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The 25 Dumbest Moments in Gaming
Gudlyf writes "GameSpy has a multi-part series this week titled The 25 Dumbest Moments in Gaming, highlighting some of the biggest debacles ever to plague our beloved pastime. While only the first part of the series is present, I can already think of a few that the list wouldn't be complete without. Anyone care to offer their own picks?" Predictions for the Top 5 also welcome, we'll run another story at the end of the week to see how people did.
Daikatana?
"They told me it was impossible. I replied with maniacal laughter." http://www.mydailyrant.com/
If those are 25-21, I'm afraid to think about what might be coming up...
Taral
WARN_(accel)("msg null; should hang here to be win compatible\n");
-- WINE source code
when they released starcraft and C&C for the console... what an atrocity that was... the horror... dragging units with a gamepad...
Great Atrocit
#26 - Gamespy decides that all gamers run their desktops at 800x600, and forces all their pages to be 800 pixels wide.
Wowbagger - Yes, obviously gamers don't buy high-end video cards and monitors that can run at higher than 800x600. Gamers like to see lots of wasted space on their screens.
</gamespy>
Criticize the
forcing
all your
text into
a few words
per line
because you are
running high res
and larger fonts
so as to have
a cleaner
display.
www.eFax.com are spammers
Some mention of the companies "Mystique" or "Playaround" must be in the top 5... these are the companies responsible for the X-rated Atari 2600 games, including Custer's Revenge, a game where you control Custer and rape an indian woman tied to a cactus. Why they even thought a game like this could work is beyond me... How can something even be erotic with such a low resolution?
Although it's not as well known, Atari also made a video game called "I, Robot". In fact, it was the first game to use 3D filled polygons I believe. Unfortunately, the game wasn't accepted very well, and people couldn't figure it out I guess. So, out of the 1,000 machines they made, only 500 even sold. The rest were sitting in a warehouse. In order to get rid of them, Atari sent them to Japan... but none of the machines ever got there, as the crew of the ship were given orders to push the machines overboard on the way! I believe the point was to make sure that stockholders didn't see warehouses of unsold machines. In any case, this deserves at least a part in this list.
And I didn't think the US Saturn pads were that bad... in fact, I like them better than Japanese ones. But then, my favorite controller ever was the enormous Jaguar controller, so what do I know?
-"One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary men. No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man." -EH
#1 Gamespy pretends to be a Gamer's site.
But OMG OMG We're making fun of Romero!!!! Gee, you think they'll bring up DNF?
It's kinda ongoing, but I nominated SCO. :)
Bugs are just features that have been fixed.
Not in any order, but these ones cames to mind quickly...
1) Intellivision II coming out and being non-backwards compatible with some of its own library in an effort to break Coleco's Intellivision releases.
2) John Romero's magazine ad that ran pre-Daikatana that said "John Romero's going to make you his bitch." (I can't find the image, but I know it's kicking around somewhere on the net)
3) Sega's "blast processing" commercial in which they claim Sonic the Hedgehog's fast scrolling is due to some neat-o feature in the Genesis' processor which the SNES lacks.
4) Making a movie that's basically one huge commercial for the NES, the Power Glove, and Super Mario 3 (shamelessly savvy moment?).
Those are about all that come to mind...
Even if Half-Life, which many contend to be one of the best FPS's out there, had used this slogan, I wouldn't have bought it out of principle!
...I'd like to see Sierra's decision to can the Babylon 5 game on the list. Then, I'd like to see, at the next "worst" position, Sierra's decision not to sell the completed portions of the game property to the developers (whom Sierra had earlier also canned) who were trying to pick up the game and finish it. Now it's all gathering dust, and the idea is being left up to the mod community and a few guys in Russia who have been working on a standalone game for some time now.
Yeah, GameFAQs going down the toilet is a pretty big thing. But I don't think anyone can top the failure of the "Virtual Boy". Except myself, perhaps.
Virtual Boy
Other possibilities: Daikatana, 3D0 (the system, the company, the Army Men...ugh), BMX XXX, maybe some of Acclaim's advertising practices (though not likely), and Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (though technically not a game, it's massive failure certainly had repercussions for Squaresoft).
Whats wrong with the n-gage? I'm not being critical, but I was contemplating getting one when the come out here in Oz in a few months. I need a new phone, and I thought it'd be cool. So what am I missing? I have to know!
Also, I love my x-box.
