigate, can't say I've had an issue with it o.o

[@PsychoNerd92]

@@st1ka I just booted it up to double check. The paths at the top of the map are swapped. It makes sense because you're basically going clockwise around a big track, but in the moment, with the alarm going off and a house to your left on the map, it can be easy to forget that you need to walk the opposite direction. Or maybe that's just me. I've never been great with directions lol

[@st1ka]

@@PsychoNerd92 aah understandable. I guess I just got used to it and didn't notice it 😅

[@zenksren8206]

It's basically like if the map in Pokemon/Zelda was like the one from Ghosts 'n Goblins

[@eddypeacock4005]

Just remember left is clockwise and right is counter clockwise

[@hamishfox]

I'm surprised to hear Castlevania II is hated. For some reason I thought it was a speed running classic...

[@st1ka]

I think the AVGN video hurt its reputation though it did regain some of it over the years

[@ElFreakinCid]

@@st1ka His video literally led to a romhack existing that fixes all the game's problems and makes it less needlessly cryptic.

[@logiclunacy606]

I mean I personally dont like castlevania 2 because I found it boring to play.

[@CerealNommer]

I was surprised to hear CastleVANIA II *might* be considered an early MetroidVANIA game. Was the fact that the genre is named after these games not a clue?

[@logiclunacy606]

@CerealNommer Actually Castlevania 2 is considered a side scroller. The 1st metroidvania that it had was symphony of the night. The sense of progression is based on items used as apposed to powers. Even with Symphony, it's only loosely a metroidvania because its a mix of both progress with items and powers.

[@ShinoSarna]

So Virtual Hydlide is an action based roguelike (rather than turn based) that was made literally decades before games like Binding of Isaac or Hades popularized that idea? Damn.

[@st1ka]

Yep kinda

[@gorauma]

I'd argue Diablo was first of its kind.

[@Turbotef]

@@gorauma Diablo didn't create the action RPG genre though

[@gorauma]

@@Turbotef Was the first "Roguelike" in that it had randomized dungeon layouts in a real time combat game

[@Vanity0666]

The problem with virtual hydelide is that for some reason they made the design decision of weight slowing the entire game's framerate down to a powerpoint presentation

[@Trialwolf]

With Quest 64 I feel it's greatest issue was expectations based on what came before, the Super NES WAS the system for RPG's with tons of games still regarded today, when the N64 came around I'm sure many picked it up to continue with those RPG's (Square did announce FF7 was going to PSX but I'm sure people still figured the N64 would get tons of them). But then no RPG's appeared for some time so I'm sure a lot of people were placing there hopes on Quest 64 to meet the standards of what came before but then suffered when it wasn't what people wanted it to be.

[@st1ka]

Yep I agree. It's clear people wanted a Final fantasy killer And quest 64 Is definitely not that

[@PlasticCogLiquid]

I was surprised they actually released it with the name "Quest 64." It was the development name and they could've changed it to something more creative

[@st1ka]

@@PlasticCogLiquid yeah I vastly prefer the European name: Holy Magic Century

[@ramrodbldm9876]

Quest 64 sucked period point blank

[@gateroozeink5061]

@@ramrodbldm9876 I played through the whole game when it first came out. At first I thought it was cool, but it quickly became SO boring. I kept hoping it would get better, but no - I really regret wasting that time now.

[@mdavis5826]

I love anybody that gives the underdogs a fighting chance. Thanks for the video! And thanks for getting the Hydlide music stuck in my head for weeks again 😂

[@st1ka]

My whole channel is about bringing a new perspective and covering stuff that never gets covered xD

[@SorcererLance]

Even if it's basically a rip-off of the Indiana Jones theme? :P

[@presidentsnow7315]

@@AndSaveAsManyAsYouCan I only ever played the first three Zelda games: the two for the NES and "Link to the Past" for the SNES. As much as I loved Zelda 2 back when it came out, it just does not feel like a Zelda game at all. I think it was a great game by its own standards, but feels so out of place from the other two.

[@pharmcat8484]

A common sentiment. If you ever revisit it, I’d recommend the remake done by hoverbat.

