Worst Games Ever - Robot Wars: Arenas of Destruction

[@KHFMcAwesome]

One of the COOLEST moments of my life: A rich friend of my family got us backstage passes to a Robot Wars House Show and I got to drive Sir Killalot briefly! None of my friends at school believed me but it was awesome!

[@simonhancock9204]

That sounds amazing dude and your friends were just jealous, happy memories eh!

[@matthewtucker5182]

Sounds like a made up story to me.

[@KHFMcAwesome]

Well whether you believe it or not is up to you. I have nothing to gain from making it up but I also can’t force you to believe me. Of course there is the possibility you’re just saying that to troll given what I said about my school mates 😜 But as I say, it’s up to you 😁

[@matthewtucker5182]

Lol I was just trying to troll you mate. I believe you and that's a pretty sweet story to have.👍

[@KHFMcAwesome]

@Alcoon Slambag Of course I am… or AM I?! Dun dun duuuuuun! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

[@Jimjamatic]

Nostagically, this game is great. As an actual Robot Wars game, it's terrible in all the best ways :p

[@therunawaykid6523]

Yeah it’s pretty cool you can make your own robot from scratch they could have just made you use the famous bots from the show but this makes it more personalised , I remember that the weapons were really easy to break but I may give this game another go though and maybe put a flipper on my bot

[@Chris_Silverhaze]

Yeah I remember getting it for Xmas and loving it in it's own way. I remember as well if you put your profile name as JPEARCE, (Jonathan Pearce was the commentator) it gives you loads of cash.

[@tombardsley3081]

For 2001, it was pretty good

[@feathertopDT]

I’ll be that guy: I loved this game as a kid. It really is trash tho lol

[@connorkinsman3164]

It's still the best it could really have been at that time :')

[@feathertopDT]

@@connorkinsman3164 Totally! I’d kill for a legit Robot Wars game made in 2021

[@krytenfivetwothreep2485]

I wanted it sooo bad but never got it, looks like I dodged a bullet lol

[@verbal_backflips9493]

Same

[@feathertopDT]

@@krytenfivetwothreep2485 It's actually a super fun game once you get through the first bit where you have no money. The weapons are mostly weird and the damage is weird, but it's still fun gameplay wise to design your own bot and go through various different level designs and stuff

[@haloserb]

Guys, this is supposed to be WORST games ever, not BEST!

[@ChrisMadd96]

For real, this game was my childhood

[@oliverfletcher1939]

Yeah but looking back on it, it wasn't that great

[@jacobj2129]

Extreme destruction was definitely the better robot wars game tho

[@pa-ikollo1851]

Yes, in opposite day. Hope you're back to reality.

[@karlrudd8914]

@@oliverfletcher1939 No. But it is still fun as hell

[@JasonCliftJones]

24:15 - Oooo, have you noticed that pathfinding flaw? If you park behind the pit, can let your opponent charge at you and they'll just drive straight in the pit?

[@epicquilbolt8550]

This was legitimately the only way I could win in the early game with the budget they gave you

[@deltahalo241]

No joke, for a long time now I've been considering setting my PS2 back up just so I can play this again, I love this game so much

[@HarryTBeck]

I’ve wanted to do EXACTLY this for years I won’t lie, I stand by what I’ve always said though… Id sacrifice every single game I have now just to play this again on a regular basis, I absolutely LOVED this game! Poor graphics sure, but I played it on the PS2 and it was common because of the time it was made… So I’m ok with the crappy graphics, but creating my own robot was the greatest thing I’d EVER done😅😅

[@Dannyvegas1701]

I have a lot of nostalgia for this game. It was one of my two starting PS2 games along with Monopoly Party. However my copy would crash whenever you tried to start any fight outside of practice mode, leaving my parents with the unenviable task of explaining why a game from Santa was faulty.

[@ItsFrannyB]

Alright, this is one of the first games they've played which I loved as a kid. Think I played this game to death on the PC.

[@Nipplator99999999999]

I almost got nostalgic, but then I realized the age of the show and game. Now I just feel old...

[@NitroBurner]

Nooo! My childhood! How dare you!

[@NitroBurner]

Mind you, upon reflection, I think I cheated and used the JPEARCE profile cheat, so I probably bypassed being forced to make a crappy robot.

