Despite what you may have heard, old games aren't crap. In fact, some of them are quite the opposite. The kind of games you could take home to meet your parents, who would later remark at how dashing they were, even with that streak of grey in their perfectly-styled, cartridge-black hair. And you only have to look at our list of the to see that no fewer than four of our top 10 are more than 10 years old (which will be our cut-off point for 'retro' in this article, for argument's sake).

But there's a problem. Modern technology isn't kind to old games. Fuzzy RF connections make playing old consoles on modern TVs a harrowing experience. Modern technology highlights their flaws. Modern technology has pointed out the weird spit stuff at the edges of their mouths and that their shoes are made from mammoth hide. Sure, you can try getting together the right kit like an HD upscaler to help, but the simple fact remains that old games look their best when they're reworked to be the best they can on modern consoles. And that's what we're here to celebrate: the best modern retro conversions money can buy. Get Ready!

Sometimes, developers think it's wise to change a game's art style when re-releasing it. That's only going to annoy long-term fans, unless it turns out to be exactly how they imagined the first game to look in the first place. Well, The Secret of Monkey Island fixes that problem by letting you switch between the two at any moment.

And who can resist doing exactly that, all the time? You can even play a sort of 'spot the difference', as long as you don't just keep saying "well, that one's made of huge pixels and that one isn't". You'll be there a long time if you do. There's also a completely re-recorded soundtrack, made with real instruments (yes, wow!). As for the game itself, Monkey Island is still the funny, charming, lovable point-and-click adventure masterpiece it always was, only now in HD and sat on your dashboard.

Nintendo had the best of intentions when it decided to port a selection of NES games to 3DS, complete with stereoscopic 3D visuals. Turns out it took so much work to convert the games, Nintendo decided it would be just as much effort to make new games instead, so stopped making the conversions. But at least we got this sensational port of Kid Icarus. The handheld world (and humanity's collective awareness of the existence of eggplants) is better for its existence.

But why? Well, it's ultra-hardcore, pixel-perfect platforming action straight from the '80s. That finely honed 2D gameplay never looked or felt this good. There are new backgrounds with variable levels of depth, a full save system instead of the original NES game's passwords, and tweaks to the game's physics. That last one preserves the acceleration effect of the original if you want a more authentic experience, or affords new, super-tight control for those who crave precision. You did good, kid. You did good.

Daytona received no fewer than three separate home conversions before Xbox 360 and PS3 finally . Everything is just as you remember it from the mid-'90s, which is actually nothing like the original actually looks if you play it now in standard definition. 1995's finest chunky 3D car models look superb through HDMI, and the blue sky and green grass are outrageously bold viewed on a decent modern TV. New games are scared of colours like this.

But there are more options and modes to play with that don't appear in the arcade game, including an endurance mode that sees you actively seeking to preserve your tyres, as you'll start struggling for traction unless you pit in. There's also online play, although you'd have to arrange with someone these days as the servers are almost certainly empty. Best of all (disclaimer: may be the opposite) is a karaoke mode so you can sing along with 'Let's Go Away'. All together now: Daytonaaaaaaaaa!

The original Half-Life is rightly held up as a watershed moment for narrative-driven first-person games, but it first came out in 1998. In case you didn't know, that's the same year that dinosaurs became extinct. So to say 3D visuals have 'moved on a bit' is like saying iPhones are a bit better than two cups and a bit of string. Suffice to say, trying to suspend your disbelief enough to enjoy Half-Life now requires a lot of determination.

Or rather a lot of determination to fix it. A group of fans decided to remake Half-Life in its entirety using Valve's Source engine – the one that powers Half-Life 2. Models, textures… the lot. The result is so impressive, Valve gave it their official support and the majority is already available to download (for free) on Steam. The remaining portion's release remains TBA. Even so, the existing part is exactly how it should be and you should play it.

Nevermind all the online issues for a minute (I know, they're unforgivable), let's focus on the great conversion of Halo 2 for Xbox One, as part of . The original Halo had already been given an anniversary edition that rejigged the visuals and added online play, but Halo 2's facelift is a major reason for buying the new collection on its own.

It's so solid. Everything looks like it's actually there and would provide tangible resistance if you could somehow prod it through the TV screen. But, best of all, despite a major cosmetic overhaul, it plays exactly like the original. Nothing's been changed - something that's proven with a toggle button that switches between the old visuals and new in real-time, just like Monkey Island. Of course, Halo 2 was already excellent. Play on the original graphics setting now, however, and you'll be struck by how Spartan everything looks. Which is also an incredible pun. What's that? I'm fired? OK, it's a fair cop.

The wonderful thing about Oddworld: New Tasty is that it's not a 1:1 recreation of the original game, it's a 1:1 recreation of what you remember the original game being like. Why? Because it doesn't look like that anymore. The pre-rendered graphics may have aged better than most PSone titles, but they're no substitute for a powerhouse console actually drawing these detailed environments in real-time.

And the power of new-gen (it's been on PS4 for a while but it's hitting Xbox One, too) means it all looks so beautifully effortless. All the expression in Abe's face, all the animated production lines… it's blissfully slick. And the game is still absolutely lovely, in its own slightly icky way. Follow me. OK. Parp.

What happened to gung-ho 2D side-scrollers? They were everywhere in the arcades of the 1980s. Maybe everyone forgot to take them out of the arcades when they got closed down. Ah well, as long as we have remakes this good, it's no great loss.

is one of the best last-gen PSN/XBLA games you can buy. Amazing, considering it's a pretty straight port of a game from 1987. Why is it so good? Graphical enhancements, control improvements, a new final level and countless other small adjustments that make the experience amazing. Is his arm his wife in this one? It's hard to tell.

The you can buy on the App Store isn't the same Sonic CD that appeared on Mega CD/Sega CD back in 1992. It's a remake. It started life as a proof-of-concept by Christian Whitehead, running on his Retro Engine, and was so impressive that Sega hired him to make an official port that found its way to Android, Xbox 360 and PS3, too. It's brilliantly authentic, yet demonstrably better than the Mega CD original in every way.

The frame-rate has been smoothed out and is so consistent, it would probably run at 60fps if you loaded it on a toaster. The original, famous Japanese/English soundtrack is now available in all territories, but the US version is in there too if that's what makes you happy. There's retina display support for iOS and widescreen as standard, plus the all-new ability to play as Tails, once you finish the game once as Sonic. It's the best handheld Sonic game ever made – and it was never even meant to be on handheld. Funny how things work out, isn't it?

M2 is the team responsible for all of Sega's 3D classics on 3DS, and 3D OutRun represents the pinnacle of its work. You get a pixel-perfect recreation of the 1986 coin-op (except for the unlicensed Ferrari sprite, which has been tweaked), only better. First-off, it now supports widescreen, meaning you can see things you never would have seen in the original. There are two new music tracks that run on the original MIDI sounds from the arcade board. Fully emulated, too. Selectable Old/New and Japanese/International hardware configurations. Oh, and a daft new credits sequence.

But there's much more going on under the surface. The arcade original ran at 30 frames per second, which was always astonishingly smooth as these massive sprites were scaled effortlessly (some say 'rampantly') all over the screen. 3D OutRun runs at 60fps, which will leave your face melted like Jack Black's after that guitar solo in School of Rock. Sixty. Frames. Per. Second. Oh and in 3D too? The original game's sprites were all calculated in 3D space anyway so of course the effect is gorgeous. This is how you do it. Needless to say, you have to buy it right now.

Ah, yes. Everyone loves a good gaming stabbing device. Whether you're slicing through demons or just giving bad guys a good poking, there's a swordfight for every occasion. Let's take a look at some of the very best that PlayStation has to offer…

Oh, and if this leaves you in the mood for more weapon-based shenanigans, check out two of our most martial of features. There's one about the - both accompanied by comment from real life weapons experts. Anyway, yeah, sword-fights.

Almost any premise can be the basis for an entertaining video game. Undesirable tasks like waiting tables or mopping up icky fluids are made by Diner Dash and Viscera Cleanup Detail, respectively. Euro Truck Simulator 2, which might sound like prescription-grade sleep medication to some people, is consistently among the most-played games on Steam. No matter how peculiar the concept, clever game design can turn even the most ordinary real-world activity into virtual fun.

Except when it can't. Some game ideas should never make it past the spit-balling phase, as any attempt to turn them into digitized amusement can only end in tears. That hasn't stopped some developers from trying, God bless 'em, but the results pretty much validate every cynical thought that pops into your head when you hear the quick pitch. These seven games (on seven different systems, no less) tried to make the best of an idea that some boardroom executive miraculously green-lit. But right from the start, these core concepts were doomed to fail.

If packing a can of pepper-spray doesn't feel like enough, learning how to physically defend yourself from an attacker is a great way to walk more confidently through the world. Usually, this involves learning from a trained instructor, who can show you exactly how to deflect incoming strikes and protect yourself from harm. What you shouldn't do is expect to feel prepared to fend off an assault when your instructor is an unfeeling game disc and a Kinect sensor that can vaguely detect how you're moving.

Calling Self-Defense Training Camp a game feels like a misnomer, since the situation it's attempting to prepare you for is deadly serious. But in a real-world scenario, the basic, methodical movements you have to make for the Kinect to register them won't dissuade an attacker, unless they have a deathly fear of artistic expression and mistake you for an interpretive dancer. Here's a better idea: Leave the comfort of your living room and spend some extra money so you can attend a real self-defense class and get some actual training.

The eye-straining search for Waldo (or Wally, as you UK readers will know him) has always delighted children, because the imagery in these picture books borders on sensory overload. Picking out the striped-shirted explorer from a massive crowd of people is only half of the fun, because no matter where you look at Waldo's surroundings, there's some kind of goofy spectacle or visual pun to take in. You could spend hours gazing at the same two-page spread and not see everything it has to offer.

Unfortunately, trying to recreate such jam-packed pictures on an 8-bit system just doesn't work. Finding the NES version of Waldo takes about two seconds, since all those colorful background characters have been replaced by pixelated stick figures. That could be construed as a good thing, since the default mode slaps you with a time limit, but the scenes are so visually bland that you'll want to be whisked away from them long before your ten minutes are up.

Dance Dance Revolution, whether it's in arcades or at home on a dance pad, is great. It's light, physically active fun when you're first starting out, and a rigorous workout once you're ready to crank up the difficulty. Its total focus on lower-body footwork might not make you the world's greatest dancer, but tapping arrows in time to catchy J-Pop songs is a blast. Yet somehow, porting an experience where your feet are stomping and jumping onto a giant controller just doesn't translate all that well to a handheld.

DDR on GBC at least tries to make the most out of a less-than-optimal situation. The chiptune arrangements of existing songs might be harsher on the ears, but at least they're familiar to fans. Your groovin' avatar is limited to a few basic animations, but it's better than empty space. And if you want to make your fingers feel like legs, a clip-on arrow pad peripheral is included. But it begs the same question as wearing shoes for gloves: Why take an experience based on feet and try to make it work for your hands?

When the Xbox One first launched, fans of fighting game had to make a choice. They could go with , a Kinect 2.0 game that forgoes time-tested inputs like 'arcade sticks' or 'buttons' for unreliable motion controls. You can probably guess which one did better.

The idea of a motion-controlled fighting game is sound, since it'd be great to physically throw a punch and see the on-screen character react accordingly. But because that level of motion-detecting tech doesn't exist in the world of gaming just yet, Fighter Within opts to link moves to completely incongruent poses, like crossing your arms to initiate a throw. Fighter Within might fail its ambitious intent, but I'll give it this: despite some uninspired character designs, it certainly looks fantastic.

I feel for Konami on this one. When you're trying to devise ways to sell more DDR dance pads for the Wii, there's not a whole lot to go with besides tiring track and field events or the simple act of walking in place. Regrettably, Walk It Out chooses to go with the latter. By marching in time to generic music, you can do such riveting things as taking a stroll around a nondescript neighborhood, or moseying through a polygonal park.

Whether you're using a WiiFit board, a DDR pad, or just the Wiimote/Nunchuk combo, the result is the same: you, walking in place, wondering if this was the best thing you could've done with your money. There's no demo for Walk It Out on the Wii Shop Channel, but if you want an idea of how it plays, simply stand up, turn on some music, and start moving your legs up and down. You're now doing for free what Walk It Out charges $29.99 for.

Setting up beer pong is pretty straightforward. All you need is a long, flat surface, some cups, a few cans of beer, and people to play with. Beer Pong: the video game has none of these things, attempting to recreate them with a PlayStation Move controller and a TV. If you try to make this substitution at a social gathering, you've just committed the biggest party foul of them all. Now, if it was just a matter of finicky, unreliable motion controls failing to simulate the simple aim-and-toss, that would be one thing. But it gets so much worse.

Since there isn't a Sony-approved peripheral for administering alcohol to the player's bloodstream, Beer Pong! tries to simulate inebriation by adding a brownish tinge and nausea-inducing camera movement to the festivities. And because this is a game aimed at those wild and crazy college kids, your plastic-looking avatar can attempt to 'distract' opponents by adjusting their bikini top or squeezing their crotch. Playing Beer Pong! defeats the purpose of beer pong: You won't get drunk, you won't make friends, and you won't have fun.

Think about all the times you've had to reluctantly use a seedy public restroom. The putrid smells, the abrasive toilet paper, the indecipherable (yet somehow threatening) graffiti. Is that an experience you'd want to simulate? Toilet Tycoon hopes the answer is 'Yes', because every aspect of this sim that no one asked for involves filthy lavatories in some form. Your primary goal is to rise to the top of a toilet empire (I wasn't aware such things existed) by beating out your many rivals (again, I had no idea) with the optimal lids, flushers, and bowls in each stall.

As with any spreadsheet simulation game, you'll have to weigh costs and benefits in your careful selection of loos and latrines if you hope to succeed. You can also pay poor slobs to go and messily vomit all over the competition's facilities, or research upgrades in what can only be described as an alchemy outhouse. But in the end, all the bells and whistles just come back to the core concept of playing a game full of grody bathrooms.

Those seven games seemingly prove the old adage about the road to hell being paved with good intentions. Have you had the misfortune of playing any of 'em? Or maybe you'd prefer a rousing game of Pet Pals: Animal Doctors (pictured above), which asks you to zoom way, way too close to the problem areas of injured, suffering, sometimes bloodied animals. Sound off in the comments below!

And if you're looking for more, check out .

Everyone knows that one surefire way to get people to buy something that is either doomed to fail or otherwise terrible is to bundle it with something people actually want. It's how Hollywood got millions of people (including yours truly) to go see trash like Wing Commander in theaters. No one's going to shell out hard-earned cash to watch a garbage sci-fi movie featuring Freddie Prinze Jr. and Matthew Lillard, but when it's the only way to watch a trailer for the hotly-anticipated Star Wars prequel? They'll come in droves.

It happens with games, too. Most recently, Square Enix proved that people are willing to drop money on . It got me thinking about all the times I bought a game solely so I could get my hands on the accompanying demo, and I realized that many of those so-called 'throwaways' have become my favorite games. And so, I've written this celebration of the best free games that came with the $60 demo we really wanted.

The demo: Squaresoft (before it merged with Enix) did this a lot during the original PlayStation era, bundling demos for anticipated games with lesser-known properties. The Final Fantasy 8 demo was probably the most popular one, since it came off of the white-hot popularity of 7, and everyone wanted to see what was up. In the demo, you control Squall and friends as they make their way through their final exam… which just so happens to be the invasion of a neighboring country.

The game: Click on my name up at the top of this article and glance at the right of the screen where my Gamertag is posted. Yeah, this game is rad. It's Square's take on the The Legend of Zelda, featuring the titular samurai as he finds himself in a strange fantasy world filled with magical talking swords and food puns. It's a bit rough around the edges, but it's still totally worth checking out, and it's far cry from the brooding melodrama found in the demo that comes with it.

The demo: Publishers have shied away from releasing demos, instead relying on timed multiplayer 'betas' to draw in pre-orders for less-popular franchises. One of the only ways to get into the Halo 3 beta back in 2007 was to pick up a copy of Crackdown in February and hold onto it until the beta went live three months later.

