The Smelliest Famicom Kuso Ge...

[skyrunner14]

Every system seems to have it's share of "shovelware", and not even the Famicom is able to avoid it... so, what are some of the worst games for it? List as many as you can think of here... not that I'm forcing you. I guess I'm just curious, and maybe this list can help people know what games to stay clear of (unless you're the type of collector who must get every single game.

*Atlantis No Nazo
The game's advertising stated the game had more levels than Super Mario Bros. ... too bad they weren't very good.
*Hoshi Wo Miru Hito
Known as "Densetsu no Kusoge" in Japan, this is one of the most infamously bad RPGs on the system.
*Takeshi's Challenge
A game many of us here know about, it's not really THAT bad, but it's hard as all heck and is known as kusoge anyway.
*Transformers: Convoy no Nazo
Speaks for itself.
*Mirai Shinwa Jarvas - truly awful rpg with some of the blandest graphics imaginable, a broken battle engine and magic that costs EXPERIENCE POINTS to use.
*Ys - this is the ugliest version of this game, somehow managing to look worse than the MASTER SYSTEM version.
*Geimos - primitive and frustrating.
*Thexder - a shmup with platform-ey action sequences, it can't manage to do either very well.
*Exed Exes - bland, boring gameplay coupled with fugly graphics.
*A Week of Garfield - This is one I've only played emulated... and I wanted my money back after playing two seconds of it.
*Seikima II - this plays and looks like someone hacked the sprites of a shitty game to make it even shittier.
*The Tower of Druaga - its like the Legend of Zelda, except in slow, jerky motion, void of any fun, with awful controls. The Quest for Ki was such a better title that if you play that first its unimaginable how bad this is.
*Spelunker - it's frustrating to even watch

[nintendodork]

If we're talking shovelware in Japan.  Make sure to count just about EVERY SINGLE MAHJONG GAME EVER.

[manuel]

For people who like Mahjong, those are great, though.

But I personally can second that.

I add all Pachinko games to the list.

[mobiusclimber]

I actually think there was quite a bit of shovelware on the Famicom. If you think about it, the NES had some truly gawdawful titles, games that someone actually spent time and money translating and porting over from the Famicom. Quite a bit of what didn't get ported over was left aside for a reason: it was so bad, even the Japanese wouldn't play it. Here's my list:

Mirai Shinwa Jarvas - truly awful rpg with some of the blandest graphics imaginable, a broken battle engine and magic that costs EXPERIENCE POINTS to use.
Ys - this is the ugliest version of this game, somehow managing to look worse than the MASTER SYSTEM version.
Geimos - primitive and frustrating.
Thexder - a shmup with platform-ey action sequences, it can't manage to do either very well.
Exed Exes - bland, boring gameplay coupled with fugly graphics.
A Week of Garfield - This is one I've only played emulated... and I wanted my money back after playing two seconds of it.
Seikima II - this plays and looks like someone hacked the sprites of a shitty game to make it even shittier.

[satoshi_matrix]

The Tower of Druaga - its like the Legend of Zelda, except in slow, jerky motion, void of any fun, with awful controls. The Quest for Ki was such a better title that if you play that first its unimaginable how bad this is.

I got my copy for free when the seller threw it in as a "bonus" when I bought a lot of FC games. Interestingly, the same thing happened when I bought a few Genesis games....the seller threw in Shaq Fu!

[Christine]

You know... Atlantis no Nazo is really not a good game. It's pretty awful and evil. But I knew this, bought it anyway, and play it fairly often although I can't get anywhere in it. It's kind of a fascinating mess, and if it's stupidly hard I can't say it's boring....

[zombiepowder]

Takeshi's Challenge is actually a fun game, if you know what you're doing... i feel that it's only flaw is that
there are some parts in the game where there is absolutely no margin for error whatsoever...
and if you die once then you have to restart from a save point with a password- normally this isn't so bad, but in this game the password is loooooooooooooong

also i'd add Spelunker to the list, it's frustrating to even watch 

[JC]

http://www.famicomworld.com/forum/index.php?topic=2608.0

[skyrunner14]

So there's a similar topic? Well, let's just stick to cartridge-based kusoge only here, and leave the disk-based kusoge to the other topic. Would that work out?

[Rogles]

Takeshi's Challenge is actually a fun game, if you know what you're doing... i feel that it's only flaw is that
there are some parts in the game where there is absolutely no margin for error whatsoever...
and if you die once then you have to restart from a save point with a password- normally this isn't so bad, but in this game the password is loooooooooooooong

also i'd add Spelunker to the list, it's frustrating to even watch 

that would make sense, seeing as how your user-title thing says "Takeshi no Chousenjou"

[UglyJoe]

What's with all the Spelunker hate here?  It's a great game! 

Yeah, you can't fall more than like half an inch without dying, but that's just one of its gameplay mechanics.  Have any of you tried playing it while, I dunno, trying not to fall?  There's a really solid game there if you'd just play it for 15 minutes or so and realize what your player can and can't do.

Bad Famicom game?  Hydlide Special:
http://www.bookofrevenant.com/2009/06/25/lets-playing-hydlide-special/

[Rogles]

Bad Famicom game?  Hydlide Special:
http://www.bookofrevenant.com/2009/06/25/lets-playing-hydlide-special/

XD It's like a horrible version of Ys!

[Ghegs]

What's with all the Spelunker hate here?  It's a great game! 

Yeah, you can't fall more than like half an inch without dying, but that's just one of its gameplay mechanics.  Have any of you tried playing it while, I dunno, trying not to fall?  There's a really solid game there if you'd just play it for 15 minutes or so and realize what your player can and can't do.

Indeed, most people just don't like it because it doesn't have the exact same mechanics like every other platformer out there. It's a pretty damn awesome game, and the japanese still rank it highly in their "favourite FC games"-lists for a good reason.

[satoshi_matrix]

I like it for the funky red LED on the cart itself. Does any other Famicom game have that?

[nintendodork]

I think a few other Irem games do.  Surprisingly, Spelunker 2 doesn't have the red LED on the cart.