BAD GAMES - Happy Console Gamer

Johnny plays some video games that were reviewed badly and sees if he can enjoy them?
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Join Johnny Millenium The Happy Console Gamer as he discusses new video games and reviews forgotten games that not many people know about but should!

[@rockmanfan5104]

Lol his experience with Balan is like that drive to work where you go into auto pilot, space out, and next thing you know you are pulling into the parking lot like "wtf how did i get here"

[@LucienVonKreuz]

Your wife's reaction killed me hahahahaha

[@ChrisMeadows1992]

That long Yuji Naka introduction felt like the buildup to a Norm Macdonald punchline. That's a compliment.

[@paprikastaude]

The sad part about Gollum is that the developers were making decent point'n'click adventure games prior. So they could've easily created an adventure game based on those drawings in the cutscene...

[@gmadera7]

the whole studio went outta business after the release.

[@Nicholasmcmath-cr1xl]

Agree

[@TMV420]

@@gmadera7 they didn't go out of business. Daedalic was a publishing and developing studio before this. because of the bad reception of Gollum, they were forced to shut down their development team and focus on publishing. Also, they were bought out by a larger company about a year before Gollum was completed, so this was a decision by this new parent company. Its really a shame. the blame all falls to that new parent company as much as Daedalic.

[@lutherheggs451]

No the sad thing really is more that ANYONE actually thought they could actually make a good game based on Gollum. There was literally nobody calling for a game about a character who does absolutely nothing. I can't even stand anything Lord of the Rings but even I could figure out that Gollum is kind of a trash character for a video game.. There were a hell of alot more interesting games that could have been made from Rings not Gollum.

[@Mintcar923]

Yeah I have a couple of their games.. I always thought they were a good dev prior.. Never played Gollum tho

[@ezioauditore4061]

These days I have zero tolerance for bad games or even games other people think highly of that I personally am not enjoying. I get the logic behind giving games a shot, but for me when I’m playing a game I think sucks and I look over at my backlog of games I really want to play, I just can’t justify giving games I’m disliking any more of my time. Every minute spent on a game that is boring me to tears or frustrating me is a minute I could spend on a game that brings me joy. So my patience for games has been cut short over the years. I used to give some games a while before dropping them. Now I cut bait rather quickly and move on.

[@777Lateralus]

Well said, the free time I have is a lot more valuable the older I get, and unless a game is bringing me joy or fun, I’m moving on. I’m a fan of rpgs but have skipped quite a few as of late just cause I can’t justify grinding for hours just to progress

[@sle2470]

Same here. I'm so busy with work and stuff at home and have a pretty big backlog of games, I'll give a game about two hours. If they can't hook me by then I give up and move on.

[@KFXG]

I'm right there with you. I give most games about 15 minutes, then drop them if there isn't anything holding my attention. I get Game Pass every few months to try something new that's been added that I don't already own (sort of like modern day renting, I guess). 9 times out of 10, it's not worth my time, and I'm glad I didn't spend full price on it. Then I cancel my Game Pass until there's a bunch of new games added and try again. If I like it, then I'll go out and buy it.

[@joshalan5125]

Agreed. As an adult with a wife, mortgage and full time job, I have come to realize that life is too short to spend time on entertainment I don't enjoy. I don't have the same free time that I did in my early 20's so I am now more selective on the games I choose to invest in. If a game is not fun to me, I don't waste my time with it.

[@michaelmacorso4479]

Yea I hardly ever play bad games. To much backlog n other great games I could play instead. Time Is always limited.

[@luisdv311]

Balan is another example that nothing is done by one person - it took a team of amazing individuals to create his original games.

[@justincolgan1833]

Something about John's summertime crazy hair just reads like "I've just seen some shit!" which is perfect for the games in the vid. Good job as always

[@simonrockstream]

They didnt even rush Gollum, they spent years on that joke. They just didnt know what they were doing, they were the wrong people for the job.

[@lutherheggs451]

Nah. If anything was "wrong" it was whoever in the office said lets make a game about Gollum. We have all this rich lore and 10,000,000 times more interesting things we could pull from, but nah. Let's use a kinda garbage character who does nothing interesting, who really doesn't do anything until you get to Lord of the Rings. Nothing sounds interesting about a game based on a character who had a ring, lost a ring, went crazy and lived alone in a mountain for years and years and years and years, until Lord of the Rings happens and he gets near the ring again.