[@benjourney8699]

Please reply back if you can but when you played 64 Superman you were talking about. What where you are playing It on? Was it on an emulator because if you play It for the 64. The fog was a lot worse than what i saw in the video clip you shown. Just let me know please and thank you.

[@st1ka]

Yeah I played it on an emulator :P

[@BUDA20]

it will be cool to play it overclocked at high fps " 07:13 - Virtual Hydlide (Sega Saturn) "

[@francescosmith7859]

Yep, right there with you on Castlevania 2 as well. The game has some flaws sure but it's far from a bad a game and I mostly think it's a very fun adventure. Not to compare them too closely but I think the first Ninja Turtles game is similar. Definitely flawed but still very fun and not even close to the worst the NES has to offer.

[@st1ka]

I was actually going to include TMNT in this video too, but cut it out for lack of time

[@exodore2000]

I enjoyed castlevania 2 as well.

[@lissas4152]

I played Castlevania 2 when it first came out. The only complaint we had then is that it was harder than either 1 or 3. It was the later gens that didn't like that was different than them.

[@dansmith16]

I wouldn't say Friday the 13 was completely faithful to the movies since his mom's head can attack you and he game overs clearly not-adult children.

[@st1ka]

That's fair :P

[@almaelma11]

Amazing video ST1KA!! Was awesome hearing your opinion on Quest 64 the most :) That game needs more love!

[@st1ka]

Thank you ^^

[@SquirrelGamez]

I respectfully disagree and firmly believe those games are truly terrible. Some of them those I even played myself back in the days of games rental, and they were the worst wastes of money I have ever been guilty of.

[@jasonblalock4429]

40:00 Thank you! I've said for years that Ft13 is underrated. It's not perfect, but it's a way ahead-of-its-time survival horror game that deserves to be recognized. Also, on the topic of "good games with bad ports" I'd point at the 80s Ghostbusters game. The NES port is crap, but the original on C64 and PCJr was great, one of the best movie tie-in games yet made. Especially the sense of escalation and mounting tension as it goes on.

[@st1ka]

Yeah I'm quite fond of the master system port of ghostbusters

[@specterent]

One thing I see in most videos about ET that I didn't see here and was glad I didn't see it, is the complaint that you have to fall in random holes. If you press the red button and use a tiny bit of energy, the hole with a phone piece has a tiny light flash in it. Making it slightly easier to complete.

[@st1ka]

I feel the issue is most people just didn't read the manual. But a lot of old games practically made it a requirement to read the manual

[@Muhahahahaz]

@@st1kaseriously, right? I see that issue all the time with retro games… Even the good ones. People complain about how cryptic Metroid, Zelda 1, etc. can be… But they never even read the original manual (which can easily be found online these days lol)

[@freebretth]

I always enjoyed ET's walking animation and the rhythmic stomping sounds. 😂

[@Holy_Zen]

Regarding Heavy Nova, it is not stated anywhere in the game (or in the manual, if I recall), but mashing the buttons (not the D-Pad like you were) causes your power meter to regenerate faster, and can even rarely cause your character to throw the enemy if they're in front of you while you're below the third power bar. It makes a big difference in the game's playability if you know this. I've actually played the game quite a bit, and while it's definitely a flawed game, I enjoy playing it.

[@st1ka]

Oh interesting! Thank you for that!

[@amaweksIII]

I Always have felt the same as you about Castlevania II, Castlevania N64, and some others. Most of these games have flaws indeed, but they are a lot misunderstood, bacause people where expecting something else them the games are offering. This happens a lot, in fact, and tehre is this effect on youtube that everyone repeats the "trend" opinions about most famous and infamous games. One other game that cames in my mind is Mr Bones for Sega Saturn, a lot of people repeats the discourse that the game is bat because it was made by Sega of America. Again, the game have flaws, but is a interesting game with a lot of greate moments, just not what mot people expected I gess.

[@Dragonrider1227]

I’ve noticed Fester’s Quest for the NES gets a bad rep and while it does have issues, I enjoyed it. My only serious problem is that it could really use a password system. It expects you to beat the whole game in one sitting

[@st1ka]

I should check out Fester's Quest in case I ever do a sequel video

[@Mr.Boglin]

You know, i really wish there was a way to get a 4K Re-Release of Mortal Kombat 1,2,3 "the ones with Digital Actors" and Sewer Shark/Night Trap and the like. Just MK being Ultra HD would be AMAZING though.