[@Crocsthemusical]

I think we all did tbh

[@MacaK145]

@@Crocsthemusical was actually fairly easy to build a shitty bot that could win, just went for front hinged flipper like firestorm, almost no bots could self right

[@THENAMEISQUICKMAN]

@@MacaK145 True to the early rounds of the show, really. It was kind of funny how so many robots just couldn't get themselves back on their wheels.

[@theoldn0va]

I enjoyed this game as a kid when I found the cheat codes to let me just use one of the actual bots like hypnodisc or chaos 2. Up until the disc or the flippe randomly falling off anyway

[@loupyrock]

As a fellow British child of the 90s, this is a nostalgia trip. Craig Charles impersonation is on point too.

[@AlmondXIII]

The closing Craig Charles impersonation from Peter is spot on! Gold!

[@em_birch]

"Lack of difficulty" is EXACTLY what I was thinking. If the best way to win is to bait the house bots and avoid everyone else, then...yeah. The best way to win shouldn't be to NOT play. :p

[@kins3ll]

I loved this game so much as a youngster. My favourite mode was the pure chaos of six bots going for it on the Tokyo rooftop. Gutted you never used the “JPearce” cheat to get your Hypnodisc on.

[@Robocopnik]

Oh my god the INSTANTANEOUS reversal of going from mocking the Franken-bot to being in the exact same situation is hilarious.

[@frazzleface753]

George Francis at the controls!

[@megatronjenkins2473]

You guys need 2 pictures each: one for Master, one for Victim.

[@johnpetty1305]

My DT teacher was on the first season of scrap heap challenge

[@Sweaty_Ken]

@Atheistrix *Donkey Training

[@JasperJunior94]

I loved this game as a child and I get the feeling my childhood is about to be destroyed. 😨

[@thomaswood414]

You best boys' silliness has been getting me through lockdown, thank you. Master.

[@albeardpower9897]

I have had a spate of watching old episodes of Robot Wars in lockdown. I’m 32 😎

[@esdeathsenpai5128]

A new season of Battle Bots is coming out now. That'll keep you occupied for a bit

[@InputArchive]

Where did you find the old episodes?

[@albeardpower9897]

@@InputArchive all on here, I was binging the iconic combination of Craig Charles and Phillipa Forrester all last year 😎

[@TescoRoadman]

I literally have every episode of the old robot wars recorded on video tapes lmao because I wasn’t always home to watch them so I recorded all of them just incase 😂😂

[@InputArchive]

@@TescoRoadman You should get them backed up!

[@Gatorbox]

Back in 2004 there were not many games in the robot combat genre, which explains the high user review scores. The only options at this time was this, Robot Arena (PC), Robot Arena 2 (PC), and the BattleBots games for GBA. Robot Arena 2 remains the gold standard game to this day, 18 years after its release, and Arenas of Destruction was a de facto second place because the other games legitimately terrible.

[@intergalactic92]

Amateurs, what you need to do is make your profile name jpearce, then you have unlimited money and everything already unlocked. It’s much more fun when you don’t have the budget constraints.

[@alexv3375]

It had its flaws to be certain, but I thought this one was actually a decent game; at the very least, not a "Worst Game Ever" candidate. One of those examples where it's definitely got quite a few negatives, but it's still a very fun game and the flaws overall make it pretty endearing in a So Bad It's Good sense; and even today, I still play it back on the old PS2 from time to time!

[@HarryTBeck]

22:27 If you picked a better motor for your bot with your budget (or got one from the scrapyard if available?), you would have been able to turn a LOT faster if my memory serves me well… You’re meant to upgrade things piece by piece after each win, instead of just allowing you to create the best bot possible, it makes you actually work for it unlike most games… And you need to do well (aka by winning battles) to be able to upgrade your Bot one piece at a time… And by the end of it you can have a VERY good bot by the end of it! I spent countless hours playing this game as a kid with all the different game modes and arenas and what not, I had a blast playing it (on the PS2) if I’m honest! Obviously the graphics are terrible, but it was made 20+ years ago probably… So every game back then had terrible graphics😅🤷🏻‍♂️ But building your own Bot was so so so fun once you’d slowly upgraded it piece by piece, especially when you added flame throwers and things like that to your bot too😂 That was always so so so fun

[@allan3266]

Seriously?! This was a huge part of my childhood!

[@DONK8008]

I loved it as a kid too. But it was really shit now I look back at it.

