E.T. "The Worst Game Ever" (Zero Punctuation)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 10 ก.พ. 2025
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This week, Zero Punctuation reviews the worst game ever.
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I think my favorite thing about this is the fact that everyone thought the whole "Atari buried 3.5 million copies in a landfall" thing was a myth until they found it
It’s half myth. It wasn’t just ET, and they didn’t bury the cartridges but ET sold poorly or because they had too many returns. When Atari started to go under they made some desperate cost cuts, including selling one of their warehouses. Without anywhere to store all the stuff the warehouse was holding, they were forced to just throw it away.
@@alexanderfreeman3406 Yeah, and they threw it away by burying it.
@@DavidEllis94 Atari didn’t bury it. Whatever waste management company that worked for the city did. Almost everything anyone throws away ends up in a landfill.
@@legitbeans9078 you pointed out a typo in a 7 year old comment. Congrats, you lose!
@@alexanderfreeman3406 okay the point is, the games were buried and everyone thought that it was a myth. And it wasn't.
"The public are fickle but not particularly smart." Precise and so funny!
That's the real lesson here.
Atari was arrogant. They made a $20-30 million dollar bet on E.T. and left the completion of the game to one man who only had 5 freaking weeks to make it.
That's nuts.
+bizmonkey007 didn't THQ do something similar? U draw?
"Hey, can you get this game finished in five weeks?" "Ok."
natnew32 sounds like what happened last gen.
There was Parasol Stars, which got cancelled because the programmer's wife had too many pub drinks and smashed 2 months worth of his work in a drunken rage.
Said man had also made Yar's Revenge and Raiders of the Lost Ark for the Atari 2600. Both games were big successes and he even said he was "overflowing with hubris" and thought five or six weeks was plenty of time to make a game. I would heavily suggest looking up the Howard Scott Warshaw episode of Video Game Story Time for more information.
E.T is the cause of activision?
I never imagine it was THAT bad
@Evi1M4chine Both Activision and Electronic Arts put out some damn good games back in the day. Then some "daddy's little accidents" graduated with their MBAs and said to themselves "I'm gonna go into the video game industry. I bet there's profits to be abused out of those."
@@thegardenofeatin5965 I believe the names you're looking for are Bobby Kotick and Andrew Wilson
HEYOOO!
@@thegardenofeatin5965 Yes, EA published some nice games back then. My personal favourites like CnC Generals and Tiberian Wars 3. Then they got raped and somehow turned to the dark side.
@@MasouShizuka fairly sure the guys that made cnc no longer worked for ea when that happened and yes tiberium wars was fucking amazing the first time a rts used super weapons it was glorious.
No matter how many times I watch it, the "Fooled you, it's shiiit!" at the very end always makes me cry laughing...
Someone needs to make a ringtone out of the new song "Lets all laugh at the industry that bever learns anything tee hee hee"
Well, it's easy...
Download the audio from the video via Torch, convert to mp3 then drop in Audacity. Cut the audio, save it, drop on your phone, and set it as your ringtone.
Eeeeeaaaaasyyyy......
c0d3r3d *star wipe* The more you know!
c0d3r3d See, and now I'm going to have to do that when I get home.
c0d3r3d But we're laaaaaazy, we want someone else to do the work for us!
I would play that ringtone at the next Microsoft conference xD
"Foooled you, its shiiiit!"
Just can not stop laughing. xD
The Custer chasing E.T. was a nice touch indeed
+Sir5EsQ_ Right? :D That definitely got the second biggest laugh from me, the first being the end punchline.
+Sir5EsQ_ your statement demands clarification.
It's Custer, fully erect, chasing after E.T. who is utterly flaccid.
Mr Scythe I own clusters revenge only because I couldn't beleve it existed. Like buying uranium ore on Amazon
Rich St Aubin it exists because people weren’t patient enough to wait for the graphics or technology to advance enough to create their weird porn games
@@beats0me Ooh man. Look up "Edith IBM 1401."
I remember when AVGN talked about this and wanted to be there when they found the landfill. Ages ago.