The game: I mean, sure, you could play the Halo 3 beta if you had the willpower to stop playing Crackdown. Right from the start, the world of Crackdown is your playground, filled with gangs to overthrow, stuff to blow up, and buildings to leap over. Not only was it a sprawling open-world game, but you also have superhero-like powers, and you only get more powerful as you play. Anyone who's heard the low hum of a hidden ability orb knows the alluring pull of Crackdown's gameplay.

The demo: While Epic Games was working on Gears of War 3 for Microsoft, they were also collaborating with Painkiller devs People Can Fly on a new title called Bulletstorm. Originally, the only way to test out the chainsaw-filled waters of Gears 3 was to pick up a launch edition of Bulletstorm on Xbox 360, but that was quickly expanded to anyone who had preordered Gears before the beta started.

The game: Bulletstorm is Tony Hawk's Pro Skater with guns, and it's a spectacular ballet of carnage. Moving through each stage is like running through the world's most complex and creative shooting gallery, only this time, the animatronic ducks shoot back. There are tons of ways to take out each of the mooks you face, from kicking them into cacti, to whipping them off of ledges with your energy leash. Doing so earns you points that you can use to unlock new weapons and abilities, which in turn, let you pull off even zanier kills. It's a shame that even the inclusion of the Gears of War 3 beta didn't improve Bulletstorm's sales, because there are few games like it.

The demo: By the time Nemesis came out, Resident Evil was a household name, so Capcom could have released a demo with sardines on toast and it would have sold. This one follows Jill Valentine as she attempts to escape from Raccoon City, eventually coming across (and running away from) the incredibly persistent undead Nemesis.

The game: Dino Crisis feels a lot like Resident Evil at first glance. It's got the tank controls, the hacky voice acting, and even the same asinine key puzzles of its predecessor. But instead of fending off zombies, you're watching out for (duh) dinosaurs. Only here, bullets are much harder to come by. Now you've got tranquilizer darts, meaning that the reptiles will only stay asleep for a few minutes. And if you don't treat your wounds, the dinos will smell your blood trail and hunt you down. At least you can finally move and shoot at the same time.

The demo: Uncharted getting multiplayer was a pretty big deal when it was announced back in 2009, and the only way to get an early hands-on was to pick up a copy of Sucker Punch's latest game, Infamous. So yeah, part of Infamous' lasting success likely hinged on the curiosity of Naughty Dog fans.

The game: Infamous is a solid superhero comic book-inspired open-world game that has gone on to see quite a bit of success. Play as a good guy and help out the citizens of Empire City, or be evil and blast them away with your electricity powers. Either way you play, you still sound like a gruff asshole. Luckily, that issue was in the sequel. And hey, that one came with early access to the Uncharted 3 multiplayer beta, though by that point people were legitimately excited about an Infamous 2.

The demo: This beta doesn't even exist yet. Doom 4 is still deep in development, and the only footage available was privately revealed to QuakeCon attendees. Inputting the code you get with the game will qualify you for the beta, though when that will actually happen is anyone's guess, despite being on the game's cover.

The game: Wolfenstein: The New Order had a lot to prove. Coming off a decently received, if forgettable, reboot in 2009, the latest adventures of B.J. Blazkowicz left a poor first impression during its E3 reveal. Luckily, turned out to be something truly special.. Yes, Wolfenstein is still all about killing Nazis (this time, on the moon!), but The New Order injects a strong dose of humanity into all of the violence, not only showing the evils men are capable against each other, but also the bonds that are formed during those trying times. It's one hell of a shooter, too.

The demo: The most anticipated demo for one of the most anticipated games of all time, the Metal Gear Solid 2 demo featured pretty much everything in the Tanker chapter up to and including the fight against Olga Gurlukovich. It was a tiny slice of the full Metal Gear Solid 2 experience (without a single hint of Raiden's presence), but it was dense, filled with secrets and Easter eggs galore. You played it once to finish the story bits; you played it dozens more just to shoot pots and pans in the kitchen.

The game: The actual game that came with the demo is a brilliant mecha melodrama filled with fast-paced battles and heady themes. Zone of the Enders follows young Leo Stenbuck as he literally stumbles across a powerful weapon, and attempts to use it to defeat an invading rebellion. It's a bit pretentious, and filled with way too many overly-long cutscenes, but it's also produced by Metal Gear creator Hideo Kojima, so that’s to be expected. Interestingly enough, when both Zone of the Enders titles were HD-ified for PS3 and Xbox 360, they came with a demo for Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance. Guess they'll never quite escape the shadow of that original demo.

You might have bought the game just for those few brief moments of what's to come, but take some time to explore the thing you actually bought. You might be surprised. Did you buy any games just for the juicy demo packed in alongside it? How are you enjoying Type-0 (after spending 30 hours inside the Final Fantasy 15 demo, of course)? Let me know in the comments!

Looking for more? Check out why .

Roll out the gore-colored carpet, because the first of . On Friday the 13th. Hmmmm, clever. He'll be part of the Kombat Pack DLC, which will also give players access to blind Ronin Kenshi, wicked samurai Shinnok, and… another special guest character. Oh, really?

Now I know I'm not the only one wondering Who's Next on the guest list. I've given this topic quite a bit of thought, and after much soul searching, even more Google searching, and consultation with the all-knowing forces of darkness, I've brought together a list of incredible guest characters who should absolutely appear in MKX. Their pasts are dark, their skills are unmatched, and their brutality is spoken of only in whispers and wails of anguish. Get over here and read for yourself.

My guess is you just jumped up and flipped your keyboard, roaring, "Why not Garcia Fucking Hotspur?" at your computer screen before storming off in a not-at-all hyperbolic rage. Aaaaand now that you're back, stop and think about it: Paula is a perfect Mortal Kombat guest character, because we know she can handle being torn to shreds. She seems to spend all of Shadows of the Damned going to bloody pieces over and over again, until she gets sick of it and turns full demon on her ungrateful boyfriend. And she likes him. Imagine what she'd do to someone she doesn't give a shit about.

Finisher: She rapidly alternates between shrieking at and flirting with her enemy, leaving them utterly confused and defenseless before ripping their head off.

Easily the least functional and most disturbed of the GTA 5 gang, Trevor has no issue wreaking havoc on anyone who deserves it, or just mildly inconveniences him. While his weaknesses are clearly on display - all his opponent has to do is follow the instructions on his tattoo - exploiting them is one hell of a challenge given the size and eclectic nature of his arsenal. He could go easy on his enemy with a rocket to the face, draw out their suffering with jumper cables to their sensitive bits, or get it over quick by dousing them with gasoline and lighting them on fire. Yeah, he's got experience with that.

Finisher: Trevor consumes a handy peyote plant, turns into a seagull, drills into his opponent's abdomen and violently bursts out of their ribcage. He doesn't even shake the blood off before snacking on their leftovers.

Gentle giant though he may be, Hodor can use that size to his advantage and bring the pain when he wants to. Or when someone else wants him to, specifically his telekinetic charge Bran Stark, who will sometimes snatch the wheel of Hodor's mind and demote the poor guy to copilot for a while. Mortal Kombat X may already have the big-and-little duo of Ferra and Torr, but Hodor and Bran bring something of their own to the fight, since all Bran has to do is blink and he's inside their heads. Let Hodor babysit his lifeless body for a while, and in the meantime Bran'll force his opponent to rend themselves asunder with their own powers, weapons, and bare goddamn hands. Possibly while chanting ’why're you stabbing yourself’, like an obnoxious pre-teen.

Finisher: Bran jumps into his enemy's mind and makes them believe they're being attacked by crows, and Hodor has to watch in confused terror as they rip their own skin off.

That raccoon bastard Tom Nook is on our for a reason, and it's because he's one of the most barbarous landlords you'll ever encounter (and that's saying something). Nook may not have the strength to crush your body, but that’s no problem when he can crush your spirit instead, burying you under a mountain of debt that increases exponentially as a direct result of paying it off. He sinks his hooks into you from the start, and the more you struggle, the deeper they burrow until you're ripped apart from the inside out. Metaphorically and physically.

Finisher: Tom Nook hands you yet another bill for a new addition to your digital house and lets the resulting heart attack do the rest.

Glover may only have four fingers, but that's all he needs to give anyone a proper smackdown. That and his five balls of varying density and maximum lethality. Watch him shatter his opponent's sternum with a well-aimed bowling ball. Look, aghast, as he uses a speeding rubber ball to break every bone in their face. Witness him slicing their belly open with the shards of his crystal ball as he . When he's around, the spheres will predict your destruction.

Finisher: Abandoning his loyal orbs, he molds his opponent into a skeleton-cracking sphere and bounces them off every available surface until their bones turn to mush.

While cool queen Elsa could definitely put Sub-Zero on ice (and possibly shove a giant icicle exactly where he wouldn't want it while she's at it), that isn't the extent of her power. Her real talent is in hypnotizing foes and swaying the hearts and minds of thousands. She's already subjugated movie-goers everywhere with her siren-esque singing, so she certainly wouldn't have a problem doing the same in battle. She'd always be one inspirational tune away from making her opponent eat a knife, and a verse of 'Let it Go' would have them dropping their weapons and crooning along. They wouldn't even mind when she put an ice spike through their intestinal tract, because she's just so relatable.

Finisher: She drops the temperature of the arena to zero degrees Kelvin, shutting down all of her opponent's bodily functions and turning them into an ice statue. The cold never bothered her anyway.

The new, young and hip model on the block, that Hansel's so hot right now (especially with ) that his very presence is a blow to yourself self-esteem. Also probably your face when he uppercuts you with the business end of his Razor scooter. No adventure is too weird for Owen Wilson in snakeskin tight pants, and no kill too bizarre. If he isn't kicking his opponent's teeth in during a sick breakdance battle, he's smashing a computer monitor over their head or inviting them to an orgy so they can be crushed under a hundred mysterious bodies. Or maybe none of that happened and he just laced their tea with a mind-shattering hallucinogen. Anything goes in the world of male modeling, or whatever's going on right now.

Finisher: He viciously defeats his opponent in a runway walk-off, and they collapse dead from shame.

RuPaul may look like a sick'ning sweetheart, but anyone who goes toe-to-pointy-toe with her is gonna end up looking sickening in a very different way. A way that mostly involves giblets crushed under the cold heel of a seven-inch stiletto. Actor, model, famously fierce drag queen, and all around hottie-who's-better-than-you, RuPaul has no trouble reading any opponent for the filth they are, and when she throws shade there will be casualties. No amount of charisma, uniqueness, nerve or talent is going to help any enemy of hers when there's a wig in their windpipe and a curling iron shoved through their eye-socket. By the time she's done, anyone who gets in her face will be sashaying away, right off this mortal coil.

Finisher: She forces her opponent to lipsync for their life, then strangles them with a cute belt when they inevitably fuck it up.

The fact that his face is painted with the blood of his closest friend is enough to qualify him for this most brutal of kontests, but it doesn't begin to plumb the depths of his dark past. Delivered unto this world by FedEx, the most evil of all shipping companies, he was given life by a man who had no problem abusing innocent volleyballs. After years of torment, Wilson left his vicious creator for dead in the depths of the ocean and drifted to freedom. But he cannot float away from the wickedness that had bloomed within his hollow center. He cannot escape what he has become, and neither can his enemies.

Finisher: He drifts into the sunset, leaving his enemy to fruitlessly shriek his name before drowning themselves in anguish.

Flinched, didn't you? What creature with a beating heart and intact cerebrum could possibly think of causing harm to Clementine? Hurting her feelings is painful enough, so how could you fathom using MK-style takedowns on a little girl?? And that's exactly what Clementine wants you to think. Her whole strategy revolves around getting your sympathy so she can shoot you in the back or kick you into a wall of spikes. Or maybe she'll just let the guilt itself do her dirty work, because all she needs is a sniffle and a sad face to make you want to defenestrate yourself. By the time you even notice the subterfuge lurking behind that adorable face, it's already too late.

Finisher: "Clementine will remember that" appears across the screen, forcing her opponent to rip out their own heart and crush it out of sheer guilt.

There you have it readers: the most brutal guest characters who should truly, absolutely, in no way satirically appear as kombatants in Mortal Kombat X. Which of these fearsome folks do you want to see shatter a man's skull with their kneecap? Who do you want to see crushed under Scorpion's boot? Finish it! That thought, I mean, in the comments below.

Dying for more Mortal Kombat? Check out the , and all the different -alities that X should totally have.

If you're a series fan, you know exactly what you're in for with 's slate of upcoming DLC. That's not really a bad thing, mind - the heavyweight shooter series knows how to make a map pack sing, with oodles of new score streaks and timed events to keep players guessing. Not to mention the indispensable Exo Zombies mode, which furthers CoD's fine tradition of cheesy undead survival... this time, with super-powered exoskeletons.

As per usual, each pack will hit Xbox One and Xbox 360 first, with release on all the other platforms expected about a month later. Each of the four packs is available on its own for $14.99/£11.59 or as part of the $49.99/£34.99 season pass - which includes a few other bonuses such as the Atlas Gorge map and early access to DLC weapons. Click on for more details on each pack as we get them, and make sure to check back in as the season rolls on!

Advanced Warfare's Ascendance DLC map pack, set to go live on Xbox 360 and Xbox One on March 31, is all about getting vertical - kind of like those old Mountain Dew commercials, but with a high-tech grappling hook instead of a sailboard. Players can use the new gadget to zoom around Perplex, Site 244, Climate, and Chop Shop, though it doesn't sound like it will work anywhere else.

Ascendance also adds the new OHM directed energy LMG/shotgun hybrid for use in competitive matches (which Xbox season pass owners are already using to shoot through walls) and its customized variant. Meanwhile, the second episode of the four-player co-op Exo Zombies campaign takes John Malkovich and company to the outskirts of an Atlas facility, where they'll (hopefully) overcome new zombie hordes with a unique selection of traps and weapons. Click on for screens of all the maps and details on previous DLC.

You want more competitive maps? Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare's Havoc DLC has more competitive maps. Four more, to be exact: Core, Urban, Drift, and Sideshow, and you can click on to see screenshots and brief synopses for each one. But what good is a bunch of new stages without some new guns to carve them up? Thankfully, Havoc also drops in the AE4 directed energy assault rifle and its customized variant, the AE4 Widowmaker.

Advanced Warfare's first DLC pack also includes the first episode of the Exo Zombies campaign, which sees four civilian employees of the Atlas corporation struggling to survive against an outbreak among the company's elite soldiers. And yes, it amps up the now-standard camp factor, complete with face-captured performances from John Malkovich, Bill Paxton, Rose McGowan, and Jon Bernthal that will leave you asking "Kevin Spacey who?" It's now available on all platforms except for PC, where it will launch on March 3.

That's all we know about Advanced Warfare's DLC plans so far, but we'll update this article with all the details on Havoc, Ascendance, Supremacy, and Reckoning as we get them. Until then, what are you most looking forward to? Let us know in the comments!

Looking for more Advanced Warfare? Make sure not to miss our .

Like them or not, quick-time events do serve a purpose: they help bring a brief flash of hectic interaction to what would otherwise be a static, potentially yawn-inducing cinematic. But QTEs tend to rub a lot of people the wrong way, since they usually create a binary win-loss scenario of 'do exactly what the game tells you, or die'. You'll typically spot QTEs hiding out in heavily choreographed action scenes, since things like camera angles and pinpoint timing are too unpredictable to leave in the players' hands.

But sometimes, a QTE doesn't kick off an epic duel, or send your character leaping to safety right before a screen-shaking explosion. They've become so prevalent in games that we've reached a QTE saturation point, where even the most mundane, peculiar, or downright silly actions might be coupled with a frantic button mashing or finger-cramping twiddling of the analog sticks. So, which QTEs have to power to obliterate your immersion or boggle your mind with their ridiculousness? Press your right arrow key in the next five seconds to find out, or risk being stuck on this intro slide forever.

It's official: slowly raising your hands (not even above your head, mind you) requires more effort in than it does in real life. Admittedly, this is meant to be a tense moment, so Galahad immediately throwing his hands up in surrender would kind of ruin the suspense. But you might be too distracted to appreciate the subtle facial expressions and threatening tone of the scene when you're hammering away at the Triangle button to make a virtual man move his arms a few inches.

