@@nonamepasserbya6658 games by monolithsoft really push the hardware into making such stunning and beautiful games despite the lower hardware fidelity. Trust me, it is the game
@@nonamepasserbya6658 This is not entirely true, nor is it fair. Games like Metroid Prime Remastered, Doom and Doom Eternal and Alien Isolation look fantastic on the Switch. Then again, The Outer Worlds looks and runs like a kick in the nuts.
It’s genuinely depressing to see what Iguanabee had in terms of its initial concept vs what they ended up making. They seem like they had a ton of passion and love behind it. Hell, it maybe could’ve rivaled the iconic Peter Jackson Kong game, only for GameMill to come in and completely annihilate any chance of this passion being realized. The fact that GameMill is still even allowed to publish games is just upsetting. So many publishers get closed down for less, yet they’re here giving us stuff that even the bargain bin would feel ripped off by.
From what I understand is it is a viscous cycle Iguanabee wants to make a good game and have the talent, but just to survive they have to take projects from companies like Gamemill and if I remember gave Iguanabee no money and only a year to make this. Since all Iguanabee has for their portfolio is games like Kong they can't get out from under predatory publishers like Gamemill and onto actual projects with actual funds and time. To put it simply Iguanabee is trapped.
@@leandrocz1606 Disagree. I think it's fair especially since they make it very very clear that it's Game mills fault and not the devs. Hell if it wasn't for this video I wouldn't even know about their other game which I've now added to my wishlist on steam.
I’m beginning to think GameMill is the reincarnation of LJN. I mean think about. Both companies typically get usually talented developers, rushes them, and aggressively releases trash games. Oh, and they snatch up almost every popular licensed property they can get their hands on!
Note this games failure is mostly the publishers fault. Iguanabee was given 1 year to make it and was forced to come up with story themselves with the only directions coming from gamemill being "skull island, king kong". Funnily enough, gamemill is known for milling out trash tier games, like rise of kong and the walking dead destinies.
You know, I can kind of imagine how Kong's size could've been a game mechanic. Intro is the same, except the big bad dino boss towers over the Kong family, and they sacrifice themselves to let him escape. You start out as Baby Kong, and work your way up the food chain, hunting down the "kings/queens" of the island to eat them and absorb whatever makes them huge. In the beginning, you're small, and you have to go after smaller enemies, like spiders and raptors, until you reach the first boss (which would be the spider, because spiders are small, so a giant one would still be smaller than a giant dinosaur). You beat it, and then you get a time-skip, after which point Kong is adult sized and much bigger, and now you can just squash the spiders you had to fight before under your foot. Then, you hunt down the crab, then the giant sandworm, and finally the three dinosaur "underlings", and each time you get a time-skip, Kong grows in size, and that changes up exploration. He's now bigger and stronger, so he can break the stone walls and floors and swat away old enemies and mini-bosses, but in exchange he can no longer climb the vines or traverse certain narrow areas, because he's too big and heavy. Then, in the finale, Kong faces off against the dino boss from the beginning, but now he's the bigger one, and beats it to a pulp, and since he now took down all the "kings/queens" of Skull Island, he becomes King Kong. Simple, straightforward, easy. But then again, when you're a developer studio with a shovelware publisher breathing down your neck, demanding a game to be finished in one year and pushing out an obvious alpha build as a full release, complete with MTX, ideas to integrate your gameplay and story and streamline them are meaningless, because that's the least of your problems.
Look, we all would've been happy with the commentary, but the insane amount of work you put into the edits does not go unnoticed. This channel is an absolute gem in a sea of low effort talking-about-things-that-are-bad content ❤
That's my take exactly. "GameMill" sounds like a Simpsons gag about a soulless corporate factory farm that manufactures Interactive Digital Entertainment Product™ and yet it's real and it's exactly what the name sounds like.
The thing is If you are a consumer, or someone who cares about... Things. Then sure, this is a negative connotation. But if you're a particular kind of middle manager, looking for the cheapest contractor possible? A Mill is _exactly what you want_ -- GameMill continues to exist because this is their market. Licensors wanting to make a "Game" for merchandising reasons that is as cheap and quick as humanly possible, because the point is not and was never to make something good, it's just to make _a thing_ so you can use it for cross promotion. And any suckers that buy it, well, that's on them.
I only associate "mill" with stuff like a grain/flour mill... Still fits tho... They grind aspects of a game down into a fine dust of what could've been a good game... or smth...
Fun fact: Universal sued Nintendo for the usage of Kong in DK's name, but Nintendo won out in the end. The lawyer who won that case was named Kirby, hence why HAL Laboratory's little pink puffball shares the name.
The theory of Kirby being a reference to John Kirby was actually disproven by Miyamoto himself if I recall. They had asked Nintendo of America to give a name to Kirby, I suppose because Nintendo of America had named a large variety of characters for NoJ like Luigi, the Koopalings, and others like them. And the staff at NoA literally picked it from a hat which had a bunch of names.
It is also worth randomly mentioning Kirby, the grumpy old vacuum, from The Brave Little Toaster. They both share the same name, and they both *SUCK* ....air, and stuff.
I'm so glad you talked about the weird scale of the game world because this was instantly bugging me. King Kong looks way too small here, even if we go by his smallest canonical height. I get that you have to make compromises between having a cool giant ape as the player character and having an open world that still makes a bit of sense scale-wise, but still, he's tiny compared to everything else on this supposed island. I don't think teasing you with unlockable abilities in the Tutorial is that bad; Metroid does that almost every time too, but the big difference is obviously that it has a functioning map and great level design that reward exploration and makes you want to regain all these abilities instead of making you feel frustrated at the fact that you can't access most of the level suddenly. Also the irony of a publisher calling themselves Game Mill being mostly known for churning out subpar licensed games is so funny. You can't make that up.
Ya know. The concept of a game where you play as a young Kong slowly making his way to the top of the food chain on Skull Island. Sounds really fun. Too bad the developers had twenty bucks and a long weekend.
King Kong deserves much better than this. The old Xbox 360 Peter Jackson game was diamond plated gold compared to this thing. Godzilla also deserves a proper new game too instead of being left for cameos on other titles and whatever the heck that one PlayStation 4 game was trying to be.
The PS4 Godzilla has tons of potential; the kaiju themselves look great, great sound, solid animation and weight, *being* the monster is inherently fun. All the criticism is valid though; Everyone but Godzilla has an extremely limited move-set with no expansion options, the campaign is criminally short with very limited re-playability, the size mechanic is heavily unbalanced, and of course *THE GENERATORS*. I think it holds potential to match or even surpass the Pipeworks trilogy. In any case, what we got was not that. It's sad because the dev obviously had the skill and passion. They only needed the time and budget. Edit: For the record: I did have fun with it! I enjoyed my time with it a lot for a few weeks! Even come back to it occasionally, just for one of the best (albeit rare) reps of Biollante, my favorite Kaiju! Still fun to control her on this and Unleashed. I liked it, but it's not exactly good overall. It just has so tantalizingly sweet untapped potential that I can't help but want more
@3:08 That's the result of a technique called dynamic resolution scaling, used in many Switch games to keep framerates consistent. I guess in this case, the game is swapping resolution so often to the point of distraction.
2:27: the TV Show on the left is by the same people that gave us those stop-motion holiday specials; in fact, Rankin-Bass use to be under “Videocraft International”. The King Kong series features an alternate universe that starts with the events of the movie happening, but King Kong is alive, and joined by an audience surrogate boy, with more adventures happening. 2:37: That's because, funny enough, Donkey Kong was not based on King Kong at all. If you remember, Miyamoto based the Donkey Kong game on Popeye, as it was originally planned to make a game based on the Popeye short "A Dream Walking", hence why the game took place at a construction site. Also, the reason Nintendo's Gorilla is called "Donkey Kong" is because Miyamoto wanted a name to catch the attention of American audiences, using words to describe a stubborn gorilla, a "Donkey" "Kong", if you will; in fact, in Japan, Kong is used as a word for a Gorilla. The only reason Nintendo got into a lawsuit is because Universal, who thought they owned the rights to King Kong, thought Donkey Kong was infringing on King Kong, when they published the license for a Tiger Electronics game called "King Kong"; this Donkey Kong ripoff has King Kong tossing Bombs, at a Firefighter who jumps over them, climbing the Empire State Building to rescue a blonde woman. Long story short, Nintendo won the court case with the help of a lawyer named John Kirby, and Donkey Kong continues on existing. 16:00: “It is a good shrubbery.” 42:21: Sounds like a broken record.
