GameTZ

23-Feb-24 10:56am
#1

benstylus


We're getting close to March which means 1 month away from April Fool's Day.

Who all is interested in doing a Secret Satan gift exchange this year?

If you haven't heard of it before, it's like Secret Santa except the aim is to get someone a game they will absolutely hate. Then we all play it on April 1st and share our misery (or surprise joy).

Going to put a $10 price charting value minimum like last year. In fact, last year's rules worked pretty well so I'll keep them the same:

Your game must have a minimum value of $10 based on Price charting for a game in similar condition. (If it's on the cusp, take a screenshot for proof). That makes things interesting so that we don't just buy the cheapest craptiest game in the gamestop bargain bin. Note you don't necessarily have to pay $10, that just needs to be its pricecharting value. If you have a poop game already that fits the bill, by all means feel free to use it You can send multiple games if you want, but at least one of them must individually meet that $10 threshold. (So a $10 game plus a $2 bonus game is fine, but sending five $2 games by themselves is not). Creativity in packaging or sending bonus items may be fun and hilarious, but is by no means required. If you do receive something creative, please take pics and share, it will be more fun for all of us.

Post a message saying you're in, or send me a PM and I'll get you on the list! If we get at least 8 participants (we had 10 last year) it's a go!

We'll get everyone assigned in the first week or so of March, and then everyone will have 2-3 weeks to find and send something to their target.

As a reminder, one of the survey questions will be whether you are uncomfortable being paired with any of the other participants. That way if there is a certain user (or multiple users) on the site, you can privately let me know. I will keep that request confidential and make sure that they won't be your Satan.

Past years:
2023 https://m.gametz.com...
2022 https://m.gametz.com...

This year's group:

benstylus - Homie Rollerz
Bleed_DukeBlue - Alex Kidd in Miracle World DX
brian9824 - Flatout 3: Chaos & Destruction
citizen_zane - Spyro: Enter the Dragonfly
Frank - Charlie's Angels
Gypsy - Magic: The Gathering - BattleMage no metacritic score
Heavyd814life - Agony
Kommie - Hunt Down The Freeman no metacritic listing
Oduomega - Yoda Stories (Game Boy Color) This version doesn't even have a metacritic listing
ryanflucas - King's Knight no metacritic listing
sailorneorune - Spice World , Smurf Racer , Sesame Street Sports , Deal or No Deal Special Edition , and The Dukes of Hazzard: The Return of the General Lee
SupremeSarna - Rollerblade Racer and Mickey’s Safari in Letterland no metacritic listings

1-Apr-24 7:57pm
#161

sailorneorune


So I also decided to participate in this farce... and my Satan wrecked me.

They sent me books: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (and I am the Girl with the Nah Mate), and Inheritance (way to go Satan, sending me the last book in a series that I might actually read).

Then they sent me a rather nice wooden box with games in it:

1st: Spice World an indecipherable Wannabe of DDR that definitely did not Spice Up My Life. IT STINKS
2nd: Smurf Racer not terrible, but the sound clips and slippery controls got on my nerves.
3rd: Sesame Street Sports This was actually the best of the lot. Again, the sound clips were annoying but points for creativity for having a variety of events and Ernie's Bathtub Boat.
4th: Deal or No Deal 2011 Special Edition Craptacular The nicest thing I can say about this is that I now have a replacement DS case.
5th: The Dukes of Hazzard: The Return of the General Lee Rated E for Ex-Boyfriend. This is exactly the kind of gun-oil-and-armpit-scented macho bullcrap I thought I got away from many years ago. I have to wash my brain out now, you jerk. Thanks for the (bad) memories.

Also
https://www.youtube....

Crapfully yours,
sailorneorune feat. Valtteri Bottas

1-Apr-24 9:05pm
#162

Frank


I got this package weeks back from a certain @citizen_zane It had very interesting artwork on the side, so I knew it had to be my gift from Satan!

image

Opening the box, I was greeted to a Brain Age 2 tote bag. Jokes on Satan, I love crap like this!

image

Inside of the tote bag revealed what looked to be some weird as hell Famicom game.

image

Jokes on me, turns out to be a bunch of seeds. Those were immediately eaten disposed of. Cudos for including the manual. I'm a packrat and will likely save the box to torture another unsuspecting soul.

image

Underneath the seeds?? Oh no, a Sega CD game. But I don't own a Sega CD!

image

@citizen_zane was kind enough to include a selfie with my package!

image

The cling wrap was a pain :P

image

Fool me once, shame on you! I knew as soon as I saw it, that it was another ruse.

image

Now this... this shocked me. This was LITERALLY the game I was considering buying for him but ultimately went a different route. I figured Spyro being bad is a bigger blow, since it's a good franchise. This... looks awful. You know what to expect right away.

image

This is hilarious that I ended up with it. I'll update when I am able to play.

