Could this be the worst game on the US Turbo?

[DragonmasterDan]

I just played Night Creatures for the first time, oh my god is it terrible. I spent about five minutes ducking with attack on juggling three enemies in the air. Then a bird eventually killed me. I thought, well maybe I'm missing something. I continued playing. This is horrible, how did this even get released. This is worse than either of the Disney games.

[SignOfZeta]

I actually hate Darkwing Duck more. Night Creatures is such an...oddity. I can't help but wonder how it got made. I know how Darkwing Duck got made (someone wrote a check to Disney) but Night Creatures? I'm facinated by the idea that someone thought this was an awesome concept for a game. Rather than copying the designs from a drug store coloring book, the creators of Night Creatures actually made all that stuff up, mostly from scratch.

Dennis: You know who would make a great bad guy for a video game? Hecate!

Nigel: Oh, I do agree! Let's learn to program!

How was this not just a DOS game? More to the point, why wasn't it also a DOS game? An American exclusive, TG16 exclusive game that wasn't based on any prior art? This is the only game like that, isn't it?

[nat]

I think Talespin is far worse.... I rather like the Night Creatures concept, actually.

[DesmondThe3rd]

Ohya, this one. I reviewed this one before and it wasn't pretty.

[KingDrool]

I'm surprised Talespin gets a lot of hate. Granted, I haven't played it in years and didn't love it back when it was released. But I do remember persevering to the end.

Night Creatures, on the other hand, I remember buying and absolutely despising. I remember the promo video that TTi sent out, making it look really cool. Like Altered Beast mixed with a horror movie. I think my brother and I played it for about a day or two before giving up on it completely.

Coincidentally, it's a game I've been thinking about lately, and considering re-buying just to experience its awful-ness again.

[Arkhan]

Night Creatures is what happens when round eye try making horror game.

[DesmondThe3rd]

I'm surprised Talespin gets a lot of hate. Granted, I haven't played it in years and didn't love it back when it was released. But I do remember persevering to the end.

Night Creatures, on the other hand, I remember buying and absolutely despising. I remember the promo video that TTi sent out, making it look really cool. Like Altered Beast mixed with a horror movie. I think my brother and I played it for about a day or two before giving up on it completely.

Coincidentally, it's a game I've been thinking about lately, and considering re-buying just to experience its awful-ness again.

I didn't really hate Talespin that much either. Granted it's not a perfect title thanks to a few really annoying areas like the underwater stage and hard as hell endboss but it still had it's moments to me. Night Creatures on the other hand was a complete chore to play thanks to awkward controls, iffy hit detection, and lame animal powers.

[_joshuaTurbo]

I still don't get all the Night Creature Hate.  I actually like the art style, and while there are obvious flaws in the game, I still think its a fine addition to those that enjoy Shape Shifter or Shadow of the Beast.

I can think of several games that are worse.

[KingDrool]

I still don't get all the Night Creature Hate.  I actually like the art style, and while there are obvious flaws in the game, I still think its a fine addition to those that enjoy Shape Shifter or Shadow of the Beast.

I can think of several games that are worse.

I do like the art style of the game. It's a really nice looking TurboChip title. But it's always been "the worst Turbo game" since I bought it as a kid, though I'm sure there are worse ones.

[DragonmasterDan]

Night Creatures, on the other hand, I remember buying and absolutely despising. I remember the promo video that TTi sent out, making it look really cool. Like Altered Beast mixed with a horror movie. I think my brother and I played it for about a day or two before giving up on it completely.

Coincidentally, it's a game I've been thinking about lately, and considering re-buying just to experience its awful-ness again.

I remember it from that promo video as well "You say you've been bitten by Hecate. You've got a problem!". I watched that promo video excessively when I was younger, and only bought (at the time) a handful of games featured in it.

[Arkhan]

Its not bad. (Night Creatures).

Its just different.  It could've been a bit better, but then again so could alot of games.  All in all its decent.   It just has the typical American/Western game flaws that make it sort of hokey.

[Black Tiger]

Night Creatures actually does some cool tricks. Apparently the graveyard uses a huge amount of dynamic tiles. There's other parallax too, which many other PCE games don't have. It obviously wasn't finished and simply shipped as-is. I really don't think that it is the polished product of incompetent programmers. I don't know how anyone can criticize the idea or basic design, since its basically Symphony of the Night before SotN existed.

Night Creatures had great potential and that is why it's such a huge disappointment. I also don't know how anyone can suggest it as the worst TG-16 game,  unless you haven't played every Turbo game. It's broken, but still a real fleshed out game in a more popular genre. Falcon is more or less unplayable and Gunboat is that much better. There's probably a dozen games I'd less like to play than Night Creatures.

It's flaws aren't even that bad when compared to similar "Metroidvania" style adventure games for NES, which are heralded as classics to this day. At least it lets you save your game and diesn't require extremely long passwords with several font characters that are indistinguishable from others.

[DragonmasterDan]

It's flaws aren't even that bad when compared to similar "Metroidvania" style adventure games for NES, which are heralded as classics to this day. At least it lets you save your game and diesn't require extremely long passwords with several font characters that are indistinguishable from others.

It's not controllable. Faxanadu is controllable, as another Turbo example, Exile is Controllable.  This.. this is just terrible. The Adams Family is a giant step forward in playability.

Just on a side note, I'm not saying the programmers were incompetent, or the basic idea is flawed. It's just executed so horribly that it's far worse than even I could have imagined.

[Arkhan]

It seems like everything went into the visuals which are really nice (in some spots, other spots its just average), and the controls suffered horribly.


It seems to be a recurring theme.  non-Japan-based platformer games have shit controls or some other stupid gameplay flaw that ruins everything.

Up to jump, slippery/jerky, Action 52.

[KingDrool]

Agreed, Black Tiger. Like I said, there are probably worse games out there, but it always had that spot in my mind as "the worst" because of my experience with it as a kid. If I could find a cheap copy (under $50 complete), I'd probably pick it up again just to reacquaint myself with it.