The 80s and 90s were a fascinating time in the evolution of video games. New, emerging technology meant that computers were no longer just for word processing and landing space probes on the moon. Graphical representations of characters lead to a new art form, a new era of creativity. Unfortunately it seems with some games, all of the creativity was used up on creating the game, and none was used on naming the game. This is the ten worst titles for video games from the 80s and 90s.
10. Action Fighter
Sega were big players in the games scene when the mid 80s came around. From releasing several successful arcade games in the 70s they moved into the home console market with ports of their arcade titles like Tapper and Zaxxon. By the time 1986 rolled around the Master System had been released and it became home to most of their ported titles. Action Fighter was one of the many arcade games that made the switch. A game based around an action hero who moves around the screen beating up the many adversaries that the game throws your way. At least that's what you'd expect with a title like Action Fighter. It's actually a top down racing game. So not only is the title devoid of any creativity, it also manages to be devoid of any logical description of the game itself. This, being 1986, was no problem to Sega, who managed to release it as an arcade game, for their Master System console and for five other systems as well. It seems that in 1986 releasing a piece of shit wasn't a big deal, just as long as you released it in the arcades first and with a nonsensical name.
9. The Ninja
Yet another Master System game on the list. Just like Action Fighter this one is from 1986, unlike Action Fighter though, The Ninja has at least a descriptive title. It is a simple game by modern standards, a vertical scrolling game where you play a ninja trying to murder people with throwing stars. A common pastime from the 1600s by all accounts. In defense of Sega, the original game was called Ninja Princess, because the original protagonist was as the title suggests a ninja princess. The Japanese did fix their own dull naming problem with the release of a revised edition called Ninja Princess 1 Mega Ban – Ninja, which although nonsensical it can't be accused of lacking imagination. The English version did include a subtle change to the game from the Japanese version though, the female protagonist was changed to a male one. I would imagine that the time taken to change the character to a male ninja for the European release is part of the reason why such an unimaginative title was used. It must have taken many hours of work to change one sprite in the game. So many hours in fact that their minds were so weary that Ninja Prince didn't come immediately to hand. The Ninja was ahead of its time in many ways, the title however was not one of these ways.
8. My Hero
My Hero is one of the first side scrolling beat-em-ups that was made. Not as famous as Double Dragon or Streets of Rage and for good reason! The title itself isn't actually that bad, it describes what is going on quite well. The titular hero's girlfriend is kidnapped by a street gang and you must fight your way through them until you rescue her. Unfortunately, the street gang never ends. The levels come on an endless loop. So the poor girl never gets rescued, no matter how many gang bangers you brutalise. This makes sense for the arcade, so people keep putting coins in to try and get to the end that will never come. On console though? He's not a hero, he's just a fool, doomed to constantly battle against never ending foes, until finally you succumb to the numbers and your death becomes an inevitability. Maybe I'm wrong and it's really an allegory for how it feels to be in a relationship with a difficult girl. I don't think I am though, the title is awful and devoid of creativity. There is no hero, unless you can go back in time and add in a satisfying ending.
7. Bad News Baseball
Image credit: wikipedia
Bad News Baseball is a classic early NES game. It follows a baseball team through a tournament to decide who is the best baseball team in the world. Like the world series, but actually including teams from more than one country. It's not a great game, but it's not awful either. For its time, it was perfectly playable. The title however is like when your Mom texts you at work saying she has really bad news and she needs to speak to you as soon as possible. So you rush home from work, clocking out early and missing out on those last three hours of pay. When you finally get there she tells you that she hasn't seen the cat since the morning, just as the cat saunters in through the cat flap. What has that got to do with the game I hear you cry. Well, where is the bad news? What is bad news about this baseball? Absolutely nothing is the answer. There's no bad news, the title makes no sense and neither does the umpires being rabbits.
6. Color a dinosaur
The first issue I have with this title is that colour is spelled wrong. Putting aside any American/English linguistic arguments though, how exactly is this even a game? It's pictures of dinosaurs that children can then fill in with various colours that the “game” allows them to use. Which is about three different shades of pink. While I can certainly see that it is descriptive title, it's definitely not imaginative. If I was a child, I would not want this game. If I was a parent, I wouldn't pay £45 for something a £1 colouring book can achieve. It makes me sad that not only programmers had to spend their time on this drivel, but the best that the creative department could come up with was color a dinosaur. Here are three ideas I have come up with in the five minutes it has taken to write this entry.
