“Please Place Sticky Tape over the Lug Holes.”
Try before you Don’t Buy This.
European box art.
Video game enthusiasts love to see bad games torn to shreds. For many, seeing a bad game scorned by others can be just as satisfying as actually playing a good game for themselves. Whether it’s the comedy value of seeing a game’s flaws laid bare, the sense of schadenfreude that comes from how sullen players express their misfortunes, or the satisfaction of seeing your own opinions validated. It’s the reason why the Angry Video Game Nerd rose to fame, for better or for worse. Heck, it’s probably the reason why you’re reading this here article right now! Be honest: When you saw that this article would be about a game by the name of Don’t Buy This, you probably had a certain expectation of what kind of game it is and what kind of article this was going to be.
A similar expectation must’ve developed as ZX Spectrum owners in 1985 stared down a copy of the game on a store shelf. I can imagine myself in their shoes, scanning the box art and wondering what exactly they were looking at. First, you reckon that the five included games have gotta be some kind of awful. Then you ask yourself, why would they try selling something like this in the first place? Which leads to wondering what purpose the title was meant to serve exactly: Is it a genuine indictment of its own content — a legitimate warning to stay far away? Or perhaps it’s the most cynical marketing ploy of all time, preying on the human fascination with catastrophe? What sort of expectation is one meant to develop for a commercially released game marketing itself as something which should not be bought? But perhaps the most important question you’ve gotta ask yourself is, are you willing to part with £2.50 to see the game for yourself?
In this article, we’re gonna get to the bottom of how Don’t Buy This came to be, find out what it’s all about, and determine whether or not it was actually a game worth buying. The answers may surprise you.
“Puppy Problems Cause a Right Mess.”
So, as an American, I wasn’t privy to the whole “UK computer games scene” that ran through the 80s and into the early 90s. I didn’t have access to the software or own any of the necessary hardware, and was generally unaware of how distinct the library of games was until being smartened up at some point in the 2000s. I’m still no “expert” on the subject, but I feel like I at least know enough to get by in writing an article like this. The best advice I can give to those looking for a bit more insight into the scene is to watch videos on the subject by Kim Justice, and to read Stuart Ashens’ appropriately-titled book Terrible Old Games You’ve Probably Never Heard Of. Actually, I’ll recommend that content to anyone in general, since it’s top-notch.
In April of 1985, British publisher Quicksilva released a compilation cassette by the name Soft Aid, with separate versions for the Commodore 64 and ZX Spectrum both containing different collections of ten “top-selling” games apiece. Valued at £4.99 (though initially advertised as £2.99 prior to release) and containing some decent little diversions, the compilation would already be well worth the price. But to further sweeten the pot, the cassettes also contained a song to be played on tapedeck; the now-mostly maligned “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” by one-time supergroup Band Aid. Say what you will about the song, but it was a smash hit in December ‘84, and apparently still had some market value left in April ‘85.
The combination of chart-topping music and games resulted in roughly 40,000 sales for the compilation, with proceeds going to the Ethiopian Appeal. The projection was actually for the game to reach 50,000 sales in the hopes of raising £500,000 for charity, and it was predicted by Computer Trade Weekly editor Greg Ingham that it would become “the biggest selling software title of all time.” Unfortunately for all involved, it failed to reach this goal. Despite missing its mark by around 10,000 sales, the number of units Soft Aid managed to move was nothing to scoff at. Possibly inspired by the major release, competing publisher Telecomsoft decided to release a games compilation of their own for 48K ZX Spectrums. Their approach would be… unique, to say the least.
“Five of the worst games you have ever seen.”
(Sinclair User. July, 1985)
Telecomsoft had a foothold in the budget software scene with their “Firebird Silver” line of £2.50 releases, while more premium games were reserved for the “Firebird Gold” line priced at £5.95 (eventually £9.95). Establishing themselves as power players, a number of independent developers and programmers submitted their games for approval to the publisher, hoping to be picked up for distribution. As you can imagine, not every submission could be met with approval, with their having to maintain some standard of quality and all.