[@TheRandomGuyTheFarNoGameCat]

​@@lutherheggs451um, Gollum actually has a lot of interesting lore behind him. A stealth game as Gollum 100% would have worked if someone competent was working on it.

[@Dystnine]

So Gollum and Balan walk into a pub and...

[@SomeDamnChannel]

I respect that you waited until after the slug fest of both games to put your two cents in! - Ian

[@MrKaprione]

Hey, Johnny!👋 You had me cracking up throughout the Balan Wonderworld segment!🤣🤣🤣

[@kingkarrot9304]

A HCG video on a Sunday morning is always great

[@TheDneaves]

Late afternoon for me, around the time I have my break at work

[@rimok.2765]

if I made a list of games I refuse to ever play under any circumstance Gollum would crack that list.

[@chrilz1498]

I haven't been privy to either of these games, so I genuinely appreciate your reviews, Johnny--especially because of how well you give each game an honest try. Have a great Sunday with the family, my friend!

[@jdecosta]

Just wanted to say the reaction shots of you and Kim were so funny! Nice work, as always.

[@MarkTheDead]

Fantastic video! Thank you, Johnny for always making the most entertaining videos. It makes my day.

[@shldnfr]

I got a new copy of the Switch version of Balan Wonderworld for $8. Still felt ripped off.

[@careyyoung7291]

love your videos bro just found you this year but nothing better than going on lunch break or getting home and seeing you uploaded. keep up the positivity and great work

[@SuperCosmicJeffrey]

So much Made for TV Johnny on display and I'm here for it!

[@UltraDTA]

What?

[@zach5381]

​@@UltraDTAI think they're saying that Johnny is on top of his game in this video

[@matthewpinder4279]

I can't remember the last bad game that I played. I tend to do my research, wait for reviews and not buy into hype based on a couple of screenshots. I can't afford to waste the money adding duff games into my collection. That's not to say I don't get disappointed from time to time, but not very often and certainly not to the extent where I just can't play the game.

[@javonjames4573]

I do the same thing when it comes to games

[@KeithKillingly]

I used to do that but I’ve enjoyed low rated games before. I really enjoy Gungrave GORE, it’s very true to its ps2 roots and reviewers and normies just didn’t understand the point or how you’re supposed to play the game. I usually look up raw gameplay and try to make my own decision I love finding something I think is genuinely underrated

[@ressljs]

@@KeithKillingly There's occasionally a game that gets horrendous reviews, but as I read the reviews, I keep thinking, "That sounds amazing!" The best example I can think of was Devils Third on Wii U. The critics gave it really low scores, but their descriptions sounded like fun to me, so I bought it. In the critics defense, the graphics and frame rate were a mess. But despite it's technical flaws, it was one of my favorite games on that system.

[@alectorres852]

More episodes like this please!! Loved seeing your actual gameplay of all the mishaps 😂

[@OptiumusMagnum]

I'd like to join some of the other voices in the comments saying that we'd love to see more videos like this on your channel. Dedicating a video to your impressions of one or two games, and giving us your impressions & perspective, in this focused format, is where you really shine, Johnny. The rest of your videos are all great, of course, but you sometimes talk about so many games in a "New Game Stuff" or pickups episode, that it leaves so many of us hungry for your in-depth impressions! It's why so many of us like your "Games I've Been Playing" videos that you do solo or with Kim. Regardless, this was a fun video, and I'd love to see more.

[@mikelucash1881]

I didn't hate Balan, but it definitely needed a lot more time to cook

[@DogcrotchHell]

This was probably my favorite happy console gamer episode ever. More of this PLEASE!

[@TheRed02151]

do bad games make anyone else depressed?? Like I seriously start to question my love for video games and that's DEPRESSING!

[@dannylenz3006]

Jon that was an acid trip I agree with you from what you showed us. Thanks again for sharing what not to buy man I love your honesty and realism! As always, love your show and thank you for keeping us gamer happy man!!!

[@Super_Death]

"The more you fuck around, the more you're gonna find out"

[@arrej9677]

Such a funny video😂 you made me laugh so many times!! Loved it

[@XXsupervisor]

Nevermind Gollum's technical problems. Who wants to play a game about being a slave and doing pointless chores. Idk who their target market was for this game.