The only thing tense than a knows this, so to spice things up during a stealth mission, you're accosted by a pre-mutation Master Splinter mid-sewer crawl. What first appears to be a simple rodent turns out to be a terrorist operative, flushing out any soldier wimpy enough to writhe in agony when bitten on a hand that's encased in military-grade leather. Giving the middle finger to an animal that doesn't comprehend what I'm doing isn't how I'd choose to spend my last moment alive, but this soldier is willing to make that sacrifice for the good of the universe's strange sense of humor.

You've just saved thousands of innocent lives by shooting down a missile headed straight for the White House. And there's only one proper way to celebrate such a heroic mission accomplished: a gloriously campy QTE. There's a certain kitschy charm to this triumphant, button-prompt-induced pose, in that Top Gun, I-can't-believe-how-cheesy-this-is-but-I-kinda-like-it way. And yes, it's made infinitely better when paired with .

I know we're here to talk about a lackluster Kinect game, but let me digress for a second. In , something as simple as giving Duck a high-five becomes a great character building moment, as you bring the slightest glimmer of happiness to a desolate wasteland. In Steel Battalion: Heavy Armor, giving your cockpit comrade a poorly motion-detected fist bump feels decidedly less meaningful, besides providing a brief respite from awkwardly waving your hands in the air like a fidgety mime-in-training.

For all their fancy sweat effects, lifelike crowds, and scanned-in player faces, modern NBA games are getting the fundamentals flat-out wrong. You can't try to conform the athleticism of b-ball to a controller's analog sticks; that's just nonsensical. Everybody knows that being able to slam-jam means having a deep understanding of pressing four brightly colored buttons in time with your opponent. I'm willing to bet good money that before Michael Jordan ever set foot on the blacktop, he was honing his legendary skills with Milton Bradley's Simon.

Whether or not you have the instantaneous reaction speeds needed to succeed at this QTE (in a game that rarely uses them) has no impact on Ezio's tale of honorable retribution. But some players are utterly devastated at the thought of leaving Leonardo da Vinci hanging when he initiates a bro-hug. And in extreme cases, it's been known to warrant a full second playthrough just to rectify this moment of inadvertent, tragically auto-saved snubbing. That jilted look on Leonardo's face when you stand motionless in front of his open arms is devastating.

It seems like no matter where Leon Kennedy goes in Resident Evil 4, there's at least one massive boulder trying to squish him flat. So after an entire game's worth of fleeing from giant rocks like a terrified , being able to deliver some of Chris Redfield's mean right hooks to a giant rock feels downright therapeutic. I can't argue that Redfield's repeated kidney punches to unfeeling stone do produce favorable results, but his fists must be the consistency of unrefrigerated Jell-O by now.

Telltale's cartoony take on Jurassic Park sticks to the film's logic that a tyrannosaurus rex can't see you if you're motionless (despite the fact that this bit of advice is ). So when a QTE asks you to stay completely still at the feet of this imposing predator, a mini-game of fiddling with the analog stick feels just a tad disconnected from the life-threatening situation at hand. Remember, kids: when your parents bark at you to sit still, what they actually want you to do is fidget in place ever so slightly for a few seconds, just like Nima here. Also, this all happens moments before you flee the dino at a full sprint, so I guess staying still wasn't the best option after all.

I'm 100 percent positive that the grieving process takes longer than a three-second establishing shot showing that you've lost your left arm. At least you're able to feel a wee bit more emotion than Jonathan Irons (aka Frank Underwood, aka Kevin Spacey), who seemingly forgets all about his son's untimely death by the time he's walked to his car. Honestly, it's a bit hard to blame him, seeing as we only knew Will Irons for a single tutorial mission before he was written out of the story for (attempted) emotional impact.

For a series that lets you bludgeon people with a giant penis-shaped bat, this QTE is surprisingly and delightfully wholesome. Instead of squeezing off rounds with that itchy right trigger finger, why not flex that digit to chow down on a stack of fluffy, buttery pancakes instead? I think that was one of the lines from the first draft of John Lennon's "Imagine". There's no fail state here, but I imagine that The Boss' fancy fork flip could've gone very, very wrong if it required a timely button press.

Wouldn't it be great if, just once, the Spider-Man films toyed with the kind of hilariously embarrassing slapstick on display in this QTE? All that money toward crafting state-of-the-art CGI, just to see Spidey slam into the ground with a sickening thud like someone doing a cannonball into an empty swimming pool. Hey, he's a superhero, he'll survive - and if anything, it'd gave that bug-eyed lady a hearty bellylaugh before they both perish in a fiery explosion.

Know of any other goofy, illogical, or ridiculously inane quick-time events? Well hurry - share 'em in the comments below! Just promise me that whatever you do, you won't call the in Shenmue 2 unnecessary, or you might succeed the QTE of bringing a tear to my eye.

And if you're looking for more, check out the .

Final Fantasy is one of those rare constants in the gaming world, with every year seeing another release for the RPG standard bearer. And while the numbered entries in the series get increasingly experimental, it's the Final Fantasy spin-offs that often allow Square Enix to really flex its creative muscle. From Final Fantasy Legend all the way up to , spin-offs are where FF gets experimental, with varying results that simply beg to be ranked.

At the outset, we disqualified possible entries like Chrono Trigger and Bravely Default, because true spin-offs must contain actual FF elements, be it characters, settings, or monsters. From there, our catalog included genres as diverse as fighters, kart racers, and rhythm games, all connected by a devotion to Moogles and Chocobos. All have now been ranked for all time (until we update it again), so read on to see where your favorite side quest ended up...

Looking back on its mid-’90s release, perhaps fans were a little too harsh on Mystic Quest. Released on the SNES in place of the more challenging Final Fantasy 5, Mystic Quest is meant for western gamers might be unfamiliar with the basic concepts of role-playing games. All these years later, when Mystic Quest isn’t standing in FF5’s shadow, this modest adventure isn't so bad.

From a design team led by veterans of the SaGa series, Mystic Quest is undeniably stripped down to the RPG basics, but it gets those basics right. If Final Fantasy’s massive exposure in the west hadn’t made it redundant, it would still function as a fine primer for the series, and RPGs in general. Meanwhile, the soundtrack remains essential, and is arguably the most underrated in FF history. Should you never pick up the game, at least give the music a listen.

3D brawlers like Tekken and Virtua Fighter were in vogue in the 32-bit era, so even RPG publishers like Square did their best to cash-in. FF's owner started a partnership with developer Dream Factory to helm the imperfect Tobal series, and the teams were looking for a fresh start with Ehrgeiz. The wild fighter has a weird cast of characters and some projectile combat to make it stand out, but its enhanced PlayStation port has a secret ingredient: Most of Final Fantasy 7's cast is playable.

In the late ‘90s, few games were bigger than Final Fantasy 7, but Square steadfastly avoided exploiting its popularity with FF crossovers. Bringing Cloud, Sephiroth, Yuffie, Tifa, Zack, and Vincent into the wacky arenas of Ehrgeiz was certainly unexpected. Ehrgeiz hasn't aged the best, but there's a charm to its manic, unbalanced combat, and said charm extends to its dungeon-crawling/brawling hybrid Quest mode. If you can forgive its dated looks, it's a fine distraction for FF completionists.

No series has truly 'made it' in terms of spin-offs until it has a kart racer. Chocobo Racing finally made Final Fantasy’s karting wishes come true in 1999 by having the series’ signature chubby bird head to the raceway. The yellow fowl competes against other beasts like Mog, Bahamut, and Cactuar, with FF8's Squall and Parasite Eve's Aya sneaking in as unlockable kart enthusiasts to fill out the roster.

Square does an admirable job channeling Mario Kart 64 and Crash Team Racing, even adding some signature Final Fantasy locations, spells, and abilities to shake things up. However, using sprite character models that clash with its polygonal world means Chocobo Racing isn't all that modern. Enjoying it now makes you wish Square Enix hadn't cancelled a 3DS sequel. Still, blasting around in the Chocobo's rocket boots and hitting competitors with Firaga will always be a little fun, so the classic is worth searching out.

Another of FF's cutesy side games, this time the doll-sized Chocobo goes underground to search out his fortune in an expansive series of random caves. The iconic bird is accompanied by a brand new Cid, a young man out to collect treasure so he can build - you guessed it - an airship. There's also a ton of amnesia, just to check off another Final Fantasy trope. Made in the famously hardcore mystery dungeon style, each step the Chocobo takes is matched by the unseen enemies, which adds a lot of planning to the action-strategy mix.

What puts this one over the Chocobo's previous mystery dungeon game on DS? The colorful Wii graphics help, but it also separates itself from other Roguelikes by borrowing the core FF job system. Cid and Chocobo can switch up abilities, and the dungeons adapt to reflect that, adding to the dense game's replayability. Plus, there are few things cuter than seeing a Chocobo dressed as a Black Mage. The 2008 game is the last of the Fables sub-series, marking the end of an all too brief collection of all ages FF games.

This is one of the Chocobo's simplest titles, but that doesn't mean this FF spin-off should be overlooked. Arriving on the Nintendo DS when the touch controls still felt novel, Chocobo Tales follows the title character's quest for magical story books that expand into numerous minigames. Usually the bottom screen recreates some classic FF actions, from casting magic to steering in a Chocobo race.

There's also a card game mechanic that works almost as well as the touch controls, and the lovely child's book art design helps to cover the occasional misfires. Chocobo Tales also offers up multiplayer variations on some of its best minigames, making it a rare FF treat that can be shared with more than one person. If you're tired of the FF's dark and brooding side, Chocobo Tales satisfies like a potion in a boss battle.

FF gets more and more complicated with each entry, and while innovation is welcome, sometimes you're nostalgic for a nocent time. You know, with less existential dread and more saving princesses and crystals. The 4 Heroes of Light is just such a throwback, drawing inspiration from the earliest FF titles, while streamlining many of the best parts and adding new facets to the combat.

There's the Crown system, a clever, hat-based approach to the standard FF job system, and the Boost mechanic to turn-based combat means fights take a bit more planning. The character design apes the spare style of FF's DS remakes to great effect, and the music is grand enough to fit its legacy. The only major negative to the game is that it's overshadowed by its spiritual successor, Bravely Default.

One of the newest entries on the list, Type-0 is a game that seemed like it would never be available to English-speakers. Released late on the PSP, Sony's portable was dead by the time Type-0 came to the system in Japan, dooming it to stay unlocalized forever. But the HD port to PS4/Xbox One makes dreams come true, so consider it a gift even if the militaristic game isn't perfect.

In case you've yet to see our , the game's biggest issues are some obtrusive menus, finicky camera, and merely tolerable voice acting, but there are definitely some positives to be found. The tone is darker and bloodier than any FF before it, including an opening segment where a bleeding Chocobo is executed by soldiers. The grittier feel and intense circumstances win out most of the time, and it has a singular style many recent FF games lack.

Final Fantasy 12 is a very divisive title for the fanbase, offering a plot that's either compellingly complex when exploring a massive world, or annoyingly obtuse and lacking in a clear main character. Strange, then, that the late-era PS2 game would see a slimmed down spin-off on the DS of all systems. Stranger still that the side story is essentially a real time strategy game.

Taking place midway through FF12, Revenant Wings also has Vaan as the leading man, but with the decidedly less messy goal of being a successful airship captain. FF12's battle system is helpfully streamlined with RTS mechanics, allowing for armies of the signature beasts to be at your command. And the game’s chapter structure makes it easier to play on the go. Revenant Wings is just the type of light epilogue its heavy predecessor needs.

This fighting game is officially pronounced Dissidia Duodecim, but don't hold that odd titling against it. This is a dream crossover for longtime fans, bringing together the beloved leads from almost every FF entry, from Cecil to Lightning and everyone in between. And the story does its best to service the fans who've always dreamed of seeing Cloud and Squall smash each other with their ridiculous swords. (That’s sounds dirtier than we mean.)

The action does its best to keep up with the premise, even when the gameplay gets more stat-based than a brawler like it requires. [012] is also both a remake and a prequel to the first Dissidia, making it the ultimate Final Fantasy fighting game, for now anyway. If you never checked out this celebration of everything FF, it's worth downloading to your Vita - or PSP, if you can find it.

In 1996, the Final Fantasy series officially left Nintendo's systems and went exclusively to PlayStation. For fans that grew up with FF on the SNES, it was a sad turn of events, and it made the eventual homecoming all the sweeter. But Crystal Chronicles changes many of the series most established elements. It ditches active time battles and solo exploration, replacing them with speedy teamwork and innovative dual screen play.

That innovation comes at a cost, namely three Game Boy Advances and three cords to plug them into your GameCube to make for ideal co-op. Predating tablets, the DS, and Wii U Gamepad, all but one player control their character with a GBA, using the extra screen to manage attacks and items. If you have all the tech, exploring the miasma together makes for some engrossing couch co-op, and none of its sequels could top the original's unique approach.

For a very brief period of time, WiiWare seemed like the hot place to publish short-but-sweet games. Before Square Enix abandoned the platform like most third parties, it released two surprisingly fun tower defense games as Wii downloadables. Spinning off from Crystal Chronicles - itself a spin-off - My Life as a Darklord is slightly better than its predecessor, mainly thanks to the darker edge of playing from the bad guy's perspective.

Set right after FFCC: My Life as a King, you play as Mira, the new Darklord who commands a kingdom's worth of monsters. Would-be heroes keep invading her tower, so you set up special traps on the fly to keep them from reaching the dark crystal. Fighting wave after wave will keep your attention, as will the nefarious thrill of playing as a big bad in an FF title. My Life as a Darklord is perhaps the best original game WiiWare ever saw - too bad you can't download it from anywhere else.

Did anyone expect a team-up between Final Fantasy and Disney to be one of the most popular series in modern gaming? Kingdom Hearts is just the action-RPG to prove it possible, and while later entries may ease up on the FF content, the original game features Cloud, Aerith, Squall, and most of FF10's cast in major roles. Their more complex emotions and backgrounds deepen the world of Kingdom Hearts in ways Mickey and the gang’s unending positivity can’t.

Beyond the confusing sight of Aerith talking to Donald, the story of Kingdom Hearts is a heartfelt one of love, loss, and friendship. Sora must master the Keyblade to find his best friends, and he'll have to vanquish almost every notable Disney villain to do it. The core FF titles that follow adapt some of Kingdom Heart’s combat, and Kingdom Hearts’ visuals and soundtrack hold up well in the recent HD rerelease. Kingdom Hearts has grown into something much bigger, but it all began here, as an excellent Final Fantasy spin-off.

One of FF’s most consistent features is its music, with composers like Nobuo Uematsu, Masashi Hamauzu, and more crafting some of gaming’s most harmonious songs. If you were ever going to make a spin-off rhythm game, it’d need to be massive to soak in just how many wonderful tunes are in the series’ catalogue. The more than 200 tracks included show Curtain Call is just such a game.

Virtually every FF title, spin-off or otherwise, is represented in Theatrhythm: Curtain Call, all with at least a stage or two exploring a given game’s best moments. More than any other release on this list, Theatrhythm: Curtain Call is the most succinct recognition of Final Fantasy’s legacy, while also being a quality music game in its own right. Tapping along with your stylus is catchy fun, making another listening of ‘Eyes on Me’ feel special all over again.

Crisis Core is a prequel to one of the most beloved Final Fantasy games ever, but rather than focus on its main characters, it tells the story of the mysterious Zack Fair from SOLDIER. A friend of Cloud’s, and Aerith’s first boyfriend, Zack only made a brief appearance in the original game. His past was ready to be explored, and we're glad Square Enix finally got around to it. Crisis Core fleshes out Zack's history, and creates a poignant story that’s very much worth telling.

A contrast to the moody leading men of the series, Zack is likeable, friendly and easy to connect with, which makes the inherent tragedy much more heartbreaking. The game looks gorgeous on PSP, with memorable cutscenes and great gameplay. A fast-paced action-RPG, it is designed to be played in short bursts, delivering what fans have been waiting for... Well, short of a full-on remake of of Final Fantasy 7.

