The History of Action 52: One of the Worst Games Ever Made

Ask anyone what some of the worst video games ever made are, and chances are, Action 52 is certain to be brought up. Released for the Nintendo Entertainment System and the Sega Genesis in the early 1990s, the game has become notorious for its poor programming, numerous glitches, and overall sense of being boring and frustrating. I have long heard of the horror stories about these games, and finally got to see the terror for myself thanks to watching play throughs of both versions on YouTube. Why are these games hated so much, and what became of Active Enterprises, the company behind such shoddy products? Prepare yourself for a lesson in how not to make a collection of games, and stay tuned for links to some rather humorous play throughs of both versions at the conclusion of the article.

Let's start with the NES version, released in 1991. After a funky opening song and, surprisingly, some solid voice work in a form of a man who shouts "Make your selection now!", it all goes downhill from there. After selecting a game from the main menu, the player is involved in space shooters, platform games, and more. Some of the games are rip offs of far better games such as Donkey Kong, some games share elements such as music and enemies, and some have more stages than others. What they all have in common, however, is that they are plagued by countless bugs and poorly programmed features, which go so far as to render games unplayable. Let me give you some examples of how buggy the title really is.

Sometimes, you have enemies that fail to attack you or do not even appear, forcing you to be eternally stuck. Dying might result in graphical glitches that could make the games impossible to win. Some games make losing a life hard or impossible to avoid, and you even have games that crash when you die or beat a level. Oddly, there are games that work on an emulator, but not on the actual NES console, and vice versa. Alfredo and Jigsaw fail to work on most emulators, as they simply crash upon starting. As for other oddities, there are games that have a score tally, but no way to earn points; inconsistent amounts of lives for individual titles (some give you three lives, but one game, Hambo's Adventures, gives you only one life to start with), and no endings for any games. That's right...if you actually beat a game, you simply restart it from the beginning or return to the main menu, with no sense of accomplishment whatsoever.

Perhaps the most interesting game in the set is Cheetahmen, which featured the adventures of three strong cheetahs. It actually seemed a bit more professional than the other 51 games, with somewhat better graphics (many of the games on the set looked downright horrid even by NES standards) and cut scenes that depicted the story, such as it was (a man being pulled into his TV set while playing a game and meeting the Cheetahmen). However, the story was not developed any further, some poor programming was still in place, and like the rest of the games, beating it simply meant that the player would restart from Level One. Even so, Active had plans for the Cheetahmen, publishing a comic that explained their origins (they were subject to a scientist's experiments after he killed their mother), and planning a toy line, animated series, and future games featuring the cats. Most of the plans failed to materialize, however, and thus the Cheetahmen never did become the next Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle-style craze.

It was bad enough that the game was abysmal to begin with, but it came with an absurd price tag of $200. I kid you not...Active Enterprises wanted $200 for this game, while many other NES titles were around the $50 price tag. I dare say that anyone who spent $200 on Action 52 only to see how terrible it was had simply thrown their money away. For the price of Action 52, one could buy several games that are far superior and have a lot more fun with them. You know a company is desperate when they ask for $200 for a clearly bad product. Despite this, and the negative reception of the game, Active decided to give the series a second chance in 1993, when they released a Genesis version.

The sixteen-bit version, which featured games not found on the NES version, actually seemed slightly more professional, with somewhat better graphics and a bit more voice work, but the collection as a whole still left something to be desired. The games were slightly less glitched, but still suffered from poor programming choices, being somewhat broken (some games could be beaten without having to use the controller) and for at least one game (Alfredo) failing to work sometimes. As with its predecessor, the Genesis version was criticized for the aforementioned reasons, and after its release, the series would never materialize again. It should be noted that Action 52 was also planned to be released for the Super Nintendo, but thankfully, it never came out.

If you are wondering how Nintendo and Sega could have placed their seal of approval on such shoddy products, the answer is that they did not. Both versions were unlicensed, and Active managed to work around their restrictions and release the titles without their blessing. You might say that Action 52 could thus be considered an early example of the so-called "home brew" games, especially considering that it contains all of the hallmarks of amateur programming. Nintendo and Sega eventually became wise to unlicensed developers, and future systems would lock out any unlicensed titles, which put a damper to Active's future plans.

These plans were quite ambitious: Active had spun off the Cheetahmen into their own game, entitled Cheetahmen 2, for the NES, but it was never fully completed and was thus not officially released, though ROMs of the rather poorly made game exist. After one other appearance in the Genesis version of Action 52, the Cheetahmen were no more. At one point, Active created a contest in which anyone who beat the NES Action 52 game Ooze could win $104,000, but it backfired when it was discovered that the game crashed before it could be beaten. The company was even planning on releasing the Action Gamemaster, which would play games released on other consoles. However, all the bad publicity surrounding Active's actions put the lid on their plans, and by 1994, the company had folded, never to make another game ever again.

It is a fortunate thing that no more Action 52 games are being made, because if the two released versions are any indication, any more incarnations would likely be just as poor. Games like Mario Party and Wario Ware proved that it is possible to make mini game compilations that are actually fun, with the latter doing so with games that only lasted a mere few seconds! However, Action 52 might have continued to have become worse. Imagine versions with shoddy 3D graphics, or poorly-implemented motion controls that would make even the worst Wii games seem like masterpieces by comparison. Thankfully, we will never have to encounter these terrors, and I would not doubt that to this day, people are rejoicing as a result of being spared any more Action 52 insanity.

I know games that I would not touch with a ten-foot pole when I see them, and Action 52 is something that I would not touch with a 100-foot pole. Just by seeing it, I realize that everyone was right: it is poor in every respect, and perhaps should never have seen the light of day. At least by watching it on YouTube, you are spared having to play it. Speaking of which, here are those links to some very funny play throughs of Action 52 as promised, courtesy of Kikoskia, my all-time favorite Let's Play commentator on YouTube:

For the Genesis version, check out this play list:

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=3B034FEDCD984251

For the original NES version, this play list is for you:

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=F34E677F03A5FBD1

Watch the madness for yourself, and be thankful that the Action 52 series is finished forever. It has had quite an interesting, if relatively brief, history, but its legacy of being one of the worst games in existence will surely last for many more years.