So Bad It's Horrible Cleanup

So Bad, It's Horrible is one of the more flame-bait-y parts of the site, so a cleanup thread is needed to ensure that works aren't added simply because someone doesn't like them.

If you want to list a work under this, keep the following in mind:

• The work must have very few fans or defenders (both genuine and ironic). It should fail to appeal to any type of audience.
• Being offensive in its subject matter isn't enough.
• It isn't horrible just because a certain critic disliked it, though their reviews can be used as sources and citations.
• The work should have notably poor reviews (e.g., less than 3/10 on IMDb, or single digit scores on Rotten Tomatoes)
• Please be polite while writing and as much as possible, avoid falling into Complaining About Shows You Don't Like. Instead, focus on explaining why the work is horrible.

Edited by Someoneman on Nov 28th 2022 at 8:58:17 AM

To start off: this example from Video Game Generations: Seventh Onwards doesn't sound very "horrible".

• Shijuuhachi Kakkokari is a horror visual novel game where you listen to horror urban tales from Japanese provinces. While the box art and opening cutscene just reeks of typical Jump Scare material, the contents of the "horror stories" are just....anything but horror. The only thing that reeks of anything horror of those tales is the creepy music; The content they depict can arrange from being humurous, Nightmare Retardant, tour guides or even things that are unrelated to that province at all. After you read all of these "urban tales," the ending you get is either All Just a Dream or you were suffering from psychosis. This game has been considered So Bad, It's Good because of the sole fact that it is an horror game that manages to make itself complete Nightmare Retardant.

The example is focused entirely on the game failing to be scary despite being horror, which doesn't feel bad enough to qualify the game as Horrible. Heck, the example flat-out mentions that the game is So Bad, It's Good without mentioning why it should also qualify as Horrible.

So, will this be the new thread to discuss potential SBIH entrys?

Not sure that's necessary at the moment, but I don't have a problem with people brining potential candidates up here. Then again, I'm not the one whos started this thread.

I am pretty certain we already have a SBIH thread somewhere...

There was once a thread for Horrible, but it's closed now. And yeah, that horror visual novel entry is poor.

I agree it needs cleaning.

To this day it has Highlander 2 is listed even though most people would call it So Bad, It's Good and The Source far surpasses it in horribleness by being a bad movie on top of a bad Highlander sequel.

There was a thread for reporting this sort of stuff but I can't find it, but I should point out the entry for Ronde in Video Game Generations: Fifth to Sixth is mostly plagiarized from an old Top 100 Worst Video Games video from Youtube. The wording is identical to that used in the video in places.

• Ronde for the Sega Saturn is infamous for killing off the Majin Tensei branch of the Shin Megami Tensei franchise. Its Video Game 3D Leap resulted in some of the ugliest graphics of the 32-bit era, and its preview demo alone caused such a negative reaction that thousands of Japanese gamers cancelled their preorders for the game — a scale of preorder cancellation that was virtually unprecedented for the Japanese game industry at the time. It would take another 12 years for MegaTen fans to see a Strategy RPG in the franchise with the release of Devil Survivor. A video of the first mission can be seen here.

I haven't played Ronde but from what I've seen it's the only MegaTen game that I've never seen the fandom say anything positive about. The current entry only seems to mention "the graphics are ugly", even though it also received criticism for its character designs, loading times and uninspired story.

Edit: I've rewritten it to remove the plagiarism.

Edited by Metaverse on May 11th 2019 at 6:07:13 AM

I've been meaning to fix up the Music subpage. Nixing the Alanis Morrissette examples since both albums had multiple Top 40 hits in Canada, and the albums themselves went platinum and gold respectively. Hardly "horrible".

I sense there was was some Troper On Board from the editor that added them because there's no justification to list anything that did that good with the general public on this page.

Weird. I just googled Shijuuhachi Kakkokari to find out more information about it, and the only two results I got were this thread and the SBiH page it was listed on. Now I'm not even sure if the work exists.

https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/四八（仮）

Looked it up using the hiragana しじゅうはち かっこかり. It exists, it's just obscure and perhaps never referenced with romaji as such.

Did some digging about after noticing the Zusar Vasar entry was also plagiarized from the Top 100 Worst Games list that I linked earlier in the thread and found out that while professional reviews conclude that the game is So OK, It's Average (which means the game wouldn't qualify for So Bad It's Horrible), the reader scores were much warmer towards the game (the average rating by readers for Dreamcast Magazine is nearly 8.5/10).

Edit: Did some more research on Ronde. While it was very likely responsible for killing off Majin Tensei (RIP), professional scores seem to be around average bordering bad, and even though most MegaTen fans bash the game and pretend it doesn't exist, those that have actually played it claim that the game is pretty good despite the ugly 3D graphics. Here's an example of one such review.