[@kadmiss1750]

There are plenty games I loved as a kid when I look back at I realise we're pretty trash. But that's OK because I get new enjoyment from the lulz

[@createmistakes]

Yeeeeeee this is the second Worst Game Ever that they have played that I sent in 🥳 the first was Buzz Lightyear of Star Command. Also my favourite robot was Hypno-Disc

[@OzzalThePirate]

My first ever PS2 game, glad to see it hasn't aged a day.

[@THENAMEISQUICKMAN]

Interestingly, the idea of "repairing things doesn't cost money, it costs time" is something from the Colin Mcrae games, where it's a handy system if you're a safe-but-slow driver, but absolute death if you're a driver who will happily torpedo into a wall if it means you can get round a single corner a bit faster.

[@TheTootyFrooty]

It still handles better than Cyberjunk 2077

[@bushybeardedbear]

Honestly, this feels like it portrays what the actual combat would be like pretty solidly.

[@Shaunharris94]

The son of the man who created hypnodisc went to my primary school and at a Christmas fair thing my family won a chance to take it for a test drive. My dad and I ended up crashing it on two different occasions and after that, hypnodisc had to take a break from the show for a few years

[@deltahalo241]

It likely wasn't because you crashed it, if that's what you're wondering. These robots are tough after all. But towards the end of the series, Hypnodisc was becoming increasingly obsolete. I believe they initially withdrew in order to make a new Hypnodisc that could take on the new competitors, but the show got cancelled before they could start work on it.

[@retvik]

Would love to see you guys play this again, but with Hypnodisc unlocked. The pre-built official robots were all great.

[@ShowdeQuetzal]

Now Triple Jump and Cultaholic must build robots and make them fight

[@jasonjones7461]

Lol that epic 1 v 1 fight at the end was just the best. Almost as funny as when ben said this is my last life then immediately died in peterpan

[@TiNRiB]

I remember here in South Africa, on a Friday after school I would get lunch ready. Then get in front of the TV for Robot Wars followed by Reboot and Cybernet! What a time it was.

[@FeatherzMcG]

As someone who owned Robot Wars: Extreme Destruction, I can confirm that it's basically identical to this game. The menus look a bit better, but that's about it.

[@paulharries9558]

Santa has given you no gifts Xmas gives you the hump, There's always Potter and TINY PETER the boys of Triple Jump!

[@ragerancher]

I used to play this so much as a kid. The start was such a painful grind but once you learned to upgrade your power and transmission first so you can actually zoom around the arena, it becomes a bit better. I'd love for a proper remake though with better controls, physics, gameplay etc.

[@ericbilly]

i sure wish there was a father ted game

[@j2dlyc]

I loved this game as a kid. I actually bought it again last year to replay it. It’s dreadful and amazing all at the same time.

[@joshjohnson3442]

I love how the game commentary sounds really into it. Thats better than what you get from commentary in wrestling games 😂

[@nicolevarnam2290]

Thanks My Dudes! U have make this year So Much Better!!

[@lewisner]

The concept of the game was pretty good. You built your own bot from scratch and gained experience that way.

[@leon46295]

I played this game a lot as a kid. If it takes forever to turn it means your robot doesn't have enough power

[@PolygonAlley]

"every time the match ends I feel like it's crashed" Bang on, I played this on PC, probably Windows 98, and it crashed, a lot, for no reason.

[@mclowes1546]

could you imagine how well they could do with this now. All the RW games were pretty bad, kinda limited by damage models of the consoles of the tine

[@sadken50p]

This will be interesting to look back on as i genuinely loved this game as a wee bairn.

[@s-b6218]

Makes you think, there is so much potential for an awesome robot wars game.

[@michaelmemmott1050]

There has been some great worst games this year! Thank you bois for the laughs and here's to a better year in 2021

[@raviamodernepic]

These have been great through the year. Thanks, team!

[@thackest2k]

Sure this game hasn’t aged well but easily those experts was talking out their exhaust At the time for the company that made it did a good job There are a quite a lot of variations you could make also trying to keep the robot in the right balance of weight as well for certain competitions Sometimes the weapons feel flimsy but that’s where the secondary one came into it or static ones like spikes come into play All in all 8/10 the controls felt like you was actually controlling the robot with the remote control It felt authentic with Jonathan Pearce doing commentary also if you call yourself jpearce that was a cheat/easter egg for max money as well

[@sos_legio_primus]

Guys I know you streamlined some of your processes to expedite production. But surely having a victim and victimizer/ Master photo of each of you and alternating them every 2 weeks to match your role in that episode would not cost any more time or cause a hassle. It worked well when you did this before. But Brutish Ben's victim and terrified master Peter looks really naff and makes Peter always the victim and Ben the victimizer regardless of the role they are portraying. Knda killing the joke and conceit of the show.

