As a rule of thumb, licensed games are terrible. It sounds like a huge generalization, and it is, but gamers have been burned many times over the past 40 years or so. This is a problem that has been going for as long as video games have been a thing. It is hard 🥃for a pre-existing intellectual property, be it a movie, a TV show, a book, or the odd advertisement, to make the transition to an interactive world while both keeping true to the original material and avoiding being awful. There are literally thousands of licensed games which could fit everything I have described so far.
Yet, overcoming the odds, we are sometimes blessed with a stellar licensed game which nearly redeems the whole genre. So why do producers and developers keep going back to that well? The truth is, if marketed properly to their respective fandom, a licensed game will often make a lot of money on the strength of its name alone. This is why, for example, we have so many Harry Potter games despite none of them being anything more t♌han average.
This list will look at both sides of the coin. It would have been easy to simply list the fifteen worst licensed games of all time; after all, so many of them are dreadful. It takes a lot more work to come up with fifteen⛎ good licensed games, which is why it is so important to underline when video games adaptations have been successful.
30 ♈ 💃 WORST: You Can’t Hide, And You Can’t Even Run
Friday The 13th for NES goes wrong in several ways, but one of its most annoying feature is that its objective is so arcane, and its gameplay so difficult, that it feels like the game is impossible to finish. Maybe the fact that the game is unbeatable is a comm🐬entary on the fate of Jason’s victims, and how futile it is to even try to confront the machete-wielding boogeyman. A common session will see a player wander aimlessly through the confusing map, visiting the same two locations over and over by accident.
Eventually, you will run into Jason, and it will end badly.
The process will repeat until all of your characters have been eliminated, at🍰 which point you will thrown the thankfully very sturdy NES controller in a blind rage. The newer game seems to have fina🎃lly figured out how to make a decent product out of the concept.
29 AWESO𝐆ME: Nice Shootin🦩’ Tex!
I know that the gameplay itself is probably little more than average, but as a total package, one has to consider the 2009 video game version of Ghostbusters to be a tremendous success. The attention to detail in every level and in every reference is what makes the game memorable. Actually written in parts by Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis, it features voice acting from all the original actors, including the guy who plays Walter Peck. You get to fight the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man, which is a fantasy of most kids born in the 80s, and using the Proton Pack feels perfectly destructive. The top-notch story and voice acting elevates the serviceable gameplay above what it should have been. As a continuation of the series’ story, it’s the closest you will ever get to watching Ghostbusters 3.
28 WORST: Down 🐼For The Count 𒈔
I know it’s hard to believe that The Simpsons could ever do anything wrong (ha ha ha!), but most of their video games outings have been less than stellar. In 2001, the show was arguably already past its golden age. To make sure that things would keep going south for the brand, The Simpsons Wrestling was released that year.
Wrestling was at the peak of its trendiness, so combining it with the popular TV show seems like a clear attempt at a quick cash-in by Fox.
The game itself obviously lacks any kind of polish, as it is nearly impossible to control the characters. The gameplay is incredibly lazy, as the developers couldn’t even get the wrestling part right. Yo🀅u must win two rounds to win a match, and it is possible to pin an opponent lying on its belly. A 2D fighting game would have been less transparent of a cash gꦅrab.
27 AWESOME: A Road Trip To Springfield, USA 🃏
If you are looking for a Simpsons game done right, the best (and possibly the only) example would be The Simpsons: Hit & Run. It plays like a competent take on Grand Theft Auto, but it’s the design of the game which truly puts it over the top. Hit & Run is a love letter to Springfield. The town is gorgeously rendered in 3D, and the map is more or less to scale, giving players a lot of freedom to drive around like maniacs and explore the universe of the TV show. All the landmarks that you would expect are there, from the nuclear plan൩t to the Springfield sign, to the Simpsons’ trademark pink house. It’s the closest you will ever come to actually visiting the cartoon.