A few years ago they did find it but by then he had a child to take care of and couldnt travel there
+tenjek rip
+tenjek and then he made a HOWL MOVIE ABOUT IT
+Miguel Sanchez whole
Children really ruin everything.
@Nick Fanchette Least he delivered on that promise. Unlike ANOTHER INTERNET CELEBRITY (looking at you, Phil Burnell...)
"Fooled you it's shiiiiit"
Probably still my favorite ZP line ever XD
"Fooled you, it's SHIT!" I lost it right there
"celebrating 25 years of kool aid man"
*HORK*
+WrathOfMega oh yeah!
@bradley1245325 Not really. Any lasting traumatic impact on the general population has diminished in the years.
I think the current video games industry is seriously overhyped, waste of existence. Most of what they put out is sh*t, or in an Indy title/ Nintendo game, and they have more sense, then greed. Especially since most Indy developers/Nintendo learned the lesson along time ago.
The amount of Flappy Birds that have taken to the air probably would block out the sun and the earth would become basically one giant cave being powered by bacteria that make energy from eating rocks.
***** Then THAT'S what the bacteria would eat to make energy.
Theodore Hodbor So... Birdemic 3?
Theodore Hodbor THAN WE WILL HARDCORE-PC-GAME IN THE SHADES
Theodore Hodbor Bird flu 2.0
Khan!!!!
"So i downloaded an emulated version. Naughty yahtzee!"
I'm freakin dying here!
"Let's all laugh at an industry that never learns anything, tee hee hee!"
I love that, and yes we should. Maybe then at some point they'll get clues.
That song is now my ringtone! It is both delightfully whimsical and true in its message and meaning. :)
0:37 This aged like a fine wine. And Gamurs can't hold it's liquor!
Let’s be real here, Yahtzee. If the Atari didn’t fail with ET and Nintendo didn’t rule the American gaming culture, all our games would be based on movies. Who knows, maybe Disney would see a profit in the gaming industry and be OUR Nintendo, which is a far more horrifying thought.
Let's all laugh at an industry that never learned anything teeheehee! hahaha
Spencer Hill LOLZ!
Make that into a ten hours.
+Spencer Hill i want it as my ring tone
Monster High Games are Cheaper than ATARI ET and Everyone wants to burn them. because the Games Are Terrible
+Spencer Hill that jingle is so awesome! xD
"FOOLED YOU IT'S SHIT!"
Probably most big overhyped games now.
*coughs* Watch_Dogs *coughs*
Want a nice game? Too bad, we want your money!
I mean, if it's overhyped, by definition...
"Fooled you, it's shit!"
♫ ♪ Shi-hit*♫
You came here for a raging video? Fooled you its fair judgement!
All of his rage is fair judgement
To think there was a point where the existence of Activision was GOOD for the games industry
How times change, as Call of Duty: Star Wars Prequel is on it's way
Yep.
+Agent Camtho I thought it was a Halo game?
Haruhi Suzumiya God?
Boy-Ika oh, you noticed n.
Haruhi Suzumiya Please don't kill me.
I can respect and appreciate that every game console is different and does different stuff moderately well, but Yahtzee's 'Fooled you! It's shiiit!' Gets me every time.
The shit part at the end made me laugh longer then i should have.
Queen Chrysalis Oh i know what the microshit is ;)
SawyersFilms Microshaft
The worst part is i have an xbox one and i cracked up
came here to say that
congrats for be fanboy splerg like the rest of the comment section
"fooled you, it's shiiit!"
oh god, it's so true. i'm crying over here, from a combination of laughter and revelation.
Did anyone else laugh their tits off when they heard Yahtzee's song
"Let's all laugh at an in-dus-try that never learns anything, tee hee hee"
This aged like a fine wine
Microsoft didn't fool anyone. Everyone knew the Xbone was going to be shit
They fooled me. I thought it didn't actually play video games from all the E3 press conferences.
***** it still doesnt its just some guy walking on the sdcreen upon start uip saying dont play a game its shit just go watch tv but watch it through MEEEEEE!!! because you paid for a tv box that doesnt do anything it should. i amk of clurse kidding if ms get rid of the tv shit in the console and stick to what the ps4 did they could still be the second best console in the world because they worked out nobody wanted their shit from the start.
