Max Design 1992
Genre: Strategy
Rating: 2/6
Licence: Commercial
System: Amiga

In late 1992, two trading simulations were competing for the (German / European) market: Der Patrizier (also know as The Patrician abroad) and 1869. The latter came a little later (wow...) and it was generally considered the loser in this direct duel by the press. Only by a small margin, though - a very good second place.

SPD 1994
Genre: Adventure
Rating: 2/6
Licence: Freeware
System: PC

Before he was banished from public view in order to stay in the pool or 'fly' over the fields forever, Rudi Scharping was the head of one of the biggest political parties in Germany: the SPD. In 1994, he managed to lose the most important election in spite of all polls having been in favour of the SPD mere weeks earlier. A few months before that, the results of the election of the European parliament turned out even worse for them. In spite of (or because of?) this game.

Gremlin Interactive 1995
Genre: Sport, Action
Rating: 2/6
Licence: Commercial
System: PC

Now I've never been one of the greatest in playing football games... however I do see it as a bad sign when I cannot find a way to move the goalkeeper. Okay, I managed to let him lift his arm... but that's about everything. Limited by this I was naturally not too hard to beat by the computer who pretty much only needed to shoot at the goal to score. Well... I have to admit that this led to frustration. I am willing to accept though that it was just my usual low intelligence hindering me to find out how that @#!* goalkeeper could probably be convinced to do more than lift his arm in the hope to reach the ball without moving or even jumping. Apart from that playing is something like semi-enjoyable. If you can live with getting control over a player that's somewhere in the background instead of the one near the ball and of course an automatical switch once you approach the ball... I do have to be fair though - this does not happen all the time - only in the worst situations.

Farrware 1993
Genre: RPG
Rating: 2/6
Licence: Shareware
System: PC

It is very unusual for a relatively unsuccessful game like Ancients I to have a sequel. Ancients II: Approaching Evil simply increases the scope of the original game, but offers little else.

Ancients II is a shareware first-person roleplaying game, where you take charge of a group of adventurers and travel the land, vanquishing the monsters. As is the case with the first part, I could not find a coherent story or the ultimate goal in this game. It is as if the designers were creating only a demo for a game engine and forgot to fill in a story. Or maybe the engine did not allow a quest system. Either way, the lack of the story makes the game very repetitive and boring.

Palace Software 1987
Genre: Action
Rating: 2/6
Licence: Commercial
System: C64

To get the story over with: Evil wizard has captured the princess, oily muscleman carrying a huge sword tries to free her by first confronting the sorcerer's soldiers and then the evil master himself.

Barschsoft 1997
Genre: Puzzle, Action
Rating: 2/6
Licence: Freeware
System: PC

All games made by 'Barschsoft'...

Salad Days

The first entry in this here reproduced log can be backtraced to 1997. Like so often, die psychosis of the testee is caused by events in his childhood. In this case, it's the strong nostalgic memories about the dominating products of long dead producers of leisure electronics.

Konami 1993
Genre: Action
Rating: 2/6
Licence: Commercial
System: SNES

A common day in Gotham City: Batman puts on his chicle coat, and with his Batmobile he drives to the place of action. Through the slits of his ridiculous mask, he sees the unjustness. Good citizens are being hindered to do their Christmas shopping. A gang of clowns prevents a fluent and free enterprise and causes a setting that reminds of an oriental bazaar.

Starbyte 1991
Genre: Strategy
Rating: 2/6
Licence: Commercial
System: Amiga

Coal mining: an industry living 100% from subsidies. Here in Germany, they only stopped training new miners quite recently, i.e. until then, they let people go to their doom job-wise by pretending this still has a future. Unbelievable! Obviously, there were different times, too. 100 years ago, coal mining became the backbone of the industrial revolution. And that's the time this game is about.

Cameron Wilkin 1999
Genre: Adventure
Rating: 2/6
Licence: Freeware
System: Interpreter

"Ignorance is bliss", people say. Know those clichéd fantasy settings in which a knight in shining armour slashes his way through hordes of 'monsters', although the whole time, you have this nagging question in the back of your head how this guy is exactly 'good' and how his victims are 'evil'? Then Bliss might be for you. On the surface, the game is exactly what we all despise: Your alter ego, the hero, has been captured by the Orcish army of an evil magician. Now, he has to escape from the dungeon and finally kill the evil guy's dragon. The whole journey being a violent killing spree. However, the evil wizard has apparantely put a curse on your head as sometimes, reality just seems to fade away...

Revolution Software / Virgin Interactive 1997
Genre: Adventure
Rating: 2/6
Licence: Commercial
System: PC

George Stobbart - occupation: American tourist in Paris. After a few month, he comes back trying to get it on again with his girlfriend Nico, the photograph who helped him unravel a Templar conspiracy in the first game. Instead of the date he hoped for, Nico drags him to the home of a Professor of Central American culture - where the two are knocked out. Nico is taken away while George is bound to a chair with a poisonous spider in the room. And just to be sure, the baddies also set the room on fire.