And no, I'm not some nuff-nut gaming retard. I've been playing games at least once a week since 1990. Hmmm 13 years, and what do I have to show for it?
Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself. -- Leo Tolstoy
Daikatana, Daikatana, Daikatana!
Granted, you can get an adapter for the SP that has a headphone jack on it, but rumor is (I haven't seen the adapter yet) you can't run it offa the power brick at the same time.
There are only 10 kinds of people in this world... those who understand binary and those who don't
"GameFAQs will still be free.
We're not cutting off any part of the site and making you pay for any of it. From the FAQs to the Message Boards, everything you see today for no charge on the site will be free tomorrow. While we may someday introduce new features that require payment, nothing you see today is going to be turned into a premium service."
There's nothing wrong with turning off cynicism for a minute or two so that you can simply accept statements at face value until proven to be lies. Wait to get cynical again if and when GameFAQs starts charging you to look at the FAQs - you might even be a happier person in the meantime.
on-line, in public, after taunting a crowd "you can't kill me". The online character of lord british was actively being played by Richard Gariott.
Classic moment in online history. I remeber the kid who used the fire-scroll on him to that day "Rainz". Lord British (Richard Garriott), Blackthorn (Starr Long), and a few others were on a balcony as LB gave a 'speech' for the end of beta. Next thing you know, the balcony is incased in a fire 'field'. Then LB taunts that fire doesn't hurt him (""nice try..."). 2s later his corpse is on the ground.
Someone responds to LB's death by summoning 4 powerfull deamons, who slaughter the innocent crowd.
A developer had made a mistake and not flipped his invlunerability flag (Developer name: "Grimli" what ever happened to that kid).
Ahh the good old days.
Rainz was banned for it, but it was the end of Beta.
google for "Rainz" "Lord British" for pictures.
-malakai
-Malakai
A Dragon Lives in my Garage
WOW! I can't believe the XBOX is #16. But then again, I guess they've got to make room for the rest of M$s blunders. =) You asked for predictions: Enter the matrix has to be in the top ten due to the popularity of the film and that fact its recent.
#27 - Gamespy Arcade
Micro$will - Yes, all of those who bought a lifetime subscription to GameSpy3D now have to fork out $5 a month for all the new crap, like Roger Wilco and GameSpy Arcade. Joy!
#28 - FilePlanet
And for those of you that like to keep their games up to date (I.E. actually play them online) get the extra special benefit of shelling out more cash for access to FilePlanet! Don't bother trying to access id's ftp site, they're always full, just like our "free" 25 user ftp sites.
Thankfully, most games these days come with built in game browsers, and as for patches and maps, there's Google.
Nintendo's Japanese office received a telex from MCA Universal stating that the company had 48 hours to hand all profits earned from Donkey Kong over to MCA and destroy all unsold Donkey Kong inventory. The reason? MCA alleged that Donkey Kong infringed on Universal Studios' "King Kong" copyright.
Unfortunately for MCA, Nintendo had a very good reason for refraining from a settlement: It had discovered that MCA did not own the "King Kong" copyright! Even more shockingly, in a previous lawsuit MCA Universal had actually gone to pains to prove that the "King Kong" property was public domain!
It's at #17. So I figured I'd post the obligitory Penny Arcade reference to BMX XXX
Even my friend Jon, who's a pr0n fiend, said he would never think about buying that game.
There are only 10 kinds of people in this world... those who understand binary and those who don't
Yeah, Daikatana has to be wayyyyy up there. I don't know if the PC Jr qualifies, but if it does it'll be on the list.
What else.. Dwango was a so-so idea at a bad time. The whole Battlecruiser 3000AD (or whatever it's called) debacle. The Sims online? And Sierra released a game back in the early 90's that was so buggy that nobody could get it to run. Some space exploration simulation thingy... I've undoubtedly exorcised the title from my memory.
I am NOT a man!
I am a free number!
With nethack one stumbles onto some really surprising situations, but this one remains unforgettable.
Several years back, when I hadn't ascended any of my characters, I had a really really good game going on, the kind of game you though might take you all the way. Multiple Amulets of Life saving paving the way. Accidental step into a polymorph trap had caused that I wasn't waring my helmet. Met a mind flayer that started eating my brain.
I didn't realize I didn't have my helmet on and my intelligence startted dropping rapidly. Didn't know exactly what that was about, I figured some "restore ability" and that's it and thought "fsck it, here, take some". Intelligence dropped to 2 or 3 and then...