Edited by Metaverse on May 11th 2019 at 6:24:48 AM

the SBiH pages do say that just because something *has* fans doesn't mean it's immune from being listed; everything has fans, no matter how bad it is (statistically there's someone somewhere whose favorite game ever is that shitty flash game you and your friends laughed at in eighth grade). that said, i would think the review scores are enough to disqualify Ronde, by the sound of it.

If anyone's interested, here are the review scores for Ronde from Famitsu and Sega Saturn Magazine, both major publications in Japan. The average is 57. For comparison, Planet Joker and Rise 2 Resurrection (both of which are listed on Horrible) have an average score of 33 and 39 respectively. If you want to use a more modern game as an example, Mighty No. 9 (which isn't listed as Horrible) has an average of 50% for the PS4 release^{Other versions for comparison} 55% for the Xbone version, 52.2% for the Wii U version and 48% for the PC version according to GameRankings.

That being said, does anyone know what the average review score has to be for a piece of media to be disqualified from being listed on its respective horrible page? Chef's Luv Shack is listed on Horrible yet it received mixed to negative reviews with the Dreamcast and N64 versions having a 50% average (which is the same as the MN9 example I listed above) and the PC and PS1 versions having a 47% and 41% average respectively.

Edited by Metaverse on May 12th 2019 at 9:17:32 AM

Doe this example in Horrible.Other count? It looks like it's just one bad thing in an otherwise good event, so it sounds more like a Dethroning Moment of Suck.

• While a great presentation overall, Nintendo 2010 has perhaps the single most infamous game showcase period with the showcase of The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. What was supposed to be a demonstration of the next big Zelda game instead became an exercise in uncomfortableness as the game started suffering from severe wireless connection problems, which combined with the highly precise control scheme meant gamers were left watching as Shigeru Miyamoto was left awkwardly fumbling around, barely able to defeat even basic enemies. What was supposed to be an epic showcase of Nintendo's next big game instead became an ill omen in many fans eyes, one which carried well into the games release.

Edited by Someoneman on May 12th 2019 at 11:32:56 AM

Sounds like a dethroning moment to me, and given that it’s for part of a game’s advertising cycle, it really wouldn’t fit in a dethroning moment page for a work either, IMO. Maybe for Nintendo as a creator. Though, that last line makes me think the whole example was written in bad faith anyway.

I'd say the best place for this example, if any, is Tainted by the Preview on YMMV.The Legend Of Zelda Skyward Sword. But even then, I'm not sure.

I’d be down with helping clean up the Music subpage. (I really don’t think that Deep Purple album belongs there— the vocalist still likes the songs and plays its’ singles live, and that Allmusic review was just a bad review, not an “oh my god what is this awfulness” review. It’s bad, especially in the context of an acclaimed band, but not SBIH).

Horrible.Advertising has an example for the Sonic movie trailer. Do you guys think it counts? I have seen people that genuinely like the design/trailer as-is on Deviantart and the like, and I think the 'y says x' stuff could be removed if nothing else.

"* The trailer for Sonic The Hedgehog 2019 is especially notable for actually causing the film to be delayed in a desperate attempt at damage control. The horrific Uncanny Valley design of Sonic caused such an intense reaction that the animators were sent back to the drawing board to come up with something better, with the film's release being pushed four months when it became clear they'd never get it done in time for the original release. And that's certainly not the only major issue people had; also coming in for heavy mockery were the inexplicable use of the slow-paced and downbeat song "Gangsta's Paradise" for a franchise that's all about speed and has nothing to do with gangsters reflecting on their wasted lives, Special Effect Failure even beyond the usual for effects-heavy movie trailers where the process likely isn't finished yet, and the Inferred Holocaust of a line about Sonic knocking out a large power grid. Jim Sterling reacts in horror, and Arlo spins a theory on whether its horrors were intentional."

Edited by lalalei2001 on May 25th 2019 at 9:06:33 AM

Urgh. The sheer amount of mockery directed towards the film that emerged after the trailer does make me wonder, but really now. Cut it.

Do you have any proof of people liking the trailer/Sonic's design?

Yep I do have proof people liked it and Sonic's design!

The trailer's stats are also much more balanced compared to, say, the Mighty No. 9 trailer.

Edited by lalalei2001 on May 25th 2019 at 4:24:09 AM

Maybe Snark Bait would fit the example better, since Snark Bait are works that attract much attention over its flaws without necessarily being SBIH.

Edited by Albert3105 on May 25th 2019 at 12:02:34 PM

On Horrible.Live Action Films N To Z, I'd like to discuss about The Omega Code entry, because it hardly says why the film is horrible beyond "the effects are bad". I'd hide it in case someone wanted to fix it, but somebody already did that before and I didn't want to start an Edit War.

Edited by OldLadyNightMan on Jun 2nd 2019 at 7:25:26 AM