[The Sinclair Spectrum]

Philip Kendall - Surprisingly bad games

As we're well aware, some companies tended to realise good games, whereas other companies tended to release bad games. On occasion though, what was generally a good company would release a surprisingly bad game. Here's a list of the worst games released by good companies:

1. Race Track (Sinclair Research Ltd) -5.42 (1.67 vs 7.09)
2. Lunar Landing (Durell Software Ltd) -5.39 (2.14 vs 7.53)
3. Highlander (Ocean Software Ltd) -5.09 (2.11 vs 7.20)
4. Embassy Assault (Sinclair Research Ltd) -5.09 (2.00 vs 7.09)
5. rEdIvIvUs (Cronosoft) -4.88 (2.44 vs 7.32)
6. World Cup Carnival (US Gold Ltd) -4.76 (2.00 vs 6.76)
7. Handy Andy (CRL Group PLC) -4.70 (2.18 vs 6.88)
8. Voyage into the Unknown (Mastertronic Ltd) -4.66 (1.70 vs 6.36)
9. Pneumatic Hammers (Firebird Software Ltd) -4.62 (1.88 vs 6.50)
10. Flak (US Gold Ltd) -4.54 (2.22 vs 6.76)
11. Track and Field (Ocean Software Ltd) -4.52 (2.68 vs 7.20)
12. Zaraks (CRL Group PLC) -4.50 (2.38 vs 6.88)
13. Uchi Mata (Martech Games Ltd) -4.16 (2.38 vs 6.54)
14. Street Hawk - Subscribers Edition (Ocean Software Ltd) -4.09 (3.11 vs 7.20)
15. Piggy (Bug-Byte Software Ltd) -4.09 (2.21 vs 6.30)
16. One on One (Ariolasoft UK Ltd) -4.09 (2.43 vs 6.52)
17. Alien Kill (Mastertronic Ltd) -4.03 (2.33 vs 6.36)
18. Superman: The Game (Firebird Software Ltd) -4.02 (2.48 vs 6.50)
19. Weasel Willy (Firebird Software Ltd) -4.00 (2.50 vs 6.50)
20. Peter Beardsley's International Football (Grandslam Entertainments Ltd) -3.99 (2.33 vs 6.32)

Conversely, what was generally a bad company would sometimes release a surprisingly good game:

1. Ian Botham's Test Match + Pyjamarama (Tynesoft) 4.87 (8.83 vs 3.96)
2. Wizards Spell (Tynesoft) 4.33 (8.29 vs 3.96)
3. Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show (Tynesoft) 4.04 (8.00 vs 3.96)
4. Deus Ex Machina (Automata UK Ltd) 3.77 (8.50 vs 4.73)
5. Circles [1] (Your Sinclair) 3.77 (9.86 vs 6.09)
6. Lyra II Megademo, The (Sinclair User) 3.66 (9.11 vs 5.45)
7. New Wheels John? (Automata UK Ltd) 3.42 (8.15 vs 4.73)
8. Deactivators (Reaktor) 3.31 (8.27 vs 4.96)
9. Mortadelo y Filemon II (Dro Soft) 3.24 (8.00 vs 4.76)
10. Accelerator (Century City Software Ltd) 3.23 (6.64 vs 3.41)
11. Arc of Yesod, The (Thor Computer Software) 3.12 (8.14 vs 5.02)
12. Urban Upstart (Richard Shepherd Software Ltd) 3.11 (8.10 vs 4.99)
13. Missile Defence (Anirog Software) 3.09 (7.25 vs 4.16)
14. Rockfall (Top Ten Software) 3.09 (8.50 vs 5.41)
15. Metropolis (The Power House) 3.03 (6.50 vs 3.47)
16. Ring of Dreams, The (Central Solutions) 2.98 (7.80 vs 4.82)
17. Rebelstar 2 (Silverbird Software Ltd) 2.95 (8.74 vs 5.79)
18. Nether Earth (Argus Press Software Ltd) 2.92 (8.67 vs 5.75)
19. Test Tape (Sinclair Research Ltd) 2.91 (10.00 vs 7.09)
20. It's Only Rock 'n' Roll (K-Tel Productions) 2.86 (8.17 vs 5.31)

[With thanks to Mickmog on the WoS forums for his thread which inspired this analysis]