Final Fantasy Tactics seems like a potential misfire. It cuts out the fancy graphics and much of the storytelling, and triples the amount of stats, a potential recipe for boredom. But instead of putting players to sleep, Tactics is a cult success, and at launch FFT made the hardcore genre more famous than ever to western gamers. Despite some excellent sequels, the original and its remake are still kings of the isometric battlefield.

The demanding turn-based combat keeps you saying ‘just one more’ over and over again in each grid-based map, but the true main event is the Job system, which uses Final Fantasy 5’s masterful class mechanic, beefing it up with an even more diverse set of skills and abilities. Assigning jobs to the massive roster of characters allows an incredible amount of team customization that consistently rewards trial and error. Later sequels try too hard to mix things up, making the originator not just the best in the sub series, but the best spin-off in Final Fantasy history.

Those are the best side games that FF has ever seen, but what are your feeling on the rankings? I'm sure you want to just dive into the comments and tell us how right we are. Well, get on it already!

And if you're looking for more things fantastical and final, check out .

Amateur chiropractors of Earthrealm rejoice! in MKX, but with Friendship and Babality finishers currently nowhere to be seen, we could do with a bit more variety.

What these fight-ending 'konclusions' really need is a good old kick up the bum. Metaphorically speaking, of course. No-one needs to see Sub-Zero's anus collapsing via slow-mo x-ray. Give us some madcap variety, NetherRealm! Crack open a dictionary, thumb your way through, find something that the MK announcer would love to utter - preferably ending in 'ity' - and have at it! That's what this big list is all about. More exciting climaxes than an evening spent at Hustler HQ… Enjoy.

Player One hands Player Two a bowling ball entirely composed of soap slivers and signed photos of MC Hammer, served in a man's hat.

Player One dons the costume of a Southern Bavarian pig farmer, proceeds to perform a lengthy and poorly choreographed interpretive dance number.

Player One treats his enemy to a nice day out at the wildlife park, telling him it's a petting zoo…

Player One straps his foe with a lifelike Thomas Edison mask, before summoning up the vengeful spirit of Nikola Tesla. Let the genital-shocking shenanigans begin!

Player One invites their opponent to a swanky new club, but 'forgets' to add them to the guest list.

Player One wheels out an old CRT TV and a Nintendo 64. They opt to settle their differences with a single game of GoldenEye. No Oddjobs.

Player One can't quite seem to advance up the 'living tower'. *winking intensifies*

Player One forces Player Two to perform several humiliating rituals. It later turns out that 'Tau Psi Alpha Tau' isn't a real frat at all.

Player One offers Player Two a place to stay, at least until he can get back on his feet. Also, Player One just sheared him in half.

Player One dons nondescript waiter's garb, before offering his opponent a tasty crab puff. Said puff is stuffed with nitroglycerin.

Player One breaks supersonic wind on their opponent, putrefying them instantly.

In a shocking twist, Player One announces Player two's real parentage live on TV, Jerry Springer-style. They embrace, sobbing.

With no unique weapons to hand, Player One manages to MacGyver together a chainsaw out of toothpicks and old shoes.

Player Two is forced to decide distinguish butter from I Can't Believe it's Not Butter, a decision that ultimately renders him quite mad.

Player One's lawyer takes a good, long look at the MK tourney's laundry list of health and safety violations. The 'kontest' is promptly closed down. Shao Khan is arrested, and later shanked to death in the prison block showers.

Player One morphs into Chris Pratt. All is made well.

Player One summons up a gigantic blender, before dicing their opponent into a nutritious gore chunk smoothie.

Player One rounds up the old babality gang and convinces them to eviscerate Player Two. Authorities later find the victim with a baby rattle implanted in his windpipe.

Player One destroys Player Two in the most modern way possible, by releasing several naked pics of them onto Instagram.

Player One forces Player Two to oil him up in preparation for the big bodybuilding meet. Many awkward glances are exchanged.

Player One meticulously recreates the Christmas manger scene, before stuffing Player Two into the crib, weighing him down with gifts of frankincense and myrrh, and finally filling him up with hot liquid gold. It's a Game of Thrones golden shower!

Player One streaks across the stage in nothing but their birthday suit. Player Two giggles and/or ogles, as appropriate.

Player One force-feeds the opponent a la The Simpsons' Treehouse of Horror. Player Two promptly explodes.

Player One runs around the arena honking like a crack-addled goose.

Player One clambers up one of those evil-eyed trees overlooking the ladies' changing rooms. "Got wood?", the tree asks the 'kombatant', before eating said pervert alive.

Player Two becomes Player One's all new manservant, fetching grapes, bathing his sores and acting as a human footstool.

Player One tears into Player Two with the vitriolic vocab of a lifelong bus station loony. Most of it, naturally, does not make sense.

Player One rides his defeated enemy into a Scrooge Mcduck-like ocean of 'koins', using him like a surfboard until the hard, metallic waves eventually scrape his front off.

Player Two narrowly avoids having his thorax ripped out thanks to train delays. Player One, having arrived for the fight on time, tries to call him seven or eight times, before giving up and buggering off back home.

Player One accepts the blame for the whole silly argument, and the two 'kompetitors' skip off into the sunset.

Player One forgets why he came here, and what exactly he was doing. Player Two begins humming the tune to 'A long way to Tipperary'.

Player One tears open Player two's abdomen, revealing a badly swollen appendix. Player Two has it promptly removed, and everyone goes for ice cream.

[DESCRIPTION REDACTED]

Player One pays Player Two a heartfelt complement. They hug it out.

Player One reveals to Player Two why he cannot perform a babality.

Player One recalls that time Player Two asked how many quarters there were in a basketball game, much to the amusement of the assembled 'kast' of 'kharacters'. Player Two slowly ambles off home for a good cry.

Player One arranges a marriage for Player Two, despite the fact that Player Two definitely, properly loves someone else. Probably someone lowborn yet dashing. It's the plotline to every period drama ever made. But with more spines.

Player One smugly lectures Player Two on the benefits of going green. Player Two opts to compost himself.

Referees rush the stage to announce that Player Two is wearing the wrong sort of shoe grips, or friendship bracelets, or maybe underpants, and is therefore disqualified.

Player One hams it up like a young Laurence Olivier, performing one of those twirly, ever-so-slightly camp, and completely bloodless death scenes from the 1950s.

Player One requests one of the lesser-known System of a Down tracks, but the bone-idle DJ just plays this instead. Player Two is really more of an indie guy and so decides to implode his own skull rather than listen to it.

Player One treats Player Two to an all-expenses spa day, before drowning him in the Jacuzzi.

Player One invites Player Two to "Get over here". Player Two declines, saying he has homework, but Zack Chadly totally sees him at the mall later that day!

Player One's dungeon spike dealer said he'd have the stuff sorted by Tuesday, and today's Thursday! Uppercutting your enemies to their deaths just isn't the same without a little shish kebab action at the bottom.

Player One attempts to disembowel Player Two with a wheel of cheese and squeaky toy hammer.

Player One confronts Player Two about his unpaid gas and electricity bills. Player Two assures Player One that he'll have the money for him by next Friday, but Player One knows that game. It's the same old bullshit he tried to pull last week. Player One asks Player Two if he enjoyed utilising all that free power, then proceeds to pump him full of premium-rate gas and electricity.

"Then have all the power you can handle!", he screams, laughing maniacally…

Taking a page out of the Covenant's book, Player One 'glasses' their opponent with superhot plasma, then uses their newly-reflective remains to check themselves out. Blue Steel, baby!

Player One just shuffles around awkwardly, failing to meet the gaze of his much cooler opponent. Then he goes home.

Player One dazzles the opponent with all manner of amazing tricks - simultaneously solving a Rubik's cube, preparing the perfect cappuccino, and writing an Oscar-worthy screenplay - all whilst playing the piano, trumpet and xylophone at the same time. Player Two exits the stage to consider how utterly shit he is in comparison.

Player One performs a series of increasingly lewd gestures, forcing their prudish opponent - with hand to forehead, and monocle dropping from eye socket - to collapse to the ground with a gasp. The indignity!

Oh, the endless, excruciating possibilities! To rip any of these suggestions to shreds and/or add some of your own, head on down to the comments section below.

Looking for more Kombat Kontent? Check out everything we know about .

You've finally done it. You've written your 1200-page game bible, describing all 150 painstakingly detailed levels, 20 different boss fights, and an overarching plot that spans generations. Now comes the part where you actually, y'know, make it. You've got two years to do so, and your publisher's last 'sure-fire' project just got sent through the critical meat grinder, so your budget's been chopped in half. Aaaaaand half of your top-level staff has quit in frustration. Hope you're not married to that hours-long multi-path ending you were planning on implementing.

There are lots of reasons certain scenes get cut, whether it's due to a lack of time, hardware constraints, or the developers simply biting off more than they can chew. Sometimes, the cuts go unnoticed, and the rest of the game goes on without a hitch. Some other games don’t cut enough, continuing to clumsily refer to these now non-existent events, leaving you wondering just what the hell everyone is talking about. And a surprising amount of these cuts are very much last-minute changes, as evidenced by their content’s persisting but locked-off presence on the final retail disc. It’s a weird old mix of stuff, alright. Ever wondered what could have been? Check out these seven amazing scenes that were cut from your favorite video games.

The Ghostbusters game is famous for two things: letting players act out their favorite moments from the classic films and also for not sucking like nearly every other licensed video game. It's pure fanservice, letting you run amok in a hotel, library, sewers, and more, generally destroying everything in sight on your quest to bust as many ghosts as possible. One particular scene was supposed to take you through the streets of Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade, but was inexplicably cut.

As you can see from , the level design and crowd AI were both in place, and if you go digging around on the disc, you'll even find some cutscenes that were supposed to take place during this parade. Had the level been included, you would have captured ghosts while riding on a float as huge balloons filled the sky. In the final game, the mayor even makes specific reference to how the Ghostbusters have wrecked "his library, museum, and parade," despite the parade never actually making it in. It's a shame, because this level sounds awesome.

Saints Row: The Third's story, while full of hilarious sequences and lots and lots of crotch punching, feels a bit lacking, and some details from the actually shed some light on as to why. According to the guide, there were several different drafts and details that changed over the course of development. At one point, Johnny Gat was supposed to be captured instead of killed, characters like Viola and Kiki would have joined the Saints, and Shaundi was actually supposed to be off gallivanting on a reality show in Mexico.

But the best scene that was left on the editing room floor? After the bridge to Stilwater is destroyed, there was supposed to be a cutscene featuring a -style song routine as the Saints attempt to raise money to rebuild the city. I'm actually a bit saddened now, knowing that this was supposed to exist. It would have been hilarious.

A playthrough of Shadow of the Colossus will take an average player anywhere from 8-10 hours. Not too shabby for a game based solely around traversing a barren landscape filled with 16 boss fights. Now imagine that total time nearly tripled, as developer Fumito Uedo originally envisioned as many as 48 colossi available to conquer.

Realizing that 48 hulking beasts was probably a bit too much for the PlayStation 2 to handle, Ueda cut the roster down to a more manageable 24. due to budget constraints and other limitations, with their only existence confirmed by their presence in the game's artbook. Among the cut colossi are a massive daddy longlegs, a phoenix, a griffon, and even a monkey. While those seem interesting enough, I'm actually even more curious about the other 24 colossi that were planned. The sheer number of them would have lead to some absolutely bonkers concepts, most of them completely unlike the 16 we actually got.

Between fighting space pirates, battling those annoying metroids, and otherwise coping with the deadly flora and fauna of Tallon IV, Samus certainly has her hands full during her first 3D outing. Hell, she even comes across a cyborg version of perpetual thorn-in-her-side Ridley, who attacks her during the penultimate boss fight. But Ridley wasn't supposed to be the only major villain making their GameCube debut. If things had gone to plan, Samus would have come across a giant, three-dimensional version of Super Metroid's Kraid.

Referred to as by fans, this overweight lizard was modelled, textured, and intended to be used as a boss fight in the Phazon Mines on Tallon IV. A large portion of his level was prototyped and implemented, but would have delayed Metroid Prime's release date. Unfortunately, he was deemed 'unimportant' to the overall experience, and thus got the axe. Maybe he'll finally get his due in a high-definition sequel? Fingers crossed.

is a long time to wait for any game, let alone for the highly anticipated followup to instant classic BioShock. And a lot can change over five years, as different modes and areas are created because they sound cool and dropped when they don't work. If you compare the BioShock Infinite we got in 2013 to the preview trailers shown in the years leading up to release, you can see some pretty spectacular moments that never actually made it into the final release.

In this from 2010, Booker's companion Elizabeth seems to have way more power at her disposal than she does in the actual 2013 release. She's not only opening tears to hidden weapon caches, but she's also summoning rain clouds for him to use as a conductor for his electricity hands. There's even an exciting and protracted bridge battle, complete with dramatic appearance by the intimidating Songbird - all of which was cut from the final game. While this trailer is likely more proof-of-concept than actual gameplay, it's still intriguing that many of the ideas and locations shown off prior to release were either changed or removed completely.

If you've played Metal Gear Solid 2, you've probably noticed that the lead-up to the final boss feels a bit… truncated. Raiden goes from standing on top of Arsenal Gear in the middle of the ocean to battling Solidus on top of a ruined building in New York City within a few awkward edits. So what happened?

Well, there was supposed to be a lengthy sequence showing Arsenal Gear smashing its way through the New York skyline, knocking into the Statue of Liberty (which would wind up on Ellis Island after the dust settled). All told, the out-of-control Gear should have crushed half of Manhattan, but all of it was cut in the wake of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. While it's a shame that the removal caused such a jarring disconnect between the aforementioned scenes, it would have been in incredibly poor taste if Metal Gear Solid 2 had shipped with this scene intact, mere months after the attacks.

It's no secret that Knights of the Old Republic 2 shipped unfinished. Pushed up against a looming deadline, developer Obsidian had to make a hard decision and cut swaths of content just to get the game out the door. It hacked off reams of character interactions and dialog, removed locations like a droid production plant and an entire extra planet, and even cut large sections of the ending. The final product left players confused and incomplete. Something was obviously missing.

Thankfully, many of the related files were still included on the game's discs, despite not being accessible during the course of normal play. have since taken these files, prettied them up, and fitted them back into the main game, including that awesome sequence in the aforementioned droid factory. Bring that misanthropic HK-47 droid with you, and either save and recruit the robots found within, or blow them all up. And the ending? Well, there actually is one now. Finally; closure.

No one likes to cut their favorite feature or tear-jerking scene, but sometimes difficult decisions need to be made in the name of actually shipping a product. Luckily, many of these scenes get to live on thanks to rereleases and player-created mods. What are some of your favorite deleted scenes? Let me know in the comments!

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In many ways video games and heavy metal go hand in hand, at least when their digits aren’t occupied with a multiplayer match and/or mind-melting guitar solo. A huge number of games revel in the savagery metal is known for, letting you eviscerate armies of enemies just as soundly as fierce riffs eviscerate mortal souls. Games like Gears of War, Manhunt, Dead Space, and Postal are all examples of carnage, violence, and destruction, so they're totally metal, right?

Well… not really, actually. While brutality is the lifeblood of heavy metal, a game without a defiant soul and gloriously overblown theatrics is like a lead singer without long, raven-black locks. To be truly metal takes passion, nerve, a black hole of rage deep in the soul, and an incoherent roaring voice that can clear the stratosphere. But most of all it needs that indescribable spark, and when you look at it you just know that's metal as hell. That's a much taller order, and few games can live up to it, but I've combed the internet and found the most metal games ever for your raging pleasure. Go forth, metalheads. GO FORTH AND READ.

You know this one's gotta be metal - it's right there in the name! And this game, about the exploits of psychopaths whose idea of fun revolves around vehicular manslaughter, has more than earned the title. Though it focuses on a pretty tired plot device - a ragtag bunch of characters come together for the chance to have their greatest wish granted - Twisted Metal puts a metal spin in it, having contestants compete in a savage death derby full of retrofitted ice cream trucks and mobile torture devices.

Sporting depraved characters like the murderous clown Sweet Tooth and the tortured beauty Dollface, Twisted Metal: Black shows that even when they get what they ask for, it usually results in horrible and brutal consequences. Even for the winners, a happy ending is out of the question.