Love me some old Rankin/Bass holiday specials. Had no idea they did a King Kong series. Was that before, during, or after their stop-motion special spree?
@@BlazeHeartPanther probably before their holiday special spree, since back then, they were under the name of “Videocraft International”, which Rudolph was also produced under.
I always felt their comedy was a little "eh, hit or miss," kind of aiming for the "early 2000s fratboy" crowd at times, but definitely they are nothing if not thorough and do their research. For that, I have to commend them.
I knew this was going to be on the channel one day. Either this, Gollum, Quest for Balance, or Walking Dead Destinies. 2023 was just filled with Gollum-likes. Edit: I just got an idea for the next JBG video, Silent Hill Homecoming. A game that is basically key jiggling for Silent Hill fans
I remember rewatching the Worst Racing Games video you all did recently before this one came out, seeing Game Mill's name on Big Rigs was a huge surprise (and slightly not so surprising) after seeing their name everywhere lately pegged with bad games like this. It's crazy to imagine that they're still somehow publishing games so recently with that sort of track record on their backs. I feel like you could make an insane marathon of their games alone, but then again considering how long this one is by itself, you would probably lose your minds lol
You know it's a gem of a bad game and a royal screw up to the license when Kong feels like a regular gorilla. Also, for a suggestion for future games, might I suggest either Revenge of The Flying Dutchman, Gollem, or YIIK
Yes haha revenge of the flying dutchnan 😂. Have you ever played or heard of the survival horror Wii game "Escape from bug island"? I keep requesting that in hopes they'll cover it. It's dialogue and story are baffling. The way you use weapons is so convoluted and it's just functional enough to make for a truly great video haha. It's one of those games that could have had potential but it's all executed with extreme incompetence. It falls into the so bad it's good category for me but most ppl think it's JUST BAD so it would def work in this channel
Why Revenge of the Flying Dutchman? It’s not good but certainly not worth an episode, especially when you realize the developers went through hell making it.
@@Channeleven2345789 perhaps, but maybe it can be put in a compilation episode similar to the bad racing games. The reason I want it covered is that I had a personal experience with it on the PS2. Call it bias, but since I don't see people cover the game as much as it should, I feel it's worth of coverage
I had to look up what revenge of the Flying Dutchman was only to see pictures of at least two obviously different games. I can’t believe there are more SpongeBob games that have multiple games under the same title, like battle for bikini bottom. Hopefully there’s more in common than battle for bikini bottom
Fun fact is, that was first test alpha build developers send to the publisher. Some time later, the developers find out that it was released as a finished game.
Fun fact: King Kong was TECHNICALLY a book before a movie, a tie-in novel based off the screenplay was released in 1932, a few months before the actual movie 😅
when you presented that clip of the Kong animated series it just gave me a rush of nostalgia, i watched and loved that show a few years back, god the memories 🥲
This channel is such an underrated banger overall. I have been tuning into this channel since 2016/2017 and it is surprisingly still extremely fun, funny, and entertaining as hell.
I am somehow surprised that this game didn’t topple the developers and close their studios down like The Day Before did, however if you research these developers, they’ve made a lot of games like this. They do not care. Anyways hello Rerez! I hope you’ll get over the emotional turmoil this game brought. Edit: I’ve just realized yeah this is Game Mill studios, and I forgot about those two other games they’ve made that was horrible. Doing some research neither GameMill *NOR* Team6 has Rise of Kong on their games page. They’re trying to hide the fact they’ve made awful games. Edit to the edit: Iguanabee was the developer so they have the game on their site, they’ve just put the publishing rights on Team6 and GameMill.
Despite how little nostalgia i have for the Kong franchise now, i watched the first two episodes of the 1966 shows countless times back when my dad had an old VHS tape with them back in like 1992. I haven't cared for Kong in over 30 years now, but those two episodes still stick with me to this day for some strange reason, and ONLY those two episodes...
I mean, the idea of having all the abilities unlocked in the tutorial where you play as a different character who would logically be more experienced than the character we play as for most of the game makes sense
@@massgunner4152 you don't switch to a different character there and the first game was absolutely terrible with the excuse given. You get a light tap and all of your high tech armor is downgraded to hell. This never happens before or after that incident. At least Echoes had the Ing literally steal everything while the suit in the third game had to be modified due to your corruption. Objectively, Rise of Kong explains losing all of your stuff a hundred times better than MP1. It's still a weird choice when you don't even have many upgrades, but I'll take that over minor injury resetting everything.
@@massgunner4152 it doesn't ruin the game, but it's still really stupid and the game would be better off just starting you with nothing like Super Metroid and Metroid II. Don't give an explanation if it's gonna be a stupid one.
There’s something cathartic about Rerez’s descent into madness that is Just Bad Games. Maybe it’s our way of letting our money ghost finally rest in peace…. Especially after spending $39.99 on Absolute Zero (the pc game)
I’m so glad there is finally a new video up, sadly I bought this game. I didn’t know how bad it could be, how hard can it be to make a game about an giant ape fighting other monsters on an island be? Answer, pretty darn hard.
I greatly anticipated hearing about the background of the game's development when starting the video, but nothing could have prepared me to hear about the... "illustrious" and all-too-familiar background of the publisher. Great video!
I remember when Jedi Outcast pulled the "You must lose this fight" beat, but you had only guns while Desann had a light saber and was a SITH. (I later found out by using the cheats that he is invincible in this fight and you have to die to progress. There's also a bug there that can sometimes freeze the game, but that I believe was fixed). Point is, I've seen that done FAR better in a game 21 years older than Skull Island. Also, frozen waterfall? In 2023? I saw a flowing waterfall in Outwars 1998. Yeah it was a pixelated texture mapped onto a curved 2D plane, but, that thing was moving. There is no excuse here, cos I'm pretty sure thr Switch is more powerful than a machine running on Win98.
GoW 2 also does it pretty well and it even properly teases the player with what being at full power is like in the game, then stripping it away. Pretty hard to fight back against a god when you've just drained all your badass juice into a sword that just got smacked away from ya. That said, I remember one time playing through the start again, and I guess the disc was scratched _just right_ or something because instead of being in a weakened state during the Zeus fight, I could just go nuts on him and also discovered yeah, he's invincible lol. Still really funny to grind a major combo out on him while he very very low effort tries to kill you.
@@Rad-Dude63andathird You know, I had a VERY similar experience to that, years ago. I was playing Starfighter 3000 and the level Command and Control usually strips you of all your weapons, save for a level 2 laser (out of like ten levels), but I paused for a sec, then all my weapons came back. Let me tell you, fighting the boss "wheel stations" had never been so easy. They went down so fast. Shame it never happened again. That was so fun.