However, it seems Telecomsoft didn’t simply toss rejected games in the bin. Some they deemed so bad as to be comical, or possibly kept with the intent to eventually do what they ended up doing with them: Release them on a compilation cassette with the theme / subtitle being “Five of the Worst Games Ever.” Games so bad, the publisher actually goes so far as to waive copyright on them, and actively encourage consumers to copy and distribute the data with their friends! On the face of it, Telecomsoft seemed like their intent was to have a laugh rather than to make a profit off of any of these games. Well, this accounts for four of the five of them, anyway. More on that later.
Now, it may seem cruel for a publisher to accept these sub-par games, only to openly insult the programmers for their efforts, and proceed to release their games on what is effectively a joke compilation with seemingly no intent to make any money for them. To that, I say… yeah, it really is kind of cruel, innit? I can’t find any documentation as to confirm whether or not the programmers were offered any kind of payment for their games, or if they consented to their games appearing in this mocking format to begin with.
In all likelihood, the developers were knowingly waiving rights to their games on submission to Telecomsoft in the first place, as was a common business practice of the time. Similarly infamous computer game compilation Cassette 50 (released two years earlier in 1983) assembled their collection at least partially through outside submission, taking a shadier approach by publishing anonymous ads in local newspapers and sending £10 checks to whoever responded with software for them. Naturally, cashing in the check was confirmation that you were willingly giving up all rights to your game to publisher Cascade Games Ltd. So, we can at least safely assume everything was on the up and up in the case of Don’t Buy This. But I still can’t help get that “bad taste in my mouth” feeling from it. Regardless of how the programmers may have been compensated, there’s no denying that the whole endeavor was mean-spirited in nature. On the other hand, none of that is about to stop me from making fun of these games myself, so who am I to judge really?
As a final note; the compilation was advertised in magazines and the like as being set for an April 1st release date. Naturally, there were those who assumed the whole idea of it was some sort of April Fool’s Day prank. Needless to say, it wasn’t… at least in the sense that, yes, Telecomsoft did actually release the compilation.
From the instruction manual: “Firebird disowns all copyright in this product. It may be copied, lent, hired or transmitted at will. If the programme is faulty please place sticky tape over the lug holes and use as a blank tape. This offer does not affect your statutory consumer rights.”
“Playing the Game Is Much Easier than Setting the Keys.”
Don’t Buy This doesn’t utilize a “game select” menu like some nowadays may be accustomed to. Instead, users would have to consult the manual for instruction on how to launch any of the five games. On the “UP” side of the cassette, the game data is recorded in the order of Race Ace, Fido, Weasel Willy, Fido 2: Puppy Power, and finally Fruit Machine. The “DOWN” side of the cassette contains the games in reverse order. To select your game, you’d have to input a command to the effect of “LOAD ‘race ace’”, which would tell the Speccy to scan the tape until reaching the allotted segment for Race Ace, where it would load the game code into memory. With all that sorted, you’re off to the races… quite literally, actually, seeing as that is in fact the theme of the first game on our list.
Game #1: Race Ace
Race Ace’s inclusion is perhaps the most interesting on this compilation, as it is evidently the one game that was actually sold individually prior to its appearance on Don’t Buy This. An acknowledgement of game in the December 1983 issue of Sinclair User confirms this initial release, as published by Micro-Gold. Race Ace is credited to one Tony Rainbird, who would go on to join Telecomsoft and help establish the Firebird label that would prove so successful for them. Whether the inclusion of Race Ace on Don’t Buy This was a joke on Tony by his employees or his own suggestion is unknown. One thing is for sure: It certainly earns its place on the cassette.
I’ve heard “stiffness” used to refer to the handling of cars in driving games. The control in Race Ace defies this measurement by only allowing turns at 90° angles. Furthermore, the direction the sprite for your car faces is relative to the position on the track, rather than which angle you are actually currently driving at. The single racetrack is comprised by a number of sharp 90° turns, and can’t even be bothered to draw a line at the starting point to indicate where laps begin and end. It is perhaps the most simplistic, minimalist take on racing I can think of in a game, save for those old-school toys that rolled a looping image of a road under a moveable cut-out of your car (à la the “Tomy Racing Turbo”). I’d be remiss not to point out that most driving games at this point were pretty well-advanced by comparison, even on the ZX Spectrum. In fact, 1983’s Chequered Flag – possibly the first driving game for the Speccy – offered a first-person perspective with effective pseudo-3D track rendering. Of course, not every game has to try and top the most technically proficient of its peers to justify its worth, but the level of simplicity / lack of effort on display here shouldn’t be mistaken as “standard” for the console.
