Let me tell you a personal story about a video game... one of the worst decisions I have ever made.

FernandoRocker · Jul 10, 2018

We didn't have much money when I was a little bambino. I remember my cousins and friends getting the NES and I used to spend a lot of time at my cousin's playing video games.

Same thing happened with the SNES... I got the SNES years after it was released. And I only had two games (one was Super Mario World) for the rest of the generation. I always rented video games instead, or my cousin used to borrow me some games.

One day, my grandma, out of nowhere, told me to go out with her to downtown (in TX), and she took me to a local video game store. And she told me to pick a game (not the expensive ones, but some of the $20 games). That was a huge surprise. I was thrilled. She caught me by surprise.

I was 8 years old. I picked up the game with the coolest cover I saw.

And I picked this shit:

Developer: BITS
Publisher: Triffix

Dream TV is an action video game for the Super NES where the player has to guide two youngsters through a nightmarish land of evil television shows (using a similar plot to the campy movie Stay Tuned and Crystal Dynamics' video game Gex). The player has to escape by defeating stereotypical television villains and finding pieces of a puzzle. The game features complex labyrinths.

Plot
National video gamers Charlie and Jimmy are given a strange game in the mail. After loading a strange-looking game cartridge, the boys find themselves transported into the game. They are sucked in by an evil being known as the Critic. Now Jimmy and Charlie must fight for their lives through four Dream Worlds (Medieval, Egyptian, Prehistoric, and Future) if they hope to return home safely. Collecting nine hidden puzzle pieces from each level will take the guys to the final showdown with the Critic and hopefully back to reality.

I will always remember this moment. One of the worst decisions I have ever made in my life.

I hate you forever, Dream TV.

ASleepingMonkey · Jul 10, 2018

Never heard of this. What's so bad about it?

Z-Beat · Jul 10, 2018

If this remains one of the worst decisions you've ever made you'll have an awesome life.

FernandoRocker · Jul 10, 2018

Well, one of the worst gaming-related decisions.

julia crawford · Jul 10, 2018

Oh no, not Dream TV.........

FernandoRocker · Jul 10, 2018

ASleepingMonkey said:
Never heard of this. What's so bad about it?

One of the worst games I have ever played. Extremely ugly graphics and soundtrack, lame gameplay. My heart broke, specially because it was the only other game (besides Super Mario World) I ever got for the SNES.

Qwark · Jul 10, 2018

Lol, I had awful taste as a kid as well and usually made decisions based on cover art or tv/movie tie-ins. Luckily, I had an older brother that told my parents to get Crash 2 instead of Rascal on PS1. Still thankful for that.

Raven117 · Jul 10, 2018

FernandoRocker said:
We didn't have much money when I was a little bambino. I remember my cousins and friends getting the NES and I used to spend a lot of time at my cousin's playing video games.

Same thing happened with the SNES... I got the SNES years after it was released. And I only had one game (Super Mario) for the rest of the generation. I always rented video games instead or my cousin used to borrow me some games.

One day, my grandma, out of nowhere, told me to go out with her to downtown (in TX), and she took me to a local video game store. And she told to pick a game (not the expensive ones, but some of the $20 games). That was a huge surprise. I was thrilled. She caught me by surprise.

I was 8 years old. I picked up the game with the coolest cover I saw.

And I picked this shit:

I will always remember this moment. One of the worst decisions I have ever made in my life.

I hate you forever, Dream TV.

Smile. It is what made gaming in the 90s a leap of faith. We would pour over cover art, and marketing materials on the box to try and seperate what was pure fluff or actual gameplay. It took hours. Days even. We had no internet, we only had magazines that may or may not have been available.

I can't say I ever woefully missed the mark. I picked some pretty good games.

Aaron D. · Jul 10, 2018

At least you didn't Day One Pac-Man 2600.

Silvergun-Blue · Jul 10, 2018

I mean, you got what you got back in those days, unless it was properly awful, you still played it. Gamers in general were a lot more tolerant of middling games back then, you would always find something about the game endearing.
Obviously having access to the information we have now is good, but the current attitude that games are either good or shit is wearisome.

Vorador · Jul 10, 2018

I had a choice between Wipeout PC and a game called Defcon 5. One i knew was awesome but had a recommendation for 3D accelerated graphic card which i didn't had, and the other had modest requisites.

I still remember it to this day.

This terrible piece of shit.

Bulebule · Jul 10, 2018

At least you didn't trade Final Doom (PS1) for Perfect Weapon (PS1) like I did.