Rock Band and Guitar Hero competed fiercely for the title of Best Game That Will Make You Think You Can Play An Instrument, and both tried to win ground with the metal crowd in 2009. But the humble Rock Band Metal Track Pack quickly fell to the blood-soaked darkness of Guitar Hero: Metallica.

Sporting 28 Metallica songs and 21 more favorites from the band, this isn't just a Metallica game, but a full-on, righteous Metallica experience. Get inside the metal heads of one of the world's greatest bands, feel the power of that music, attempt to imitate the with a rainbow of plastic buttons! After all, you cannot kill the battery! I mean, unless your controller's wireless.

. Not only does Doom fit that theme perfectly, but it even gets the look down perfectly. Seriously, just look at that cover art.

Playing out like an Iron Maiden concept album, Doom centers on a nameless space marine as he thrusts himself into glorious, blood-soaked battle with hordes of demonic aliens, only to discover they're actually demons from the pits of hell and he must descend into the underworld to battle for the fate of humankind. And in case you aren't convinced the devs did all that intentionally, is the most metal thing you'll hear that side of MS-DOS.

When it comes to metal appeal, Splatterhouse has a little bit of everything. A damsel kidnapped by an evil scientist who plans to sacrifice her to the forces of darkness, a demonic mask that turns its wearer into into a hulking beast, and scenery just begging to be accented with gallons of blood and guts. Savage is a gentle word for all that.

Plus, the geeky protagonist has to make a thinly veiled deal with the devil (in a segment called, I shit you not, 'Satan's Masque') to get the mask in the first place. If you didn't mutter the world 'metal' at least once while reading that, I don't even know what else to say. Actually, I do: .

I know what you're thinking: sure, robots can be metal as hell, but unicorns and their little dolphin friends? In a flash game about living in harmony, harmony oh love? But I'm talking about the Heavy Metal edition that's so goddamn metal you'll forgive its flash/mobile game status through tears of joy and blood. I mean, probably.

Taking the endless-runner premise from the original game, the Heavy Metal version turns its unicorn into a fire-maned hell beast fit to bear one of the horsemen of the apocalypse, racing across the gruesome piled skeletons of giant monsters. You'll spend the race collecting demon bats and shattering deadly pentagrams blocking your path, all while an . rages in the background. The most brutal flash game in existence? It's in the running.

If all of this unlicensed bullshit is beneath you and you won't touch anything that isn't personally endorsed by a real band, you're gonna love this game (and a certain brand of ). Based on the Kiss: Psycho Circus comic book series, the brutally over-punctuated Kiss: Psycho Circus: The Nightmare Child follows a KISS tribute band as they make their way through various realms collecting weapons and armor so they may attain their ultimate godly forms: the actual members of KISS.

To accomplish that, the rockstars-to-be explore various barren 3D locales ala Half-Life and easily defeating enemies, which fall apart like water balloons full of apple sauce when you take a swing at them. Fight hard enough, and you too may one day become Gene Sim - I mean The Demon.

Like Doom, Shadows of the Damned portrays a heroic main character descending to the pits of hell to defeat an overwhelming evil. Unlike Doom, Shadows of the Damned is rife with black humor, sexy ladies, and so many dick jokes. After his girlfriend Paula is kidnapped by the Lord of Darkness, heavily tattooed demon hunter Garcia "Fucking" Hotspur and his motorcycle / badass gun / devilish sidekick Johnson pursue them to the depths of the underworld.

As our hero redecorates the Land of the Damned with demon innards, both Garcia and the Dark Lord escalate their testosterone-drenched posturing, with Garcia's choice of weaponry growing increasingly phallic until things get . The whole thing is a machismo-fest set somewhere between a road movie and a Judas Priest record, with Garcia's angel waiting at the end. Well, an angel that goes demonic with rage in a thoroughly metal fashion. Hell yeah.

Can you really make a list of awesome metal games and not mention Brutal Legend? That's like forgetting to mention Led Zeppelin or Slayer, because they weren't important or anything. A love letter to all things metal from the folks behind Psychonauts, Brutal Legend follows the adventures of Eddie Riggs (a roadie who is definitely not Jack Black) as he fights to save a land of living metal album covers with the help of a vicious battle ax and his trusty Flying V guitar.

The gothic scenery and huge genre-clashing battles sweat molten metal from every pore, and the game's soundtrack is full to bursting with over 100 songs from Ozzy Osborne to Motley Crue (with a little Dethklok tossed in there because why the hell not). Brutal Legend's the sort of silly and sincere homage that knows the genre perfectly - and too well not to poke a little fun.

Playing Guilty Gear is like marinating in a sauna of pure heavy metal. It permeates everything from the soundtrack to character design and the weapons they use to mercilessly destroy each other, to the point that you can almost feel the music seeping into your pores and filling you with glorious, pulse-pounding METAL.

A 2D <(i>or is it?!) fighting game that focuses its attention squarely on the brutality of battle, it still slips in plenty of nods to metal's most influential figures (i.e. one guess who Slayer's named after) and a soundtrack that ups the savagery of every vicious victory. And if none of that is obvious enough for you, there's a hot lady who kills people with a guitar. And she has a .

I can hear your roars of rage for daring to suggest that a game full of J-Pop and suggestive lollipop licking could ever come close to being metal. Say that to Bayonetta's face though and she'd crush you under one hellish monster heel because she doesn't give a shit what you think she's so goddamn metal.

Like many games on this list, Bayonetta has a distinct motif about the struggle between Heaven and Hell, and a hero that will confront the powers of evil threatening to destroy the world - and even more metal, those powers of evil are grotesque angels that would fit right in on a Slayer album cover. The way she kills them is no less brutal, using drawn out Climax moves to rip them apart in uncomfortably sexual torture devices while gothic metal plays in the background. And to top it off, with hair like that, can you imagine her headbanging skills?

Those are the top 10 most brutal, indisputably metal games you will ever experience in your entire goddamn life. Am I speaking the righteous truth? Am I so fucking wrong it's making you vomit liquid darkness? What emotion does that convey exactly? Explain in the comments below, because a vibrant exchange of ideas is so metal.

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In the olden days, your first time playing a game rated M for Mature was a big deal. Maybe it was the fact that, like getting your driver's permit or being able to vote, the power to buy a game deemed too bloody or scandalous for younger eyes felt like a true coming-of-age moment. Maybe your first M-rated game was like a secret hidden from your parents' prying eyes, or smuggled to you by a hip relative like clandestine tickets to an R-rated movie.

Now you've got all these kids getting Call of Duty as a present on their eighth birthday, or playing Five Nights at Freddy's and skipping those 'ESRB' or 'PEGI' things altogether. It's not like it's illegal for parents to buy age-inappropriate games for their children - but there was a time when booting up something M-rated as a youngster had a certain mystique about it, with the sense that you were suddenly ready for anything (except maybe those ). So, which gory, gratuitous experience ushered you into gaming adulthood?

It was wonderful fun growing up around the founding of the ESRB, because even though game ratings existed, parents didn't notice or particularly care about them yet. That's how my friends and I got our young hands on Perfect Dark at the tender age of 11. GoldenEye's weird cousin with a head for alien conspiracy theories, Perfect Dark made us feel like we were getting away with something every time we played it. You could blow people up, blood would splash across the wall whenever you shot a guy, and sometimes enemies would call you a bitch as they went down. Everything a pre-teen could want.

But what really made Perfect Dark great was the multiplayer mode. Sure, it was just a bunch of blocky maps where you could play King of the Hill or shoot up mooks, but that was only part of the draw. What we loved was being our own little army, eliciting shrieks of AI terror and spraying the walls with gore, crushing those who would oppose us with the sort of chilling cruelty only a child can wield. That is, until we turned our digital guns on each other. Does anyone else hear child-like cackling on the wind?

Like all good things in a young boy's life, Resident Evil 3: Nemesis came by way of a cool older cousin. Violent games were forbidden in my household, so I dove into this one with ravenous curiosity. The blood. The guts. The gore. I wanted to see it all. RE3 was my glimpse into gaming's seedy underbelly. Then there was the Nemesis itself. Powerful and imposing, this unstoppable monster hounded my every step; its guttural cry of "STARS!" heralding my imminent doom.

Tragically, after a mere three days in Raccoon City, my parents put the kibosh on RE3. I was distraught. YouTube didn't exist yet, so how would I know if poor Jill made it out alive? That's when I found the novelization of RE3 at a local bookstore, which I secreted away under my mattress. I figured, 'My parents want me to read more, so even if they do find this, they can't get that mad, right?'

Let's see here... we've got a serial-killing clown, a dude who got his face mutilated during a botched surgery, a girl who has a porcelain mask nailed to her skull courtesy of an abusive father figure, and a Vietnam veteran turned cannibal. And that's just on the character select screen! The most iconic part of the car combat Twisted Metal series is its utterly deranged cast of psychotic misfits, but David Jaffe and co. went extra dark and disturbing for the PS2 installment.

My parents agreed to buy this horrifying concoction for my 13-year-old self based on one condition: I would skip all the potentially psyche-scarring cutscenes, meaning the only violence I would ever see would be car-on-car. I held up my end of the bargain (since I was too scared to watch anyway) - but I wasn't quite prepared for a stage set-piece that lets you fry death row inmates to a crisp, or Brimstone's special attack that launches a suicide-bombing zealot onto enemy vehicles. Let's just say my mom wasn't exactly pleased to see that kind of imagery on the family TV.

My older brother was always there to lead the charge, so I never had to worry much about getting M-rated games. As long as I kept it low-key, I could play pretty much any of his purchases without (voiced) concern from our parents. I never got in trouble at school for reenacting all that 'Animated Violence' and 'Animated Blood and Gore', so I guess it worked out ok.

Speaking of which, the only thing I vividly recall about the N64 Turok games is the blood. I doubt anything else about them is still remarkable (except maybe to virtual fog enthusiasts), but that blood was really something. It's even more impressive when you consider that Nintendo made Mortal Kombat fighters bleed frickin' Ecto Cooler just a few years before. But I digress: My first truly M-rated experience was throwing a razor-sharp Frisbee into Turok 2's giant eyeball boss so I could watch blood spurt as it bounced around inside the vitreous humor. Hooray for video games!

At least Connor got a chance to play his copy of Turok. See, I come from a pretty religious household (true story: My mom made me throw away some Magic: The Gathering cards I'd bought from a friend in middle school because the devil). So other than a quick round of Mortal Kombat or Doom at a friend's house, M-rated games were out of the question. But one day, when I was 13 or 14, I decided to press my luck and rent a copy of Turok: Dinosaur Hunter. I don't remember how it happened exactly, but somehow the game slipped past the watchful eye of my parents and the Blockbuster clerk well enough for me to take it home and play it.

For five whole minutes. I slapped the cartridge into my N64, booted up the tutorial, and began wandering through this foggy, dinosaur-filled realm. I took aim with my bow, and loosed an arrow toward an unsuspecting mook. Decapitation! And, because this is how these things go, this was the exact moment my dad walked in my room, shouted "WHAT THE HELL IS THIS?" and promptly grounded me for a week. I felt upset about it at the time, but I'm honestly kinda grateful. He saved me from a pretty terrible game.

I was in love with adventure games from the late '80s and early '90s, and the only reason I had access to them was because my dad had colleagues who would share their games. So in between playing King's Quest and Police Quest, my dad had also passed along Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards because he had no idea what it was about. Yeah, I know. I even helped Kickstart the remake a couple of years ago... and still haven't played it.

Parental controls weren’t really a thing with my parents, unless I was tying up the phone line (and he took my modem). So naive, clueless little me was walking around as this pervy guy in a white suit trying to hit on women. I kinda knew who he was since he made a cameo in Police Quest, but I didn't quite get the full picture until many years later. Many, many years later. Luckily for me (or maybe not), I couldn't figure out the puzzles and didn't get the jokes, so wandering around trying to kiss whoever showed up didn't really get me very far.

Had the ESRB actually existed when Mortal Kombat 2 launched, that would technically be my first, but instead the honor officially goes to Duke Nukem 3D. The FPS certainly earned its rating with gory violence, crude humor, and even some heavily pixelated nudity. Back in 1996, all of that had an intoxicating charm to me and my juvenile friends. It was such a thrill knowing my parents would disapprove of Duke Nukem saying “I'll rip your head off and shit down your neck,” let alone him literally doing that during the post-boss-fight cutscene.

Today, Duke’s reputation as gaming’s bad boy seems so quaint. His gory escapades look tame next to God of War, and his dirty attempts at wit can’t really compare to the colorful insults of Saints Row. Also, once I saw films like They Live, I realized all of Duke’s best lines weren’t even original. Nowadays, I'm mortified whenever I think about my seventh-grade self's excitement for Duke's breakout hit.

So, how about you? What was the first M-rated game you ever owned or played, and how did it all go down? Did you incur the wrath of your parents, or exploit their inattention to what you were actually playing? Or heck - maybe you were old enough to just buy it for yourself, no questions asked! Share in the comments below.

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There’s a lot said about gaming’s depiction of women, and with good reason. For all the talk of sex positivity and the empowerment of sexuality, there’s a long history of objectified digital ladies. And I’m sure that regrettable lineage of underdressed women has you thinking the same thing as me: Where are all the nearly nude men in gaming?

Purely in the interest of equality, I went searching all over the internet for sexy, scantily clad gaming dudes. After sifting through A LOT of scandalous fan art, I finally found a handful of hunks that reach for similar heights of fanservice as women like Bayonetta. Just to clarify, these are dudes who not only wear very little, but actually appear intentionally provocative, as opposed to power-fantasy musclebound brutes like Kratos. Without further ado, here are the most shockingly underdressed men in gaming...

The Dead or Alive games are (in)famous for one thing, and it isn’t balanced gameplay. The series has been cashing in on the appeal of its buxom female cast for years, and the majority of Dead or Alive 5’s DLC is made up of a near endless number of sexy costumes. For the most part, the guys of DOA5 are left with jokey downloadable attire like Santa Claus and his reindeer, but this alternate look of Ein’s doesn’t seem intended for laughter.

Now, the incubus his costume refers to is basically the lady-tempting equivalent of a succubus, not the awful rock band. That said, it doesn’t seem all that satanic to me. All the leather, red nail polish, and novelty horns look more like he bought a ‘Sexy Devil’ outfit for Halloween. Ein’s Incubus look is still a far cry from the flowers and string the ladies are bedecked in for DLC, but it’s still nice to see that some of the DOA guys can strut their stuff.

I wouldn’t describe any of the Castlevania characters as sexy during the 8-bit era, but things took a turn on PlayStation. Not only did games like Symphony of the Night take clear inspiration from Metroid titles, but everybody got a whole lot prettier. Nowhere is that shift in design more obvious than with Simon Belmont. By the time he appeared in Castlevania Judgement, he had taken his whole ‘whip wielding’ motif much farther than anyone expected.

Much like Ein’s Incubus attire, Simon’s Judgment apparel is a lot of belts and leather wrapped around an exposed torso. Credit for the design goes to concept artist Ayami Kojima. She worked on most Castlevania titles from Symphony onward, and Kojima clearly has skill with crafting attractive men, though most weren’t as kinky as Belmont in Judgement. His short pants and tattooed midriff are definitely a change from the heavy armor of the original NES box art. You have to think Dracula would even be a little uncomfortable if Simon showed up wearing that.

Street Fighter has its share of underdressed guys, from the handsome psychopath Vega to the bearish wrestler Zangief, but they can’t really compare to this duo from Street Fighter 3. Brothers Gil and Urien are both leader’s of a dangerous cult, with Gil making himself the messianic figure as Urien tries to usurp control. Both have the power of Greek gods, and the bodies to match, as you can no doubt see. Seriously, how can Ryu keep a straight face when battling either of those guys?

The two are wearing virtually nothing, not even shoes, though what’s a little foot pain to a god? If anything, their sole garment - one small posing pouch apiece - have the effect of emphasising their nakedness. Street Fighter 4’s big bad, Seth, is fully nude, but is as smooth as an action figure below the waist, effectively removing sexual connotations. Less so with Gil and Urien’s body wrappings, which effectively works as both sacred and scandalous garb. It’d be sexy if the two weren’t so into kidnapping and world conquering.