"You die of brainlessness. But wait. --more--"
(I knew I had several amulets of life savings, so no worries)
"Your medallion begins to glow. Your life has been saved. --more--"
(but little did I know...)
"You still have do brain. You die."
"Do you want your possessions identified y/n ?"
I can't begin to describe my astonishment there...
1 Earth is warming, 2 It's us, 3 it's royally bad, 4 we need to take action NOW
the dumbest line and one of the dumbest fads that just took forever to die.
It's not a rumor. Until someone creates a "Y" adapter, you're (externally) powerless with headphones.
Don't know if it'll make the list, but:
What began as what I consider to be a series of colossal mistakes, Nolan Bushnell sells Atari for a mere fraction (who knew?) of what it was worth and signs a non-competition clause for an ungodly time like 10 to 15 years. It probably hurt like hell to watch all that money he lost, but I'm sure it was really painful to stay out of the market when his mind was probably sharpest in the area of innovative video games.
These are not worthy of karma bonus, but here are some things that should make the list:
-Automan (TV series trying to reverse TRON formula)
-Starcade (really bad gameshow that focused way too little time on video games--watch it on G4!)
-G4 (bad content, but who said cable was good?)
-Nintendo's dumping of Sony's CD ROM drive for SNES (can you say Playstation?)
-Game.com B&W (even the Brady Bunch was In Color)
-Best and worst lists on video games. These often change with items that aren't new since the last list. How can something be worst now more than last year?
-Dick Clark. Okay, that's a prediction, but in time, he'll ruin videogames, too.
Especially since for the longest time VilePlant-it was "Non-Windows Need Not Apply" - if you weren't running Exploiter and Windows you were SOL for access.
I also love how VilePlant-It was able to completely muscle out all other sources - every game site went to them and that was that.
Perhaps somebody will build BitTorrent into a game - you download the level and provide it as an upload as well...
www.eFax.com are spammers
is here.
- Bungie's Halo. Cool game? Oh yes. Released for the Macintosh first like Steve Jobs promised at MacWorld, causing Microsoft-based-OS gamers to squirm as they watched the Apple folks have all the fun? Nope. I remember staring in awe at the webcast of the MacWorld show a few years ago when Halo was announced, and was just a teensy bit jealous of Mac users when I saw what the game promised. It came through on the promises alright, all but one of course.
- Verant's Sovereign. I sort-of recall this game being announced not long after Everquest was released. We were going to see an awesome display of massive-multiplayer RTS, all by the fine folks who made the legendary MMORPG, Everquest. Screenshots were released here and there, but news of its advancement slowly petered out. Finally this year -- I'd say at least four years later -- the game was finally announced as dead. Now that I think of it, this might have been a smart move.
The rest have already been mentioned, such as Nokia N-Gage, Daikatana's Ad Campaign, and Duke Nukem Forever. I don't need to go into details about those -- you know what they are.Trolls lurk everywhere. Mod them down.
I thought Dead or Alive was pushing the jiggle factor, but a volleyball game with fighting game characters? What's next, all our lovable Nintendo characters in a fighter?
these boxen have no names
Dungeon Siege, one of the most hyped games Microsoft has released, was given terribly high scores (96% in one magazine, etc), but it seems that nobody played it in multi-player mode - it was terrible! You effectively had to play for a day-and-a-half to complete a quest to move onto the next one, you couldn't do later quests without completing earlier ones, and there was no Save feature. It was Diablo2 done wrong. Then again the whole transportation system was a joke anyway, it really was more complicated than it should have been - give me a Town Portal spell anyday!
When I decided to I wanted to play PSX in the shower. :-(
Back in my SNES days, when the Houston summer was too hot for football, we'd break out John Madden every day. ANd it was good. Then, one day, we got Troy Aikman football and a little later Monday Night football. (Whoa Nellie, touchdown) Needless to day, these games sicked big time. We hated these games so much that we opened them up and spat upon them. It didnt make the any better, or unplayable, but it felt good!
What, me Tweet?
It's not a rumor. Until someone creates a "Y" adapter, you're (externally) powerless with headphones.
Someone has. Macro Kit SP
I don't even know how people can stand using Fileplanet... it's been awful for years, and forces you to click through enless pages of mirros to finally get a download. There's been many times I just gave up and decided it wasn't worth the effort... perhaps this is how they save on bandwidth?
The way Sourceforge does it is so much nicer.
