With the year coming to a close, a major milestone was reached for yours truly, I hit the two hundo mark of the games reviewed. Over two hundred and eight games have been reviewed since I started at Horror Fuel. To celebrate this milestone, you’re probably expecting me to write about the best games I’ve reviewed. Honestly, where’s the fun in that? Man, some of these games were, shall we say… not good. I looked back at all my reviews for more of the actual horror-themed and triple-A games that I’ve checked out over time and came up with the Top Five Worst Games I’ve Reviewed, in total eighteen games made it to the list but these five would make me replay the other thirteen! Let’s go from bad to worst!
This first-person environmental thriller was the reimagining of the book Silent Spring by Rachel Carson and her research into the environmental dangers of DDT. On paper, it sounds like it has potential, but the end result was more of an interactive fever dream and slightly insulting to Rachel Carson, an accomplished scientist and writer who was made ditzy in the game.
The folks who created the legendary Squad FPS Left 4 Dead were back with Back 4 Blood, a squad FPS where players face off against hordes of zombie-like creatures. The game ended up being a poor attempt to copy Left 4 Dead as the game punishes players playing alone, easy difficulty being hard for some reason, and a perk mechanic that gives players advantages while also making the levels harder, and to top it off, at launch they had a paywall so you had to pay to play offline, that’s been since removed but the game still ended up making a lot of players, myself included, resentful to the creators failing to copy/imitate their own game!
This one hurt. From first hearing about this game and seeing the game’s art and learning Akira Yamaoka was on board doing the soundtrack, I thought I was in for one of the best horror games ever. Stray Souls follows a young man who enheartened his late grandmother’s home where soon creepy things happen…if the game was no so buggy. Well, saying it was buggy is an understatement. The game was more along the lines of, incomplete… so incomplete that it made Cyberpunk 2077’s rocky release look like a full game. The game was so bad that many gamers demanded refunds which more than likely attributed to the game’s developer Jukai Studio’s closure.
Labeled as a Survival Horror, 35MM is more of a walking sim where a lot does not happen. Taking place in post-apocalyptic Russia, you’re traveling through the countryside making your way home. The only true horror in this game is how dull and bleak it is.
Before you see the worst game, I’ve reviewed, here’s a brief look at the other thirteen games from Ok to Bad!
Vampire The Masquerade – Swansong
For a popular RPG, the graphics, voice acting, and storytelling should have been better!
A short funhouse walking sim where the title character is not even part of the plot for some reason.
unneeded multiple storylines, Tommy Wiseau-level voice acting, too dark (literally!).
an unoriginal Layers of Fear clone but set in a circus.
bad voice acting, being multiple RPGs in one, difficult enemies, and lack of combat mechanic variations.
Roguelike/Rouge-lite gaming done wrong!
another Layers of Fear clone but with game-breaking glitches, overuse of flashing lights as jumpscares, and unresponsive controls.
Don’t know what I saw more in this game, glitches or dildoes.
tried to be super retro but lacked scares.
White Day 2: The Flower that Tells Lies
Falsely advertised, poor graphics, stuttering animation, and AI voice acting.
MY EARS!
Layers of Fear (2023)
Initial pressers presented this game as if it would be the third installment of the game series but it’s just the first two games.
too much noise on the screen, super cheap look, and possibly AI text to Speech tech used.
And now, the number one worst game I’ve reviewed…
Presented as a “Norse Pagan” story about a village full of children and its coven of witches was supposed to be a horror, but the true horror of this game was how absolutely BORING it was. The only bit of horror that’s in the game is at the very beginning and from there… the story drops off. Though visually beautiful, it was not what it claimed to be.
So there we have it, kids! This year was a busy year for gamers, with many titles released and drama within the gaming industry. Thousands of workers have lost their jobs, forcing multiple games to fall into development hell. May the next year bring some positive changes to the industry.
There was a lot of negativity in this read, so I wanted to end this on a more uplifting note. I know a lot of folks are concerned about the upcoming year for whatever reason, but know you’re not alone in feeling that. Things are only bad if we let them, or just focus on the bad, coming from a guy with clinical depression I know how hard it can be to look beyond the shit-filled burning dumpsters around us, but we can at least make an effort to make our little corners better. See you next year, be kind to yourself, be kind to others, and don’t let the bastards win.