Goichi ‘Suda51’ Suda and his team at Grasshopper create strange games, perpetually the result of their creator's lifelong obsession with punk rock, pro wrestling, and horror films. Even his lesser works, like Killer Is Dead, still offer a more distinct world than you’ll find in many other games. I mean, how many other action titles feature an arch enemy who exclusively wears gold chains and lives in a palace on the moon?

David is the big bad of Killer Is Dead, a self-styled lunar king, bedecked in naught but the gilded dental floss and thong befitting of that status. It shows you how nuts the whole game is that David can dress this way without anyone commenting on it. Killer is Dead garnered some controversy for its raunchy dating minigames, but David’s garb somehow missed the headlines. Ironically, said minigame makes players work to see the dates in their underwear, while David is dressed down from the outset. That’s very charitable to players, no?

These days Raiden is fully accepted as one of gaming’s elite stars, but fan reaction wasn’t so charitable when he first appeared. Most players were apoplectic that he replaces fan-favorite Solid Snake - up til then the lone protagonist of the Metal Gear Series - so early in the game. Konami only made it worse by not revealing that was the case ahead of release. Unlike the grizzled Snake, Raiden is a pretty boy who’s much more sexualized than his predecessor. I mean, Snake didn’t have to stand around with just a straw obscuring his penis, did he?

Raiden’s stripped down torture scene, followed by his nude escape, rapidly became one of the most talked about scenes in gaming. And I get why: it’s easy to admire Raiden’s acrobatic skills as he does cartwheel kicks while covering himself with his hands, though I think some fans weren’t ready for the character to be so exposed. Most western fans weren’t prepared for such nakedness. This might explain why Raiden became much more popular when he exchanged his snow-white body for a gunmetal grey cyborg death machine…

Devil May Cry star Dante has always looked more like a ‘80s glam metal singer than a paranormal investigator. Seriously, just about any of his outfits would fit on the cover to a Poison album, but Dante’s standard garb in Devil May Cry 3 takes it to a whole new level. He keeps his signature red leather duster, and this time he’s going shirtless underneath, save for the strap right across his chest.

Just like with Capcom stablemates Gil and Urien, the leather line situated on Dante’s upper torso makes his shirtlessness more pronounced. The coat’s accessory draws the eye much more than an unobstructed view would. Of course, if you prefer to see Dante go fully topless, DMC3 offers that as an alternate costume, though you have to finish the game first before you unlock your just desserts - and that’s no simple task even on the Easy setting.

If you’re ever thinking of digging up Final Fantasy 7, please do me the favor of playing Vagrant Story first. That game’s been underrated from day one, and with apologies to writers of Cloud/Sephiroth fan fiction, Vagrant Story has sexier guys as well. Unfortunately, thanks to the limitations of technology, their outfits could only really be appreciated when you look at the concept art.

When you see the muddy textures and jagged polygons of the PSone game, it might not be immediately obvious lead character Ashley is wearing bottomless chaps, but the official art confirms it. Meanwhile, his rival Sydney is channeling David Bowie with an emaciated look and low-hanging pants that must require magic to keep from staying on. This game needs an HD remake so people can truly appreciate those designs! And also, you know, to play it or whatever.

So those are the most ludicrously underdressed gaming guys I could find, but I’m always looking for more examples (purely for research). If I missed any unclothed examples, tell me all about them in the comments!

In the market for more thrills? Check out our list of .

Now, I wouldn't say that Destiny actively hates its players, but it sure doesn't do them any favors. Dailies, weeklies, reputation grinding, Crucible matches, raids… there's a seemingly never ending demand on your time just to have a chance at finding a good new weapon or piece of armor. So, naturally, players have decided to work smarter, not harder.

It seems that high-level Destiny play isn't so much about the loot grind as it is about finding every single glitch, exploit, or 'cheese' as possible and taking advantage of it until Bungie decides to patch it shut. But there's always another piece of cheese around the corner. These are some of the best ones. Some of them still work, so get to studying, Guardian!

The Cheese: If you were playing the beta and were hard up for cash, this was a real quick and easy way to fill your coffers. Simply find a chest, open it up, hop on your Sparrow, and drive away for a bit. Once you're far enough out you can return and, lo and behold, the chest has reset, once again full of glimmer. Look at that; people trying to cheese the game even in beta.

Does it still work? Naw, this one got ironed out in beta. In the retail release, chests will only respawn if you return to orbit. Still, it would have been pretty hilarious if it had stuck around, huh?

The Cheese: Ahh, yes, the loot cave. This thing was a standby for months, where players would all line up outside of a cave in the corner of the Cosmodrome, fire at the infinite brigade of mooks pouring out of it, wait for the dust to settle, then round up all the shiny engrams they just dropped. There was no guarantee that what you got was any good, but since you picked up so much stuff it was usually worth it.

Does it still work? Nope, the loot cave has since been altered to prevent this kind of camping and loot gathering. Other areas have their own 'loot cave' moments, but they're usually patched out pretty quickly.

The Cheese: You could fight Phogoth the normal way, by walking into his chamber and taking him head on while avoiding the neverending stream of Hive. Or, you can be smart about it and He might move a bit, but he always seems to walk back to the same spot. Enough shots and boom - it's over.

Does it still work? Yep! You might have to watch out for some enemies creeping up on you, but otherwise, you're golden.

The Cheese: Now, in this fight, you could simply stand up at that tall ledge and shoot at Sekrion from on high (which is, in itself, a cheese), but you'll still have to avoid plasma shots and the Minotaur that spawns behind you. No, this is way better: by using some expertly timed boost jumps, you can parkour your way right above Sekrion, and nothing will hit you. Just watch for directions on how to do it. It's amazing.

Does it still work? As long as you can get up there, yeah. You have to be careful, though, because if you miss a jump, there's no way back up, other than restarting the whole damn mission.

The Cheese: Got your crew of six? Got your grenades? Ok, you're good to go. Setting this cheese up is , but once you've gotten everything coordinated, you can start chucking your 'nades at each boss, slowly inching the pair toward their respective precipices. After enough hits, off they go, plummeting into the abyss. Is it fair? No. But it sure is satisfying.

Does it still work? Unfortunately, no. This got patched out a little bit after the exploit was discovered. It was still a fun couple of weeks, though.

The Cheese: During the Crota's End raid, a giant bridge will eventually materialize after you kill off enough bad guys, but there's a much easier way to make your escape. Simply off the Swordbearer, grab its sword, hop onto a ledge, and sword-swing your way across. If you do it right, you can skip an entire section of fighting. Sure, it looks silly as hell, but you can't argue with results.

Does it still work? Well, yes and no. The original method appears to have been patched out by throwing a ton of Thralls in your face, but there's another way to pull this off. It involves offing one of your team members while the other two players boost jump at the top of the tower, ascending slightly out of the intended playable area, thus causing the game to think everyone's dead for a fraction of a second. This despawns the Thrall, letting you kill off the Swordbearer and zip across the chasm. Brilliant.

The Cheese: Of all the cheese, pulling out your ethernet cable to defeat Crota is by far the cheesiest. First you need to make sure that the cord-cutting player is the session host, so have them be the first into battle with Crota. Once Crota's knee hits the ground (and is then vulnerable to attack), have that person disconnect from the game. The rest of the players can mop up while Crota remains permanently on his knee, and they can invite the other player back in once Crota's defeated.

Does it still work? Nope. All good things must come to an end, and this cheese got patched out relatively quickly. We'll always have YouTube.

The Cheese: Do we have another 'loot cave' on our hands? Simply load up The Dark Within mission, hop on your Sparrow, and follow the mission marker. You'll be doing some indoor driving, so take care, and make your way through until you get to the Darkness Zone where your Ghost opens up the gate for you. Right before that room is a sealed off passage. If you park your Sparrow right next to it and hop off, you'll clip through the gate. Walk through some unfinished geometry, and eventually you'll find a room with glitched out Thralls. They spawn quickly, and they don't move at all, so take 'em out to fill out your bounties and nab loot to your heart's content. It'll probably take ages, though, and you're probably better off doing Hive bounties in the Rocket Yard. Still, if you're keen on breaking the game a bit, will guide you in the right direction.

Does it still work? It's a new cheese, so it still works, but for how long is anyone's guess.

The Cheese: It used to be that Weekly Heroic and Nightfall strikes were either solo or Fireteam affairs. No matchmaking whatsoever. Bungie recently updated Destiny to add matchmaking for these options… by making it default. That's right, there's now no way to solo any of these missions. So what's a hardcore lone wolf supposed to do? Well, where there's a will, . If you've got a PlayStation console, all it takes is changing your time-and-date settings. Set it to the future while you're in-game, and you'll get booted back to the title screen. Choose your character, and while your game is loading, switch it back to the current time. If you head to the Tower and no one's there, then the glitch has worked. Now, you can play without randos spoiling your fun.

Does it still work? This is new, but I'm sure Bungie is working on a way to prevent it from happening. Hopefully they'll put some work into giving players the option to solo without cheesing as well. Plus, it only works on PlayStation consoles; the Xbox 360 and Xbox One won't let you change the system settings while in-game.

These were only a few of the more noteworthy cheeses and exploits in Destiny. There are a ton more, whether it’s exploiting some glitch in the scenery or simply hiding somewhere the developers never intended you to hide. Looking for inspiration on how to find your own cheese? Start with , and go from there. If you find anything cool, let me know in the comments! I'll be updating this feature with more cheese as it surfaces. It always does.

Looking for more? Check out .

You know how you sometimes get asked that question – often during a conversational lull during an already boring dinner party - “Who would you like to meet, and why?” You might even have already heard it in relation to video game characters. It would be cool to meet Mario for real, right? Cheery chap. Cool moustache. Good times. And how cool would it be to get some real, first-person insight into the life of one of the most successful video game characters of all time?

Wrong. You definitely don’t want to meet Mario, or most of your other gaming heroes for that matter. Have a scroll through this article and I’ll explain what’s wrong with all of them. You can still admire them of course, but please, do so from afar.

Mario has been running and jumping on literally everything in sight for decades now. That is some aggressive hyperactivity he has going on there, and he’s not going to stop just because you’re a fan. Just trying to hold a conversation amid his spontaneous sprints, leaps and “Wahoo!”s would leave you exhausted within half an hour. Also, do you really want to hang around a guy who spends all day getting high on mushrooms? Get a job, Mario. He might be dressed like a plumber, but have you ever actually seen him fix any of those pipes?

If you do end up meeting him, despite my warnings, please make sure you keep your wallet hidden, or he’ll pilfer all of your spare change. Maybe just pay for things on your card to be on the safe side. You might be okay with notes. Unless of course, you meet Paper Mario. Get it? Like paper money?

Yeah? Moving on...

Actually, I should apologise to Mario, because he’s not the worst for stealing your valuables. At least if he nicks some of your money, he can’t run away that fast. It’s a whole different story if Sonic the Hedgehog gets a hold of your trinkets. And he’s in it for much bigger pickings. Jewellery and precious stones at the very least.

If you do somehow manage to catch up with him, a single punch will see him drop some of the swag. But he’s still a hedgehog, and with all those spikes, you hit him at your own risk. Is it really worth it? Also, he’s blue. Hedgehogs aren’t supposed to be blue. There’s something seriously, evolutionarily wrong with that creature. Stay away. Just stay away.

“Hey.”
“...”
“How’s it going?”
“...”
“Nice weather we’re having.
“...”

That will be your entire conversation with Gordon Freeman. Enjoy. And have fun trying to talk him down once he starts trying to open doors with a crowbar.

Next!

You know what these angsty, image conscious adolescents are like. You try to engage them in conversation, and all they want to do is talk about how big their sword is. You just know there’s a Tinder profile out there somewhere where he’s posing with the Buster Sword – beneath a towering mass of pristinely preened hair that he’s just desperate for you to notice - but his description has a quote that’s something tritely positive, like “Always believe in the power of friends“. Total, surface-level, internet poser.

He’d never find the time to meet you anyway. When he’s not messing around with Aerith or hanging out with his other friends, he’s usually off fighting evil and saving the world. Probably just for attention though. Give it a rest, would ya, Cloud? No-one needs to see another Junon reactor selfie.

“I’ve never been interested in anyone else’s life. Other people just complicate my life. I don’t like to get involved.”

Oh, okay then Snake, I’ll just leave you alone then, shall I? Yeah, he’s pretty much a sociopath, this guy. And on top of that, he’s a well trained, highly skilled killer. That’s not the friendliest combo. Steer clear unless you want a gun pointed at your… parts… and a grizzled man trying to take your rations. But wait, what’s this?

“I think at any time, any place… people can fall in love with each other.” Kinda sending out mixed signals there, Snake. Maybe add 'monstrously irrational mood-swings' to the list of reasons you probably don’t want to meet him.

Come on, I don’t have actually have to explain this one to you do I? If you want to meet an arrogant, aggressive, wise-cracking, politically incorrect idiot who solves all his problems using a combination of brute force, explosions, and machismo, then dig up Russell Crowe’s address on a Hollywood star map. Also, don’t you hate it when people wear their sunglasses all the time, even indoors?

If you do end up meeting him, just don’t ask him to do any of his famous quotes. He’ll hate that. Just ask any celebrity who, decades later, still has that once-cool-and-hilarious catchphrase shackled around their neck. In fact he’ll probably respond by killing you with brute force and explosions. And then he’ll do one of his famous quotes anyway, because that’s all he has left, damn it. But you won’t hear it. ‘Cos you’ll be dead.

While Mario is getting high on mushrooms all day, Pac-Man is popping pills. Then he gets a bit peckish and eats some fruit. Then he goes and attacks ghosts. This is another guy you don’t want to meet, at least not until he goes to rehab.

It’s unclear if the ‘waka waka waka waka’ sound is due to Pac-Man’s substance abuse or just a crippling speech impediment. If the former, you might be able to get a decent conversation out of him after he gets clean. If not then that’s all you’re gonna get, and don’t think you’ll even get a word in. It’s endless. He can’t even move without wakking. If you want to emulate the experience without having to leave the comfort of your own home, save yourself the trouble of actually hanging out with him by just putting your finger in your ear and scratching, quickly and rhythmically. Go on, try it. It totally works.

Now, Commander Shepard is just an extension of whoever’s playing him or her, and who in their right mind would want to meet you? No, I’m only kidding, I’m sure you’re lovely. And I bet you don’t work on a bog-basic, three point morality compass like Shep does.

Everything you say, Shep is either going to react well, poorly, or morally ambiguously. If you’re going out to eat, make sure you select the kind of food he likes. He has a tendency to randomly slap people or push them out of windows if he’s annoyed. He also has a tendency to butt into…

“I’m Commander Shepard and this is my favourite slide in the article.”

Damn it, Shepard.

Well, you know what they say, never meet your idols. Why don’t you let me know which gaming characters you’d like to meet in the comments section below? Or better yet, come up with some examples of characters you definitely wouldn’t want to meet, and why.

Looking for more character assassination? For in-game unpopularity, check out .

The Game Developers Conference is over and now it's time to look to the biggest gaming event of them all: E3 2015. Every year game developers from all around the industry show off their games on the E3 show floor. Sometimes we see games that will be out in the wild in just a few months, other times we get very early looks at games coming years down the line. Then there's the glitzy press conferences, revealing new titles and hardware. Needless to say, it's an exciting time.

What we'll see on the show floor is fairly uncertain. Will the Last Guardian finally re-emerge? Will Mass Effect 4 be announced? Is the Legend of Zelda for Wii U going to be playable? These are some of the questions we want answered, and we're sure you do too. That's why we've put together this list of games we want to see at E3 2015. But stay tuned. As new details surface, we'll update this article with the latest information on your favorite upcoming titles.

It may be any less. With a giant galaxy to explore, BioWare could take the next title in the series basically anywhere... and it hasn't been much more specific than that so far. In fact, all we know at this point is that the game exists and will have space stuff in it. Also Garrus? Please also Garrus.

While it may seem like the game is too far off to pop up at E3 2015, consider the fact that it was announced at E3 2014 with nary a screenshot. With a year since then, we suspect that the development team has hammered out the basics a bit more, and BioWare will be happy to tease the title even more. Maybe a piece of concept art? Two pieces of concept art? We'll see.