🎯 Key Takeaways for quick navigation: 00:00 🎮 *Overview of Skull Island: Rise of Kong* - Skull Island: Rise of Kong is an action platformer game developed by iguane and published by gamil entertainment. - Originating from the 1933 film, King Kong, the game explores the story of the colossal ape species living on Skull Island. - The game features muddy visuals, buggy mechanics, and lacks attention to detail, impacting the overall gaming experience. 03:00 🎬 *Game Start and Initial Gameplay Impressions* - The game's start screen exhibits noticeable visual glitches and asset problems, setting a disappointing tone for the gameplay experience. - Initial gameplay reveals muddy textures, unresponsive camera controls, and levitation glitches, indicating poor game optimization. - Despite attempts to immerse players in Kong lore, the game's visual and technical flaws detract from the overall immersion. 04:22 🕹️ *Introduction to Kong's Gameplay Mechanics* - Players control Kong, utilizing basic attacks, special moves like hurling chunks of Earth, and iconic chest-thumping abilities. - Gameplay mechanics include exploration, combat encounters with enemies like the "papasaurus," and encountering environmental obstacles. - The game's combat system lacks depth, with repetitive enemy encounters and simplistic strategies for defeating them. 06:41 🌧️ *Encounter with Night Storms and Initial Combat* - Night storms introduce environmental challenges, adding atmosphere to gameplay but lack significant gameplay impact. - Combat encounters with enemies, such as the papasaurus, demonstrate simple button-mashing mechanics and lack strategic depth. - Glaring design flaws, including invisible walls and environmental glitches, detract from the immersive experience. 08:21 🌊 *Exploration and Environmental Anomalies* - Exploration reveals environmental anomalies like glitched waterfalls and climbable surfaces, highlighting the game's lack of polish. - The absence of clear objectives or guidance in navigating Skull Island leads to confusion and frustration for players. - Environmental design flaws and inconsistent mechanics undermine the game's potential for immersive exploration. 11:52 🔴 *Encounter with Glaring Design Issues* - Glaring design issues, including buggy animations, invisible walls, and broken combat mechanics, hinder the player's experience. - Frustrating encounters, such as Mama Kong's forced defeat in a scripted cutscene, disrupt immersion and player agency. - Poorly executed game design choices, like inadequate tutorials and inconsistent gameplay mechanics, contribute to player dissatisfaction. 16:22 🦍 *Transition to Playing as Adult Kong* - Transitioning from playing as Baby Kong to Adult Kong occurs abruptly, skipping crucial developmental gameplay stages. - Lack of character progression and missed opportunities for immersive storytelling diminish the game's narrative depth. - Players feel cheated out of experiencing Kong's growth and development, resulting in a less engaging gaming experience. 22:36 🦀 *Issues with Skill Points and Abilities* - Skill points are scarce, hindering progression in the skill tree. - Lack of skill points from defeating enemies disrupts the learning curve and frustrates players. - Locked abilities impede exploration and gameplay mechanics, undermining player satisfaction. 24:02 🗺️ *Exploration and Ability Locking* - Exploration gated by inaccessible abilities and locked sections. - Contrasts with games like Metroid and Hollow Knight, where abilities are gradually introduced. - Locked abilities hinder player agency and disrupt immersion, leading to frustration. 27:26 🐒 *Gameplay Mechanics and Level Design* - Encounter buggy platforming and gameplay mechanics, such as clipping through floors. - Level design flaws include poorly placed assets, texture stretching, and lack of visual polish. - Inconsistent gameplay experiences detract from immersion and enjoyment. 29:01 🎮 *Gameplay Frustrations and Design Oversight* - Frustration with inaccessible abilities required for progression. - Lack of essential features like character positioning on the map and backtracking aids. - Disappointment with core gameplay elements, such as combat and platforming mechanics. 31:21 💼 *Publisher Influence and Game Quality* - Publisher constraints, including tight schedules and limited resources, impact game quality. - Game Mill Entertainment's history suggests a focus on quantity over quality. - Examining other titles published by Game Mill reveals a pattern of subpar releases. 37:53 🌳 *Transition to New Game Zone and Exploration* - Introduction of a new game zone, Jungle Wetland, with visual changes but minimal gameplay impact. - Frustration with the lack of map indicators and navigational aids. - Continued encounter with bugs and glitches, disrupting immersion and gameplay flow. 42:00 🌿 *Dark Jungle Exploration and Gameplay Anomalies* - Exploration of the Dark Jungle introduces new enemies and challenges. - Persistent bugs, including teleportation to previous areas and non-functioning enemy encounters. - Frustration mounts due to game-breaking anomalies and lack of player control over progression. Made with HARPA AI
What really sucks is the expressions that Kong model pulls are pretty good, and a lot of the concept art is really great. Some talented people worked on this trash and I genuinely feel sorry for the devs and artists.
@@Giran_0 I still sometimes hear those lines the director would shout in my dreams. They payed for 3 lines of dialogue and by god were they gonna use them
Hey Rerez! I loved watching your videos! ❤ Especially Burglar X your first Just Bad Games video, a classic! Speaking of obscure games, you should check out Spectral Tower, the first RPG made by Idea Factory, a Company known for making terrible RPGs, it has the worst game mechanics known to man, I don’t want to say too much to ruin the surprise, but it definitely deserves to be on Just Bad Games! I would to see you guys play it and hear your funny reactions and edits! ❤🎉
Speaking of GameMill, guess what else they made last year... "Walking Dead: Destinies"! They're a gift that keeps on giving you guys material for Just Bad Games! Whee!!
Worth noting that GameMill also published the Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl games, Smash-like platform fighters both developed by Ludosity and Fair Play Labs, and those games are actually pretty fun. Goes to show that you don't judge a game based on their publisher.
True, but (and I speak as someone who's played both games) evidently, the first game was extremely rushed. No idea if this was because of GameMill or Nickelodeon, but it was released with many things absent that you'd probably expect from a Smash-like game, such as the option to have items or (like the first two Nick Kart Racers) any voice acting. Ludosity/FPL did add both of these later on, but still... Luckily, Nick Brawl 2 was certainly more polished in that aspect.
@@killdozer7792 Yeah I can tell the first one was rushed. It was good and fun for what it was, and the quality of life patches did make it feel a lot more complete. I think 2 was rushed a bit as well, which is probably why a whopping 11 characters from the first one were axed, but it still feels a lot more polished overall.
I've seen other people cover this game but I love how you all give us the full, detailed breakdown of every aspect. It's like I can taste the rotten instead of merely smelling it.
I never understood why people keep using Roblox for comparisons, Roblox has so many different kinds of games that it's basically impossible to use it as a comparison. While there are games that look like crappy plastic but at the same time, there are games that look amazing and look better than some triple a games nowadays.
Ima be honest, i thought that swamp was oil and said "Why is there oil in the water? THERES NO PEOPLE TO DRILL FOR IT!!!" only to get cut off mid yell to hear that very flammable looking liquid is just water.🤣
@@SatanenPerkele I know, it's deep underground, not just chilling on the surface water, you gotta drill pretty deep for it tho... You don't just turn a corner and "Oh hey I better not drink this water it's loaded with oil"
@@SatanenPerkele huh... I actually didn't know that. Prolly makes a long way up irl, but I doubt the devs were thinking that for this game though if that's "normal" boggy swamp water.
Fun fact about the first gaw fight you are correct about the fight being scripted footage I saw always die to him and never actually deal any real damage to him however I actually find it really interesting that the game did have a Fail-Safe but hey it's interesting I've seen a lot of games have a failsafe for those battles that you're meant to lose however some of those battles that you're meant to lose to don't have such a state in fact actually have an alternative ending
24:55 This section is actually wrong about something- Most Metroid games typically do the same thing as Rise of Kong. Samus starts out with her full kit, and then loses it due to cutscene shenanigans, and has to get everything back as the game progresses.
@@assassin8636 while there were indeed *some* really good gems, for every battle for bikini bottom there's three jimmy neutron: boy geniuses (and there literally is three!)
No list of "licensed game trash" would be complete without Dalmatians 3 or Snow White & The 7 Clever Boys or Animal Soccer World (or any such crazy formulaic fairy-tale-licensed "game" from Phoenix/Dingo/LJN/whatever, for that matter).
Kong is actually an introspective masterpiece, as it serves as a symbol of GameMill's internal structure. Which is that their coding and art teams are all comprised of actual monkeys from the zoo.
24:17 "No that can't be right. Why would they do that? Why would they show you moves in the game's tutorial if you weren't supposed to make use of those moves immediately?" That's actually not uncommon with open world games that have a progression system. Start with a fully powered character so the player can immediately enjoy the best experience in traversal and combat, feeling powerful, then at the end of the prologue, remove those. Then the players can gradually earn them during the main game. Prototype does this by making the prologue a flash forward that happens towards the end of the game, for example. It was actually one of the thing that really drew me into this game. So it *can* be done right. Not here, obviously. First the moves you get in preview don't make the movement feel different, they're basically metroidvania keys. The counter-examples you showed are all metroidvanias, which is precisely when previewing like that is the opposite of helpful. Then it's not made clear that you start with a young Kong that has a lot to learn. It gave me the impression that he already did all his rising off-screen with that intro.