[@IrishKeshiHead]

I had the PC version of this game. The way the audio would give out after playing like a few matches was pretty fun for myself.

[@greenhowie]

You know what the annoying thing is? With better sound design (to sound like the show) and tweaked controls this could have been really fun.

[@RC99_Productions]

As a massive Robot Wars fan, I love this game, no matter how bad it is with its repetitive commentary, unrealistic hit detection, terrible AI and you using Chaos 2 and reaching the final only to lose to a damn BATTERY FAILURE..... GAAAAHHHH!!!!

[@thealphareaper23]

I absolutely adored this game as a kid. Holy nostalgia!

[@misterblakk3690]

When I was a kid I had a game like this called Robot Arena 2, and it was so fun!

[@thegreatstapley]

The game is still going strong today - I still play in tournaments.

[@samgreenway2905]

Worst games ever? This looks brilliant 😂

[@scarlettbandit2803]

As an American, I am legitimately jealous you guys got Robot Wars games. I would've played this so much in my middle-high school years

[@therunawaykid6523]

Apparently there are two battlebots games in the gba

[@jdb2002]

Shame that the Robot Wars reboot wasn't as good as the original, since the House Robots didn't get to play as much. And the BattleBots reboot had looser rules for what a contestant robot can do, leading to more imaginative and interesting robots. And you have to love the time when a rake weapon took down a drone.

[@LuminalSpoon]

CEASE. God this game looks worse than I remembered.

[@ourhandsaretied]

Physics were dreadful, but this was a fun game

[@fromvault801]

Damn current day WWE could use an announcer like that

[@storytimetl]

He’s footballer commentator so plenty of experience! one of my favourites

[@ThisNormalLife]

Miss robot wars.

[@therunawaykid6523]

Yeah me too I hope a new series happens soon

[@mr8I7]

Watch Battlebots. It's basically the US Robot Wars. There's a season literally airing right now. Next episode will be available in the UK on Saturday morning.

[@Sharkchill]

I remember buying this not too long after getting my PS2, even then I knew its was a bit crap, but still.. its Robot Wars!! Panic attack was OP on this

[@ABomb_Plays]

This and Extreme Destruction got a lot of play time on my PC

[@LEWIS1992]

You should have tried all of the other maps!! Plus the "real" robots like Hypnodisc!

[@Faapu]

I think that repair time system thing is a staple of rally games... don't quote me on that, I've only completed one.

[@jaffajack101]

I absolutely love this game and bought a ps2 not long ago, purely to play this game, just like I used to play it non stop years ago too. It's really not a bad game, just rough around the edges.

[@timthememer2785]

I like how these guys did the same thing with the name as an actual robot called 8645T by accident

[@shawnpatterson2230]

Battle Bots was the version we had in America.... RIP Grant Imahara.

[@RavenWitchShade]

Not gonna lie, absolutely loved this game as a teen, played the hell out of it on PS2. Even knew the cheat code that unlocks all the robots :P (If you ever decide to come back to this, start a new profile under the name JPEARCE)

[@AppleInk]

So, they stick a hammer on a roomba and call it a bot? ok then.

[@TheMartinChronicles]

I'll admit it...there's a new season of Battlebots on and I think it's awesome.

[@scottthewaterwarrior]

I grew up playing Robot Arena 2, this game is pretty rough compared to that.

[@willster947]

Haha I had this game, the damage mechanism was insane and didn’t make any sense at all. If they invested some time they could of made a quality game with ease.

[@josephhassall8523]

Just a quick question How did you get it work on a windows 10?