[@grouchygamer2404]

the callisto protocol is my bad game of the year. I only pay 29.99 but I still feel like they stole my money.

[@7milesdavis]

Unrelated, but I thought I’d let you know you helped get me into the Ys series. I’m on VIII now and I’m loving it. I needed a break from tears of the kingdom and now I can’t put Ys down. Thanks man.

[@matt_shaboy]

The edit of you kissing and hugging BOTW and Phantasy star made me smile so much!

[@JJUniverseChannel]

Awesome video man 😎!

[@cacophonic7]

You know, thinking about it ... I don't think I have played a truly bad game in months. There has been such a bounty of good stuff that its been a while since I felt like something I played was really bad. 🙃

[@seal3081]

i couldn't stop laughing when that dance number came out

[@lazyPawdy]

5:25 when you mentioned the vines remind you of PS1/2 era animation… i actually thought the same,looking at your clips here as I have never seen the trailers or any other reviews of this game. I didn’t even know it was out already and that it got horrible reviews. When I saw that lighting effect with Gandalf and the beginning image showing Sméagol, I was like, wtheck, this feels like a cancelled game from ps1/2 era that they just brought back and added HD stuff in it. Some developers are doing that and are being so lazy to start new coding from the very start. That’s laziness.

[@vismayhem8413]

Another banger by Mr. HCG. Ya love to see it

[@Yomommalinkmugen]

As much as we don't want you to suffer playing not so great games, this video was really entertaining. You should definitely do another one like this in the future.

[@Slawsers]

Paper mario sticker star, biggest disappointment game direction towards a series i loved since the og n64 game

[@Tennindo]

Cant agree more.

[@Rotodown]

Its probably a bit cliche but Redfall was a bad time and i played it with a friend.

[@ravagingwolverine]

That description of a game being really simple but being fun in a zen-like way was similar to how I felt when I played Pac Land on the PC Engine. It's pretty basic, but it's made well. The simplicity was refreshing for me at the time.

[@TwoEyesOpen]

That Yuji Naka insider trading story was crazy! On the topic of bad games, I tried out a game called Dynowarz on the NES over the weekend and I beat it (it's pretty short), and I thought it was pretty decent! I found out after the fact that it was really heavily panned by players and critics alike, even at the time of release. It definitely has flaws but as I was playing I thought, "maybe Robman would like this," actually. It reminds me of Blaster Master a whole lot. Not as good but scratches a similar itch. Fallout 4 also seems to be very controversial in the Fallout fandom, but I'm enjoying that too 🤷‍♂️

[@juddwatson1067]

Always making my Sunday mornings great. Thanks, John!

[@bigdrudogg33]

Sometimes you have to play a couple stinkers to appreciate how great some games are

[@Tochir0]

Love the re-enactments. I think I’ve been sold on Balan

[@s.8288]

Make more videos like this. More reaction shots! And your wife is hilarious!!

[@tsmith4719]

Secret of mana turned 30 today, I was thinking happy console gamer was going to make a video about that lol

[@matthewjohnston1746]

I appreciate that you gave them a try Johnny! You never know 😂

[@davidvinc]

Oh gosh, I'm still upset about that SCAM Fragrant Story, as well as Lagoon, Secret of the Stars, Cosmotank, BOF Dragon Quarter, Lunar Dragon Song and most recently, Loop 8. Great video!

[@thestuff10]

"What were they thinking!?" ~AVGN

[@dannysimion]

OMG that second game you played looked like something you made after one too many espresso shots at 2am. LOL. I'm curious to watch a gameplay of it and see more of it. I might recoil like your wife did but darn it, I'll man up like you did on that game! LOL.

[@shayne604]

Brooo I was at Pressstart video games today haha, thought I'd run into ya! i picked up a psp, hexyz force, mana khemia 2!

[@alistairreeder5635]

Love your videos. I like to hear about what you love more than what you don’t though. Peace man x

[@cbg1723]

Did Rob get his physical copy of Tunic? Mine just came in, excited to try it out. Hope he didn't steer me wrong lol

[@SakuraAvalon]

I've had the fortune to avoid playing any bad games in quite sometime. What bad ones I have played recently, I've since long forgotten.