Presentation aside, the game still has plenty of other issues. It is nearly impossible to pass your competitors, as they have the unfair advantage of not being stopped by collisions. On the other hand, your vehicle will be rendered immobile for a number of frames if it’s registered as occupying the same space as another for even a split second in time. According to the manual though, if you should manage to pull ahead of the pack, the race will just immediately end and give you the victory. I say “according to the manual” because I have never once been able to get in first place over the course of a race: It’s just too difficult to pass other racers without accidentally coming into contact with them, stopping you dead in your tracks and effectively resetting all the progress you’ve made. It’s an exercise in frustration, and one which I eventually had to give up on after a half-hour of repetition.
In perhaps the game’s one admirable inclusion, you can set the game speed and number of laps to your liking. I suggest a speed somewhere in the range of 125 – 175, as the 250 cap renders the game literally unplayable with your car colliding into walls with every frame update, and as the slower speeds are simply excruciating to witness. If it’s actually possible to rank first in a race in Race Ace, I’d imagine a player would have to gradually get there over the course of at least five laps (more likely, more). The opponents do seem to spread a bit further out as the race develops, so perhaps the openings you’d need open up around that point. I’ve given up on trying for myself.
Game #2: Fido
If Don’t Buy This were to have a mascot, it would probably be Fido the dog. Fido stars in two games across this cassette compilation, which are best played / reviewed in order. In this first installment, you are put into the paws of a pixelated pup who must keep waves of moles at bay. You might expect to do so with a bark or bite. Instead, you do so by furiously wagging your tail, bopping the moles on the head and sending them back down their holes. It’s effectively a take on the old Game & Watch Vermin, which actually happens to be my second favorite of the product line. The key difference here is, Fido is constantly on the move across the screen horizontally, and only stops when commanded to attack or when eating from his energy-restoring food bowl. The strategy is to stop to the left or right of the mole you want to whack, as you can zap two moles at once if they’re surfaced within sufficient distance of one another.
Saving time and conserving energy is the name of the game here, as your energy depletes at as rapid a pace as the moles ascend. Seven strikes and you’re out, which seems like quite an arbitrary number to me? There are three stages to Fido, progressing as you reach your mole-thumping goal. The second stage introduces a bird, who will collide with you if you’re in wagging mode if they’re overhead. The third stage adds a cat to the mix, who tosses what appear to be keys at you, which must also be dodged in order to avoid penalty. Complete the third stage and the loop begins again, with the warning “ITS GUNA GET HARDER NOW!!!” I should mention that if you incur a strike due to starvation or collision with bird or key, your progress in the stage is also reset, which is perhaps the most painful penalty of all.
Positioning Fido is probably the most frustrating bit of the game, especially when dealing with moles to the far sides of the play area. Thanks to Fido’s constant walking, he’ll immediately bounce off the sides of the screen when he touches them, meaning you have to learn the timing on when to trigger your tail at the edges. Outside of that, you’ll sometimes be in a position on-screen where your tail is clearly knocking the mole on the head, but because you’re not exactly in one of the spots the game wants you to be in, it won’t count as a hit. If you care enough to practice, you’ll eventually get the positions and the timing down, but the game really should be more lenient to begin with. Surprisingly, that’s actually my major complaint with what is otherwise a decent little game! I actually quite like Fido and its updated take on a classic Game & Watch premise. The falling keys you’re meant to dodge might even be a nod to another Game & Watch title, Helmet, where you’re made to dodge a variety of tools falling from the sky.