*****
Oh, God....
I knew when I saw the "TV TV TV TV TV TV TV Sports Sports TV" conference that it was shit, but I had high hopes before that because the 360 was so good.
Oh, I have to completely disagree with you there. I'm sure Microsoft managed to fool themselves.
"You tell me, did modern game companies ever overspend on overhyped games that dissapoint the buying public?"
Yea, I can confidently say that aged well with things like Anthem.
The fact they never stopped doing that was the joke.
Wow. Your comment didn't age well past the first sentence. I was hoping you were kidding at first.
Know this: Companies releasing disappointing products happens only as much as the Consumers allow it. There have been many many many Anthems before Anthem was even thought of, yet people are still buying them, and currently a game not having MicroTransaction is worthy of praise.
AVENGERS MOMENT
You know another company which was formed with the noble intention of providing due credit to developers, treating them as 'rock stars' and even going so far as to release their early titles in vinyl record-style packaging? Electronic Arts.
Irony?
Writ In Water wrong video, mate. You're looking for the Daikatana review.
I was referring to how Activision was started by former Atari developers so they could get credit for the games they created, similar to EA.
Evi1M4chine Given early EA's work, and that a lot of the more rapey stuff happened after Trip left, I wouldn't say that's entirely true, although there is likely a grain of truth in it
Don't forget Interplay: "By Gamers. For Gamers." They eventually got snatched up by EA because their philosophies were so in tune.
I had to listen to that jingle some 3 or 4 times before moving on. That was hilarious.
+Gaspar Caricaspah
"Moving on" is a euphemism for "dying".
We can't have "Fooled you, it's SHII-IT!" as a T-Shirt, can we?
I'd buy that.
Shut up and take my money
Let's all laugh, at an industry, that never learns anything, tee-hee-hee!
***** And when it gets to your house, there's a note saying "fooled you, it's shit!"
I'd buy that about 7 times.
That was probably the funniest end joke since Might and Magic X.
try the 50 cent game, or maybe gta 5, actually i think child of light had the best one.
i gotta see those videos, but as of now, that end joke was by far the funniest I've ever seen him do since I saw the half life review with the "pouch mounted gun tits" part XDDD
I wonder if Yahtzee likes Evangelion.
Rei>Asuka
I know Right!
He's not too big on JRPGs, so it's unlikely.
kevin chen Unit 01> Unit 03
Well, maybe he likes anime, because Evangelion is a show, not a Japanese RPG.
Yahtzee has yet again been proved correct. The Games Industry still haven't learned a single thing.
the jingle has aged like fine wine
"Japanese company hadn't grabbed the american console market and practically raised a generation"
Music reviews, meet game reviews.
That Video is closing in on a decade old and Yahtzee is still right on the fucking money about the long dry periods.
"Fooled you it has violently polarizing opinions!"
so true :P
No backwards compatibility, an extra $100 on the price tag for an optional peripheral that isn't necessary for the machine to function, always-online DRM and forcing you to check in once every 24 hours for absolutely no reason or benefit to you... is not an opinion. That's simply bad. Objectively bad. And the Xbone is shit.
***** They've created new models that don't come with the Kinect motion sensors, that are on sale at the moment, and they removed the 24 hour thing pretty much instantly after the E3 backlash bar a few aspects. I agree the Xbone "was" shit, but now Microsoft have rectified their own mistakes it's a semi-decent piece of technology.
iHuzza Completely irrelevant. Microsoft was taking pre-orders when they announced this, they *were* selling the version with mandatory Kinect for months, they vocally defended their DRM and Kinect for months as well, and they were more than ready to sell it to us with that level of fucking bullshit attached. Once again, not an opinion. Microsoft was ready, willing and able to sell us a shitty machine that benefitted them a lot more than it did their customers. Intent is what matters here, not execution, and their intent was to be greedy, manipulative bastards.
***** who exactly was fooled by Microsoft again? from what i recall, the xbone was immediately panned after being announced.