Bits of information about have trickled out to the public over the last few months, but in terms of actual footage, fans have had nothing to feast their eyes on since the original release trailer at E3 2014. The dam's looking fit to burst at this point, and what better time to do it than center stage at E3 2015?

Following the success of the Tomb Raider reboot, our thirst for more and bigger adventures (with more tombs, please) is greater than ever before. Plus, Microsoft ruffled a lot of fan feathers when it announced that Rise of the Tomb Raider would be a timed Xbox exclusive, so we somehow doubt it's going to keep Lara tucked away when it's got everyone's attention.

It's been years since we've gotten to play an all new, vehicle-based Star Fox game, but gettinga quick glance at the work-in-progress at last year's E3 has given us hope of seeing a more complete version this year. Oh, how we long to hop in an Arwing to gun down enemy ships with charged laser blasts and sit in the driver's seat of the Landmaster once again.

The good news is, it looks like we'll be able to do those things in the new , only it may be a slightly different experience. The game is controlled using the Wii U Gamepad, and its shooting takes advantage of the controller's camera and motion control, which appears to take some time to get used to. Even so, we definitely expect to get our hands on the game on this year's show floor.

Our anticipation is now out of control. It can't get much more unbearable than this. DICE's upcoming has shown up at the previous two E3s but with little to show. In 2013 we got a teaser trailer showing off the ice world of Hoth, and in 2014 there was an in-engine look at Endor. Now we're expecting a full-blown reveal for E3 2015. Anything less than that, and we're turning to the dark side.

Why do we expect to see it this year? Well, the game is probably going to come out later this year. Dice has set a release window for Holiday 2015, which would be in line with the upcoming Star Wars: The Force Awakens release to theaters. We just hope it's everything we've come to expect from a Battlefront game. Let us see some epic space battles, lightsabers cutting through stormtroopers, and awesome, reenacted movie battles.

The Skyrim of the franchise is coming. At least, that's what the Wii U's upcoming open-world title looks like to us. We've only seen a few glimpses, but from what has been shown so far, the game is massive. The fields of Hyrule extend as far as the eye can see, and the crazy thing is, if you can see it, you can probably go to it.

Because the world is so large, much of the gameplay shown has focused heavily on Link's horse. His equine companion appears to be used as more than just a vehicle to get you from point A to B. For example, Link can leap off the horse's back and enter slow motion, launching a volley of arrows before he hits the ground. And that's just the sneak peak. Nintendo is sure to reveal much more of the game at this year's E3 in preparation of Zelda's expected 2015 launch.

This is a resurgence that you probably didn't expect to witness anytime soon. Rock Band is making a comeback. The upcoming title is said to be making a few changes to the traditional formula (though the specifics are still scarce) to get you and your co-op rock buddies back on the drummer's throne and flicking the clicky guitar strings on new-gen consoles.

Harmonix is saying that will be the Rock Band game of this generation. What does that mean? Well, for one, you probably won't see the developer releasing any more Beatles or Green Day spinoffs as was done before. Rather, the game will be built upon with expansions and DLC. Plus, the developer is also working on making the old peripherals usable on the new hardware, so you won't necessarily need to buy new kits.

Another year, another Assassin's Creed. But this year it appears that Ubisoft is taking on another setting that fans have been asking for, Victorian London. Early screenshots of the game showed off the new setting's skyline, featuring Big Ben and a massive, explorable city. On top of that there were a few glimpses of the hero swinging from ropes, putting on disguises, and dueling enemies on top of moving carriages.

If doesn't show up at E3 2015 it would be surprising. The series has had a long track record of yearly releases, and Ubisoft isn't going to miss this year. You can definitely expect the next Assassin's Creed to be the headliner of the Ubisoft press conference.

No Man's Sky may just be the biggest game you could ever experience. Yeah, there are games out there that have procedurally generated worlds, but No Man's Sky gives you a procedurally generated universe to explore. From the animals of an alien planet to distant asteroid fields, there is no limit to what you can explore. See a planet in the sky? Go there and check it out.

How you spend your time is completely up to you. Want to sit and stare at dinosaur-like alien beasts as they graze on a colorful, peaceful planet. Do it. Want to take part in massive space battles that make you feel like you're in a Star Wars movie? You can do that too. We've only scratched the surface of No Man's Sky, and hopefully we'll get a chance to delve deeper this E3.

has developed a habit of making impressive E3 showings then disappearing for the rest of the year. We've previously gotten a glimpse at the three-person co-op open world gameplay. But outside of a few in-game firefights and cinematic trailers, there hasn't been much to go on with The Division. Hopefully, that all changes at this year's E3.

If the game is still set to come out by the end of the year, E3 is the perfect time to build hype for the online shooter. We've seen the success of Bungie's open-world shooter Destiny, and it's easy to imagine Ubisoft is eager to get it's co-op-centric online experience out in the open.

Having made its debut at E3 2014, seems to be taking the tactical shooter genre in a new direction. As a member of a SWAT team or a group of criminals, it's up to you prevent the other team from accomplishing their goals. In the demo shown last year, the criminals had a hostage and were barricaded in an American suburban home. The SWAT players had to coordinate their attack as they busted in through windows and blew down doors (and even destroyed the floor) with breach charges. It looks intense.

The most impressive aspect of the demo is the level of destructibility in the environment. Players were able to shoot holes through the house's drywall exposing the wood framing within, and breach charges seem to destroy just about anything you can stick them to. We expect to see more of Rainbow Six Siege this year, and to test out just how much of it we can blow up.

is easily one of the most anticipated games of the year, and with the newly announced September release date, we're definitely expecting a big showing at this year's E3. Snake is back (Big Boss snake, not the Solid one) in a console prequel/sequel to the rest of the Metal Gear Solid series...except 3 (and the portable ones), that takes place before MGS 5. Look, it's complicated, but the game looks absolutely amazing.

A few things have changed in Metal Gear Solid 5. For one, the world isn't as confined as it has been in previous games. Instead, you have the freedom to approach your missions as you see fit. Snake has an entire army at his back as well as powerful companions who can join him in the field, not to mention a ton of new gadgets to mess with, kidnap, and kill guards. We can't wait to get our hands on it in June.

After spending way too much time as a Final Fantasy XIII spin-off, nearly tripping into development hell, is finally, finally coming out. Sporting all the giant swords and crazy hair that we love with a whole new battle system and gobsmackingly pristine graphics, XV is a huge turning point for Square Enix. This E3, we're expecting an all-in media blitz.

It's been a rough couple of years for Square in terms of consumer confidence, particularly after it devoted so much time to producing FFXIII sequels and fixing an utterly broken MMO. The once revered giant of JRPGs is on the ropes in the Western market, but if the successful relaunch of A Realm Reborn is any indication, it isn't down and out. It just has to make this year count, and treat Final Fantasy XV like the make-or-break game it really is.

We have a ton of questions about . After all, the game was just announced in December and there are only a few details and trailers trickling in here and there. We know it has classic fighters like Ryu, Chun Li, and what appears to be a newly resurrected Charlie Nash, but the rest of the roster eludes us, as does its place in the series' timeline.

But who really cares about the lore that much anyway? We're definitely excited to see more of the game in action and it seems that E3 would be a prime time to reveal new (and old) characters and maybe get some hands-on time with the fighter. Nothing is set in stone yet, but it's difficult to imagine we'll go through E3 2015 without at least another glimpse of the game.

is a massive game and developer Rockstar has done well to keep the online portion fresh with fixes and new content (with more on the way). But what about those of us who want to delve back into the story mode and maybe explore the lives of some other characters living in Los Santos? We want more stuff, too.

It's about time Rockstar releases a new single player expansion for GTA 5. The series has never been shy about doing so before. Rockstar has even mentioned that it has GTA 5 DLC in the works. We wouldn't be surprised to see an announcement revealing some form of expansion. Gamers have had time to play through on the new hardware by this point. E3 would be the perfect time to show off any additional content.

We've been waiting to see the ol' Chief back in action ever since he threw off that pointless cape in the game's first teaser trailer. We've already gotten our hands on the Halo 5 multiplayer beta, and from what we've played so far is going to be worth the wait.

What kind of E3 would it be if we didn't get to see Master Chief back at his best once again? Not only will we get back in the Chief's Spartan armor, a second hero has been thrown in the mix who we'd love to get more acquainted with. Perhaps we'll get to see more of the story mode, or check out a few new multiplayer maps. Whatever the case, we can't wait to get our hands on it.

Chances are won't be scaring the shit out of us until 2016 at the earliest, but that doesn't mean we should feel safe from Kojima's stunts. Revealed through the now famous (and famously horrifying) 'playable teaser' P.T., Silent Hills has since received one more, ultra-creepy trailer at the 2014 Tokyo Game Show. Since Kojima is the kind of guy who likes to tease games for years prior to release, it's not a stretch to think that some new horrible hints about Silent Hills will sneak their way into E3.

Granted, we probably won't be able to expect anything huge - if the marketing campaign for The Phantom Pain is anything to go on, it probably won't be anything bigger than a two minute trailer, a mysterious character reveal, or showing off a mechanic that lets you airlift giant centipedes after a disembodied head vomits them up. But still, it's something. It's going to scare the hell out of us, and when it does, we're going to freaking love it.

This imaginative team-based arena game is coming to Xbox One and PC this fall courtesy of a publishing deal with Microsoft, so it'll definitely be playable on the E3 show floor. If you haven't seen its third-person action yet, you should know that Gigantic is on par with Blizzard's in terms of colorful, vibrant character designs, and the blazingly fast gameplay blends third-person combat with the coordination inherent to a MOBA.

While the 5v5 team setup will seem pretty familiar, your objective is anything but. You and your dazzlingly animated compatriots are actually fighting on behalf of one colossal guardian, a larger-than-life mythical beast that needs your help to make its way across the map and into enemy territory. Of course, the opposing forces have a guardian of their own - and the battle that breaks out when the two teams meet head-on is nothing short of epic.

Skyrim has been out for over 3 years now and Bethesda has to have been working on something since then, right? Maybe that thing is Fallout 4. Maybe it's something completely different, but it totally could be Fallout 4. We've been waiting to return to the dilapidated, radioactive world of the Wasteland, but there hasn't been a peep about the game coming from the developer.

The rumors have run rampant, mostly based on job postings and voice actor comments from years ago. But, it's possible that the developer does have a Fallout 4 announcement coming in the near future. Bethesda is even running its first-ever E3 press conference. What better game to headline the Bethesda conference than Fallout 4.

Really? The Last Guardian? Isn't that game cancelled yet? Well, no. Not yet. Sony still refuses to close this concept up in a crate and ship if off to that warehouse from the Indiana Jones movies. So, we're still here, eagerly anticipating some news about it's development. Will we get a surprise announcement this year? We'll just have to wait and see.

There have been around that Activision will be making some sort of Guitar Hero-related announcement at E3 2015. We already know that Rock Band 4 is an actual thing, so this actually isn't too far fetched. Activision has made no official comment to confirm the rumor but a spokesperson did say that a new game wouldn't be released unless it had "developed the right innovations to usher the franchise into the new generation of gaming."

GTA 5 has finally been ported to the next gen consoles, and now that we've got a GTA game on the shiny new hardware, it's likely that Rockstar has another GTA brewing somewhere in its pipeline. But will an announcement for the next GTA come to E3 2015? Probably not.

This isn't happening. Just deal with it.

This year's show already looks like it's going to be a doozy. Do you have a favorite title you can't wait to see more of? Looking forward to a game not on this list? Let us know what you want to see in the comments below.

For more from GamesRadar, check out our list of the .

Getting tired of checking your kill-death ratio in Advanced Warfare or fruitlessly searching for the best sniper rifle in Destiny? Sometimes video games can feel a little stale - I've been there too, buddy. Luckily, there's a whole industry of indie games shaking things up. Ever play Braid or The Binding of Isaac? Then you know what's up.

Now is a great time to check out the most promising indies on the horizon. If you're still enjoying your triple-A experiences, don't worry: these guys borrow from modern and classic blockbusters, but each title brings its own twist. Let's get started - severed limbs, dance floors, and cupcakes await!

Why should you try it? You have to be a fan of big, tough boss fights if you've played through Shadow of the Colossus, and Titan Souls serves up the same menu of ginormous entrees. It's not about whittling down a giant health bar, but figuring out how to damage each Colossus. Most strategies involve latching onto limbs as the boss draws near, and many of Titan Souls' contenders require a similar level of trickery.

What's the twist? Colossus killer Wander wields a bow, and so does the hero of Titan Souls… except he only carries one arrow. Fire it, and you'll have to manually pick it up or draw it in like a boomerang to fire again. Legolas would surely kick butt regardless, but the rest of you will have to take careful aim - especially since you die after a single hit.

Why should you try it? For a game set deep under the sea, BioShock sure has "atmosphere." Oxygen jokes aside, the enrapturing art deco style is definitely evoked by We Happy Few's retro-futuristic 1960s London. And where Infinite's white-washed Columbia was packed with psycho supremacists and pseudo-religious freaks, Few's city is inhabited by Brits at a disturbing level of constant happiness, thanks to a government-mandated drug

What's the twist? If the Splicers or the Order of the Raven gave you a hard time, you could dispose of them with a few shotgun blasts or semi-magic Plasmids. That sort of behavior is a no-no in Few's overly enthusiastic world. All you can do is sneak around, blending in with your perpetually smiling neighbors. Trust me, you don't want them catching you.

Why should you try it? I'd like to tell you that the team behind Guacamelee secured a Mike Tyson cameo, but alas, the ear-chomping boxer is not to be found here. That said, taking down Severed's enemies and bosses is a matter of memorizing patterns, just like with Punch-Out's totally-not-racist cast. Swiping across the Vita screen to parry attacks or deal damage is all about timing and memorization. There's even an equivalent to the Star Punch: the game takes its name from a finishing move that slices baddies to bits.

What's the twist? But unlike Punch-Out, you're not stuck in a boxing ring forever. Severed's world is explored in first person by moving from screen to the next, much like iOS cult classic Infinity Blade. The team also calls Severed an "RPG-lite," since you can collect bad guys' dismembered body parts to boost your health and strength.

Why should you try it? You leap across boulders in a river of lava, scale a tower, and slay a Space Pirate - all to reach a chamber containing the heat-resistant Varia Suit. Now you can run right through that lava river! Powerups like these are what make Metroid games great, and Axiom Verge delivers the same wardrobe of game-changing apparel and attachments. It's all about exploring, finding new abilities, and re-exploring in new ways, all across a mysterious alien world.

What's the twist? The 60-plus items and powerups in Axiom Verge are already impressive. Even better, some weapons in Axiom Verge have two modes of fire. The Nova, for instance, can fire a large single shot or burst into six smaller ones. Bet the Galactic Federation doesn't have that in its arsenal.

Why should you try it? Call me crazy, but finding a unique way to off someone and get away with it is exciting… in Hitman, of course. Party Hard offers the same opportunities to set traps and find multiple routes through places like clubs and crack houses. There's an intensity to trying to not get caught, and a sense of satisfaction if you manage to pin the blame on someone else.

What's the twist? While Hitman provides chef hats and clown costumes to let you move around undetected, the 'hero' of Party Hard has no disguise. In fact, you can only hit the dedicated dance button to boogie and blend in with the plebes you're trying to murder. And yes, that's plural. Agent 47 has one target to off, but your party guy must kill everyone in the place. That's hardcore.

Why should you try it? "What's so special about platformers anyway, Ernie?" "Gee, Bert, it's just great jumping around and using fun things like jetpacks. It's the way we move that's so fun." The Sesame Street bros are right, and NES classic Bionic Commando proved it by replacing the ability to jump with a robo-arm-embedded grappling gun. Although Ronin's heroine can jump and grab ledges, she also has a handy dart rope for swinging around, and it's the key to slipping through windows and rooftops undetected.

What's the twist? Nathan 'Rad' Spencer never stopped for a turn-based battle, but our Ronin warrior certainly does. Combat isn't about aiming a gun - you'll have to plan your moves to avoid enemy fire, leap around, and slash foes with your trusty sword. Not bad for a one-armed warrior.