[@st1ka]

Oh night trap got a modern re-release with higher quality footage (or at least, as higher quality as you can given the limitations)

[@antwango]

night trap was on the vita i think... yeah it was I supposedly bought it, it should be in my account but never played it... its supposed to be abit broken at launch or something which is why i never gotten around to playing it... so vita means there was probably a cross play ps3 version or a ps4 version as well!??? i cant remember

[@Aivottaja]

An MK trilogy remaster was in development. Until it was cancelled, unfortunately.

[@KasumiRINA]

@@Aivottaja this is borderline criminal, it's one thing canceling games with cheap asset upscales and another erasing tons of footage made with real actors specifically for the game.

[@LordArikado]

@@KasumiRINA What's wild is that out of all the dozens of Mortal Kombat games released over the past 30+ years, only X, 11, and One are playable on modern platforms. 9 was delisted due to licensing issues with Freddy Kreuger, and everything before that has either never been ported or their last port was on the PS3/360.

[@doctabaldhead]

Simon's Quest and Castlevania 64 are both rather good. They are awkward compared to other entries in the series sure but they are still quite good. Hell, I don't really see how Castlevania 64 is all that much worse than the PS2 3D Castlevanias.

[@st1ka]

Yeah i never got the hate for castlevania 64

[@yourtoyrobot9455]

Quest was limited at the time, but the innovative combat/spirit system was a great idea that wouldve thrived on later systems

[@st1ka]

Yep agreed

[@megabolt5898]

I played Quest 64 and loved it. Need to reobtain it. Knew anyone giving it a bad review had an agenda...

[@GodSponge]

There's a super cool romhack for Simon's Quest called "Castlevania 2 Simon's Quest Revamped" and it fixes a lot of the problems you mentioned in the video, including the day/night interruption and the cryptic citizens. IF you're not into the updated graphics and other things, there's "Castlevania II: Simon's Redaction" which just fixes the text and keeps the original look.

[@st1ka]

Oh I know about those projects but I wanted the video to focus on the original title ^^

[@GeorgeWeeman]

I remember playing ET when I was a kid....I was proud of my young self when I beat the game. People don't realize that most of atari games didn't even have an end; they just went on till you died, or you gave up!

[@st1ka]

Yep very true

[@Pridetoons]

I DON'T CARE WHAT ANYONE SAYS, I LOVE BOTH CASTLEVANIA GAMES FOR THE N64!!!

[@st1ka]

Yep they're good imo

[@RandomGamingDouchebag]

I saw this video preparing to drop and in the back of my mind I was hoping to see Castlevania 64 and I'm not disappointed. Such an underrated game.

[@st1ka]

Glad I could deliver! ^^

[@CrashGordon94]

I don't think I'd ever seen anything on this channel before but this was randomly recommended to me. Honestly quite solid, interesting to see the differing perspectives, the cases where it was rightly deserved versus the times when people might have been overly harsh on something that's just a bit weird or meh.

[@Soshikix]

MK Sub Zero is criminally underrated. Sure, it's janky but it's fun and the FMV clips had just the right amount of cheese.

[@elitriss]

Good video St1ka 👍 Covered a few of my fav games that get too much hate. (I really like Quest 64, Die Hard & ET 😅) I want to check out Virtual Hydlide now, it looks interesting.

[@st1ka]

Glad you enjoyed the video ^^

[@MasterLinkuei]

17 games that reputation has been killed by AVGN

[@st1ka]

I think there's a few he didn't play 😅

[@justinjones5778]

Pretty shore they ruined their own reps and avgn is just capitalizing on it

[@Throbingkcoc]

Kind of like how Beavis and Butthead ruined a few music careers by bashing their music videos.

[@michaelhall736]

Not really. Even some of the worst games he's ever reviewed have developed a cult following because of him. Those Bible games he reviewed such as King of Exodus, Bible Buffet, and Super 3D Noah's Arc are on Steam and they have a pretty sizable amount of downloads. Castlevania 2 was released on modern game consoles and people have played the heck out of it. And people are demanding Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde get a sequel or remake.

