The saltiest a game has ever made you

[Lichen Bark]

Ikaruga.

This game can go fuck itself. I thought I purchased a fun space game for the GameCube, but what I didn't know is that I purchased a "bullet hell" game. Boy was I in for a surprise! Didn't know 'bullet hells' were even a thing. I never felt so frusterated and cheated. The game is simple, you switch between blue and red shields depending on the bullets coming at you. You can be blue and absorb blue bullets, or swap to red and absorb red bullets, this gives you energy to power up a useful homing missile attack. If your pinky toe touches a red bullet when you are blue or vice versa you die.

Over twenty years later and I still hold a grudge against this game.

 

[Nick Gars]

Ikaruga.

This game can go fuck itself. I thought I purchased a fun space game for the GameCube, but what I didn't know is that I purchased a "bullet hell" game. Boy was I in for a surprise! Didn't know 'bullet hells' were even a thing. I never felt so frusterated and cheated. The game is simple, you switch between blue and red shields depending on the bullets coming at you. You can be blue and absorb blue bullets, or swap to red and absorb red bullets, this gives you energy to power up a useful homing missile attack. If your pinky toe touches a red bullet when you are blue or vice versa you die.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=f-OSlo0dsMk:83
Over twenty years later and I still hold a grudge against this game.

You have to be a special mix of masochistic and sadistic to enjoy bullet hells, especially Ikaruga. It usually boils down to dancing around in a pattern in a small area, but the hit boxes for bullet hells make it like walking on a bed of needles.


The only real salt I can recall as of late is Golden Axe (Genesis). It's sequels play much better, but the first one is genuine dogshit in every way and anyone who says otherwise has never played a competent video game.

The controls are painfully stiff making any input a chore and unless you have the game down to a science this makes it almost impossible to actually react to any attack. If you're not already counter attacking before it comes out, the AI will jump your ass. On top of that, because of how poor the vertical hotboxes are you have to abuse the fuck out of dragging the ai near the bottom to reliably land hits. Also, get used to dash-jump attacks, besides your dash attack to throw shit off cliffs, it's your only attack worth a fuck. You got screen nuke magic, but it's best use is being saved for 2-3 specific points, then back to jumping.


Fuck the Final Boss, Death Bringer. Thanks to the skeletons, the only reliable way to win is to abuse the ai to the point of cheese by forcing him and his skeletons to dance back and forth by staying constantly up his ass. Mind you, the smallest fuck up with these shit controls and you will be hit with a big fucking axe to the face, followed by magic, or beat by skeletons, then the same, both scenarios more likely than not being a full hp to death.

Got to the final boss with 2 continues and an extra life. Let's just say I would of broke my controller in half if I didn't just walk away. Its barely a case of being bad at the game, it's more that the game is so poorly made that my inputs don't even seem to make a difference either way.

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

You have to be a special mix of masochistic and sadistic to enjoy bullet hells, especially Ikaruga. It usually boils down to dancing around in a pattern in a small area, but the hit boxes for bullet hells make it like walking on a bed of needles.

Ikaruga disappointed me but bullet hell shooters, to me, is about zoning out and flutter around in what might look like chaos but isn't. Then reset if I get hit and never, ever use bombs because that violates the purity of the game, man! *bong rip*
But there wasn't something with Ikaruga I didn't like.

 

[Plumber's Kokoro Wish]

Odama: A relative gave me this game when I was in my tweens and I sucked ass at it, it would mock you when you lost. Saying stuff, like "Maybe you should just quit" This would make me incredibly salty as I lost for the 20th time in a row, a Gamecube wireless controller lost its life in the aftermath.

 

[Prophetic Spirit]

Fallout 4 ending.
Basically a horrible take of "war never changes" iconic phrase. Thanks, Todd.

 

[WhatInTheActualFuck]

Ikaruga.

This game can go fuck itself. I thought I purchased a fun space game for the GameCube, but what I didn't know is that I purchased a "bullet hell" game. Boy was I in for a surprise! Didn't know 'bullet hells' were even a thing. I never felt so frusterated and cheated. The game is simple, you switch between blue and red shields depending on the bullets coming at you. You can be blue and absorb blue bullets, or swap to red and absorb red bullets, this gives you energy to power up a useful homing missile attack. If your pinky toe touches a red bullet when you are blue or vice versa you die.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=f-OSlo0dsMk:83
Over twenty years later and I still hold a grudge against this game.

Goddamn, I loved that game. The Dreamcast was such a great console and had a shitload of niche titles. The Gamecube picked up a lot of that stuff when Sega got out of hardware.

 

[HodgePodgeRogerDodger]

Rhythm mini games in games for side quests. My brothers and I would call my sister in to beat those as kids.

 

[Spud]

I think I must have repressed this due to how salty I got but I saw FFXV on my shelf earlier and suddenly remembered. I was 40 mins into fighting the adamantoise in FFXV and accidentally point warped out of the fight. I must have blacked out from rage because I remember nothing after that.

Fun fact, on the PC edition of the game the one hit kill ring now works on adamantoise

 

[Defensive Ella Purnell]

Flying up through the space elevator in the final Ace Combat 7 mission.

I don't know how many times but it was too many. In the end I was so mad I just didn't play the game for a week, then did it first try when I returned to it lol.

 

[Jasper2K]

Overwatch most recently. I seethe, rage and cope. As do my friends i play with. It gets real toxic real fast lmao

 

[Hann]

Warcraft 3: Reforged.

Yes, at that point I should have known better than to have high hopes but nostalgia made me get it anyway only to be so thoroughly disappointed I have yet to get over it. Fuck you, Blizzard.

 

[Battlecruiser3000ad]

Flying up through the space elevator in the final Ace Combat 7 mission.

I don't know how many times but it was too many. In the end I was so mad I just didn't play the game for a week, then did it first try when I returned to it lol.

Flying up the elevator was fine, my countless deaths were in the tunnel and the big chamber under the elevator.
But yea, salt was there.

 

[umami's milk]

This is stupid, but I was playing RE2R recently, and this was specifically the part where you play as Ada and try to hack to circuit to activate the lift in that maze-like area. It's a difficult part for me because you don't get a lot of ammo and on top of that her gun sucks. Avoiding the zombies is tricky, too.

After several deaths the game had the fucking audacity to say ' TURN ON ASSISTED MODE?' It got me so miffed.

 

[The Last Stand]

Overwatch most recently. I seethe, rage and cope. As do my friends i play with. It gets real toxic real fast lmao

Agreed, especially with competitive. No team synergy, common disconnects, balance issues.

Achievement hunting in that game is less frustrating than maintaining an imaginary rank.