Looks like they shipped an early version of the game then patched the finished version on the quiet with the hope no one would notice their mistake, love the video guys Just Bad Games is my jam.
all the funny parts in the video 1:08 the snatching is a girl screaming. 1:11 the searching is also a girl screaming. 1:15 dinosaur fights are just a girl screaming. 1:32 Kong goes up empire state. building 1:36 Kong goes down empire state building. 9:08 a scene from king Kong 9:30 slow climb 15:52 the cutscene that plays out in which your supposed to lose. 16:09 a character 21:26.............BABY SKULL............ 23:53 YOU NEED TO LEARN THE HOLD HEAVY ATTACK TO DESTROY THIS DEBRIS 27:16 yay we can keep playing skull island rise of Kong 27:34 Kong drops object on purpose 29:33 Kong goes through the wall 30:43 first boss down 42:19 explore and explore and explore 44:12 Kong falls out of bounds 44:53 It takes Kong two tries to break wall then Adam says that words can't express how much he wants the game to end 46:07 flashback of the first Gaw boss and calling it the easiest boss 46:44 Shane calls a picture of Gaw the day Kong's parents were brutally murdered 48:30 the Kong dance 53:23 Shane talking about how scary Gaw is and mentions the feet that still don't touch the ground 54:16 Gaw breaks itself while playing the best soundtrack of the game 54:40 Kong ruining the purpose of the final boss while playing funny music 54:50 Kong kills Gaw for papa Kong and mama Kong which makes sense, but he also kills Gaw for making him chase him through the jive Doody Bot game 55:08 woo we murdered 1:01:22 a scene from Kong vs Godzilla
Should also make another "Just bad games" video on "Transformers: Rise of the Dark Spark"? I mean it has bad graphics, bad story, and even bad gameplay.
"Man this video's REALLY hard to look at... Maybe I should try upping the quality."
Video was already set to *4K*
".... Oh no."
Such is the horrors of Nintendo consoles...not that this game look THAT much better on the PS consoles anyway
@@nonamepasserbya6658 Trust me... it's the game
@nonamepasserbya6658 idk Man, there's some decent looking things on there. This game is some kind of experiment gone wrong...... 😷
@@nonamepasserbya6658 games by monolithsoft really push the hardware into making such stunning and beautiful games despite the lower hardware fidelity. Trust me, it is the game
@@nonamepasserbya6658 This is not entirely true, nor is it fair. Games like Metroid Prime Remastered, Doom and Doom Eternal and Alien Isolation look fantastic on the Switch.
Then again, The Outer Worlds looks and runs like a kick in the nuts.
It’s genuinely depressing to see what Iguanabee had in terms of its initial concept vs what they ended up making. They seem like they had a ton of passion and love behind it. Hell, it maybe could’ve rivaled the iconic Peter Jackson Kong game, only for GameMill to come in and completely annihilate any chance of this passion being realized.
The fact that GameMill is still even allowed to publish games is just upsetting. So many publishers get closed down for less, yet they’re here giving us stuff that even the bargain bin would feel ripped off by.
I think is really sad mocking this game made by like two guys and basically no budget
GameMill has no expectations, but then again their prominent game was "Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing", so let that say what it will.
Yep. Super sad.
From what I understand is it is a viscous cycle Iguanabee wants to make a good game and have the talent, but just to survive they have to take projects from companies like Gamemill and if I remember gave Iguanabee no money and only a year to make this. Since all Iguanabee has for their portfolio is games like Kong they can't get out from under predatory publishers like Gamemill and onto actual projects with actual funds and time. To put it simply Iguanabee is trapped.
@@leandrocz1606 Disagree. I think it's fair especially since they make it very very clear that it's Game mills fault and not the devs. Hell if it wasn't for this video I wouldn't even know about their other game which I've now added to my wishlist on steam.
The fact that GameMills were sane enough to publish Big Rigs and are still able to make games today surprises me.
I wouldn't be surprised if they turned out to be a front for a money laundering scheme
Sane?
I beg your PARGON?
How do they keep getting thier hands on huge titles like the last airbender game?
@@Smellytotsor the walking dead
@@Smellytots Best offer auction???
I’m beginning to think GameMill is the reincarnation of LJN. I mean think about. Both companies typically get usually talented developers, rushes them, and aggressively releases trash games. Oh, and they snatch up almost every popular licensed property they can get their hands on!
The difference is that LJN actually out out a game or two that was fairly decent. JAWS on the NES was actually a lot of fun.
LJN werent developers, they were just publishers... which is why ive always felt the modern equivalent of Laughin' Jokin' Numbnuts would be Activision
@@thepolarphantasm2319 GameMill is also a publisher.
I used to say that the "Modern LJN" had to be the now-defunct Data Design Interactive, but I'm seriously thinking GameMill is vying for that title.
@@Yuli_Ban for a while we had one guy- fella named Gilson B. Pontes- who was on track to be an LJN of One
Its like the developers played Life of Black Tiger and said, "We need that, but with King Kong."
Black Tiger: [BOMBASTIC SIDE EYE] For *Shame...*
Fred Fuchs will be laughing his ass off in heaven at the thought of Shane and Adam wasting money on that game.
They need to do it.
Iguanabee got very little resources and only *one year to make game* - no wonder this game is as it is
The Publishers, Not the developers.
that’s so true about Black Tiger, lolol.
Note this games failure is mostly the publishers fault. Iguanabee was given 1 year to make it and was forced to come up with story themselves with the only directions coming from gamemill being "skull island, king kong". Funnily enough, gamemill is known for milling out trash tier games, like rise of kong and the walking dead destinies.
I mean, it's in their name:
GAME
MILL
Wasn’t it one year?
@@valivali8104 you are right. I guess i should have refreshed my memory before posting my comment. Thanks for the correction.
@@FrostTheRedeemed even one year was too little time, and having too little time was main point 👍
this is mentioned in the video
They somehow managed to make it feel like you, playing as KING KONG, were the size of a regular gorilla.
considering the size of everything else and the fact they appear to use velociraptors instead of t-rexs i think they legit forgot
BRILLIANT
But a really slow, lumbering gorilla.
You know, I can kind of imagine how Kong's size could've been a game mechanic. Intro is the same, except the big bad dino boss towers over the Kong family, and they sacrifice themselves to let him escape.
You start out as Baby Kong, and work your way up the food chain, hunting down the "kings/queens" of the island to eat them and absorb whatever makes them huge. In the beginning, you're small, and you have to go after smaller enemies, like spiders and raptors, until you reach the first boss (which would be the spider, because spiders are small, so a giant one would still be smaller than a giant dinosaur). You beat it, and then you get a time-skip, after which point Kong is adult sized and much bigger, and now you can just squash the spiders you had to fight before under your foot. Then, you hunt down the crab, then the giant sandworm, and finally the three dinosaur "underlings", and each time you get a time-skip, Kong grows in size, and that changes up exploration. He's now bigger and stronger, so he can break the stone walls and floors and swat away old enemies and mini-bosses, but in exchange he can no longer climb the vines or traverse certain narrow areas, because he's too big and heavy.
Then, in the finale, Kong faces off against the dino boss from the beginning, but now he's the bigger one, and beats it to a pulp, and since he now took down all the "kings/queens" of Skull Island, he becomes King Kong. Simple, straightforward, easy.
But then again, when you're a developer studio with a shovelware publisher breathing down your neck, demanding a game to be finished in one year and pushing out an obvious alpha build as a full release, complete with MTX, ideas to integrate your gameplay and story and streamline them are meaningless, because that's the least of your problems.
In other words, you'd more ironically be playing as Donkey Kong if he were a bad monkey from the start and stayed bad instead.
"It was GameMill killed the beast."