No Depth · Jul 10, 2018

After loading a strange-looking game cartridge, the boys find themselves transported into the game. They are sucked in by an evil being known as the Critic.

Sounds like the developers were working through some things in the creation of this one. Hopefully they found their peace...

FernandoRocker · Jul 10, 2018

Well, at least I did finish the game a couple of times.

ghibli99 · Jul 10, 2018

Back in junior high, I was trying to decide between a NES and SMS for Christmas. I happened to be looking at the newest Toys R Us ad, and in it I saw a Master System, and the cartridge in the slot said Cobra Command. Now, I had only every seen/played the LaserDisc game of that name, not the side-scrolling one of the same name (I would see that one in arcades the following year, IIRC). My 12 or 13 yo brain saw that and made the jump to, "The Master System can play animated arcade games like this and Space Ace?" The mind reeled from my obvious ignorance about technology, storage, etc.

But reel it continued to do... I figured I'd be playing arcade ports of various LaserDisc games via cartridge, and so... I asked for a Master System.

Yeah, that never happened. Not even close. No version of Cobra Command ever came to that console, which remained annoying to me for years. LOL Finally did on Sega CD, but that video quality was... just no. I don't regret the SMS overall since it's home to some of my favorite games, but I would have had a lot fewer dry spells had I gone with a NES.

Camstun187 · Jul 10, 2018

I like to believe we have all bought a random-ass trash game when we were younger and given that ever rare go-ahead by our parents to pick a game at CALDOR or Circuit City.

It helps us to never do it again. We would usually become wiser and start researching games before buying them.

Tebunker · Jul 10, 2018

I kind of feel bad for you guys. If I had to think of bad gaming buys as a kid? Like maybe 1943, but I loved it as a kid. Wizards and Warriors 2, the one with Fabio on the cover. I have no idea why we liked these games.

Usually we rented before buying anything so land mines were easily avoided

Angie · Jul 10, 2018

And yet the nostalgia value on the game I'm sure it's high.

Wolfgunblood · Jul 10, 2018

That was the new game experience for just about every single new game purchase for most kids in the NES and SNES era. Mostly in the NES era, the stores almost never had the good games in stock so you had to get one of the crappier games. If you were lucky they'd have stuff like Mega Man, Golgo 13 or Life Force.

The SNES game disappointment for me that I'll never forget for some reason is Xardion. Xardion had a cool anime mech on the cover, how could it not be good?

Once again even in a case where the US got a good game cover the Japanese boxart was way better, because of course:

It wasn't Dream TV levels of crappy but it was not good. It was almost always disappointing when my parents got me a new game at the store. Kids have it so good these days, just about every game is good. They're inundated with information now with everything that even if there were shitty games on the shelf, they still already know what's worth getting or not.

Karlinel · Jul 10, 2018

When I was a kid with a Mega Drive, I chose, in order: greendog the beached surfer dude, taz-mania, eternal champions, asterix and x-men 1.
I mean, those were 2 full years of birthday presents and honor student rewards, spent in mediocre to lame games, with cool covers.

Scott Lufkin · Jul 10, 2018

I had a super, super similar experience (very few opportunities for a new game, almost none outside of rentals) but one day my Mom let me buy a game when we had a NES! This was huge! I picked (also) one with a cool cover, and ended up with this nonsense.

Oh MBJ, how I fucking hated thee.

Lolosgolos · Jul 10, 2018

My Dad got us Metal Combat falcons revenge for Snes without the gun. Agony of a kid gamer

Blade Wolf · Jul 10, 2018

I am glad I always picked up the best games as a kid, there's not a single bad video game in my childhood.

DOOM3, F.E.A.R., Half-Life 2, Onimusha, Resident Evil 4...all fantastic game in their own right.

Doom 3 is more of a controvertial one but imo it's a great horror shooter.

srtrestre · Jul 10, 2018

My worst gaming decision was renting Superman 64 for a day.

Either that or getting a Vita.

mjc · Jul 10, 2018

That game was mine. Got to pick out any game I wanted and I picked DENNIS THE FUCKING MENACE.

FernandoRocker · Jul 10, 2018

Blade Wolf said:
I am glad I always picked up the best games as a kid, there's not a single bad video game in my childhood.

DOOM3, F.E.A.R., Half-Life 2, Onimusha, Resident Evil 4...all fantastic game in their own right.

Doom 3 is more of a controvertial one but imo it's a great horror shooter.

Well, you were a kid in a generation were most games were good! But yeah, you picked up great games.