[@novelezra]

I remember my first ever instance of experiencing a more balanced opinion of a game. I grew up with AVGN; Spoony and the like and it was easy back then to misread hyperbolic statements as fact, instead of jokes that many of them were. I then started watching HalfBlindGamer and he did a playthrough of the Zelda CDI games. I remember thinking 'oh yeah here we go, this is going to be hilarious!' only to find that his let's play was much more balanced and pragmatic than what I was accustomed to. Basically he played the game and explained what it did well and what it didn't - whilst also highlighting that for a CDI game, the game was kind of a technical marvel. That was over a decade ago now but ever since then, I've tried to have the same kind of outlook. Sure it can be funny to say something is terrible and some games truly are objectively awful (The Uncanny X-Men on NES is absolutely one of the worst games ever). But a lot of the time, what is funny is usually a joke and it's best not to take jokes too seriously. Especially when it risks putting someone off playing a game they might actually enjoy.

[@st1ka]

Honestly I've played a lot of truly bad games before and most are still relatively unknown

[@MatCaveGaming]

"Sewer Shark", "Friday the 13th" and "E.T." are 3 of my favorite games! Great video!

[@st1ka]

Glad you enjoyed it! :D

[@delusionnnnn]

A complicating issue with movie tie-ins is that they're often set to a deadline as long as there is "minimal viable product" and if it doesn't feel relevant to the movie, it will disappoint more. E.T.'s reception in particular was exacerbated by the fact that the people most likely to want to play an ET game were people who identified with its 10 year old boy and 7 year old girl characters - younger kids who were double-whammied by the game's insufferable difficulty, and how repetitive the pit-escape sequence was. And it felt very little like anything that happened in the movie.

[@Lovuschka]

Actually, the townsfolk in Castlevania 2 lies to you in the Japanese original also.

[@st1ka]

Oh wow I wonder why?

[@Lovuschka]

@@st1ka Design choice. Which most likely means they wanted to sell hint lines and strategy guides. There is a patch that fixes that, and also makes the day/night message faster. But personally I never played Castlevania 2 (a few other games from the series though, mostly the Metroidvania style ones). So I can only relay here what I heard on the internet.

[@st1ka]

@@Lovuschka aaah makes sense

[@zazelby]

From what I've read, they don't lie to you exactly, they're passing on rumors. Any statement in the Japanese version that starts something like "I hear that..." or "I've been told that..." is wrong in some way. But the English translators didn't pick up on that nuance, so they left those identifying phrases out.

[@Lovuschka]

@@zazelbyThanks for clarifying!

[@ignorethis214]

I greatly enjoyed the video. A few things regarding Quest 64, as I understand, the lack of currency and sidequests was due to running out of resources and having to rush the game out rather than it beijg 'intended' as an introductory rpg. (I saw in another comment you already knew about the other playable characters that were cut.) Also, none of your gameplay showed you dodging any of the enemies attacks. In case you didn't know, you can move during their attacks. It makes a big difference. Your stats go up as you use them, basically. If you keep hitting enemies with your staff, it gets stronger. If you keep getting hit, your defense goes up. If you tape your controller down overnight and continually run into a wall, I forget, your agility or something goes up. Yes, I'm nostalgic, and it was my first RPG outside of Pokemon. Just wanted to share, especially since this is the second or third video I've seen of players who don't realize they can dodge.

[@neoqwerty]

I swear, people who touch Quest 64 should not be allowed to say ANYTHING about it until they've made it past Solvaring (the first boss and the one who makes you learn to move during the enemy action or die). They're literally still in the tutorial zone and getting spoonfed battle and leveling hints by the NPCs, and I'm groaning in frustration at "it's okay I guess" while they blithely don't realize that THE MOVEMENT OCTAGON FOR BRIAN IS UP _that's when you can move within your range_ why is that so hard for people to notiiiiiiiiiice.

[@nondescriptcat5620]

Cultured Quest 64 Enjoyers in this thread.

[@st1ka]

I did beat the first boss though (admittedly I only showed footage of me dying against him but I did beat him)

[@st1ka]

Oh I did eventually learn to move while being attacked but yeah I should have showed better footage that showed that

[@ressljs]

I never played it, but one of my coworkers talked about this game. He said he enjoyed it except it was so short, it felt like a huge rip off. Since there are clearly people here who played it, is that true?