Since Satan and I's top picks were same... does that make us equals?

1-Apr-24 9:47pm
#163

benstylus


Frank wrote:
Since Satan and I's top picks were same... does that make us equals?
The only way to find out is a tetris + urban champion match

1-Apr-24 9:59pm
#164

benstylus


sailorneorune wrote:
4th: Deal or No Deal 2011 Special Edition Craptacular The nicest thing I can say about this is that I now have a replacement DS case.
After sailorneorune played this one I tried it with a goal to get either the $1 million case or the $0.01 case. With 26 cases, then i should have a 1 in 13 chance of getting one of those two if the RNG is fair

So far, no luck. I'm still well within the margin of error, but i also suspect it's probably not the truest RNG out there. Given the somewhat shoddy touch controls in the game, I don't think QA was the highest priority here, and they probably also slapped in the quickest rng generator they could find or make.

1-Apr-24 10:26pm
#165

citizen_zane


@Frank - I was heavily considering getting you what you got me, but had to get Charlie's Angels because of how ridiculous it truly is. Even though the game that you blessed me with will take me three times longer to beat, your punishment is almost ten times worse than mine, so I believe I win this round!

1-Apr-24 10:30pm
#166

citizen_zane


BTW, I did play Charlie's Angels for a little while and have just started playing the superb Spyro game. So far, I'm not impressed, but it beats the hell out of Charlie's Angels!

I won't really be able to put some time into playing this until Wednesday, so I give my thoughts on it after I have done so.

1-Apr-24 10:37pm
#167

Frank


citizen_zane wrote:
BTW, I did play Charlie's Angels for a little while and have just started playing the superb Spyro game. So far, I'm not impressed, but it beats the hell out of Charlie's Angels! I won't really be able to put some time into playing this until Wednesday, so I give my thoughts on it after I have done so.

I disagree. At the end of the day, Charlie's Angels won't ruin anything for me. Your game has real potential to ruin the entire franchise for you.

2-Apr-24 5:23am
#168

Oduomega


sailorneorune wrote:
So I also decided to participate in this farce... and my Satan wrecked me. They sent me books: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (and I am the Girl with the Nah Mate), and Inheritance (way to go Satan, sending me the last book in a series that I might actually read). Then they sent me a rather nice wooden box with games in it: 1st: Spice World an indecipherable Wannabe of DDR that definitely did not Spice Up My Life. IT STINKS 2nd: Smurf Racer not terrible, but the sound clips and slippery controls got on my nerves. 3rd: Sesame Street Sports This was actually the best of the lot. Again, the sound clips were annoying but points for creativity for having a variety of events and Ernie's Bathtub Boat. 4th: Deal or No Deal 2011 Special Edition Craptacular The nicest thing I can say about this is that I now have a replacement DS case. 5th: The Dukes of Hazzard: The Return of the General Lee Rated E for Ex-Boyfriend. This is exactly the kind of gun-oil-and-armpit-scented macho bullcrap I thought I got away from many years ago. I have to wash my brain out now, you jerk. Thanks for the (bad) memories. ... Crapfully yours, sailorneorune feat. Valtteri BottasBows
The Satan Sommelier thanks you for your patronage. Come again next year!

2-Apr-24 5:32am
#169

benstylus


PTSD FTW

2-Apr-24 5:34am
#170

benstylus


@Gypsy @ryanflucas @Heavyd814life

If your games weren't so bad they sent you to your Graves, please share your feelings on them!

2-Apr-24 6:48am
#171

sailorneorune


benstylus wrote:
PTSD FTW
Objection.

2-Apr-24 8:22am
#172

Gypsy


Sorry about that @benstylus I've been way too busy.

That said I did fire up the game. Battlemage on PS1. I will say it is truly awful. I struggled at first to even figure out how to start the damn game because it wasn't very intuitive. The initial menus make sense it's after I went in to try and start a campaign that I had issues. Almost had to look it up.

In general this game would be more playable on PC. It wouldn't be good there either but holy hell the console controls are bad. The game makes no damn sense though...it's...an rts???

An actual good version of some of the concept here ended up being made when Shandalar happened. That game is actually fun. This game is...horrible. I ended up playing some Shandalar after lol.

2-Apr-24 11:56am
#173

Oduomega


@sailorneorune
One of the little snippets on the TV channel (I think?) was the line “What does Nelson Mandela think of the Spice Girls?”

I just burst out laughing, lol. Didn’t find out what was said there though…I just moved on.

@benstylus
Does that make me the most evil Satan this year? The fact that someone got PTSD?