Deleted member 42686 · Jul 10, 2018

pokemon-xd-gale-of-darkness-europe-en-fr-de-es-it-gamecube_1485595969.jpg

This game is a piece of junk. I mean...I had my share of bad games, but they manage(somehow) to be enjoyable for some time.

This game manage to be the only game I ever regret buying. Is really that bad. At the time, I tried to sell or change for an another game, but my friend had no interest. They said they would never buy this game(if he had told me that earlier I would save later for another game, jokes on me).

Stiler · Jul 10, 2018

This was so tough to do back in the late 80's/early 90's. We didn't have the internet or anything to help us figure out what games were good or not.

So you basically had to look at the box (which was made to sell the game to you) and you'd get some real stinkers thinking they looked awesome from the box cover art and things on the back. One I remember

"Oh it looks like Indiana Jones! I've got to play that!"

I mean, it was ok in some aspects, I got enjoyment from it and there's certainly worse games, but it was not at all what I expected lol.

Luckily in those days many game stores did returns/exchanges, if you were lucky at least.

MaitreWakou · Jul 10, 2018

Wolfgunblood said:
That was the new game experience for just about every single new game purchase for most kids in the NES and SNES era. Mostly in the NES era, the stores almost never had the good games in stock so you had to get one of the crappier games. If you were lucky they'd have stuff like Mega Man, Golgo 13 or Life Force.

The SNES game disappointment for me that I'll never forget for some reason is Xardion. Xardion had a cool anime mech on the cover, how could it not be good?

Once again even in a case where the US got a good game cover the Japanese boxart was way better, because of course:

It wasn't Dream TV levels of crappy but it was not good. It was almost always disappointing when my parents got me a new game at the store. Kids have it so good these days, just about every game is good. They're inundated with information now with everything that even if there were shitty games on the shelf, they still already know what's worth getting or not.

HO-LY shit ! That japanese cover ! I would buy that shit asap even today without knowing a damn thing about that game because this cover is so cool holy shit ! Shame it is not really good.

daniel77733 · Jul 10, 2018

Got you beat -

Instead of buying Earthbound with the guide and big box for SNES, I decided to buy two $30 games instead. Demon's Crest which I fucking hated and WCW SuperBrawl Wrestling (huge wrestling fan back then) which fucking sucked. This was all me. Still the worst gaming decision that I have ever made and trust me, I have some shitty ones.

Buckley · Jul 10, 2018

I saved up $100 bucks as a kid and bought Wolverine for NES.

'3y Kingdom · Jul 10, 2018

Scott Lufkin said:
I had a super, super similar experience (very few opportunities for a new game, almost none outside of rentals) but one day my Mom let me buy a game when we had a NES! This was huge! I picked (also) one with a cool cover, and ended up with this nonsense.

Oh MBJ, how I fucking hated thee.

I actually love this game. Very difficult, though.

Reinhard · Jul 10, 2018

Aaron D. said:
At least you didn't Day One Pac-Man 2600.

Oh the nightmares. The only console I ever owned until college was an Atari 2600 (was mostly PC growing up) and as a very young kid in elementary school I rarely got any games for the 2600. I got Pacman shortly after its release date as a reward for a good report card and that was the only new game I had to play that entire summer. It crushed my soul, lol. Hmm, I had pneumonia that summer and nearly got hospitalized, maybe the horrible Pac-man port had a role in my poor health.

cognizant · Jul 10, 2018

Raven117 said:
Smile. It is what made gaming in the 90s a leap of faith. We would pour over cover art, and marketing materials on the box to try and seperate what was pure fluff or actual gameplay. It took hours. Days even. We had no internet, we only had magazines that may or may not have been available.

I can't say I ever woefully missed the mark. I picked some pretty good games.

Your post reminded me of Spectrum game covers, which looked fantastic and had no hint of the actual gameplay, lol.

388677-castlevania-spectral-interlude-zx-spectrum-front-cover.jpg

aa9339979c060dd239b68ec25f00b014--game-computer-games-box.jpg

Raven117 · Jul 10, 2018

cognizant said:
Your post reminded me of Spectrum game covers, which looked fantastic and had no hint of the actual gameplay, lol.

And of course, the classic:

D4rth Man7iz · Jul 11, 2018

srtrestre said:
My worst gaming decision was renting Superman 64 for a day.

Either that or getting a Vita.

What nightmares are made of!

IrishNinja · Jul 11, 2018

i feel you, OP - as a master system kid, i opted for aztec adventure over space harrier, and never forgave myself

then there was the time diehard gamefan got me hyped for tail of the fucking sun...ugh

Stiler said:
Ernest Evans

hoo doggie was that a stinker! my condolences. my neighbor back then bought Sword of Sodan, so i feel like i'm right there with you

Xavillin · Jul 11, 2018

I asked my aunt to get me Peter Jackson's Kong on DS for my Christmas present.