[@shiyokugou404]

FC version HYDLIDE is not a low rated game in Japan, so I was very surprised when I saw that it was heavily criticized by people outside of Japan. The timing of the release, including the PC version, is mentioned in the video, but I sometimes wonder if it would have been rated a bit differently if it had been released before Zelda, as it was in Japan.

[@st1ka]

I assume it would have been better received for sure. By 1984 standards the game wasn't far from the earlier Ultima games

[@beavinator]

When Jekyll & Hyde came up I was like "Why do I recognize this song, I haven't ever played this game. Wait, isn't this from Rygar?" It is. Both games had the same composer, and they re-used the title theme, just in a different key.

[@st1ka]

Oh wow I never realized that! That's kinda cool haha

[@justnature1900]

I think Bubsy is my favorite hated game I was shocked not to see it on this list

[@dabanjo]

I always tried to preach that ET wasn't that bad. It wasn't that good either....but definitely not the worst game of all time as it's been labeled.

[@neoqwerty]

Mostly it was a heavy case of GUIDE DANG IT and unintuitive clues, compounded with an All There In The Manual (which, well, most people who emulate do not, in fact, read the manual). It's more a victim of its time and relative complexity than actually bad.

[@chopdog6563]

@@neoqwerty it also didn't help that the programmer was only given about 4 weeks to make the game because licensing issues ate up all the time that could have been spent making the game. Considering the constraints, it's amazing anything remotely playable came out of that situation. Th original programmer created a patch to fix some of the glaring issues a few years ago.

[@st1ka]

Yeah I've played MUCH worse lol

[@Vanity0666]

ET singlehandedly crashed the home video games market and nearly killed the entire industry in its infancy to the point that they had to bury the remaining existing copies in the desert. It was pretty bad.

[@scorpinok3006]

@@Vanity0666 ET WASN'T solely responsible for the 83 video game crash. It was a combination of shovelware and poor marketing that crashed the market. ET being only given a month to make for the holiday rush didn't help, but it's not 100% responsible.

[@Shinmsl]

I see a common element of most of these games is unrealized potential... Either because of badly implementation of interesting ideas, comparison to superior sequels/prequels, or straight up rushed development. Like quite a few of these were frustrating because you could feel that there was great potential but a key defects really bogged down the whole experience; so there's a conflict of liking it but at the same time being overly frustrated when those faults showed up. Super Mario and Castlevania games have come to be classics because even to these day are superb, polished gameplay; and in the time the came out it blew minds how insanely good they were, so when facing with inferior sequels spinoffs , the comparison is dreadful, because the expectations were super high. It makes the perfectionist obsession of Shigeru Miyamoto and other accomplished developers much more understandable, because their own previous success put the bar always higher, it's a lot of pressure.

[@st1ka]

Yeah I have to admit I'm a sucker for ambitious games

[@Superman-ec2cq]

Superman 64 gave me seizures. I don't care if you defend it, it is always going to be bad to me.

[@Wolfdragoness]

OMG! Heavy Nova!! That one really hit me in the nostalgia! O-O I remember how much I LOVED that game. I dont remember if I ever raged quit or anything, or if I suffered the problems you mentioned, (it was that long ago >.

[@sacriptex5870]

heavy nova its a eletronic torture, the only 2 games on that list that are ok are the Nes ones and mk myth and Quest

[@theguybrarian]

quest and castlevania 64 lets gooo

[@st1ka]

Hehe :P

[@coreyoliver4778]

Heavy Nova, "get up, get up...oh f*ck this game!" had me laughing so hard.

[@st1ka]

That part was completely unscripted haha

[@Danielsonic87]

Castlevania 64, slowdowns besides, for me is a masterpiece. I never understanded why is sooo hated from gamers, I have very very enjoyed Legacy of Darkness at times

[@st1ka]

I love Castlevania 64 :D

[@affegpus4195]

Heavy Nova becomes a lot more playable once you read the manual The power gauge you were refering to actualy can be replenished my mashing a and b while downed. And it will fillup up naturaly if you are not crouching or jumping. But the lower your health are the slower it recovers. The whole game strategy is that while crouched or jumping you are immune to attacks, but your energy doesnt recover. And becouse takes time to raise up or turn around, whoever is standing has an advantage. so it turns into a battle for who can stay standing in a advantageous position.