[@Ralphensteins]

Looking good my friend! Slim

[@gamervet4760]

10:12 Like trying to get blood from a stone. 😂😂😂

[@lazydgsf7429]

I see a lot of people talking about not giving games much of a chance before dropping them. I’d like to see a video on second or even third chance games. Games that you went back to and fell for after first bouncing off them. I’d have missed out on some of my all time favorites if I hadn’t given them a second or third chance. In fact, when a game gives you what you can’t look away from you can confuse it with what you want. Sometimes the best thing in life start out as something you dislike.

[@denblackie-superneoturbome9802]

15:44 my new favorite GIF

[@vyperii]

I relly loved Ballan. There were a few things I'd change- just adding a jump for every character. Overall though, it has Naka's magic if you give it time...

[@AndDeathForAll82]

Even the bad games in my collection are fun if I pop them in when I’m in just the right mood. A while back, I played Back to the Future (NES) for HOURS, and had a blast.

[@scottkelley4517]

Seems like a easier Nights into dreams concept or influenced experience. I was playing that on pc and man that game will make your trip out.

[@gothard5]

I put some time into Balan Wonderworld a while back, but I never finished it and I honestly cannot remember why.

[@GrishnakAthanor1]

Kingdom Hearts for me. Bad controls, bad camera, bad combat, bad AI. To this day I still don't know why that game is so popular?

[@ryan_drums]

The fact that disney and Final Fantasy are brought together, because of the music and characters, because of nostalgia goggles.

[@klocks2543]

In a world where it’s increasingly difficult to formulate your own opinion because of the amount of noise and coverage given to anything in particular. I respect the attempt to get something out of these games even if it’s just because. On games I think I’ll be interested in I like to avoid the reviews and just talk to my friends about their experiences. Try and just get that school yard review free of spoilers.

[@paulanderson3772]

Wanted: Dead reviewed poorly but I love it.

[@cpthardluck]

Vortex for SNES still pops into my mind occasionally. It's a Star Fox clone that degenerated in the test tube, running at a buttery 6fps.

[@HorrorCollector138]

Hey John, off topic but the Splatterhouse soundtrack just came out on vinyl just was released. I didn't know if you knew or not. It's the Japanese arcade soundtrack. I know your a huge turbo graphics guy so had to tell you.

[@JL-ep6op]

Johnny, are you getting your hair ready for Vash the Stampede cosplay?

[@Flokker]

The wizard of oz on crack line had me choking on my sandwich, for the love of god never change man.

[@hokut3n]

For me, personally, Final Fantasy XV. I was under the mindset the game was going to be complete at launch and not the brokenness FFXV turned out to be. It still stings seeing how Square Enix marketed FFXV with sooo many things missing from those trailers... To live in a different timeline where we actually got Versus XIII would be something else.

[@damonke79]

Final Fantasy XV was a massive disappointment for me as well. Hated the empty environments, all the driving, the characters, the combat. Hated how linear the end game was. Hated how much of a reliance they had on the movie to fill in the story.

[@ryan_drums]

As a lifelong FF fan, and someone that also is good at actions RPGs like soulsborne games and character action games like DMC and Bayonetta, FFXV was one of the worst FF game Ive played .. might be the actual worst mainline FF. The combat practically plays itself its just bad has such a low skill ceiling, the open world is lame and barren, I like the characters and the story set up thanks to the movie that it came with but it just doesn’t work.

[@espenskinstad6722]

I played and beat Balan Wonderworld. I had a similar experience. I think it's a very average game because it has some strange gameplay design. In most collectathons like Mario 64, Banjo Kazooie, etc, you have exploration, platforming and small puzzle elements to challenge you. In Balan Wonderworld there is very little exploration and most collectibles seem to be handed to you for free almost, others you just wait until you have a new constume to then backtrack. The most fun for me in Balan might have been the bosses.

[@marcusradtke9507]

Is the new fso any good?

[@socialistprofessor3206]

Just saw you on David's channel earlier. You guys are my favorites on the platform. Cheers, mate.

[@thebudgetgamer9979]

Which channel is that? Thx

[@davidvinc]

@@thebudgetgamer9979 Davidvinc RPGs, I hear he's wonderful :) LOL

[@IFinishedAVideoGame]

I'm not surprised you had an alright time. The idea of a film that's so bad that it's good is very common but we rarely see it in the video game industry. Both these games are hilarious but for all the wrong reasons and I'd encourage anyone to try them out

[@metawanderer]

The Callisto Protocol was the worst game I played recently. Paying $70 at launch for it and was super disappointed with it. Sure the graphics and voice acting was great, but the lack of polish with the gameplay and having enemies gang up on you without any crowd control, and the reusing of a boss 4 times just made the experience frustrating. I truly regret paying full price for it.