Dinosaur colouring adventure.
Prehistoric picture pandemonium
Colour some dinosaurs
There, and I'm not even trained to come up with video game names.
Dinosaur colouring adventure.
Prehistoric picture pandemonium
Colour some dinosaurs
There, and I'm not even trained to come up with video game names.
5. Dance Aerobics
This game was most definitely way ahead of it's time. It was Dance-Dance-Revolution before it even existed. The wildly popular arcade dancing hit, was a success in part due to the flashing lights and excellent song list on offer to dance to. Dance Aerobics however was not the runaway success that Bandai expected. This was in part due to the limited sound capabilities of the NES. It's hard to really get a groove on to a series of beeps unless you've taken knee quivering amounts of drugs and have a whistle around your neck. The main reason the game was not a success was the title though. Ask yourself, what are the two things that video game players hate the most? That's right, washing and talking to girls. At three and four on the list though it's dancing and aerobics! The only way this title could have been marketed worse was if it was called “shower yourself and talk to women 8”
4. Hatris
If you looked at this title and thought, I bet that's Tetris but with hatsm unfortunately you'd be right. That is the only thing that this title screams out. It says “I had a really good idea a while back, I'm going to rehash it until you're totally fed up of it” it's like the Star Wars Episode One of Tetris spin offs. If you can think of a worse idea for a game than Tetris, but with hats, then I think that whoever made Tony Hawks Pro Skater 5 would like to offer you a job. I know I've spoken a lot about how bad this game is and this article is about bad titles not necessarily bad games, but how bad this game is, is relevant to how bad the title is. You see, because this title screams at you “TETRIS WITH HATS” over and over again, there's no danger of accidentally buying it thinking it is something else. This title tells you exactly what the game is going to be, and that is exactly what the makers of this game should have avoided when naming it.
3. Laser Invasion
I know what you're thinking. How can an intense beam of coherent monochromatic light invade anything? The answer is, it can't. The game isn't even about an invasion. It's about a potential long range bombing. The title makes absolutely no sense. I think it was shoehorned in because it makes use of the over priced and not very good laserscope. The number of people who bought this game expecting exciting laser based explosions and lasers personified invading a nation and being let down by what they actually got must have been in the tens of people. The title is not descriptive and certainly not imaginative. It's just a badly hashed together vehicle for trying to sell yet more over priced peripherals for their wildly popular system. Nintendo certainly needed the money at that point.
2. Al Unser Jr.'s Road To The Top
I've played this game quite often on my SNES. I still keep it hooked up to my old cathode ray television. It's not that bad. The problem I have with it is, as you all probably expected, the title. Celebrity endorsements have been a part of video game marketing tactics since Sam Fox's strip poker. Which if you have to google means you're too young to know about that kind of thing anyway. The general rule though when choosing a celebrity is to choose one that is actually well known. Al Unser is so unknown that his own Mother saw this game in Electronic Boutique upon release and bought Ayrton Senna's Moto GP instead. If they had chosen someone who was known outside of his own house, this game may well have sold enough copies to have paid Al Unser's fee for appearing on the game's box.
1. Super Bases Loaded 3: Licence To Steal
If there's one thing the third title in a sports franchise doesn't need, it's a tagline. Especially one that seems to be trying to paint the baseball playing heroes of this game as secret agents. If I had seen this game in my local game shop as a young child I would have instantly asked my Father to take me home. There is nothing about this title that says buy me. It just says “this game is so bad, we have resorted to a nonsensical tagline to try and make you buy it.” Within ten years of this game being released there are no major baseball games being released. Now I don't want to jump to any conclusions but I can safely say that it is definitely because of the title to this game.
By Frank King
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Frank is known for his outspoken opinions on everything and anything, as well as his next-level social network trolling. He is also the main coder for Foul ENT games and documents the progress of Foul Fantasy in his dev blogs.
Email Frank
Frank is known for his outspoken opinions on everything and anything, as well as his next-level social network trolling. He is also the main coder for Foul ENT games and documents the progress of Foul Fantasy in his dev blogs.