Sure, the presentation could’ve used a little more sprucing up (Fido’s animations are pretty laughable for one, especially his rather phallic tail), but it’s at least acceptable for a 1985 ZX Spectrum budget title. It might have also been nice to have a counter-attack for the hazards other than just having to dodge them, but looking at the way this feature is actually implemented in the sequel… Well, maybe it’s for the best that the original keeps things simple. I could totally see Fido making for a fine little LCD handheld game; it might be a bit too simple after all for the computer games space if taken individually, even at a budget price. For whatever it’s worth, it’s probably my favorite game on the compilation. We’ll see how the sequel stacks up shortly.
Number one goes to Chef. Also, as long as I’m on the subject, I might as well mention that I’m a huge fan of the Game & Watch Gallery series that Nintendo put out across the Game Boy and Game Boy Advance, and I wish they’d put out some compilation / remaster of all the Game & Watch games again. I’d be perfect on a 3DS!
Game #3: Weasel Willy
Weasel Willy should win the prize for “Best Menus” of all the games on the compilation. You get a cool load / title screen, a jaunty rendition of “Pop Goes the Weasel” on the following leaderboard, and a choice of which input method you would prefer. Unfortunately, it is on this screen where I must take issue. You see, the game gives you a choice between keyboard and joystick, as well as the option to redefine your keys. Problem is, picking either keyboard or joystick will result in not actually being able to control the game at all. Rather, you actually have to pick the redefine option to set your controls each time you launch the game. Granted, controls weren’t exactly “uniform” across old computer games the way games mostly share similar control schemes today, so picking the option to define your own personal input preference should be the option most folk elect for anyway. But the question remains as to why the keyboard and joystick options are present to begin with if they don’t have any function?
Luckily, as the manual so eloquently puts it, “Playing the game is much easier than setting the keys.” The game is a take on the “Light Cycles” minigame from the Tron arcade game, where your character leaves behind a trail as you move which will kill (?) you if you walk into it. Similarly, the edges of the screen and randomly-placed trees (??) serve as additional insta-kill (???) hazards. Rather than collecting items and trying to survive for as long as possible à la Snake, or trying to trap a competing weasel like in the aforementioned Light Cycles, the objective is simply to walk an unspecified number of steps before the game decides to put you through to the next level. The level transitions are totally abrupt, and by their unpredictable nature don’t allow you to rack up points on your own terms (if you’re into the whole “high score” shtick).
One other unpredictable element are the randomly-placed green lumps which may or may not be trees. With seemingly no real science to what pattern they appear in, you will occasionally be spawned into a level that is literally unwinnable, sometimes even inside of a cluster of trees that will kill you the second you start moving! If there had been some way to account for the hazard placement in relation to your spawn point, giving a minimum amount of space to at least give you a chance of escape, the randomization could have been a novel element. Instead, it ends up guaranteeing frustration for players who find themselves progressing nicely through the game, only to be killed by an element they have absolutely no control over.
Despite a potentially entertaining concept, Weasel Willy falls short due to the incompetence of its programmer (credited as one “R. Harrington”). With some amount of tweaking and error-fixing, the game could probably be fixed up into something far more playable. But the simple fact of the matter is that the premise could’ve been better executed in even slightly more deft hands, or if Mr. Harrington had invested a bit more time in learning to troubleshoot the obvious issues. I think it’s fair to be a bit critical here, given the fact that there was no “deadline” for getting this game in; assuming it was independently made as some sort of hobby project turned possibility for profit. It could’ve been refined before being submitted to the publisher, but this was presumably the revision they deemed “good enough” before sending away.
Game #4: Fido 2: Puppy Power
The first Fido was not released prior to Don’t Buy This. It hadn’t been sold on shelves, been critically praised, or gained any name recognition. So, why the developers thought it a wise idea to pre-emptively develop a sequel to it is a curious thing indeed. Were they so sure it would be a success, they figured they might as well save Telecomsoft the waiting and gift them the follow-up straight away? Or perhaps they simply figured “we might as well milk these assets we made for the most of it?” I’d probably bet on the latter choice there, if I were a betting kind of gal. At the very least, you can credit developer “Wildest Dreams” with one thing: They certainly changed things up a bit with their sequel.