-"One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary men. No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man." -EH
Atari's biggest mistake has to be high up on that list, and I'm suprised nobody here has mentioned it yet.
They had the opportunity to buy the rights to produce and distribute a console from a Japanese company, back in the day when American companies were doing all the game consoles. However, it was during the video game crash, and for some reason, they decided to pass, and stick with their own system they were developing.
The system Atari could have had a huge chunk of? The Nintendo Entertainment System. Instead, they stuck to their own products, which really didn't go anywhere.
One wonders what might have happened if they had made the other choice...
Of course, we're talking about a company that had Jack Tramiel in charge, a man who was personally responsible for destroying multiple companies, and seemed to fight against turing the company around. During the Jaguar days, Atari hired someone to help get the company moving and going, a person who ended up quitting because Jack insisted in having control over everything, down to personally deciding when to approve overnight shipping of packages.
"You know your god is man-made when he hates all the same people you do."
Maybe I misunderstood your post, but Commodore launched the Amiga 1000 in 1984 if I remember, wasn't it their brand from the start? (Sold off after the company went under, and then resold, resold, resold...still in purgatory waiting to be brought back to life)
I don't think Interplay will ever get anywhere with the Lord of the Rings series of games. They tried DOS and got to the Two Towers...then puked out. So they tried again...this time on the SNES...and puked out after the first one. JUST FINISH THE SERIES!!
Okay, so Dynamix is forced to release T2 WAY before it was ready. A zillion patches later, the company that owns Dynamix (Vivendi?) closes the whole company... never mind that T2 (despite a too-early release) is quite successful.
Kinda reminds me of farscape. "Successful? Great! Close 'em down."
Fooz Meister
I predict that Daikatana will take all five of the Top Five Mistakes.
You cannot apply a technological solution to a sociological problem. (Edwards' Law)
Let's not forget the idea here is for the dumbest ideas in gaming.....with that said here are 2 entries that I haven't seen brought up yet....
The Robbie the Robot from Nintendo has to be on the list. Did they even make more than one game that used that dumb thing? Mine just ended up sitting on a shelf collecting dust for years....looked pretty cool up there though.
How about that dance game, also for the NES I think? The one that came with a mat that you would lay on the floor and I guess dance on. Never saw it in person myself because the first time I saw the commercial I remember thinking....'Man, that is the dumbest idea ever'....and I slouched back into my chair and starting playing Zelda again.
Actualy he is correct
at least in a business sense the Xbox is a massive mistake
it has a huge loss attached to it (somthing like 33% loss)
its only kept alive because bill gates has the money to keep it alive
If I recall correctly, it was announced a couple of weeks ago. And yet, several posters seem way too keen to include it in this list. Why?
Genuinely curious.
Sega-CD - need I say more?
:)
Colecovision Expansion Pack - allowed owners to play Atari games on the Colecovision. Atari sued Coleco. Coleco sued Atari. Ended up in a massive lawsuit totalling somewhere close to $1 billion dollars. (This was a LOT of money circa 1983!) BTW, Colecovision expansion packs are now illegal due to the DMCA.
Daiktana - a gimmie.
R.O.B. - Nintendo's Robotic Operating Buddy, the little piece of plastic crap that 'helped' you play Gyromite.
NES Power Pad - Basically Nintendo believed gamers wanted to exercise
3 D O - failed system
Total Recall for NES - worst...game...ever.
Now that would be a joke...
----- Friends, l33tists, l4m3z0rs! Lend me thy keyboards.
So is the N64 sticking to cartridges going to show up later on the list? How about the poor support for 3rd party developers?
This Space Intentionally Left Blank
The server crashed. It couldn't cope with sending 64^2 simultaneous death messages.
When I am king, you will be first against the wall.
I'm not sure what "moment" this publisher meets, but Gathering Of Developers seems to have been a really bad idea, considering that they haven't published any good games. The Blair Witch Games? Heavy Metal FAKK2? Oni? I defy you to find a good game published by Gathering of Developers. Actually, seeing as I gave up on them some time ago, it's entirely possible that they've made a good release since I wrote them off. Somehow I don't think so. Only Serious Sam stands out in my mind.
Ravi
When the axe came to the forest, the trees said, "Look out - the handle was once one of us."
Wait to get cynical again if and when GameFAQs starts charging you to look at the FAQs - you might even be a happier person in the meantime.
They can't. (At the very least, it would be messy.) FAQ's are the property of the people who wrote them; not CJayC or GameFAQs.