My dad let me choose any game to get on DS. Got Marvel's Nemesis Rise of the Imperfects.

Kelanflyter · Jul 11, 2018

Vorador said:
I had a choice between Wipeout PC and a game called Defcon 5. One i knew was awesome but had a recommendation for 3D accelerated graphic card which i didn't had, and the other had modest requisites.

I still remember it to this day.

This terrible piece of shit.

PC version of Wipeout was not very great either

I ad a good time with it, but it was for the music more than for the game itself.

kitsuneyo · Jul 11, 2018

FernandoRocker said:
Well, at least I did finish the game a couple of times.

The truth comes out. OP secretly loves this game for all it taught him/her about life and gaming.

AllMight1 · Jul 11, 2018

D4rth Man7iz said:
What nightmares are made of!

I owned and made it to the last level of Superman 64 through months of grinding (I was a kid back then and there was no way of returning video games, so instead of complaining you'd just play with what whatever God's hand dealt)
. Later with the internet i realized i was close of beating that flaming pile of trash.

KaiPow · Jul 11, 2018

Fuck. This. Game.

Bakercat · Jul 11, 2018

Doesn't sound too bad if you were limited to cheaper games. Now, if you had free reign on any game and passed on something like Earthbound or Dracula X new, then I'd pity you OP.

However, do you remember what other games that were available at the time that you passed on?

FernandoRocker · Jul 11, 2018

Bakercat said:
Doesn't sound too bad if you were limited to cheaper games. Now, if you had free reign on any game and passed on something like Earthbound or Dracula X new, then I'd pity you OP.

However, do you remember what other games that were available at the time that you passed on?

I vividly remember the Secret or Mana and Illusion of Gaia covers (and I also remember a very cool looking transparent turbo controller), but I'm pretty sure those games were very expensive and that's why I didn't ask for those.

Laughing Banana · Jul 11, 2018

FernandoRocker said:
Well, one of the worst gaming-related decisions.

At least you didn't spend your young'in savings for Quest 64, OP!

Hexa · Jul 11, 2018

SaberX said:
This game is a piece of junk. I mean...I had my share of bad games, but they manage(somehow) to be enjoyable for some time.

This game manage to be the only game I ever regret buying. Is really that bad. At the time, I tried to sell or change for an another game, but my friend had no interest. They said they would never buy this game(if he had told me that earlier I would save later for another game, jokes on me).

Whaaaat? That to this day is still my favorite Pokémon game.

thetrin · Jul 11, 2018

Vorador said:
I had a choice between Wipeout PC and a game called Defcon 5. One i knew was awesome but had a recommendation for 3D accelerated graphic card which i didn't had, and the other had modest requisites.

I still remember it to this day.

This terrible piece of shit.

The best part of this is that the developers couldn't be arsed to just look up how defense condition numbering works. DEFCON 5 just means it's peace time, and the military is in a state of normal readiness. LOL

Deleted member 4292 · Jul 11, 2018

SaberX said:
This game is a piece of junk. I mean...I had my share of bad games, but they manage(somehow) to be enjoyable for some time.

This game manage to be the only game I ever regret buying. Is really that bad. At the time, I tried to sell or change for an another game, but my friend had no interest. They said they would never buy this game(if he had told me that earlier I would save later for another game, jokes on me).

How can you say this when Miror. B is a reality?

Capra · Jul 11, 2018

daniel77733 said:
Got you beat -

Instead of buying Earthbound with the guide and big box for SNES, I decided to buy two $30 games instead. Demon's Crest which I fucking hated and WCW SuperBrawl Wrestling (huge wrestling fan back then) which fucking sucked. This was all me. Still the worst gaming decision that I have ever made and trust me, I have some shitty ones.

Alright, missing out on EarthBound is a damn shame but there's no way Demon's Crest belongs among anyone's worst gaming decisions.

petran79 · Jul 11, 2018

This game here

You recognize the logo bottom right? From the devs of Little Big Adventure. Didnt even waste 1 hour on this game. The irony is that LBA2 had a stage where you fought that guy.

Let me tell you a personal story about a video game... one of the worst decisions I have ever made.

One Winged Slayer

Took the red AND the blue pills

Attempted to circumvent ban with alt account

Best Avatar Thread Ever!

Prophet of Truth

One Winged Slayer

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One Winged Slayer

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Saw the truth behind the copied door

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