[@therunawaykid6523]

I’m not sure...I plan to play this again but will use the ps2 emulator which works really well for ps2 games on my aya neo handheld pc 😉😏

[@woolfieMcP]

I never knew this was on BBC. I always watched it on MTV back in the day

[@therunawaykid6523]

Yeah it used to be on bbc two in the U.K. and there were newer series later on, I really hope we get more series some point also really enjoyed a show called techno games where robots competed on sports like: football, shot put and the 100 metres

[@greggen63]

Can't believe you mentioned a Robot Wars / Scrapheap Challenge crossover and made no reference to Philippa Forrester 😢

[@AngelRasmus3]

A VERY long time ago, a lot of the house robots were on display, I think at Lakeside shopping centre (could be wrong) and you could have your pic taken with them. I remember me and my dad looking at closely at Sir Killalot and realizing he was turned on and off with this cheap on/off switch, we thought it was hilarious

[@ABomb_Plays]

I went to one of those live shows. Had a photo with Sergeant Bash, and met the Plunderbird and Sir Chromalot teams.

[@gibospartan6185]

This game has its issues but it was actually pretty decent. Doesn't help that Ben didn't know he could put more than 2 wheels on the robot so it wouldn't handle like trash. The two big downsides are just that there are some trash weapons which aren't worth using and that the game starts out slow. Once the player get's through a few fights and starts earning some money they can make better robots and fight other good robots. Not to mention they then unlock new arenas which can be pretty cool.

[@jonnyhall1]

Can you imagine if this game came out today? They would make a fortune on micro transactions

[@storytimetl]

Some of the commentary sounded like it was from Jonathan Pearce’s MOTD stuff 😂 I had a mini Sir Killalot Peter! I think it was from Maccies or Burger King

[@decipheringsv2967]

As a game from 2001, to say this is a bad game is just wrong.

[@Crimson_Rogue97]

I loved the game growing up but always struggled with it (tbf I was like 6 or 7 at the time). I think I still have my Robot Wars figures somewhere in my house 😂

[@OfficialFingazMC]

I think without the tank controls this would be pretty good!

[@alexv3375]

To be fair, you _can_ do that; there's options for tank controls (as seen here), a remote control-like setup (up/down on the left stick, left/right on the right), or doing it entirely on the left stick so it's a lot easier to drive. The former two are fun to mess around with occasionally, but I mostly use the third!

[@ian8745]

Worst games ever?? What are you playing next week ocarina of time?

[@yksneakyturtle5698]

I didn't realize that BattleBots-like shows existed outside of the US, it seemed like a concept so ridiculous and over-the-top that it could only come from us. I thought it was the coolest show ever as a kid, even had the BattleBots game for GBA. It was extremely similar to this and was equally as frustrating to play.

[@mr8I7]

Robot combat originally came from the US but Robot Wars in the UK was the first to make it into a big TV show. Battlebots shortly followed and thankfully continues to this day 👍

[@therunawaykid6523]

@@mr8I7 indeed I used to love watching robot wars, I have also started watching battlebots on yt I like: uppercut, endgame and bronco the most

[@Chris_Silverhaze]

Ah I just thought about the lovely Philippa Forrester and Julia Reed. Lol another reason to tune in back when I was a 14 year old lad 😅😅😍😍

[@joshuaraby7099]

I lived next door to Mortis off Robot Wars

[@billystanford275]

Just started te video, so don't know who shows up, but I fully remember chaos II, hypno disc and one that was a stretched pyramid with a saw at the top, I feel it has Cat in its name somewhere

[@MattyTheFox89]

That Pyramid one is Pussycat 2 I think

[@MAshby1001]

I loved this game as a kid. Wouldn’t care to guess how many hours I sunk in to this...

[@Kreeschon]

I'm just here to see Sir Killalot murder some bots

[@basitsnake]

Hypnodisc fans rise up

[@JimmiCottam]

Spin to win, my dude

[@basitsnake]

@@JimmiCottam found the reboot series up on youtube. So catching up rn. All of the OG series is there too. With quite a few others

[@netflixandburn]

Movement is so important in this game. Literally just having one that can move and turn will make you able to beat 90% of the opponents. If you think the physics are bad in this, try extreme destruction lol.

[@therunawaykid6523]

Yeah I remember trying to play that on gba but because the screen was so dark on it I had to sit at a table and angle a light at the screen to even be able to see it it was pretty much impossible to play the gba while travelling unless you had a constant light with you - really glad we have backlit screens now. 😉there was also a house robot rumble mode I remember where you went up against a house robot and had to push them out of the arena sumo style

[@TheAnon03]

Had this game on PC, took years until I got a PC that would actually run it. Just cover the robot in spikes, does the job.

[@hippyvanmug]

I wish I still had my signed Razor poster

[@joeclements6075]

I have so much nostalgia for this game, but now I think about it I remember how bad it actually was