I will never get that little jingle out of my head. It's so lighthearted and malicious at the same time :3 It has just the right amount of cowbell, too...
This, out of all the ZP i've seen, is my favorite! Not only did it have interesting history facts in it, it also was super funny ^-^
0:34 Sony should be paying attention right now. Concord is going to be a textbook flop, studied in classes for years.
Seriously though, this has to be the worst gaming drought in recent memory
its so bad im replaying skyrim
You must have a pretty short term memory.
allen13e It's been the same for the past 3 years.
Butterworthy well in terms of summer yes because my summers are usually boring and uneventful. I remember last summer was ok because of The Last of Us and some other flop titles
Butterworthy it's so bad that I play Gta online everyday
*browses through Escapist videos*
*reads the title*
Oh, this is going to be good. *click*
FOOLED YOU! It's the story behind the game, not the game itself!
I really thought that last line in AirTheFallen's post was going to followed by "Escapist: 'Fooled you! It's shit!'".
...So I guess AirTheFallen fooled me. :)
1:01 I was taking a mouthful of coffee at that moment and nearly lost it. lol
I'd like to see this become a series on its own, separate from Zero Punctuation
Viewing this from a casual gamer standpoint, it's just your average shitty game. Nothing really warrants it as "the worst game ever" in the actual game aspect of it. From an economic and development standpoint, yes, this is the worst game ever.
+SaburoCherry I got a book for christmas titled Terrible old games you've probably never heard of by Ashens (yes, the youtube ashens). He has a couple of interviews in there, with old timey developers and it seems that all the games, no matter the cost of the final result, were made the same. Also with just about the same amount of development time as E.T had, just that E.T was expected to be big and failed, while most other games were unheard of and that didn't really affect the market that much if they failed.
+vengefulenigma The advantage of most of the terrible old games that you've probably never heard of is that they were 99p on a cassette tape rather than $60 cartridges. A British child could buy a steady supply of computer games with their pocket money and thus support the indie and insane market even if 99% of games were utter rubbish.
In the USA on Atari meanwhile the cheap, derivative, terrible masses were over ten times the price and obliterated buyer confidence. It's the same reason the glut of mediocre indie games hasn't crippled steam, they're too cheap for us to care.
I've seen worse games and Iv'e seen more cryptic games.
CASUALLLLLLLLL!!!!!!!! :0
Well consider it had to be done by one guy in 1 month and programming games those times was notoriously difficult, they did not have all the tools developers have now.
Man I get at least one out-loud laugh out of every video Yahtzee does.
i bet valve is just waiting for a games crash and will release half life 3 when it happens
Holi sheit
No thell wait till the atri 5200 or the ps8 thenwait till the year of 2028 to start a 9 year development then its gonna be within 3247 the relses hapf life for ever and yatches grat great great great great great grand son call it shit and compsre to duke nukem for ever remastered
😂shit i cant spell
jubbie1122 or maybe they're purposefully trying to cause a crash
casual sun the Atari 5200 and 7800 already exist.
The new Atari console on the horizon is called the “VCS” and its panning out to be a shit show
"Let's all laugh at an industry that never learns anything Teeheehee"
I fucking love that ^_^
You left out the part where they produced more ET games than they had sold consoles.
@Axiom Steel26 I think we all were, when they dug it up a few years ago.
"Lets all laugh at an industry, that never learns anything! Tee hee hee."
For a British person, you'd think Yahtzee would know that the video game crash (of America) did absolutely fuck all to the UK as we had moved on to program Spectrums by then which created famous people like Peter Molyneux, David Perry and Julian Gallop. So saying it crashed the entire Western hemisphere is a "slight" overstatement.
Also, E.T. was only partially responsible for the crash, it was more down to the unsold copies of Pac-Man that caused it. E.T. sold 4 million units (it produced 7 million), which was a phenomenal number back then. So far from a failure.
But people like to whitewash the truth to make a more compelling story.
Wheatley from aperture science
I didn't. I typed it.
***** Well aren't you just the smartest person in the room!
Seriously though, i find you everywhere now. Even that old FF7 parody animation that i hated
The real irony is that Yahtzee's favorite game as a kid was Dizzy. Which is a Spectrum game. Meaning he lived out the video game industry not crashing in England and still apparently thought that there was a video game crash.
