Every year tons of games are released to hungry gamers looking for new products that will further their descent into the subculture of the dateless. In order to feed this ambition game companies have taken to dividing their resources to two different fronts, the first being to pour hundreds of thousands of dollars into high profile, consumer friendly games. The second strategy is to shove a few crappy licensed titles that are sure to garner truckloads of cash, even if the game box has “Mary-Kate and Ashley” on the cover. The third, less often used, tactic is to create new games with unique premises and game play mechanics to draw in cash from the jaded game junkies (me) who feel that games were better when Nintendo dominated the industry. Unfortunately this last method, as often as not, produces atrocities that rival the worst movies starring Ben Affleck, in terms of entertainment value. Was Seaman unique? Yes, but ask if it was any fun, and you will receive a most emphatic declination of assertion.  This year is no different, and as I will show you, using my clairvoyance granted to me by a wandering gypsy gamer, some games are destined to suck.

Darkwatch – This is the first game to be published from recent Sega owners Sammy that will not involve fighting. The excellent Guilty Gear series shows that Sammy definitely knows what goes into a great game, so one must ask, who the hell green lit this future worst game of the year? For a little background Darkwatch is a FPS set in the old western era of American history. So far not such a bad concept, indeed Dead Man’s Hand was a solid game. Unlike that particular game, however, Darkwatch does not feature just any old cowboy; instead you play as a vampire cowboy named Jericho. I was in chess club in high school and even I beat up the kids with names like that. Instead of shooting desperados, you get to plug away at skeletons and other evil monsters, presumably with a holy six-shooter. To recap: An evil western FPS with a vampire/cowboy/dork as your protagonist (who happens to ride an UNDEAD horse) who shoots skeletons with a gun. Add to that graphics that appear to be a first generation mod of Half-Life, and you have a recipe for a horrid game, unfit for human testing.

Fight Club – I know that this is technically a licensed game, based on the movie starring Brad Pitt, which was in turn based of a book by Chuck Palaniuk, which was in turn based of  a combination of reading A Clockwork Orange and the author drinking too many White Russians, but this is actually in no way related to anything that meant anything in either medium. Not only does this previous “sentence” win an award for longest rant, but Fight Club: The Game wins an award for Missing the F-ing Point of your Source Material. A fighting game based off a movie/book that preached about the excesses of modern civilization makes as much sense as a Gandhi Brand Dog Chow (Made of Actual Peasants!) Whoever thought this one up should be dragged out of their office by the freakish cult followers of the book and beaten to death with socks full of quarters.

McFarlane’s Evil Prophecy – Let me ask you this, when was the last time anything with Todd McFarlane’s name on it has been any damn good? Though so.

Backyard Wrestling 2 – Are there really enough rednecks out there who bought the first B.W. to warrant a sequel? For a game with such a simple premise as betting a grown man dressed as a clown with a rubbish bin, there was absolutely no redeeming qualities about this title. From the poorly ripped off game play of Power Stone (Dreamcast) to the inclusion of the Insane Clown Posse, nothing was done to make this “game” anything more than a early warning sign of brain damage by the party responsible for purchasing it. If you really must beat the crap out of somebody buy Def Jam Vendetta, a game that avoided last years crap list by being a lot of fun, instead.

The URBZ: Sims in the City – Are suburbanites so fascinated with the culture of the thug life that they have to create a game where every negative stereotype of urban living in at their fingertips? Why not create a game called “Honest Hard Working Black Men, and Their Upstanding Intelligent Women” instead? Oh, that’s right, it’s not keepin’ it real. Guess what wanna-be G’s, if you can afford to buy a computer, find the time to sit down and play a game depicting the ghetto life; chances are you are as far away from “street” as is possible. It’s like when Vanilla Ice declared, “I’ve lived that life,” you are not fooling anybody, so go back to your mum's car and play your Eminem at volumes low enough so as not to anger anybody.

 This is just part one of the worst games to come. Rest assured my magic 8 Ball and I have some say on other games you might have (hopefully not) heard of. Be afraid, for part two concerns the worst offenders of disgusting game play, the mere title alone will have gamers running for their copies of Chrono Trigger to ward off the evil spirits….Licensed Games! *Queue ominous music* See you next time…if you dare! MD