2-Apr-24 1:52pm
#174

Bleed_DukeBlue


Sorry, Gypsy. I was your Satan :).

Gypsy wrote:
Sorry about that @benstylus I've been way too busy. That said I did fire up the game. Battlemage on PS1. I will say it is truly awful. I struggled at first to even figure out how to start the damn game because it wasn't very intuitive. The initial menus make sense it's after I went in to try and start a campaign that I had issues. Almost had to look it up. In general this game would be more playable on PC. It wouldn't be good there either but holy hell the console controls are bad. The game makes no damn sense though...it's...an rts??? An actual good version of some of the concept here ended up being made when Shandalar happened. That game is actually fun. This game is...horrible. I ended up playing some Shandalar after lol.

2-Apr-24 2:09pm
#175

Heavyd814life


I got a game called Agony for the PS4. I gave up after about an hour. Awful, awful game. It may be the ugliest game I've ever played and I'm not even being hyperbolic. It's also needlessly graphic. Like some of the imagery is disturbingly explicit. I guess that must have been the selling point. The survival horror genre is one of my favs and I've put up with plenty of mediocre and even bad games, but this is something truly special. Only played it for about an hour and it crashed on me 3 times. The gameplay is buggy and glitchy and there are stealth sections that either don't work or I was too stupid to figure them out. The game makes you hold your breath so enemies don't detect you. You hold your breath and they still detect you. Add to that the terrible level design, unintuitive controls, bad voice acting, and environments that all look the same because it was just a copy/paste job. Honestly just a bad time.

The only thing it has going for it I guess is that it's conceptually a pretty interesting take on Hell. But the execution is so poor and I don't know if I've done justice to just how poor it is. It's all shock and zero substance. I went and looked through some reviews on Steam and Metacritic. Anyone who gave this a positive review was paid off or something. It's honestly that bad.

The game has a PS4 Metacritic of 37 and that's too high. Nice work, Satan. I'm actually worked up about this lol. I was going to make some playful puns but this game doesn't deserve it. It belongs in the trash which is exactly where it is going.

2-Apr-24 2:33pm
#176

Gypsy


Bleed_DukeBlue wrote:
Sorry, Gypsy. I was your Satan :).
Well done. This is the worst thing related to MTG that I've ever experienced lol.

2-Apr-24 2:37pm
#177

Gypsy


Heavyd814life wrote:
I got a game called Agony for the PS4. I gave up after about an hour. Awful, awful game. It may be the ugliest game I've ever played and I'm not even being hyperbolic. It's also needlessly graphic. Like some of the imagery is disturbingly explicit. I guess that must have been the selling point. The survival horror genre is one of my favs and I've put up with plenty of mediocre and even bad games, but this is something truly special. Only played it for about an hour and it crashed on me 3 times. The gameplay is buggy and glitchy and there are stealth sections that either don't work or I was too stupid to figure them out. The game makes you hold your breath so enemies don't detect you. You hold your breath and they still detect you. Add to that the terrible level design, unintuitive controls, bad voice acting, and environments that all look the same because it was just a copy/paste job. Honestly just a bad time. The only thing it has going for it I guess is that it's conceptually a pretty interesting take on Hell. But the execution is so poor and I don't know if I've done justice to just how poor it is. It's all shock and zero substance. I went and looked through some reviews on Steam and Metacritic. Anyone who gave this a positive review was paid off or something. It's honestly that bad. The game has a PS4 Metacritic of 37 and that's too high. Nice work, Satan. I'm actually worked up about this lol. I was going to make some playful puns but this game doesn't deserve it. It belongs in the trash which is exactly where it is going.
I knew I had to pick something truly horrific for you. Muahahaha.

2-Apr-24 2:46pm
#178

sa330206


benstylus wrote:
Looking at that return address... Pretty sure the entire state of Ohio is "Satan's Butthole" not just one city
Hey, Ohio isn't so bad after some changes passed in the fall. Almost became one of the worst states in the country though had things gone the other way.

2-Apr-24 2:59pm
#179

benstylus


Heavyd814life wrote:
The only thing it has going for it I guess is that it's conceptually a pretty interesting take on Hell. But the execution is so poor and I don't know if I've done justice to just how poor it is.
Or maybe it is a perfect representation because of the poor execution.

2-Apr-24 5:10pm
#180

SupremeSarna


I’m still waiting for my victim to post. I put a fair bit of work into mine, and the game choice will make @benstylus shudder.

2-Apr-24 6:47pm
#181

Oduomega


SupremeSarna wrote:
@Oduomega I believe you mean John Williams. I'm curious what your experience with the game will be.It's not bad...liken it to the GB LoZ games and you'll have an idea of what it's going for. Not my speed, but not terrible.