[@st1ka]

Aaah thank you! :D

[@dimruby]

I know why E.T. gets hate. While playing, if you fell in a hole, it was difficult to get out of the hole for a stupid reason. While in a hole, you hold "up" to go upward and out of the hole. But once you are at the top of the hole and your perspective shifts, you need to continue holding "up" even though that direction is currently north instead. Until you realize this, the game is almost impossible to play, and I bet many people give up at this point.

[@dimruby]

And personally, I loved ET because it was different. It had an ending. There was more purpose to it than gathering points. "Adventure" was the best Atari game though. In fact, I'm fairly certain that games like Superman and E.T. used the Adventure game engine.

[@ZimLuvGigan]

I love Castlevania 64 and I never hated Mortal Kombat Sub-Zero

[@st1ka]

Fun Fact, Mortal Kombat Sub-Zero was my first PS1 game

[@mage1439]

I agree with you that Simon's Quest is a pretty good game, but I wish you'd mentioned one of the big problems with it -- the almost complete lack of bosses, which is a lot of where CV usually shines.

[@st1ka]

Aah that's a fair point

[@loutchi7981]

there was a good youtuber cygnus destroyer/LJN defender now "the slum archive" who make good video in bad game juging them by comparing good/bad point and announcing if it innocent/guilty in conclusion.And in france, our local AVGN "Joueur Du Grenier" make once with his partner a tier list of the game he "tested" to elect the worst and during that time, he come to "rehabilitate" games like E.T.

[@st1ka]

Oh man I remember Cygnus. Loved their videos

[@Nodeathnolife]

I really missed the guy. I was rather shocked when I learned that he suddenly deleted his channel and heard that he was facing with mental health issues which was what led to it.

[@probium2832]

Dark Castle - they're right, it's absolutely horrible Jekyll and Hyde - it is playable but painfully slow

[@blodguizer]

One of my greatest gaming achievements was beating all three levels of Friday the 13th. Its still one of my favorite games and the music is perfect.

[@Throbingkcoc]

I've never been able to beat Jason on day 3. He is just to damn fast in the cabins and I try to do the outside fight and follow him to the next screen trick but I always end up dying.

[@FinalFrantasy]

Been playing Castlevania 64 thanks to RetroAchievements and I'm having a great time, at least as Carrie. I haven't tried Reinhardt yet.

[@st1ka]

It's such a cool game

[@linkonprime]

The Die Hard game reminds me of Hotline Miami (a fantastic game).

[@PaulWerkema]

Thanks for the video, St1ka. It is always nice to hear other perspectives about video games that have received a bad reputation.

[@st1ka]

Glad you enjoyed it:D

[@tropicalgalaxy1503]

Has anyone pointed out yet that Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hide has multiple endings? That is the brilliance of it. If you can solve Mr. Hides madness by keeping him up all night (i think that's how) , you can repeat the day as Dr. Jekyll but this time there are no enemies and happy music, you can simply stroll straight to the wedding and get a glorious ending. There is also a Mr. Hide wedding version , and also generic crap wedding if you beat the game the hard way by surviving as Dr. Jekyll.

[@BurstError]

Thanks for giving "bad" games a proper try! It's frustrating when some of these misunderstood titles get trashed on without good reason.

[@3dpprofessor]

43:12 Is there a playlist where we can see these games reviewed? Or at least get the name of them? What's that TMNT game that's worse than ET?

[@st1ka]

I have a play list called "old videos". You'll find the TMNT game there :) The others I haven't reviewed yet Edit: here's the video, but it's an old video and my video making skills were lacking: kzbin.info/www/bejne/qoW6famfmcmIfMU

[@josuepereira9782]

I not only finished Heavy Nova but I managed to pile drive the last boss. I still don't know how I did it.

[@st1ka]

haha you're a braver soul than I

[@awsomkid3735]

What they used to call called "bad game design" we see it as "Ambitious game design"

[@BBHood217]

Ah yes, Jekyll & Hyde. It's all ho and hum, until the barrels start rolling down the street.