Why should you try it? Turn-based RPGs are fine and dandy, but tactics games like Fire Emblem and The Behemoth's tentatively titled Game 4 set combat atop a grid system - it's much better than standing in a line taking hits one at a time, really. Moving about the grid puts an emphasis on troop placement and attack order, so you have to strategize instead of spamming fire spells each turn.

What's the twist? When the team behind Castle Crashers gets into the tactics game, you can expect two key features: cuteness and absurdity. Where Fire Emblem includes archers and infantrymen, Game 4 sends hordes of living cupcakes and blonde cyclopses after you - don't be surprised if the ambush is interrupted by crashing pirate ships or UFOs either. It's also more forgiving than its hardcore counterpart: there's no permadeath mode, and fighting your way out of corners is very doable.

Why should you try it? If you're play Dark Souls, you're going to die. As for Necropolis, well… 'necro' ain't the prefix for 'life,' pal. The Souls series isn't just about dying though; there's a ton of little quests that can turn NPCs against each other. Likewise, the creatures of the Necropolis have a designated food chain - you can use survival of the fittest to your advantage.

What's the twist? The thing about Dark Souls is that you can memorize enemy and placement and environments, making your journey a tad easier. As for Necropolis… well, 'necro' doesn't mean 'repeatable' either, bub. Necropolis is procedurally generated, making each dive into the hellhole just as dangerous. You can manipulate the layout to get around, solve puzzles, and uncover treasure, but that doesn't mean the adventure will be any easier.

See? Not every video game is a near-future shooter or a medieval RPG - there's some intriguing stuff out there. And these are just a few of what's coming. Did one catch your fancy? Is there another indie you want to spotlight? Let me know in the comments!

Looking to get into some more obscure titles? Here are .

Slightly more offensive than Strong Lyrics and Fantasy Violence, slightly less than Nudity and all the other kinds of Violence, the ESRB warning for Drug References tends to fall into a no man's land of rating neutrality. Not something you want attached to a Mario game, but when it's slapped on an M-rated title, it's probably not gonna be the thing that either puts you off or piques your interest. And yet, even if the Blood and Gore category has more visible examples, you can make a good case that instances of Drug References are vastly more memorable.

Whether it's to show that a character is going on a deep personal journey, chase a theme that benefits from absurdism, or toss in some insane bullshit for fun, games have been using drug trips to mess with your mind for decades. And sometimes? They get away without any warning at all. Intrigued? I've got eight examples here to show exactly what I mean, from in-your-face to sort-of-disguised, and everything in between. Go ahead and flip through, and don't worry - you probably won't get a contact high.

Like any good college vacation, Jason Brody's trip to the Rook Islands involves imbibing all sorts of strange substances and going on mind-altering head trips. Just, you know, maybe not for the reasons he thought it would. Over the course of Jason's journey to save his friends and finish off his sick magical warrior tat, brah, he's exposed to a worrying amount of hallucinogens and is repeatedly pulled into a freaky-ass dream world as a result. When he's not walking through shrinking greenhouses full of exploding mushroom puffs, he's fighting off demonic hallucinations of his girlfriend that keep trying to kill him. Err, trouble in paradise?

These crazy-ass trips are supposed to be a look into Jason's psyche, ravaged by the acts of violence he's committed while on the island. Well, that and drugs. So many drugs. If he lets that dream logic really take hold and carry over into the real world, he ends up and getting stabbed to death after, ahem, passing on his genetics. Weird liquid handed to you by total strangers: not even once.

Assassin's Creed has a long tradition of exposing its protagonists to brain-bending mindscrews, from Altair's mental battle against dead Templars to Edward swimming through an ocean full of corpses. Good times all around. But of them all, Arno's drug trip is the most blatantly surreal, and the only one required to get into the Assassin clubhouse.

After making the thoroughly intelligent decision to drink a cup of whatever that's given to him by cultists chilling in their underground lair, Arno goes on a spiritual journey to prove he has what it takes to join the Brotherhood. That apparently involves diving through a spinning cylinder of paintings depicting his life, and racing down an ever-expanding hallway as it crumbles and bursts into flames. I'm pretty sure Ezio just had to change his clothes to get his membership card, but all right. When Arno wakes up from a dream that presumably would have killed him if he screwed up, he officially becomes an Assassin, with only the occasional terrifying glitch to bring the memory back 'round.

Don't do drugs kids! Or you might end up like little Ness, who took something unsavory from the wrong back counter and ended up in a crazy 'alternate reality'. After Ness and Jeff discover actual criminal Everdred lying in an alley outside a café, he tells them there's something mysterious hidden behind the café counter. That's a giant red flag already - he might as well have tried to sell them 'sugar' in duct taped bags - but innocent Ness does as instructed, checking out what ol' Jackie has hidden in the back.

An instant later he's dropped into a bizarre-o version of Fourside called Moonside. There, black is white, yes is no (seriously, it gets really confusing), and inanimate objects make a serious effort to kill him. After navigating streets full of nonsensical citizens, weird psychedelic music and fluorescent happy trees, with presumably no clue what they're supposed to be doing, Ness and Jeff stumble on the 'center' of Moonside: an evil statue that creates illusions and has overtaken their minds. Breaking it 'destroys the illusion' and transports them back to the 'real' world, now free of its evil powers. Wow. I feel like this is what Reefer Madness warned us about.

Take a moment to scan the ESRB's breakdown of GTA 5 (take a few,even, it's a bit long) and somewhere near the bottom it mentions "Some sequences within the larger game allow players to use narcotics." While definitely 100% accurate, that clinical description doesn't begin to describe the intensity of the drug trips GTA 5 lays down. The original game's world of parachute-free skydiving and gun-toting circus performers is insane enough, but when you bring in the peyote animal adventures from the expanded edition? Then things really get wild.

While Franklin keeps pretty chill and doesn't move far from his couch or his joint, look to Michael and Trevor for much more colorful trips, and some of the best damn dialogue in the whole game. Trevor's personal revelations while gunning down clowns in a haze of flowers and glitter are a personal favorite. But if you're looking for something more transformative, gives you the chance to inhabit the body of an animal and cause all kinds of epic carnage. But, err, still don't do drugs. That's not a thing that actually happens I'm pretty sure.

HOLY S*** D*** F*** **** *** OF B******S AAAAAAH. If that wasn't your exact reaction to watching a vigor burn your fingers to the bone in BioShock Infinite, you're a stronger creature than I. Shown every time you pick up a new bottle of Magic Juice That Should Definitely Not Be Available To The Public, the cutscenes that display your liquid might in all its heinous glory are the definition of a bad trip.

Though the physical effects of BioShock's plasmids are bad enough - seeing bees crawl out of your skin is a good sign you need to head for the med tent - it isn't until BioShock Infinite that they're rendered in excruciating detail while you're forced to watch. Devil's Kiss may be the most shriek-inducing, as you witness your flesh getting barbecued away, but the rest aren't much better. Bucking Bronco rips huge chunks of meat off your hands, Undertow fills you with nasty barnacle holes, and Return to Sender straight-up turns you into Wolverine for a second. Of course it's all an illusion, and the effects are gone an instant later, but Troy Baker's bellows of horror as your digits are disintegrated into bloody stumps? Those stick around a little longer.

If you were, say, making a sandwich or looking at an interesting bug on the wall during the first minute and a half of Child of Eden, you basically missed the entire plot. But that's okay. It doesn't really matter, because look at the pretty colors! A rhythmic on-rails shooter that assaults you with more hues and sounds than your brain has room for, Child of Eden is the kind of game where you fight flying squid eels with the power of song and bosses are giant spheres made of blocks. It only makes sense if you are seriously trippin' balls.

That's not to say this game isn't fun for the sober set - anybody with even a little rhythm and an appreciation of majestic exploding phoenixes can find something to like here. But there's a reason why the word 'trippy' shows up in almost every discussion of this game, and why the whole thing looks like a rave would if people were blocks. . . . Like if they were magic, shimmering space-cubes or something. Whoa man. That just blew my mind.

Bless this game, it doesn't even put up a pretense! A bizarre and headache-inducing exploration game for the PS1, LSD Dream Emulator is all about wandering around a 'dream world' based on the sleep diary of one of its developers. A dream world where bright colors are constantly assaulting your brain, touching a lion transports you to a land of miniature wonders of the world, and whre you will at no point have any idea what's going on. Oh, and your introduction to all of that is a . Yes, this was based on a diary of dreams. Just dreams. WINK.

The point of the game, if it really has one at all, is to look around the world and walk into stuff to make it transport you somewhere else. Where you end up seems to depend on what you touch. Buildings will send you to pretty normal looking locations, like a logically constructed village, while touching an animal or an object lands you in the audience at a sumo match where the only exit is through a tunnel made of viscera. Quite the interesting dream indeed.

One of the weirdest games ever produced by mad genius Suda51 (and certainly the most insanely Suda-y), Killer7 does its best to be simultaneously badass and utterly nonsensical. It accomplishes that with a mix of random creepy laughing, erratically flashing visuals, bad guys who explode into clouds of pink particles, and a ghost decked out in bondage gear with a computerized voice and his eyes sewn shut. And that's just the first ten minutes.

Killer7 is bizarrely hard to classify, since it has a recognizable storyline and some of the time it nearly seems coherent. But don't be fooled: that's how it gets you. Start to think that things are making sense, and you're bound to find a severed-yet-still-talking head in the next clothes dryer you stumble across. Perhaps the weirdest thing of all is that, even when you do find a character who doesn't look like something out of an overly creative creepypasta, they don't seem to think anything strange is going on around them. Man, this . . . this is one seriously bad trip.

Some people like to argue games today are too easy, and that we've forgotten what it means for something to be 'Nintendo hard'. I don't think that's true. The difficulty is still there, but only for those who seek it out. As games seek to reach a wider and wider audience, they have become more flexible. Load up a random, modern game and chances are you'll be asked to pick a difficulty ranging from easy to hard to groin-shot-nightmare-extravaganza. Most people don't pick that last one.

Some of these insane difficulty modes are unlocked straight away, while others are only awarded after you've finished the game on a lesser mode. However you get them, these are the hardest of the hard, capable of transforming otherwise enjoyable games into masochistic exercises of personal torment. They're not for the faint of heart, but they'll fetch you some hefty bragging rights should you persevere.

XCOM is one of those games where everything can go wrong without a moment's notice. One turn you're silently sneaking between the trees, searching for a crashed UFO. And then BAM! you're neck-deep in Floaters who are flying all over the place handing out grenades like party favors while a couple of Sectoids roll up and hit your flank. And it's around now that Rookie Redshirt panics and hunkers down right in the middle of the chaos. Why would you think that's a good idea!?

Playing on impossible difficulty basically raises the stakes for every decision up to 11. Rewards are smaller, costs are greater, and every decision you make has far-reaching consequences. If you're not on top of your game from day one - complete with an overall strategy in mind that'll carry you through to the final mission - things can and will unravel very quickly. As the game's Wiki so helpfully notes, "...every funding nation can be lost during the first month, depending on alien activity and the efficiency of XCOM's response." This might be the speediest response from the international community to any issue in this history of forever.

Playing Metro: 2033 Redux on the Ranger difficulty means you and your knife are going to be close friends. This mode attempts to make the game more realistic - or about as 'realistic' as you'd want a post-nuclear-apocalyptic Russian horror game to be - by removing several modern conveniences. An abundance of health? Gone. A decent supply of ammo? Gone. Literally the entire HUD and all the valuable information contained therein? It's outta' here, baby, and this is just Ranger Easy mode.

Ranger Hardcore ups the ante even further by making you less of a survivor and more of a - shall we say - dead man walking. You are extremely fragile, which means engaging enemies using stealth is basically your only shot at survival. And you can forget about ever having a reasonable supply of ammo. Enemies will fall to one or two gunshots, sure, but if you end up actually using your gun it had better be because the person (or horrible monster) on the other end inflicted some sort of deep, personal offense upon you.

Fire Emblem is already a tough-as-nails series. When your characters die, they're gone forever; weapons degrade over time, especially the good ones, and stat bonuses are doled out randomly when you level up. Fire Emblem: Awakening lets you mitigate - or enhance - these challenges through various difficulty options, the toughest of which is Lunatic+. This mode packs the same crippling difficulty of Lunatic, but with an added twist found only in this mode.

As it turns out, that "+" stands for a grab bag of brand-new, enemy-exclusive abilities that are randomly assigned to grunts and bosses alike. These include Luna+ (all attacks halve your defense), Pavise+ (all your attacks deal half damage), and several others. Early on, this can make fights flat-out impossible, forcing you to constantly reload the same battle over and over in the hopes you get a more favorable distribution of skills on the enemy team. Don't expect Frederick to bail you out of this one.

F-Zero GX is one of the unsung greats from the Nintendo GameCube. It offers an incredible sense of speed on par with the best in the racing genre while keeping the F-Zero basics of vehicular combat and track memorization intact. It's an edge-of-your-seat racer that demands a lot of its players, and is easily one of the most challenging racing games ever created.

This game gives you very little, and demands everything in return. Learning the layouts of each track is required. Learning the nuances of each racer is required. Practicing races over and over again is RE-FREAKING-QUIRED. It's not for everyone - which is surprising for a Nintendo release - but putting the time in will reward you with a genuine challenge that feels difficult because it's actually taxing your skills as a player, not because it's hitting you with blue shells moments before you cross the finish line.

Video games often make complicated tasks look easy, whether it's piloting a spaceship or simply firing a gun. The Guitar Hero series does this as well, simplifying the strumming of a guitar down to a few colorful buttons and a plastic switch. That is, until you round the bend with Legends of Rock on expert mode. All of a sudden, playing a pretend guitar becomes, arguably, more difficult than playing the same song on an actual guitar.

When you watch someone play a song like The Devil Went Down To Georgia on expert it looks like a friggin' Lite-Brite threw up all over the screen. There are so many colorful little circles flying all over the place you basically need to have the song memorized. If you try and keep up running on instinct alone the quick tempo will leave you in the dust. Oh, and just in case expert isn't tough enough, turn on "precision mode", which makes the window for hitting a note even tighter. The only things getting shredded here are your fingers.

Grenades. Grenades everywhere. Call of Duty: World at War, when played on Veteran difficulty, presents a fantastical version of World War II in which every soldier was given a dozen grenades per mission and expected to use them all, at risk of court martial. And every one of them is going to land right at your feet at the most inopportune time which is basically ALL the time because this game is crazy hard.

You want to talk about making meaningful choices in video games: how about choosing between getting blown up by a grenade or being cut down by machine gun fire? It's meaningful because it's the only choice you ever get to make and both options are wrong. You spend more time running away from the fight, in an attempt to avoid all the grenades, than you do breaching doors and doing the standard Call of Duty stuff. But then the game just spawns more dudes in your absence, creating a vicious cycle where you're constantly fighting without making any real progress. And then a grenade kills you.

Ninja Gaiden has built a dynasty upon the broken controllers and mournful cries of its followers. Dating back to 1988 with Ninja Gaiden on the Nintendo Entertainment System, this series has been renowned for its brutal difficulty that really puts the screws to you as soon as you press start. Master Ninja mode in Ninja Gaiden 2 is by far one of the series' greatest challenges, without relying on cheap tricks. It's simply a fast-paced game that demands players use the entirety of Ryu Hayabusa's arsenal, make snap judgements, and watch out for exploding turtles.

To give this some context, most action games - such as God of War or Devil May Cry - get "solved" within a few months to a year of their release. This means someone has posted a video of them beating the game with "100% completion, no damage, one arm tied behind their back!!" Ninja Gaiden 2 has one of these , the only difference being it took the internet SIX YEARS to pull it off. This is especially surprising given that there hasn't been another good Ninja Gaiden game released in that time to distract diehards.

So there you have it, the hardest hard modes in gaming. How many of these bad boys have you bested over the years? Are there any that you think were even harder? Tell your story in the comments, and share your victories and defeats with fellow readers.

And for even more GR+ excitement, you know you gotta' check out .

Move through this gallery to see characters from some of your favorite franchises, like League of Legends, Street Fighter, and everything in between [note to editor - these will change depending on what I actually photograph]. Maybe you'll be inspired to don your own gaming garb...

For more great games of dress-up, check out the .