GBA Hall of shame

Between shovelware, bad ports, and terrible released, the Gameboy Advance had some terrible games. This is not to say all the console was bad or that all the games suck I just am very opinionated about a few of them. If one of your favorites are on this list, sorry but not sorry. Welcome to gremlin's GBA Hall of shame.

Please note that opinions can change, I might find more games that I don't think has any value to players, and that these are just my opinions. My own personal opinions are not necessarily correct so please take them with a grain of salt.

Sonic the Hedgehog: Genesis

I have talked about this port in the past on my sonic negativity bias page which you should check out if you are interested in finding out why I used to think all sonic games sucked. I don't anymore, however, with this port was my first experience with him dating all the way back to when I was a child could you really blame me for not appreciating the franchise? The original genesis release is alright but this is absolute garbage.

Low frame rates, bugs, less visibility due to a lower resolution and nothing done to accommodate for it, and progessively worse and worse remakes of the in game music makes this port hard to endure.

SSX Tricky

You all remember SSX Tricky, the snowboarding game that is constantly remixing Run-DMC's It's Tricky. Lots of fun to be had right? Not in the GBA version. At least it still has It's Tricky. They could have focused on making it into something actually some what fun to play like SSX 3 on the GBA but no, if you rotate on the Y axis at all good fucking luck landing.

Jet Grind Radio/Jet Set Radio

Let me start this off by saying that I love Jet Set Radio. It's one of my favorite games. I have it on PC, Xbox 360, and Dreamcast. Unfortunately I also have it on Gameboy Advance. I don't want to be too harsh because the original game isn't without it's flaws but I've been able to beat it countless times at this point. On the GBA not so much.

To start off with, half the enjoyment to be had out of JSR is the visuals and music. It's a game that oozes cool. They attempt to recreate the visuals for the platform, they do a better job with the music, however they both fall flat. Again I feel bad for judging it so harshly given the fact that this is running on the GBA but it really does look like and sound like a bootleg.

Gameplay wise it also falls flat. It's got rail grinding, graffiti spraying, difficult controls. The formula is all there. By all means this is an impressive attempt at recreating the game on GBA. However, the difficulty with the controls is thanks to the tank controls. While tank controls is fun with Resident Evil 4, it feels like I'm fighting my character to do anything in JSR GBA. Good luck trying to jump up on anything. Another issue with these controls is how sensitive they are. You turn so fast you likely won't be facing where you want to. If how fast your character turned around was slowed down a bit it would help so much.

The fixed camera perspective is a thing. It's neat in the sense that it almost looks like a news chopper watching everything go down from above. It fails the player any time your character goes behind anything that blocks the view. Good luck trying to attach yourself to a rail thats behind. I really want to like this version of JSR but I don't and no amount of forcing it can fix that. Don't expect any guides for it on tokyo-to.neocities.

Razor Freestyle Scooter

Graphics are nice, thats the only positive thing I have to say about this game. It's buggy, has awful music, and is based on another not so great game that was trying to ride on Tony Hawk's Pro Skater's success. I'd say at least this isn't the Gameboy Color version but that one actually looks like there is some fun to be had since it's fundamentally different.

Cruis'n Velocity

There are so many better racing games on the GBA that I have a really hard time trying to justify this game's existence. Even SNES Mario Kart is more fun then this. Graphics are abysmal + turning feels awful and you spin out super way too easy. It's not even fun in a "it's so bad that it's entertaining" way.

007: NightFire

Gameplay is awful, graphics is awful, if you die or fail a mission at any point in the game you get sent back to the beginning of mission one. Zero redeeming qualities.