For starters, Fido can now move up and down on the game screen. Moles still emerge solely from the bottom, so you might not think this has much use at first. Then you realize it is necessary in order to avoid the homing hazards that assail you in each level, ranging from weird creatures with long noses to fireballs from a volcano all the way to perpetually-spinning handguns. Luckily, you are granted the power to shoot lasers from Fido’s mouth, which can disintegrate the hazards while also refilling your “Food” meter. In case you were wondering, no; the manual does not provide any additional insight into why anything that’s happening in the game is happening. In fact, the entirety of the instructions for Fido 2 amount to two whole lines:
FIDO 2 = LOAD “fido 2”
Woof Woof. (Press D during play.)
Right, so first things first: The writer for the instruction manual actually makes a mistake of their own, by providing the wrong line of code for launching the game. The correct program name you must type is “fido2” without the space, or your Speccy will scratch its head trying to find a line of code that doesn’t actually exist. Secondly, the tip they provide about pressing “D” during play is a an interesting one, since pressing it will instantly take you to the next level of the game as if you’ve beaten the previous one. It’s a handy way of getting to see all of the different settings and hazards the game has in store for you, and I wonder if it was left in by the original programmers (possibly as some sort of debug function) or added in as a cheat by someone at Telecomsoft.
I was generous to the first Fido earlier in this article. I have no generosity to spare for it’s sequel. Every time you destroy one of the hazards, another instantly appears to take its place, barely / rarely giving you enough time to maneuver out of the way. Fido’s hitbox is too big to account for hazards overhead, and your movement is too slow to shake a homing target off your tail. You have to hope that the hazard eventually “gives up” the chase of its own volition, and decide to start traveling in a seemingly random pattern rather than follow you. In this sense, you’ll want to leave the hazards alone altogether and focus solely on the moles, but the necessity of refilling your Food meter means you’ll have to shoot them down eventually. By the time you’re dealing with three hazards at a time (the fourth stage, which takes place on a beach and sics sandcastles after you), it becomes absolutely impossible to dodge them as far as I can gather.
Fido 2: Puppy Power suffers from a bad case of what I’ll call “Too Tough Too Quick” syndrome. The original game worked because of the simplicity of its premise and mechanics, and provides a fair difficulty curve which eases you into each of the new hazards with each new stage. Right out the gate in stage one of Puppy Power, you’re assaulted by an endless stream of big-nosed bastards, who replenish themselves as quickly as you can kill them. The game tries to ramp up its difficulty by adding an additional hazard every couple of levels after that, but having to contend with just one is already a major pain. Not only that, but it represents the game giving away all of its mechanics in the first seconds of gameplay: You need to develop and demonstrate mastery of the game in order to pass the very first test the game presents you with. From there, it’s not a matter of escalating difficulty so much as the game simply becoming less fair, eventually placing you in a seemingly unwinnable scenario. By this point, you’ve already long-since mastered the “tricks.” The simple fact is, the game presents you with too much challenge too soon, and the only place it has to go from there is into impossibility.
Game #5: Fruit Machine
Fruit Machine is a simulation of a fruit machine (alternatively “slot machine”). You pull a lever, press a “Hold” button, and hope the five spinning reels land in such a pattern as to reward you with money. An additional “nudge” function occasionally allows you to keep a currently visible icon on reel before re-spinning the others. If you manage a successful pattern, you’re given the option to gamble your winnings, either increasing them or forfeiting it all depending on your luck in pressing a button. So far, so standard.
… And it doesn’t go anywhere beyond just “standard.” There’s no gimmick to distinguish it from a library of other slots simulators on the console, which were a dime a dozen from what I can gather. The presentation might be a bit slower / sloppier than some, but not to the point where it’s particularly laughable or anything. The only comedy comes from the manual’s own inserted description of the game, which goes as follows:
This mysterious, original new game requires skill, timing, nerve and absolute concentration. Packed with high drama, Fruit Machine should be reserved for that part of the day when time is not important (such as 4 o’clock in the morning while you are sleeping).