[@st1ka]

Haha

[@7F0X7]

I realized this was a meme video when Superman 64 showed it's smooth head and you ended with the E.T. game for the perfect chef's kiss send off. Great job!

[@st1ka]

Haha thank you

[@Bobbfenox]

Unfortunately Castlevania has a complete game breaking glitch and you can be hard locked

[@DevioXS]

Great video! Glad to see you gave ET a fair shot. So many people say it's the worst game ever without having plumbed the depths of what the Atari had to offer. Also glad to see you enjoyed Castlevania 2, that's long been a favorite of mine. Mental note: Play Die Hard and Friday the 13th sometime.

[@atmaweapon2803]

A lot of KZbin game review channels can be surprisingly dismissive and negative. As a programmer myself, I really, truly appreciate how you try to see the good in games. Thank you.

[@st1ka]

Thank you, I try ^^

[@janneaalto3956]

The NES Hydlide music is a crime against humanity's ears.

[@rRecoveryProd]

misleading. Some of these are legit bad, so your title should've ended with a question mark.

[@GrumpyCat97]

you can beat ''Dark Castle'' under 3 minutes

[@trueakuma777]

I like this video, as I believe that some of the games you reviewed here deserve a playthrough and don't deserve the hate they get. Having said that, I think a better title for this video would have been "17 'Terrible Games' That Deserve a Second Look". The current title suggests that all the games on the list are "Actually Good", when in reality some of them deserve ALL the hate they get. I almost didn't watch the video when I saw Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and E.T. were on the list, as I've played these games and I can say unequivocally that they absolutely deserve the designation of "Terrible Games". But I decided to be fair and listen to what you had to say, and I'm glad I did. Your analysis of these games is spot-on, so overall you did a good job with this video. In particular I was glad you pointed out how good of a game Castlevania 2: Simon's Quest really is, because I've always considered it to be a bit of a flawed gem and undeserving of much of the hate it gets. Thank you for the interesting video and stay safe out there!

[@PrinceMallow]

This was really neat and I'd love to see another video delving into infamously bad games to see if they're really as bad as people say! Some more that come to mind are Bubsy 3D, Sonic the Hedgehog Genesis (GBA port of Sonic 1), Ninjabread Man, and Mario is Missing.

[@JeffChausse]

I actually loved the E.T. game so much as a kid, and I hate people slamming it who probably never even played it, or didn't read the manual. Once you get used to the quirks of how the holes work (and get off of hard mode), it's REALLY not a bad game!

[@Ricard1807o]

What game is shown for the PC at 24:38?

[@differentman1878]

No superman 64 was murderously horrible. I played it when it came out and it was...so bad it was hilarious. Just to be clear, I always think that frame rate drop is a feature to a game (so cool when everything slows down) and bad camera angles just means u need to get better at playing. This game though...it was just so bizzare. And boring (u fly forever doing nothing) and disappointing (superpowers are practically gone). E.t ive never played. Im not THAT old lol. But watch playthroughs. Its astonishingly bad. And im glad quest 64 made it on the list. Though I think the gameplay was decent (my bar is verrrry low), the intuitiveness of the game is just not there (youve got NO clue where to go). And then graphics were so awful that my brother and i were on top of this mountain and we went around in literal circles trying to find a way off. Then he saw this patch of "ground" that was slightly browner than the other patches and it turned out to be the path. So no, I rly dont think we were lied to xD

[@greatestutuberhd]

The villagers in Castlevania II lying to you was a deliberate design choice by the devs at Konami

[@st1ka]

Oh, interesting. A fun idea, but maybe one they should have left on the cutting board lol

[@NosBlueade]

IDK man, I rented Quest 64 from Blockbuster and it was dogwater. You are right, it's not unplayable but dang it was dull. I remember effing around in the grass field for about 20 minutes and subsequently returned it.

[@st1ka]

Yeah I thought the game was just okay. Not the worst ever, but not something I'd go out of my way to finish

[@Conan_the_Based]

Many of these were among AVGN's best videos ^^

[@st1ka]

Oh his videos are excellent