Electronic Gaming Monthly's Worst Reviewed Games of 2004

Leisure Suit Larry: Magna Cum Laude

#6

Although point and click adventure games have traditionally been rare on home consoles, you still saw a few slip through from time to time. But while Shadowgate and Monkey Island may have made the leap early on, it took Leisure Larry a really long time to catch up. I'm talking about nearly two full decades. To put it in perspective, by the time Al Lowe made six PC installments, you still had to wait eight more years before Larry debuted on a PlayStation or Xbox. And to pour salt all over that wound, the adventure console gamers got was the terrible spin-off, Leisure Suit Larry: Magna Cum Laude.

Jon D tried to spoil my episode by namedropping another game on this list: "If you've never seen breasts before, you might end up at the video store choosing between this and the abhorrent Guy Game, but you're screwed on gameplay either way." His problem wasn't with the lewdness, but rather string of mindless tasks based on simple button-tapping and aged arcade titles like Pong and Tapper. Demian called the game "trail-blazing" and compared Leisure Suit Larry to The Crying Game. He also called it "unfunny" and "straight up painful," concluding that "when it comes to Larry, abstinence sounds pretty good." With an average of 2.5 out of 10, there's no happy ending for Leisure Suit Larry: Magna Cum Laude.

Fight Club

#5

Is it possible for a game to misunderstand the point of a movie worse than Fight Club? Here is a scathing indictment of the emptiness and isolation of capitalism, but sure, the movie has the word "fight" right in the title, so just turn it into a one-on-one fighting game and be done with it. And maybe toss in the dude from Limp Bizkit just to underline that you completely missed the point. I suppose it's also worth mentioning that Fight Club was more than just a baffling movie tie-in, because it was also a terrible fighting game. I mean, one of the worst.

Dave took aim at the developers, saying that "at best, Fight Club will serve as a resume bullet to get somebody work doing 3D art or interface design. It has some decent character models and animation and a cool interface inspired by the movie's camera work, but the rest is like a bunch of 14-year-old kids trying to make Tekken in mom's garage." Justin followed that up by complaining about, well, everything else: "Everything, including the fighting engine, character balance, and stat improvement is completely and utterly broken, boring and useless." The three editors complained that the game was clearly unfinished, which is why it averages a 2.5 out of 10. Perhaps they were going to add in the point of the movie at the very last second and ran out of time? We can only hope.

Yuyu Hakusho: Spirit Detective

#4

If you've been watching me count down Electronic Gaming Monthly's worst reviewed games, then you already know that anime adaptations tend to fair poorly. So is the case with Yu Yu Hakusho: Spirit Detective, based on a show that apparently ran between 1992 and 1994 in Japan and then a decade later here in the United States. I say "apparently" because I've never heard of this game and have never seen the show, so I feel a little out of my depth here. Based on EGM's reviews, I suspect I'm not missing out on much.

Phil tries to look on the bright side: "When the best thing you can say about an anime-based game is that it's faithful to its source material, you're in trouble. Unfortunately, that's all Yu Yu Hakusho has to offer." Kevin gave the game a low 1.5 and said that if he was a Supreme Court justice, he would put a restraining order on Yu Yu Hakusho. "Four questions come to mind here: Why is Yusuke fetching items in huge, mazelike towns without a map? Why do all the characters look like they're constructed out of pipe cleaner? Why is fighting so dull and annoying when thrilling battle scenes are the original anime's chief attraction? And most importantly, why would anybody want to play this?" I may not know much about this anime or game, but that's not going to stop me from telling you that Yu Yu Hakusho averaged a faithful 2.2 out of 10.

Drake of the 99 Dragons

#3

Drake of the 99 Dragons is the reason why you should never trust screenshots. Confined to the pages of Electronic Gaming Monthly, it looks like a fun new action game with a stylish art design. But the moment you start playing the game, the whole house of cards comes crashing down. In fact, the game is so bad that Paul decided to list out just a few of the things that are made painfully difficult in Drake, which includes "seeing things, going places, and shooting enemies. In other words, everything. You'll spend more time fighting with Drake's camera and controls than its dastardly robomen. Unless, of course, you don't play it."

Shawn went even further, suggesting that "if someone gives you a copy of Drake, consider it your moral obligation to destroy it. The game's so broken that it's unplayable. The camera constantly spirals out of control, making the platforming impossible, and the auto-targeting is inoperative." He says that you're better off standing outside the game store warning people not to buy it. Shawn gave the game a score of 0.5, which was quite a bit lower than the other critics, which both gave it twos. His low score drags the average down to a pathetic 1.7 out of 10.

American Idol

#2

When you hear the name "American Idol," what is the first thing that pops into your head? For some, it's probably Simon Cowell yelling at some poor contestant who made the mistake of standing in line for 12 hours, but for most people, American Idol is all about the singing. And you want to know the one thing you don't get to do in the American Idol game on PlayStation 2? That's right, you don't get to sing. To put it in context, this poorly-conceived rhythm game came out a full year after Karaoke Revolution, so it's not like the concept of a singing game was completely foreign at the time. But alas, American Idol is a game about pressing buttons, no different from PaRappa the Rapper ... only bad.

Carrie sums it up perfectly: "Even Simon Cowell couldn't think of an insult demeaning enough for this game. It's bad enough that you can beat the single-player game in an hour. But that short time includes excruciating minutes spent watching ugly cartoon people sing off-key while you're waiting for your turn." Jennifer also zeroed in on the bad singing: "Ever wish the earsplitting, off-key vocals of the American Idol TV show would penetrate your gaming world? No? Then this isn't for you -- and I'm really not sure who else would want to play it." The editors agreed that you're better off buying Karaoke Revolution, but I'm sure you already knew that. American Idol averaged a very pitchy 1.5 out of 10.

The Guy Game

#1

Some games are merely bad, but The Guy Game was so bad that it was literally a crime. Pitched as a cross between a game show and Girls Gone Wild, this short-lived console game was basically an interactive comedy special with occasional trivia and nudity. Critics at the time called it lewd, crude and barely a game, but the reason the game ultimately got into hot water is because one of the women featured in The Guy Game was underage. This not only resulted in a lawsuit, but also the game being taken off shelves only four months after release.

Of course, the EGM editors didn't know any of this when they reviewed the game in their November 2004 issue. Greg gave the game the lowest score possible -- a zero. He put it this way: "It doesn't take a transvestite-hooker-starved Eddie Murphy to tell you that some sex is entirely too costly. In The Guy Game, players must wade through 40 or so minutes of badly shot, badly edited, and badly commented on spring break footage before one of the "hotties" shows her gazooms without any censoring." He recommended players seek real breasts the old-fashioned way, "by begging." With the rest of the critics in full agreement, The Guy Game averages a 0.8 out of 10, one of the lowest scores in Electronic Gaming Monthly's history.