- 'King Kong' (1933)
Look, we all would've been happy with the commentary, but the insane amount of work you put into the edits does not go unnoticed. This channel is an absolute gem in a sea of low effort talking-about-things-that-are-bad content ❤
Unedited video are just the Starfield of videos.
Oh hey, I watch you when you upload. Neat.
You here? Now that's a pleasant surprise
Right on brother! I only wish I could edit videos like these two do. Outstanding work and his channel deserve more subs and views.
Agreed I know this channels pretty old, but they are like a breath of fresh air compared to a lot of bad video game review channels.
Even the name "Game Mill" should be a red flag. They do know what "Mill" means colloquially, right? Like diploma mills? Or puppy mills?
That's my take exactly.
"GameMill" sounds like a Simpsons gag about a soulless corporate factory farm that manufactures Interactive Digital Entertainment Product™ and yet it's real and it's exactly what the name sounds like.
@@Yuli_Ban
It's even how their website reads, self-awareness is something they lack lol
The thing is
If you are a consumer, or someone who cares about... Things. Then sure, this is a negative connotation.
But if you're a particular kind of middle manager, looking for the cheapest contractor possible? A Mill is _exactly what you want_ -- GameMill continues to exist because this is their market. Licensors wanting to make a "Game" for merchandising reasons that is as cheap and quick as humanly possible, because the point is not and was never to make something good, it's just to make _a thing_ so you can use it for cross promotion. And any suckers that buy it, well, that's on them.
Or Heather Mills?
I only associate "mill" with stuff like a grain/flour mill... Still fits tho... They grind aspects of a game down into a fine dust of what could've been a good game... or smth...
Rerez + Recent Awful Game = I’M HERE AT LIGHT SPEED!!!
Fun fact: Universal sued Nintendo for the usage of Kong in DK's name, but Nintendo won out in the end. The lawyer who won that case was named Kirby, hence why HAL Laboratory's little pink puffball shares the name.
i thought about john kirby from white house
The theory of Kirby being a reference to John Kirby was actually disproven by Miyamoto himself if I recall.
They had asked Nintendo of America to give a name to Kirby, I suppose because Nintendo of America had named a large variety of characters for NoJ like Luigi, the Koopalings, and others like them. And the staff at NoA literally picked it from a hat which had a bunch of names.
It is also worth randomly mentioning Kirby, the grumpy old vacuum, from The Brave Little Toaster.
They both share the same name, and they both *SUCK* ....air, and stuff.
@@BloodWraith777thats just cause Kirby is a brand of vaccums
Ironic considering Nintendo itself is one of the most aggressively litigious companies in existence.
I'm so glad you talked about the weird scale of the game world because this was instantly bugging me. King Kong looks way too small here, even if we go by his smallest canonical height. I get that you have to make compromises between having a cool giant ape as the player character and having an open world that still makes a bit of sense scale-wise, but still, he's tiny compared to everything else on this supposed island.
I don't think teasing you with unlockable abilities in the Tutorial is that bad; Metroid does that almost every time too, but the big difference is obviously that it has a functioning map and great level design that reward exploration and makes you want to regain all these abilities instead of making you feel frustrated at the fact that you can't access most of the level suddenly.
Also the irony of a publisher calling themselves Game Mill being mostly known for churning out subpar licensed games is so funny. You can't make that up.
About the last part, that's not irony, it's fitting.
Psychonauts did the same thing with Basic Braining
Not all of their licensed games are subpar, I will always be a defender of the Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl games.
If I’m not mistaken, a god of war did something similar, too. Tell me if I’m wrong though, i never played it.
Ya know. The concept of a game where you play as a young Kong slowly making his way to the top of the food chain on Skull Island. Sounds really fun. Too bad the developers had twenty bucks and a long weekend.
Twenty bucks and a long weekend would likely have resulted in a better game because it would be short and tightly focused.
That Kong puppet for the musical was really impressive.
I actually want to watch just to see that thing in action tbh
i was lucky enough to actually see it on broadway, it was as amazing as it looked.
1:23 King Kong sniffing his two fingers after touching her LOL
Smells like fish
King Kong deserves much better than this. The old Xbox 360 Peter Jackson game was diamond plated gold compared to this thing. Godzilla also deserves a proper new game too instead of being left for cameos on other titles and whatever the heck that one PlayStation 4 game was trying to be.
it was released on PS2, Xbox, Gamecube, PC
it wasn't an Xbox 360 game
@@bassram3337it was release on 360 as well
@@GHOST-zy3ji yes but still, it was a 6th gen game
That PS4 game was more of a photo mode with an annoying minigame attatched that you had to play to unlock characters
The PS4 Godzilla has tons of potential; the kaiju themselves look great, great sound, solid animation and weight, *being* the monster is inherently fun. All the criticism is valid though; Everyone but Godzilla has an extremely limited move-set with no expansion options, the campaign is criminally short with very limited re-playability, the size mechanic is heavily unbalanced, and of course *THE GENERATORS*.
I think it holds potential to match or even surpass the Pipeworks trilogy. In any case, what we got was not that. It's sad because the dev obviously had the skill and passion. They only needed the time and budget.
Edit: For the record: I did have fun with it! I enjoyed my time with it a lot for a few weeks! Even come back to it occasionally, just for one of the best (albeit rare) reps of Biollante, my favorite Kaiju! Still fun to control her on this and Unleashed. I liked it, but it's not exactly good overall. It just has so tantalizingly sweet untapped potential that I can't help but want more
53:20 bruh, the tail broke as it was swinging mid cutscene 💀
I love how Team 6 Game Studios is becoming the LJN of Rerez.
For racing games, at least.
@3:08 That's the result of a technique called dynamic resolution scaling, used in many Switch games to keep framerates consistent. I guess in this case, the game is swapping resolution so often to the point of distraction.
Imagine making a game so bad that a video ranting about it has to be AN HOUR LONG
Sonic the Hedgehog (2006) and RUclipsr TheGreatClement went on a seven video rant that lasted three hours total…
Imagine making a game so bad, that a youtube channel dedicated to bad video games makes it’s LONGEST EVER video about you
uh, duke nukem forever?
@redbulbuniverseyes
@@lvl90dru1dDuke is different. There’s a lot more to unpack with what was an icon like duke and the fall from grace vs something like this
2:27: the TV Show on the left is by the same people that gave us those stop-motion holiday specials; in fact, Rankin-Bass use to be under “Videocraft International”. The King Kong series features an alternate universe that starts with the events of the movie happening, but King Kong is alive, and joined by an audience surrogate boy, with more adventures happening.
2:37: That's because, funny enough, Donkey Kong was not based on King Kong at all. If you remember, Miyamoto based the Donkey Kong game on Popeye, as it was originally planned to make a game based on the Popeye short "A Dream Walking", hence why the game took place at a construction site. Also, the reason Nintendo's Gorilla is called "Donkey Kong" is because Miyamoto wanted a name to catch the attention of American audiences, using words to describe a stubborn gorilla, a "Donkey" "Kong", if you will; in fact, in Japan, Kong is used as a word for a Gorilla.
The only reason Nintendo got into a lawsuit is because Universal, who thought they owned the rights to King Kong, thought Donkey Kong was infringing on King Kong, when they published the license for a Tiger Electronics game called "King Kong"; this Donkey Kong ripoff has King Kong tossing Bombs, at a Firefighter who jumps over them, climbing the Empire State Building to rescue a blonde woman. Long story short, Nintendo won the court case with the help of a lawyer named John Kirby, and Donkey Kong continues on existing.
16:00: “It is a good shrubbery.”
42:21: Sounds like a broken record.
NI
Love me some old Rankin/Bass holiday specials. Had no idea they did a King Kong series. Was that before, during, or after their stop-motion special spree?
@@BlazeHeartPanther during the stop motion spree. It was also animated by Toei doga of DBZ, sailor moon and one piece fame for budget reasons.
@@BlazeHeartPanther probably before their holiday special spree, since back then, they were under the name of “Videocraft International”, which Rudolph was also produced under.