26 WORST: Hard To Pronounce, Hard To L⛦ike
Star Wars: Masters of Teräs Käsi had the potential to be the ultimate Star Wars fan service in a time where such a thing was not as frequent. Most of the key characters were playable, including Luke, Han, Leia, Chewbacca and Darth Vader. Despite the lack of Lando (who looks like he could hold his own in a fight) and Obi-Wan (who was still just known as an old man back then), it was as close as you could get to an all-star Star Wars roster before the prequels came along.
If we only look at the packaging, this game is a winner. The trouble is, it’s pretty terrible in action.
I’ll just start by mentioning that it’s a fighting game set in the Star Wars universe, and you simply cannot use The Force. Evꦯen as a regular fighting game, it just feels soft.
25 ✱ AWESOME: The Force Done Right 🐈
Before EA tarnished the name, the original Star Wars Battlefront was the game fans of the films played to live out their dreams. The sequel, Star Wars Battlefront 2, was even better than the first, improving on every aspect. More than being a simple soldier, you can now play as your favourite hero, or even become a Jedi Master and wreck your enemies with the power of The Force. More or less every planet that has ever been seen in the series is included, and all the vehicles you would expect also make it. The space battles are gigantic in proportion and epic in scope. More importantly, it’s a game that could be appreciated by yourself, without the need to play online. It’s still, to this day, the perfect Star Wars game as far as I am concerned.
24 🥃 WORST: Missing The Point
The first rule of Fight Club is you don’t talk about Fight Club. But apparently, you are allowed to make sub-par games about it. This game completely forgets the message from the movie and instead tries to cash in on the craze surrounding the property. The game’s big hook is that it is supposed to be more real, with hits that will actually break bones, and stain the arena. Unfortunately, more really do𒁃es not mean more exciting.
You can only throw so many straight punches before being bored.
There’s 🐈a reason why most fighting games give you fireballs. There’s one positive though: if you have ever wanted to play as Meat Loaf in a fighting game, n🐈ow’s your chance. On the other hand, Limp Bizkit singer Fred Durst is an unlockable character, so it’s one step forward and two steps back.
23 ꧙ AWESOME: Let’s Kick Shells!
I would like to mention TMNT II: The Arcade Game, a NES classic which almost made it to this list. Instead, TMNT IV: Turtles In Time stands as the sole Turtles surviv🤪or. It is just too good to pass up. It improves on previous games by bringing the series to the 16-bit era. The big and colourful sprites are just perfect to emulate the animation of the cartoon. The fighting is crunchy, and the levels are diverse. You will take the Turtles to the time of dinosaurs, of pirates, even in the future. The enemies are tough, but fair, so finishing the game feels like a real accomplishment. Quite honestly, if it wasn’t for the quality games which accompanied the phenomenon at the time, I am not sure the Turtles would have been as big as they were for as long.
22 WORST: Bad Movie, Worse Game 🤪
If you have ever seen Catwoman starring Halle Berry, you might think that the attached game could not possibly be worse. Somehow, you would be wrong. The game is a lazy beat ‘em up with a little bit of adventure thrown in, but it’s either too easy or too broౠken to be worth anyone’s time.
The one aspect of the game which seems to have received any kind of effort is the poses that Catwoman takes on the pause menu.
The best way to describe this game would be to imagine Tomb Raider as if it was remade by someone who only had the game described to them, yet never played it. It’s like a dollar store version of Tomb Raider, but wearing the skin of the Catwoman film.
21 AWESOME: The Definitive Dark Knight 🧔
As the best game in the Arkham series, Batman: Arkham City gives you plenty to explore and truly makes you feel like you actually are Batman on patrol in Gotham City. Every sidekick and villain worth mentioning from the Dark Knight’s history is there too, so it feels like the definitive version of that universe. The fighting is second to none, as with just a few presses of a button, you will end up performing crazy combos and impressive techniques that will make you feel like a martial arts master. There is just so much to do in this open world game that you never quite feel like you are completely done, even as your play time gets close to three-digits hours territory. If you need even more Arkham, then the downloadable content is a great example of DLC 💯done right.