Truthfully, Fruit Machine doesn’t really belong on Don’t Buy This. It’s not particularly original or exceptional at what it does, but it gets the job done well enough. Like Fido, the badness of the game is overblown, and the real issues with the games become apparent: They simply aren’t games the publisher was confident publishing individually at budget price. They fit a compilation format just fine, and this unfortunately just so happened to be the compilation they winded up on. By virtue of their competence, they actually serve as the “padding” that fills the gaps between more exceptionally bad titles. Dubious honors to be sure.
So, if you were a consumer in the day who didn’t mind your games with a few rough edges, I’d argue that the compilation was actually fairly priced at £2.50! Fido is the stand-out game amongst the bunch, while Weasel Willy walks a fine line along being playable. And if you happen to be a fan of casino-style games, Fruit Machine is there to deliver a thoroughly functional experience. For the modern equivalent of £5.70 / $7.65, you could definitely do a whole lot worse. It’s a surprise that where the game fails to deliver is actually in providing “Five of the Worst Games Ever,” as I can only consider two of the games even contending for that title.
“Brilliant in Its Concept, Unoriginal in Its Conception.”
A lot of people credit the aforementioned Angry Video Game Nerd with the rise of “bad games”-centric content. Really though, the series didn’t start picking up steam until around 2007, and there had already been lesser successes with similar types of content (Gamespot’s unofficial “Don’t Play This Game” series comes to mind). Before any of that though, there were only the occasional scathing reviews seen in games magazines and possibly a few folk ranting on BBS servers who you could go to for your fix of games thrashing. What I’m trying to get at is, there wasn’t as much of a fascination with terrible games in the mid-80s as there would be going into the new millennium.
And yet, enough people were fascinated by the idea of possibly seeing some of the worst games ever, that Don’t Buy This actually managed to sell some number of copies. I cannot verify precisely how many, but the April 2005 edition of Retro Gamer magazine claims “Don’t Buy This sold extremely well.” Truth be told, I’m actually a bit skeptical of this claim, since the game never managed to chart on any top sales lists for the Spectrum, and because I can’t seem to find any sort of discussion of sales figures for the game at all. The only explanations I can come up with for the claim are theoretical: The Firebird label was popular enough to carry some weight on store shelves, so perhaps people bought it out of some sense of brand recognition? They also invested the money into advertising the game in a number of magazines, including a giveaway competition for the game which ran in the August 1985 issue of Computer and Video Games Magazine.[6] So, we can assume that Telecomsoft didn’t release the game out just to lose money on it.
And so, it’s possible Firebird may very well have seen minor success with a release which not only urged potential consumers to stay far away, but which also encouraged them to copy the contents of the cassette and share it with their friends rather than pay money for additional copies. At the very least, the game made an impression on ZX Spectrum users, and is still remembered to this day among enthusiasts. And you can attribute that fact entirely to the marketing for the game, rather than to the infamy of the included games themselves. If the cassette had simply been released as just a standard games compilation – something like Cassette 50 or what have you – it would have very likely flown under the radar entirely and remained [rightfully] forgotten by history. But the title is certainly successful in conjuring up an expectation of what the compilation is supposed to be, and that expectation was enough to convince someone to want to purchase the game and see it for themselves.
It’s a trick which I don’t think could’ve worked twice for the publisher — one of several reasons I reckon we never saw the “Don’t Buy This Again” hinted at in the C&VG advert. But with the advent of games bundles in recent years, with your Humble Bundles and Bundle Stars, I can almost see the concept making a comeback! Just think about it: “The Humble Awful Bundle,” comprised of Steam games with “Overwhelmingly Negative” overall scores. I’m sure there are at least a handful of developers out there who wouldn’t mind cashing in a bit of their dignity for a few dollars in residuals, right? I’ll even volunteer myself to curate if need be. Let’s make this dream a reality.
“Development will continue until enough people tell them to stop it.”
(Computer Gamer. August, 1985)
For what it’s worth, at this point multiple of the second-string bundle sites have created explicit bad game bundles. Every year Bundle Stars gives a “Tax Day” bundle of terrible games, and Indie Gala has done at least one (April Fool’s? I forget the reason for it) which consisted of dead indie multiplayer titles, non-functional RPGs, and the like.
So I guess that’s a thing.