One of my favorite things about this series is how in-depth it goes. No stone goes unturned with these two jokers
I always felt their comedy was a little "eh, hit or miss," kind of aiming for the "early 2000s fratboy" crowd at times, but definitely they are nothing if not thorough and do their research. For that, I have to commend them.
I knew this was going to be on the channel one day. Either this, Gollum, Quest for Balance, or Walking Dead Destinies. 2023 was just filled with Gollum-likes.
Edit: I just got an idea for the next JBG video, Silent Hill Homecoming. A game that is basically key jiggling for Silent Hill fans
Gollum-likes should be a new genre, it will make dollars.
I remember rewatching the Worst Racing Games video you all did recently before this one came out, seeing Game Mill's name on Big Rigs was a huge surprise (and slightly not so surprising) after seeing their name everywhere lately pegged with bad games like this. It's crazy to imagine that they're still somehow publishing games so recently with that sort of track record on their backs. I feel like you could make an insane marathon of their games alone, but then again considering how long this one is by itself, you would probably lose your minds lol
This game is so bad, when the second spider boss fight glitched out? MY INTERNET CRASHED AND THE VIDEO FROZE. I laughed my ass off at the timing.
Opitmus Primal: Well, that's just prime!
Is that a Phelous reference?
@@crazyluigi6664 nah optimus primal was a character from Transformers Beast wars , it was basically his catch phrase saying Well that's just prime
@@Reploid-dj9jc Of course it was that. I said that because I remember Phelous used that clip himself a few times also.
@@crazyluigi6664 I honestly forgot Phelous using Optimus Primal's quote. Forgive me for not responding to your initial reply.
@@leemcdonald1342 Heh, it's all good, man. Just glad that someone else knew what I was getting at there. ;)
honestly gamemill itself could get its own video in this series
theres a lot to unpack there
"Gamemill, it's in the -game- Name."
It's hard to believe I've been watching this series since there were only four or five videos, and now there are 50. Great work guys!
Didn’t know Scott the woz and what happened dude were buddies!
You know it's a gem of a bad game and a royal screw up to the license when Kong feels like a regular gorilla. Also, for a suggestion for future games, might I suggest either Revenge of The Flying Dutchman, Gollem, or YIIK
Yes haha revenge of the flying dutchnan 😂. Have you ever played or heard of the survival horror Wii game "Escape from bug island"? I keep requesting that in hopes they'll cover it. It's dialogue and story are baffling. The way you use weapons is so convoluted and it's just functional enough to make for a truly great video haha. It's one of those games that could have had potential but it's all executed with extreme incompetence. It falls into the so bad it's good category for me but most ppl think it's JUST BAD so it would def work in this channel
@@jasonjones7461 I've heard of it a long time ago. Would love to see it covered as it's not talked about as much online
Why Revenge of the Flying Dutchman? It’s not good but certainly not worth an episode, especially when you realize the developers went through hell making it.
@@Channeleven2345789 perhaps, but maybe it can be put in a compilation episode similar to the bad racing games. The reason I want it covered is that I had a personal experience with it on the PS2. Call it bias, but since I don't see people cover the game as much as it should, I feel it's worth of coverage
I had to look up what revenge of the Flying Dutchman was only to see pictures of at least two obviously different games. I can’t believe there are more SpongeBob games that have multiple games under the same title, like battle for bikini bottom. Hopefully there’s more in common than battle for bikini bottom
Reminder that GameMill is the same publisher that gave the world Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing
Oh Holy night...
I'm genuinely wondering if GameMill is just a front for a money laundering scheme.
Fun fact is, that was first test alpha build developers send to the publisher. Some time later, the developers find out that it was released as a finished game.
Fun fact - watch the frigging video 😆
@@2Scribble AND ITS SEQUEL!
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Ooo, this one is gonna be a doozy
Do mario party the top 100
Fun fact: King Kong was TECHNICALLY a book before a movie, a tie-in novel based off the screenplay was released in 1932, a few months before the actual movie 😅
And unlike the movie, that novel is actually in the public domain.
Rise of Kong is like if Kong himself tried to program a game
Even he could make a better game than this.
when you presented that clip of the Kong animated series it just gave me a rush of nostalgia, i watched and loved that show a few years back, god the memories 🥲
This channel is such an underrated banger overall. I have been tuning into this channel since 2016/2017 and it is surprisingly still extremely fun, funny, and entertaining as hell.
I am somehow surprised that this game didn’t topple the developers and close their studios down like The Day Before did, however if you research these developers, they’ve made a lot of games like this. They do not care.
Anyways hello Rerez! I hope you’ll get over the emotional turmoil this game brought.
Edit: I’ve just realized yeah this is Game Mill studios, and I forgot about those two other games they’ve made that was horrible. Doing some research neither GameMill *NOR* Team6 has Rise of Kong on their games page.
They’re trying to hide the fact they’ve made awful games.
Edit to the edit: Iguanabee was the developer so they have the game on their site, they’ve just put the publishing rights on Team6 and GameMill.
Kind surprised that the game had many crabs as enemies.
And still you guys didn't make a "giant enemy crab" joke, what a missed opportunity.
Let's be honest, most viewers weren't even alive in 2006.
@@Popebug
Same I could say with 1933.
After all we are talking about a game based on a very old IP. 😂
@@Totavier Speaking of very old IPs, not even Greek mythology deserves this sort of mistreatment.
Despite how little nostalgia i have for the Kong franchise now, i watched the first two episodes of the 1966 shows countless times back when my dad had an old VHS tape with them back in like 1992.
I haven't cared for Kong in over 30 years now, but those two episodes still stick with me to this day for some strange reason, and ONLY those two episodes...
Adam and Shane, Thank you for using your talents to make this incredible hour of comedy.
I thought it was one guy doing two voices as a joke
Saw new Rerez in my feed, exclaimed "nice!", realized it was an hour and in a high pitched voice exclaimed that fact immediately afterwards.
I mean, the idea of having all the abilities unlocked in the tutorial where you play as a different character who would logically be more experienced than the character we play as for most of the game makes sense
It's still horribly paced.
Metroid prime did this, but Metroid prime is a good game.
@@massgunner4152 you don't switch to a different character there and the first game was absolutely terrible with the excuse given. You get a light tap and all of your high tech armor is downgraded to hell. This never happens before or after that incident.
At least Echoes had the Ing literally steal everything while the suit in the third game had to be modified due to your corruption.
Objectively, Rise of Kong explains losing all of your stuff a hundred times better than MP1. It's still a weird choice when you don't even have many upgrades, but I'll take that over minor injury resetting everything.
@@anothenblue2630 i mean failing to explain the first time Samust starts with no -bitches- upgrades doesn't completely ruin the game.
@@massgunner4152 it doesn't ruin the game, but it's still really stupid and the game would be better off just starting you with nothing like Super Metroid and Metroid II. Don't give an explanation if it's gonna be a stupid one.
40:06 "Stones shall not hurt me?"
-Morphman
i fuckin love how funny you two are together in every video you make, its gotta be a hard thing to pull off consistently
35:50 Adam: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
35:55 Adam: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO😭
I was at a Gamestop and saw this game and just started laughing beause it was right next to Balan Wonderworld and Gollum.
Wow the workers actually tried to warn their customers by placing them together
@@Reploid-dj9jcThe unholy trinity lol
If that version of Kong thought Godzilla, Godzilla would had already won😂
Thank you for persevering all the way through these games so we can enjoy them. ;)
There’s something cathartic about Rerez’s descent into madness that is Just Bad Games.
Maybe it’s our way of letting our money ghost finally rest in peace…. Especially after spending $39.99 on Absolute Zero (the pc game)
I’m so glad there is finally a new video up, sadly I bought this game. I didn’t know how bad it could be, how hard can it be to make a game about an giant ape fighting other monsters on an island be? Answer, pretty darn hard.
I greatly anticipated hearing about the background of the game's development when starting the video, but nothing could have prepared me to hear about the... "illustrious" and all-too-familiar background of the publisher. Great video!
“The clock has stop ticking, The hell are you waiting for?” Is a sentence this game goes by
It's criminal that this channel doesn't have at least a million subscribers.
I remember when Jedi Outcast pulled the "You must lose this fight" beat, but you had only guns while Desann had a light saber and was a SITH. (I later found out by using the cheats that he is invincible in this fight and you have to die to progress. There's also a bug there that can sometimes freeze the game, but that I believe was fixed). Point is, I've seen that done FAR better in a game 21 years older than Skull Island.
Also, frozen waterfall? In 2023? I saw a flowing waterfall in Outwars 1998. Yeah it was a pixelated texture mapped onto a curved 2D plane, but, that thing was moving. There is no excuse here, cos I'm pretty sure thr Switch is more powerful than a machine running on Win98.
GoW 2 also does it pretty well and it even properly teases the player with what being at full power is like in the game, then stripping it away.
Pretty hard to fight back against a god when you've just drained all your badass juice into a sword that just got smacked away from ya.
That said, I remember one time playing through the start again, and I guess the disc was scratched _just right_ or something because instead of being in a weakened state during the Zeus fight, I could just go nuts on him and also discovered yeah, he's invincible lol. Still really funny to grind a major combo out on him while he very very low effort tries to kill you.
@@Rad-Dude63andathird You know, I had a VERY similar experience to that, years ago. I was playing Starfighter 3000 and the level Command and Control usually strips you of all your weapons, save for a level 2 laser (out of like ten levels), but I paused for a sec, then all my weapons came back. Let me tell you, fighting the boss "wheel stations" had never been so easy. They went down so fast. Shame it never happened again. That was so fun.
🎯 Key Takeaways for quick navigation:
00:00 🎮 *Overview of Skull Island: Rise of Kong*
- Skull Island: Rise of Kong is an action platformer game developed by iguane and published by gamil entertainment.
- Originating from the 1933 film, King Kong, the game explores the story of the colossal ape species living on Skull Island.
- The game features muddy visuals, buggy mechanics, and lacks attention to detail, impacting the overall gaming experience.
03:00 🎬 *Game Start and Initial Gameplay Impressions*
- The game's start screen exhibits noticeable visual glitches and asset problems, setting a disappointing tone for the gameplay experience.
- Initial gameplay reveals muddy textures, unresponsive camera controls, and levitation glitches, indicating poor game optimization.
- Despite attempts to immerse players in Kong lore, the game's visual and technical flaws detract from the overall immersion.
04:22 🕹️ *Introduction to Kong's Gameplay Mechanics*
- Players control Kong, utilizing basic attacks, special moves like hurling chunks of Earth, and iconic chest-thumping abilities.
- Gameplay mechanics include exploration, combat encounters with enemies like the "papasaurus," and encountering environmental obstacles.
- The game's combat system lacks depth, with repetitive enemy encounters and simplistic strategies for defeating them.
06:41 🌧️ *Encounter with Night Storms and Initial Combat*
- Night storms introduce environmental challenges, adding atmosphere to gameplay but lack significant gameplay impact.
- Combat encounters with enemies, such as the papasaurus, demonstrate simple button-mashing mechanics and lack strategic depth.
- Glaring design flaws, including invisible walls and environmental glitches, detract from the immersive experience.
08:21 🌊 *Exploration and Environmental Anomalies*
- Exploration reveals environmental anomalies like glitched waterfalls and climbable surfaces, highlighting the game's lack of polish.
- The absence of clear objectives or guidance in navigating Skull Island leads to confusion and frustration for players.
- Environmental design flaws and inconsistent mechanics undermine the game's potential for immersive exploration.
11:52 🔴 *Encounter with Glaring Design Issues*
- Glaring design issues, including buggy animations, invisible walls, and broken combat mechanics, hinder the player's experience.
- Frustrating encounters, such as Mama Kong's forced defeat in a scripted cutscene, disrupt immersion and player agency.
- Poorly executed game design choices, like inadequate tutorials and inconsistent gameplay mechanics, contribute to player dissatisfaction.
16:22 🦍 *Transition to Playing as Adult Kong*
- Transitioning from playing as Baby Kong to Adult Kong occurs abruptly, skipping crucial developmental gameplay stages.
- Lack of character progression and missed opportunities for immersive storytelling diminish the game's narrative depth.
- Players feel cheated out of experiencing Kong's growth and development, resulting in a less engaging gaming experience.
22:36 🦀 *Issues with Skill Points and Abilities*
- Skill points are scarce, hindering progression in the skill tree.
- Lack of skill points from defeating enemies disrupts the learning curve and frustrates players.
- Locked abilities impede exploration and gameplay mechanics, undermining player satisfaction.
24:02 🗺️ *Exploration and Ability Locking*
- Exploration gated by inaccessible abilities and locked sections.
- Contrasts with games like Metroid and Hollow Knight, where abilities are gradually introduced.
- Locked abilities hinder player agency and disrupt immersion, leading to frustration.
27:26 🐒 *Gameplay Mechanics and Level Design*
- Encounter buggy platforming and gameplay mechanics, such as clipping through floors.
- Level design flaws include poorly placed assets, texture stretching, and lack of visual polish.
- Inconsistent gameplay experiences detract from immersion and enjoyment.
29:01 🎮 *Gameplay Frustrations and Design Oversight*
- Frustration with inaccessible abilities required for progression.
- Lack of essential features like character positioning on the map and backtracking aids.
- Disappointment with core gameplay elements, such as combat and platforming mechanics.
31:21 💼 *Publisher Influence and Game Quality*
- Publisher constraints, including tight schedules and limited resources, impact game quality.
- Game Mill Entertainment's history suggests a focus on quantity over quality.
- Examining other titles published by Game Mill reveals a pattern of subpar releases.
37:53 🌳 *Transition to New Game Zone and Exploration*
- Introduction of a new game zone, Jungle Wetland, with visual changes but minimal gameplay impact.
- Frustration with the lack of map indicators and navigational aids.
- Continued encounter with bugs and glitches, disrupting immersion and gameplay flow.
42:00 🌿 *Dark Jungle Exploration and Gameplay Anomalies*
- Exploration of the Dark Jungle introduces new enemies and challenges.
- Persistent bugs, including teleportation to previous areas and non-functioning enemy encounters.
- Frustration mounts due to game-breaking anomalies and lack of player control over progression.
Made with HARPA AI
What really sucks is the expressions that Kong model pulls are pretty good, and a lot of the concept art is really great. Some talented people worked on this trash and I genuinely feel sorry for the devs and artists.
36:01 even the name betrays that
I saw the title and got so worried you covered the beauty that was the Peter Jackson King Kong game for the GameCube
Not even Rerez could trashtalk about that underrated gem.
@@nahomgirma5095The jaw cracking scenes genuinely made me cover my eyes when I played it as a kid, it was so well made
You can't bad talk that game
Five magazines on backup
@@Giran_0 Except the Nintendo DS port. That was hot garbage.
@@Giran_0 I still sometimes hear those lines the director would shout in my dreams. They payed for 3 lines of dialogue and by god were they gonna use them
pop-ins during the cut scene? in 2023?
ITS RAW!
Y’all actually reviewed this
Seems like so. I hope they can recover from just bad game.
Well it was
"Just a bad game"
Hey Rerez! I loved watching your videos! ❤ Especially Burglar X your first Just Bad Games video, a classic! Speaking of obscure games, you should check out Spectral Tower, the first RPG made by Idea Factory, a Company known for making terrible RPGs, it has the worst game mechanics known to man, I don’t want to say too much to ruin the surprise, but it definitely deserves to be on Just Bad Games! I would to see you guys play it and hear your funny reactions and edits! ❤🎉
I believe those white squiggly lines that go off in the distance when he roars are supposed to be birds flying off startled from his roar
It's like the developers forgot that King Kong ist a giant.
Speaking of GameMill, guess what else they made last year... "Walking Dead: Destinies"! They're a gift that keeps on giving you guys material for Just Bad Games! Whee!!
Worth noting that GameMill also published the Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl games, Smash-like platform fighters both developed by Ludosity and Fair Play Labs, and those games are actually pretty fun.
Goes to show that you don't judge a game based on their publisher.
Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing alone devalues anything good GameMill has ever done, and that's not much.
True, but (and I speak as someone who's played both games) evidently, the first game was extremely rushed. No idea if this was because of GameMill or Nickelodeon, but it was released with many things absent that you'd probably expect from a Smash-like game, such as the option to have items or (like the first two Nick Kart Racers) any voice acting. Ludosity/FPL did add both of these later on, but still...
Luckily, Nick Brawl 2 was certainly more polished in that aspect.
@@killdozer7792 Yeah I can tell the first one was rushed. It was good and fun for what it was, and the quality of life patches did make it feel a lot more complete.
I think 2 was rushed a bit as well, which is probably why a whopping 11 characters from the first one were axed, but it still feels a lot more polished overall.
@@Yuli_Ban Yeah, the devs of NASB really need a new publisher. GameMill's not good.
@@Yuli_Ban Forget GameMill, Big Rigs is so glitchy it was probably programmed by the Glitch Gremlin.
Yessss! I'm so glad you guys covered this game. Could you please do walking dead destinies or gollum
I've seen other people cover this game but I love how you all give us the full, detailed breakdown of every aspect. It's like I can taste the rotten instead of merely smelling it.
I was going to say "i saw roblox games preattier than this" but thats a disservice to roblox devs
fr. phantom forces looks almost like a real flagship fps on maximum graphics, if only my pc handled it
@@lightsupportweapon yea, im still impressed with the amount of detail in the empty shotgun shells
I never understood why people keep using Roblox for comparisons, Roblox has so many different kinds of games that it's basically impossible to use it as a comparison. While there are games that look like crappy plastic but at the same time, there are games that look amazing and look better than some triple a games nowadays.
@@thefancydoge8668 YEA! honestly a Lot of people that criticized Roblox never actually used the engine or used but activly went after the bad stuff
Ima be honest, i thought that swamp was oil and said "Why is there oil in the water? THERES NO PEOPLE TO DRILL FOR IT!!!" only to get cut off mid yell to hear that very flammable looking liquid is just water.🤣
@@SatanenPerkele I know, it's deep underground, not just chilling on the surface water, you gotta drill pretty deep for it tho... You don't just turn a corner and "Oh hey I better not drink this water it's loaded with oil"
@@SatanenPerkele huh... I actually didn't know that. Prolly makes a long way up irl, but I doubt the devs were thinking that for this game though if that's "normal" boggy swamp water.
Considering this was in the same year as Gollum it was a contest of what game was worse to pick from.
24:37 it's giving you a taste of the awesome Kong that you will be once all levelled up, except games like Metroid do this thing well 😂
Please bring just bad games back
Still mad about Nerf Legends.
26:42 Damn didnt think I'd hear Scarlet Fire here
So THAT'S why my headphones exploded
same lol
glad you guys still made just bad game series
Rise of Kong? More like... rising dong, amirite?
At least this video got me interested in playing "What Lies in the Multiverse"
I love how thorough you are, Rerez. Always a treat.
0:27 AYYYYYY IT'S GODZILLA!!!!!
22:22 how did they not think about saying "So there's this giant enemy crab"
Get Hercules and batman in on that dance.
19:52
“RUN! IT’S KING KONG!”
“It looks like King Kong, but due to international copyright laws, it’s not.”
Kong: Refund Island
Fun fact about the first gaw fight you are correct about the fight being scripted footage I saw always die to him and never actually deal any real damage to him however I actually find it really interesting that the game did have a Fail-Safe but hey it's interesting I've seen a lot of games have a failsafe for those battles that you're meant to lose however some of those battles that you're meant to lose to don't have such a state in fact actually have an alternative ending
Also I never knew there was an update for the PC version of the game however one benefit about PC games is that they can be modded
You know shit's gonna get sour real fast when a series like this is covering a game on *_modern fucking console_*
"We have a Kong at home, Kong." Probably the best description of this game. XD
24:55
This section is actually wrong about something- Most Metroid games typically do the same thing as Rise of Kong. Samus starts out with her full kit, and then loses it due to cutscene shenanigans, and has to get everything back as the game progresses.
Clearly they need to replay super metroid
Definitely your best video to date! And I'm so proud there was not one banana joke.
At least this game is a throwback to the endless licensed game trash we used to get back in the ps2 era.
i have a feeling this publisher will throw *us* back into that era
Nah, there were some really good gems with licensed games in that era
@@assassin8636 while there were indeed *some* really good gems, for every battle for bikini bottom there's three jimmy neutron: boy geniuses (and there literally is three!)
No list of "licensed game trash" would be complete without Dalmatians 3 or Snow White & The 7 Clever Boys or Animal Soccer World (or any such crazy formulaic fairy-tale-licensed "game" from Phoenix/Dingo/LJN/whatever, for that matter).
@@zyzzy-ko4ww i'm very sure those were *un*licensed games
Kong is actually an introspective masterpiece, as it serves as a symbol of GameMill's internal structure. Which is that their coding and art teams are all comprised of actual monkeys from the zoo.
1:44 How ironic is it that I'm *literally* learning about the Great Depression in High School
It was only a matter of time. Also, I see that Shovel Knight Treasure Trove chilling there. Big respect
Godzilla is never going to let Kong live this one down
I;ve been waiting for Rerez to get to this game, and now we're here faster than I thought. With an hour-long vid too.
Gotta love it.
Next game up, Gollum...
24:17 "No that can't be right. Why would they do that? Why would they show you moves in the game's tutorial if you weren't supposed to make use of those moves immediately?"
That's actually not uncommon with open world games that have a progression system. Start with a fully powered character so the player can immediately enjoy the best experience in traversal and combat, feeling powerful, then at the end of the prologue, remove those. Then the players can gradually earn them during the main game. Prototype does this by making the prologue a flash forward that happens towards the end of the game, for example. It was actually one of the thing that really drew me into this game.
So it *can* be done right. Not here, obviously. First the moves you get in preview don't make the movement feel different, they're basically metroidvania keys. The counter-examples you showed are all metroidvanias, which is precisely when previewing like that is the opposite of helpful. Then it's not made clear that you start with a young Kong that has a lot to learn. It gave me the impression that he already did all his rising off-screen with that intro.
48:39-48:44 Kong being such a help consoling his enemies is something I really needed in this life TY Rerez! 😂
Looks like they shipped an early version of the game then patched the finished version on the quiet with the hope no one would notice their mistake, love the video guys Just Bad Games is my jam.
9:31 goes hard 😂😂
all the funny parts in the video
1:08 the snatching is a girl screaming.
1:11 the searching is also a girl screaming.
1:15 dinosaur fights are just a girl screaming.
1:32 Kong goes up empire state. building
1:36 Kong goes down empire state building.
9:08 a scene from king Kong
9:30 slow climb
15:52 the cutscene that plays out in which your supposed to lose.
16:09 a character
21:26.............BABY SKULL............
23:53 YOU NEED TO LEARN THE HOLD HEAVY ATTACK TO DESTROY THIS DEBRIS
27:16 yay we can keep playing skull island rise of Kong
27:34 Kong drops object on purpose
29:33 Kong goes through the wall
30:43 first boss down
42:19 explore and explore and explore
44:12 Kong falls out of bounds
44:53 It takes Kong two tries to break wall then Adam says that words can't express how much he wants the game to end
46:07 flashback of the first Gaw boss and calling it the easiest boss
46:44 Shane calls a picture of Gaw the day Kong's parents were brutally murdered
48:30 the Kong dance
53:23 Shane talking about how scary Gaw is and mentions the feet that still don't touch the ground
54:16 Gaw breaks itself while playing the best soundtrack of the game
54:40 Kong ruining the purpose of the final boss while playing funny music
54:50 Kong kills Gaw for papa Kong and mama Kong which makes sense, but he also kills Gaw for making him chase him through the jive Doody Bot game
55:08 woo we murdered
1:01:22 a scene from Kong vs Godzilla
Should also make another "Just bad games" video on "Transformers: Rise of the Dark Spark"? I mean it has bad graphics, bad story, and even bad gameplay.