Wrath's Attack
It's a bit of the Superman mentality, he's only really famous/popular as he was the first.
If they created pac man today, he wouldn't last five minutes. way too vanilla by todays standards
I think you may be misusing the word "whitewash."
Yahtzee is best waifu.
"Whereas Microsoft threw the cover off and went *'Fooled you!* *_It's shit!'"_*
That fucking line. Fucking amazing. It's so quotable, as well.
For example:
"Hey, look, a new game in a series I like was announced! I can't wait! I bet this will be an astoundingly excellent entry to the series!"
"Fooled you! It's shit!"
Hahaha!! Omigosh, that jingle!!
It got a legitimate laugh out of me. Especially that "tee-hee-hee" bit. XD
I love that jingle
"Fooled you, it's shiiiittt" is literally the most succinct thing anyone could say about the xbox
Was expecting that last punchline to be "FOOLED YOU! It's a terrible PC!!"
I never knew I needed E.T./General Custer slashfic until 1:42
Also worth mentioning that AAA companies still give their teams short deadlines to create games that will supposedly raise a generation.
an incomplete rotary telephone farting around a meadow
best description for the worst game :)
"FOOLED YOU IT'S SHIT!!" awesome
I actually had this game when I was a kid. Wish I kept it... along with my Star Wars figures, baseball cards, Garbage Pail Kids & my Captain Caveman trapper keeper & Fraggle Rock lunch box.
They had Captain Caveman trapper-keepers? Man...
POGs weren't from the 80s, bruh.
"Let's all laugh at an industry that never learned anything,tee hee hee!"
That bit always cracks me up.
I wasn't laughing to much at this one…until that xbox one joke at the end. Then I laughed for about 10 minutes straight. "Fooled you, it's shit!"
"Fooled you it's shiiiiit~"
No Man's Sky, what're you doing here?
0:19 Funny thing is that Evil Within actually looks really bad graphically, even on the Xbox One and PS4.
4:20 That part kinda confuses me. Which stigma was Microsoft trying to overcome by announcing the XB1 as anything but a dedicated game console?
CaitSeith I think it's more of a stigma that exists in people who aren't into consoles or gaming in general and regard gaming consoles as overpriced toys for children and fat neckbeards (which isn't entirely untrue, but still). Microsoft knows it's got it's market share of the gaming market, but wants to expand it by convincing people that "No really, it's an entertainment system!".
Penningtontj
So it was mere greed, wasn't it? Maybe it would had worked, if they hadn't neglected the console part so badly.
"The combined footstep sound effects can be used to make a funky boombox beat.So it's at least as fun as rhythmically banging your head on a wall." LMAO!!!! That part always kills me! XD
Back here after Atari announced their new NFT lootbox scheme. Really hoping they'll manage to repeat their previous success and crash the entire games industry once again.
LETS ALL LAUGH AT AN INDUSTRY THAT NEVER LEARNED ANYTHING TEE HEE HEE! I can't stop laughing about that XD!
So I have to thank Nintendo for anime to hit mainstream...
fuck.
Your pic is my choice of wifu.
Ez dePaz waifu*
Ez dePaz
I approve of your choice.
Hal Steel ya it is, anime has fucking boomed in America. There even a program on TV built around it. Toonami
skylar simes
A late night Cartoon Network program that also existed when anime was not popular somehow means anime has boomed in America? It's starting to get more popular, I suppose, but let's not jump the gun here.
Good Job, Escapist. You fired one of your best, and lost most of the rest. As Yahtzee put it,
""Let's all laugh at an in-dus-try that never learns anything, tee hee hee""
i love the ending to this episode. "fooled you, it's shit!" *squirt*
i was only half watching, and then he yelled that and i sat up in my chair and started laughing so hard i woke up the rest of the house.
Is no one going to mention the jingle that he made? He probably spent all of 5 seconds making that wonderful little bit and no appreciation
A video comparing the video game industry crash of 1983 to the state of it today. Wow. People have been calling me a "Conspiracy Theorist" and "Alarmist" for doing that.
