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Posted: Fri Jul 11, 2003 12:14 pm
by Slator
I have two companies that I really hated.

1) players
(for the worst tapeloaders EVER, checksums are for lamers, eh ???, you are never sure if the game will work even after the mainfile started)

2) melbourne house
(because you had a 50/50 chance in getting a shitgame)

Posted: Tue Jul 15, 2003 9:45 pm
by LeeT
Just remembered another candidate...

Quicksilva

Prat of th Argus Press group, who released a compilation called '30 Games' which (apart from a couple of Taskset games) was a stinking pile of poo!

Posted: Tue Jul 15, 2003 9:52 pm
by Iain
390 games? That's almost as many as Cascade's 50 games pack!!! They were pretty crap, a lot of basic ones there but it was still a good tape (at the time anyway) and when my friiend ordered it, he got a calculator watch so it wasn't all bad! :-)

Towards the end of the C64's commercial life there were a good few budget 4 game packs released, the Codemasters ones were pretty good but some other company's ones were really crap.

Posted: Fri Aug 22, 2003 2:25 pm
by alexhighnumber
iain wrote:when my friiend ordered it, he got a calculator watch so it wasn't all bad! :-)
I seem to remember that and being being tempted by the offer!

Posted: Sun May 08, 2005 2:25 pm
by IzZle
Ill never forgive Melbourne house for that conversion of Double Dragon. Christ that was terrible.


BTW. Hi everyone. 1st post :D

Posted: Tue May 17, 2005 6:39 am
by Fizza
Fred by Quicksilva was a great little game, as was Ring of Power, Aquaplane wasn't terrible, but I think they still had some reasonably good games for the time before they were bought out by Argus Press, I think Yabba Dabba Doo rates as one of the worst wastes of licenses especially when those graphics were so neat, I was greatly looking forward to that game being a Flintstones fan at the time. I thought the Rupert games were pretty good for kids, they had a knack for programming arcade quality sprites, shame about the games though.. Glider Rider wasn't bad either.

I forgot about those adventures that CRL released, they were rather good actually and add enough to their credibility to just make them a poor software house overall.

Players released Fungus, which was quite an addictive little game although I never bought any of their other titles so I can't comment overall, but my experience with them was good, especially the cool Amidar loading game.

Durrel were terrible, although Saboteur was a excellent game in an 8bit Splinter Cell kind of way.

My suggestions for crappiest software house would be:

Anirog
Games Machine

Posted: Tue May 17, 2005 10:35 am
by CraigGrannell
Players also had that mini-game loader—something way more companies should have done.

Posted: Tue May 17, 2005 1:23 pm
by LeeT
Fizza wrote:Fred by Quicksilva was a great little game, as was Ring of Power, Aquaplane wasn't terrible, but I think they still had some reasonably good games for the time before they were bought out by Argus Press, I think Yabba Dabba Doo rates as one of the worst wastes of licenses especially when those graphics were so neat, I was greatly looking forward to that game being a Flintstones fan at the time. I thought the Rupert games were pretty good for kids, they had a knack for programming arcade quality sprites, shame about the games though.. Glider Rider wasn't bad either.

I forgot about those adventures that CRL released, they were rather good actually and add enough to their credibility to just make them a poor software house overall.

My suggestions for crappiest software house would be:

Anirog
Games Machine
My reasons for picking Quicksilva and CRL were also because of the sheer volume of games they released - If you look at the amount of games they released for the C64 and how many good ones..Not many really! :)

I had to look-up what games 'Games Machine' actually produced - I enjoyed 'Skull' (I own an original of it) although it is a bit slow.

Posted: Tue May 17, 2005 4:55 pm
by Professor Brian Strain
Argus Press/Quicksilva were responsible for Hocus Focus. It was a nice idea badly put together.

Another nominee - TOP TEN budget label, their BMX game was awful...

Posted: Tue May 17, 2005 11:34 pm
by Fiery Phoenix
Regarding The Flintstones, making one bad game was unforgivable, but two?

Quicksilva, who later became Grandslam, had another chance, but again made a complete hash of making a decent Flintstones game

Posted: Wed May 18, 2005 9:44 am
by brian_dead
i probably wont be popular for this but i didnt like any of gremlins games.
codemasters chuned out alot of crap too.
ditto US gold

Posted: Wed May 18, 2005 10:14 am
by Lloyd Mangram
brian_dead wrote:i probably wont be popular for this but i didnt like any of gremlins games.
codemasters chuned out alot of crap too.
ditto US gold
??? :shock:

Posted: Wed May 18, 2005 11:32 am
by LeeT
Gremlin did a fair few average games (especially around the time that they did lots of those two-page ad's with Gary Lineker games!) but I wouldn't say they were one of the worst.

Posted: Wed May 18, 2005 11:47 am
by Lloyd Mangram
LeeT wrote:Gremlin did a fair few average games (especially around the time that they did lots of those two-page ad's with Gary Lineker games!) but I wouldn't say they were one of the worst.
Yeah those ugly green ones, and those painted hands sticking out of the ground. Whoever dreamed that up over at Gremlin's marketing department. :?

Posted: Wed May 18, 2005 12:53 pm
by LeeT
Mr.Zzapback wrote:
LeeT wrote:Gremlin did a fair few average games (especially around the time that they did lots of those two-page ad's with Gary Lineker games!) but I wouldn't say they were one of the worst.
Yeah those ugly green ones, and those painted hands sticking out of the ground. Whoever dreamed that up over at Gremlin's marketing department. :?
They were probably on something and most likely wearing a Global Hypercolour t-shirt too! :lol: