Shooters That Make Aliens: Colonial Marines Look Like a Modern Masterpiece

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It seems fashionable today to bash on multimillion dollar production video games for bad voice acting, funny animations, and bugs. Understandably our expectations are heightened with such projects, but is Aliens: Colonial Marines really one of the worst shooters ever made? No. I would seriously consider Gearbox's newest disappointment to be, if anything, a decent title within the grand scope of the genre. Now that's not to say it isn't the falsely advertised crap that it is, but it certainly isn't ET or even another Daikatana.

In no particular order I'm going to list some of the biggest abominations and disappointments of the 3rd and 1st perspective complete with youtube videos on each title. These are real games created by actual game companies, and if you haven't heard of them before; it's because history buried them for a reason.

#1 Thundra by Spungulas Software (2000)

I first discovered this monstrosity from the Somethingawful game review. It's one of few games developed in the Pie in the Sky 3D engine which has ceased to be updated and sold, thankfully. The game takes place in the future where a eugenics experiment creates a disease that can somehow stretch far into the universe unless you stop the outbreak! Or something like that for all I know this game is collect the syringes and fist whip ReDeads riding UFOs. The game's creators used art from public domain sources and admitted programming defeat when they dumped this piece or crap project intended for a $20 purchase price. You can download the full game through 3D Shooter Legends at your own risk.

#2 William Shatner's Tekwar by Capstone/Intracorp (1995)

In Tekwar you play as a cop who's taken out of cryogenic sleep to hunt down seven evil Teklords. It's kinda like Demolition Man but without the fun. The game only really excels in its use of the Build engine and the FMV cutscenes but that's like giving credit to a crack whore for being a malcontent, so I'll stop there. Almost everything about Tekwar is a complete Shatner. Enemy detection issues, general bugs, tedium, blocky characters, flat plot, little documentation. This game was released to the public in a broken state, and one year later Capstone filed for bankruptcy.

#3 Virtuoso: Rock n Roll Shooting by Motivetime/Elite Systems (1994)

The 3DO didn't have a great lifespan. It had potential, but eventually it was games like Virtuoso that made it defunct and forgotten. Virtuoso puts you in the shoes of a rock star who flees to a virtual reality world for inspiration. The objective to the game is to…Collect orbs? Get to the exit? Kill giant robots and spiders on alien planets without a space suit? This title will make you hate video games, the parents who bought this for their children probably hate themselves to this very day. Virtuoso is an instant bargain bin classic of its time and nearly forgotten today. I'll also blame it for shooting Data East in the back of the head.

#4 Drake of the 99 Dragons by Idol FX (2003)

Ukrainian developers Idol FX made a great survival horror game and that's Nosferatu: The Wrath of Malachi. They also made another survival horror game called Drake of the 99 Dragons except the horror in this game is actually beating it without shitting fifty pounds. If you're noticing a recurring theme with these games it's the lack of actual documentation. Where the game fails to explain how horrible it will be at the title screen, it should at least be documented thoroughly in the manual. This is something Drake of the 99 Dragons does not do. Drake of the 99 Dragons does not explain, it does not play, it does not aim, shit even running Drake around is just something this title just can't do right. Even the camera has a mind of its own. Xbox owners know by now that this game was easily the worst title for the system but hey that's what you get when you hire a bunch of amateurs to make your games. Idol FX would later release FBI Hostage Rescue.

#5 Angst: Rahz's Revenge by ManMachine Games (1997)

If you require immediate diarrhea you can download the demo here.

Last and certainly the worst is Angst Rahz's Revenge. This game is so bad that I immediately removed it from my computer after five minutes of playing/dieing on the inside. This game's metal soundtrack, which might be the only passable thing about it, cannot save it from being a clusterfuck of absolute terrible. I hope you use this review above as a means to avoid actually playing the game. The weapon pick up and hold sprites are exactly the same, the elevators only go up, the ammo pick ups are solid objects, battles degrade to an ammo chucking contests, mismatching textures abound, enemies firing through walls, psychic scorpions, the in game sound is comparable to hearing the cries of slaughtered seals conveniently recorded for redbook format. I can go on and on. Thankfully ManMachine Games soon went out of business after Angst's release before they could digitally torture the world with a sequel.

Gamers, we've been through worse than Aliens: Colonial Marines. Some of us know it and some of us don't know it hence the purpose of this article. I hope these five selections out of many terrible shooters provided a greater insight on the depths of this genre. It has sunk incredibly low and rose incredibly high so let's hope that Gearbox is the worst developer for shooters in the future. All things considered we could be doing a hell of a lot worse.

Honorable mentions:
Christmas Carnage, Immoral Cumbat, Hades 2, Isle of the Dead, Exploding Lips, Operation Body Count, Gods and Generals, Rock'n Shaolin , Jurassic Park Trespasser, Elite Forces: Navy SEALs