I like how the entire Xbox One launch year has literally been Microsoft just shitting their pants trying to one-up Sony.
"Oh, well your console doesn't have always-online DRM? Well, then ours doesn't either! Now your console is $100 cheaper because it doesn't include an overpriced and unnecessary peripheral? Well, throw it out the window! We'll sell the console for the same price! Oh, Playstation Plus lets you download 2 games a month for free? Well, our membership now lets you do the same thing OH FOR GOD'S SAKE PLEASE LOVE ME I'LL DO WHATEVER YOU WANT."
FOOLED YOU ITS S##T XD
+Gondile it was at that moment, I fucking died.
+----)Hipster Walrus Gaming(---- thanks captain fucking obvious
Well it is Xbox. :P
Ben Ward his mum is dead 😂
That last joke was probably one of Yahtee's greatest
LOL at the whole part of ET falling down pits and the ending part! So funny! XD
4:31 Not enough sun tan lotion for Microsoft to protect them from that burn.
This may hurt your brain, Yahtze, but there IS a film named "E.T. The Extra Testicle". Yes, it is an E.T. porn parody, and yes, this is a genre.
Nintendo: Fooled you! It's a game console!
Microsoft: Fooled you! It's shit!
True story when i first heard the jingle I was at an airport restaurant and had to physically restrain myself from laughing out loud like a madman
Let's see if Destiny can pull an E.T
That would be funny; at the same, it be a damn shame
Amanwithbones Activision:" Fooled you! it's really DLC to our other game Advance Warfare and you must pay 99 percent of your money to look at!!"
E.T: the useless animated musical
I don't think it could pull an E.T but I do believe that it can pull a GTAV. I have a feeling that the servers are going to crash and all that bullshit, who knows what might happen but we will eventually find out.
the may never know.
*Let’s all laugh at an industry that never learns anything tee hee hee*
So THIS is where that all began 😂
In my opinion, one of Yhatzee's best.
My sides have officially vacated the planet in response to that ending joke. The random appearance of the Custer's Revenge guy helped pack the bags for the trip.
Hearing this story and comparing it to current events is kind of scary, as if we are heading that way already.
"You see, the gaming industry was controlled by a bunch of business men that had no clue what gamers wanted, they continued to "appeal to a wider audience", an audience that bought one or two games a year and usually the same franchise, and continued to push micro-transactions and milking the fanbase with outrageous cop-outs, until eventually gamers stopped giving a shit and began waiting for reviews or only buying indie games, made by small developers which could only afford to please their fanbase anyway. Eventually Capcom fell and others soon followed... The console market did not have sufficient AAA games to hold their own, and with their constant greedy, allways pushing to an all digital-market to alienate the pre-owned market they eventually became obsolete as no one saw a benefit to owning one... Indie devs thrived with the PC gaming master race and banded together to make bigger and better games and the cycle begins anew."
I for one approve of this new series.
I want Yahtzee to do a review of the "game" SEX for the 3DO.
"But mewl those shits did!"
3:36 wait was Yahtzee's actions here a reference to the smart black guy meme tapping his head?
This is surprisingly insightful as well as being Yahtzee's usual brand of funny. I look forward to more.
That ending... I'm drowning in laughter. Xboxo
God I really, really hate the goddamn "waifu" and non-stop lusting after "women" made from pen and ink and/or pixels. To steal a quote from Yahtzee, just like skateboarding, anime and hentai culture is only something that could come from a truly decadent society.
0:33
lol itunes please XD
0:33 Ahhhhh, that’s why I got this recommended. 😊
0:34 anyone else picturing Thomas the Tank Engine with the simple but funny jingle?
Lets ask the real question: Atari's ET or Ride to Hell?
worse or beter???
I'd argue that Ride to Hell was more fun to laugh at.
Naturally E.T., but that isn't saying much compared to today's market. What passed as full fledged cartridge games back then now wouldn't even be passable as $.99 iPhone games today.
+For The Wayne obviously ride to hell, a better question is E.T. For the Atari or Superman n64
+For The Wynne Air Control