[@TheSubZero187]

So I didn’t think it was terrible at all. Dead Space just did everything better. It also helped I got the game for free when I did the buy one get free at GameStop and then I traded it in lol.

[@AssociationAdmirer]

For bad games that I've chugged through, the first that springs to mind is Creature Shock: Special Edition for the Saturn. It has a mix of "I can't believe they shipped this" awfulness and sublimely thrilling moments, and I enjoyed both of them. There are two polygonal space shooter levels, and as a big time Saturn fan I can tell you that there are few Saturn games with polygonal graphics anywhere as poor as this. Terrible frame rate, poor draw distance, and glitches so conspicuous that it's hilarious. Some of the dungeon crawler sections are overly drawn out and difficult as well, but that didn't stop me from appreciating the thrills of going through tunnels to confront giant killer centipedes.

[@xepfeon]

My biggest mistake in regards to bad video games, was when i bought the ps2 game Hidden Invasion. The controls where terrible and i played for about 15 minuttes, before i put on the shelf and later sold it

[@chrisbullock6477]

Its like when you catch yourself watching a childrens show on public television until you feel your brain regressing backwards, slowly losing what little bit of intelligence you have.

[@k3nnb428]

This reminds me of a popular song I've heard... "worst game ever made..the worst game ever made.. worst game made.." lolz

[@GrigoriRasputin]

B roll of you playing games: 5⭐

[@James-gj8rn]

Aww what's up with this? where did the HappyConsoleGamer go? In all seriousness, i love the show Johnny :)

[@Mintcar923]

I really can’t think of any bad games off the top of my head.. Guess I’ve been lucky in recent years.. What I do remember is being a huge fan of the boxing series Knockout Kings on ps1.. I especially loved KK 2001.. But after playing the 2002 edition on ps2 I returned it.. Thankfully they later rebooted the series as Fight Night which was at its peak on ps3

[@james441]

I would’ve put totk in there

[@jordanb7789]

I like the part with Kim haha

[@musy345]

I tried to finish Gollum and encountered a game-ending bug at the beginning of one of the chapters. I kept falling through the geometry. It's disgraceful how they didn't iron those bugs out. This was a week ago so they've had plenty of time to. Also, I don't think you focused on how the game has the worst fetch quests in the history of video games. Although, I don't blame you because there are a million things wrong with this mess!

[@Olafurh21]

Final fantasy XV and Ni no kuni II.

[@wenchwogg8843]

Thumbs up for the BOTW and Phantasy Star kiss alone 😂

[@Eabox1]

Yes

[@Eagleknight815]

It's been awhile since I saw a bad game to this caliber on a console. Most recent one I would think is Warcraft 3 reforged/refunded

[@OurJoyOfGaming]

The last terrible game I played was Loop 8. Just a painful game.

[@ihatelittletitties]

Gollum needs more patches than a skateboarder working a ramp.

[@aarons.2323]

How many years ago was Brink? Yeah, I still own it on Steam.

[@djchac5245]

I'm like 3 months late to this video, but I just realized that the background music is taken from Strania. Great game, great soundtrack. That's all.

[@user-zf2wz5rp8d]

I can't believe he played Gollum. Lol

[@straitJacketFashion]

Shenmue 3. Broke my heart

[@Randomark3087]

I didn't even know Gollum was getting his own game

[@femtrooper]

Wowwww. Balan Wonderworld looks…special…that song! The game looks bad but also charming in a strange way. Got a kick out of this!

[@chronology556]

There’s a new Fatal Fury game coming out, there’s a teaser.

[@lostboy626]

Lol, apparently I only touched the surface of Balan with the demo (which I did enjoy). I’m kinda looking forward to the zen experience now after this video. For me, the most infamous game that I was so put off by was Alone in the Dark 2. I bought a used copy for my Saturn, thinking it would be a cool RE clone, and I’d heard of the series before, knowing it’s popularity on PC and 3DO. But, it was so sluggish to control, couldn’t run away of fight back from the first zombie encounters. I was just like “what is going on?” And “who approved this for release?”. It was just terrible.