Avoid this game like you would a laser beam to the head. [Dec 2003, p.150]

Releasing Bounty Hunter is tantamount to being held down while someone farts in your face. [Feb 2003, p.101]

The general feeling this game conveys is confusion and chaos, akin to being flushed down a jet-powered toilet. [Apr 2006, p.118]

Leave this one stranded on Ceti Alpha V – it’s of no use to you or the cause of the Federation.

The pumped-up graphics look pretty mediocre at best... the game mechanics are bland and simplistic - like the worst of the Genesis era. [May 2003, p.87]

The game fails in the simple task of capturing the excitement of actual bowling. [July 2004, p.112]

Natural Motion's Euphoria technology is a great building block for a football game, but Backbreaker suffers from too many rookie mistakes. Only the most hardcore gridiron fans dying for an alternative to the EA Sports offerings should bother bringing this one in for a look.

Umbrella Corps is an unusual online shooter. Unfortunately, its odd mix of mechanics don’t come together well, and its online matchmaking is a total joke. I once waited almost 20 minutes for a match that lasted less than 10 minutes. In that amount of time, you could drive to the store and buy a better game.

If you spent months bowling in Wii Sports, then this will be an upgrade. Otherwise, it isn't worth your time. [Jan 2009, p.76]

Playing the trivia games was about as fun as Bliz got. [Dec 2001, p.118]

It's the sheer tedium of every moment that prevents any enjoyment of the cool features it offers. [Aug 2004, p.106]

A dumb, forgettable game and nothing else. [Sept 2005, p.100]

Outside of these interesting narrative nuggets, Survival Instinct sinks its infected teeth into monotony and carelessly chews away at it to deliver a repetitious experience that lets a few cool ideas go to waste. This is an apocalypse you don’t want to survive.

I know the charm of Swery games (and, to a lesser extent, Suda51 titles) is how utterly bizarre they are, but any chuckles Hotel Barcelona’s quirky sense of humor may elicit were drowned under a sea of head-scratching and outright bad design and storytelling decisions. No matter how many secrets it may have or surreal moments it assaults players with, it’s all wrapped around a dull, limited, and flawed core gameplay experience. You don’t have to go home, but you shouldn’t stay here.

In theory, these randomly created dungeons should add a level of unpredictability and replay to the experience, but in practice it renders the level design so incredibly tedious and dull that I could barely force myself to keep playing. [Aug 2004, p.99]

I would love to see more experiments like Skyrim VR and Resident Evil 7 in virtual reality, where fully featured games get ported to this still-young medium. This port is rough, but I’m still hopeful that there is a game out there that works both ways. For now, if you want to revisit Skyrim, your best bet is to boot up one of the editions you already own or grab it on Switch.

Some of the most antiquated and broken gameplay available on modern consoles. [June 2005, p.126]

Tony Hawk’s Downhill Jam is an unimaginative and often times annoying game that hangs its hat on a Wii controller interface that is interesting because it is different, but easily forgettable after a few short hours.

Tac Ops' fun will fizzle within an hour of play. [July 2002, p.91]

Long story short, the adventure motif simply didn't catch. [Sept. 2006, p.88]

Outside of clips stolen from the motion picture, you won’t find any kind of story here, either. Pandemic worked wonders with Star Wars, but couldn’t grasp the One Ring. Conquest is a joyless trip through familiar territories, and sadly, nothing more than that.

The execution of this entry is almost unplayable because it's just so darn dull and clunky, bu tthe ideas are there to make something interesting. [Feb 2005, p.115]

Like sitting alone in the woods with a bottle of peepee tends to be, this game is damn boring. [Nov 2003, p.171]

Even if I never played "NBA 2K1" or "NBA Live," I'd still know this game sucks. [Nov 2001, p.122]

After this miserable showing, the only waters that Jaws will be patrolling are those of the great video game toilet. [Aug 2006, p.84]

The combat is basic, sloppy, and imprecise, and the spastic overhead camera often gets annoying. [Dec 2002, p.152]

In short, playing this epic-sized monstrosity is similar to being scratched to death by a house cat...not only is it painful, it's also embarrassing. [Sept 2004, p.104]

So maybe the battle system and AI still suck, and the graphics look like an original Xbox game. Is that really a big deal? Building up an army and conquering a nation is still fun. Who cares if hundreds of other games do it better?