In response to "The Cellar of Shame" from The Escapist Forum: The best thing about terrible games? For me, it's the reviews. I laugh uproariously every time I read a review of the latest complete dud. Reviewers take to these games on purpose, I think, to be able to fully stretch their literary muscles. A good review lambasting a bad game isn't very long as entertainment goes, but is often worth quite a few chuckles. Best part is, if you're reading it online, it costs next to nothing.
I think it's funny you mentioned Big Rigs being your favorite cringe game -- GameSpots review of it continues to be my favorite 'great review of a bad game'.
And it's not just the cost in dollars; time is a much more valuable commodity. A bad movie can be burned through in 90 minutes; a bad game will take at least 4 times that, and probably a lot more if you're determined to finish it.
One factor that needs to be taken into account: bad movies are enjoyed when you have others to share the pain with. Same goes for bad games. One of the best experiences I had was playing the piece-of-crap "Kings Quest 5" with my roommates back in college. Sure, it had high production values for the time - fancy graphics and well-produced music. But the horrible, idiotic, nonsensical puzzles and deeply flawed gameplay (having to sllllllooowwwwly navigate your dude across screen after screen as you backtracked your way around to try stuff out) made it infuriating. Having your friends around to hurl insults at the screen with you made it a legitimate pleasure.
We never did finish it, though.
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In response to "How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Superman 64" from The Escapist Forum: I think the article is right on the money in drawing lines between bad games and 'camp' movies. If somebody walks by and sees that you're playing a garbage game (graphics-wise or whatever), their first reaction is usually "My gods, what are you playing!?" Somehow the game's lack of quality is attributed to you, the poor bastard choosing to struggle through a pixelated mess. It's a hands-on kind of awful.
A campy movie on the other hand, usually inspires people to sit down and help you make fun of it. It's the movie that sucks, not you for choosing to watch it. The lack of quality is comfortably at arm's length, for criticism or jackassing or whatever. I know people who make an active habit of finding the worst-looking movies for just that purpose.
Camp is something to be scanned and scorned, not endured over the course of a 20 hour 'game'. That would be called "masochism".
I bought Ripper at GameTraders for $5. I had to get DosBox and VDMSound to run it, then I had to burn copies of the 6 CDs as they were so scratched that attempting to play them made the video unwatchable, but they were still readable to create an image. After a few hours of play I had to search for a walkthrough for some of the puzzles as they were highly illogical.
But it was worth it to see Christopher Walken and John Rhys Davies in a cyberpunk Jack the Ripper story with terrible scripting and a ridiculous plot.
- Fugue
