WALL OF TEXT EXPLAINED: What you're looking at is an episode of Countdown w/ Defunct Games published before 2006. As you can tell, something has gone horribly awry. I won't bore you with the technical details, but it has to do with the old layout being incompatible with the new. Eventually, we would like to retrofit these old episodes of Countdown, but that will require a significant amount of time. As Defunct Games has only a limited staff, we aren't sure when we'll have the chance to fix this article. If you absolutely need to know what this article said, get a hold of us on Twitter or leave a message in the comment section below. Sorry for the inconvenience. I hope you will enjoy the episodes created post-2006.

#10 Boomer You tell him to go right, he heads left. You tell him to take cover, he runs right into the middle of the gunfire. No matter what you tell him to do, chances are he's doing just the opposite, like he rode the short bus to the Army base! Regardless of his glitch, Boomer is useless as a soldier, and half the challenge of the one-player mode in SOCOM: U.S. Navy SEALs. All of your other team mates get along and follow orders, but for some odd reason Boomer has a mind of his own. Is he enough to ruin SOCOM? Probably not, but he does make the one-player mode more than a little frustrating. At least he won't be returning in SOCOM II: U.S. Navy SEALs. #9 Leo Stenbuck Konami has a funny way of creating some of the most annoying characters of all time, and Leo Stenbuck, from the original Zone of the Enders, could be the must frustrating. Throughout the entire adventure we have to endure constant groaning and complaining about how he doesn't want to do it, he doesn't like that it's thrust on him, blah blah blah. C'mon kid, during World War II teenagers were watching their friends die in droves on the coast of foreign countries, you're in a giant mech for Christ sakes, it's not the end of the world. #8 Waluigi Where did this guy come from? I guess Wario makes sense, but who the hell is this Waluigi? Couldn't that have just changed the first letter, or just created another name or something? After pondering these questions, as well as many others, I realized that there is no answer that would make any sense. No matter if he's part of a board game, no matter if playing tennis or golf, or really whatever he's doing, the fact of the matter is he doesn't belong! Why not include Kid Icarus in these games? Or how about putting Toad back into the line up?? There are all these questions, but only one answer: Waluigi has to go!! #7 Kurtis Trent Alright, I confess, Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness isn't an "otherwise good game", in fact, it's mediocre at best, but Kurtis Trent still doesn't belong. We play the Tomb Raider games not to see the "drummer from Seattle" look, we play it to see a fit, busty, attractive Lara Croft kick ass, take names, and call them in the morning. Adding Kurtis to the line-up only bolsters the problems with this PlayStation 2 sequel. And really, the best they could come up with was a Chris Cornell look alike? No wonder the franchise was taken away from Core! #6 Lizardman There are a lot of silly characters in the Soul Calibur series, but Lizardman is stupid even by those standards! Here is a character that is almost stupid beyond words, he's like that Vanilla Ice movie Cool As Ice. In Soul Calibur 2 he's barely there, stuck with one weapon and only a couple of wardrobe changes. Why would Namco even consider putting this guy in more than one game? If they got rid of him the series wouldn't have that weird sideshow freak aura that surrounds Lizardman. Even his name is generic; Namco just needs to get rid of this weenie. #5 Aerith In explaining my disdain for Aerith's appearance in Kingdom Hearts, I would like to avoid some of the obvious continuity problems that arise. I'd like to believe that everything is happy in the world, and things can go on as normal. But I can't because every time I see her I get this weird icky feeling I get when I see the dead alive again!! For crying out loud, people, can't the woman rest in peace? And do we really need pop singer turned actress Mandy Moore providing her departed voice?? Come on Square, there are plenty of beautiful young women in your games that weren't brutally murdered in front of our eyes, show some compassion for the family. #4 Dan The war is over; SNK and Capcom are now friends. There is no reason what so ever to have a parody character still in Street Fighter games, unless you want to make fun of a company you really do have a feud with. How about a character that kind of looks like Sub-Zero or kind of looks like Heihachi? And really, the whole Dan being useless thing is getting pretty old. None of his moves are effective, and frankly he's just taking up space that could be better used with another character. It's a shame Capcom has to constantly use Dan instead of just creating a new opponent. #3 Roo the Kangaroo Before Tekken employed Kuma the Bear, Sega journeyed to the zoo to bring us one of the worst characters of all time, Roo the Kangaroo. In an otherwise serious game, this kangaroo is more than a little out of place. And worse yet, he's featured on the cover, so even people who've never play the game will know how stupid Roo is. If we could get rid of him we would have a fairly standard, if not slightly dated, brawler on our hands, but with him, it's hard to take the game seriously. #2 Miles "Tails" Prowers Sega originally added Miles "Tails" Prowers as a new character for Sonic the Hedgehog 2, but that's where they should have left him. All he does is follow behind Sonic and make fun of animals who can't fly. He's rarely useful, and is about as interesting as you'd expect from a four year old. Things only got worse when the 3D Sonic games came out and started to feature dialog from the young fox. Between pulling out of the hardware market, releasing the 32x, and allowing Tails to talk, I'm not sure which Sega decision was worse. And besides, pairing doesn't make any sense; I mean, if you really had a fox and a hedgehog in the same room at least you'd know one won't be hungry the next day. #1 Raiden We waited for years to play as Solid Snake in another Metal Gear game, but what we got was a game featuring a whiny, pathetic character named Raiden! Why didn't they just let Michael Bolton score the game?? When he's not being overly dramatic to whoever will listen, Raiden is doing his best to derail to the game's pace. Whatever this kid and his whiny little girlfriend have to do with the game is still a mystery to me, I would have preferred to play the entire game as Solid Snake! Oh, and while we're recalling Metal Gear Solid 2 characters, is there anyway we can also toss out that vampire character? It's a coin toss between who is more annoying, but ultimately if we could get rid of both, that would be best for everybody. . In an attempt to be completely fair, we've decided to run a special list of games that don't just need one character excised, but their entire cast! That's right, games with horrible characters, yet really good game mechanics. Seems like that would be a oxy moron, but it's not, as you will see below ... Five Games that Need their entire Cast Recalled Star Fox What was cute back then, is insanely annoying now. If you suffered through the bad story telling of Star Fox Adventure, you know how terrible these characters are. I mean really, who cares if it's a Fox or a Toad manning the spaceship, just give us something to shoot and we'll shoot it. The Bouncer Sure it's a great four player fighting game, we established that last episode, but that doesn't mean it couldn't use at least one interesting character. Tobal No. 1 had a dizzying amount of unique characters, but the Bouncer must have kicked everybody with any personality out. Downhill Domination In trying to bring us "extreme" figures, Incog gave us the most annoying wannabe's since Saved by the Bell and Blossom! With all attitude and no personality, these downhill bikers were a lot like your everyday high school football locker room. Street Fighter III After introducing the world to some of the most memorable World Warriors around in Street Fighter II, Capcom turns around to brings us a set of fighters with no personality at all. It's hard to remember who they are even when you're playing the game, let alone months later. Run Like Hell It's a survival horror game where you actually don't want any of the boring, self involved characters to survive! What the aliens that are hijacking the ship can do to you is far more interesting than what you do to them. Ladies and gentlemen, cover your eyes.