6 SNES Games That Are Way Worse Than You Remember

Published Sep 20, 2026, 6:00 PM EDT Tom Wilson is a Gaming Features Writer at Screen Rant. Over the past five years, Tom has worked as the Editor-in-Chief at The Game Crater, as a Staff Writer for GamingIntel, a List Writer at TheGamer, and, of course, as a Senior Writer at ScreenRant. Tom has experience writing reviews, guides, news, and features, and has been responsible for teams of writers, training them and editing their work. Tom graduated with a Masters in Multimedia Journalism, and has since gone on to build up his portfolio of games journalism work. The SNES was packed with truly incredible games, ranging from amazing RPGs to memorable platformers. Many of these amazing titles have gone on to enjoy lasting legacies, garnering numerous sequels, spin-offs, and ports, all of which continue to garner enthusiastic responses from fans. However, not every game on the SNES was a true masterpiece. Some titles seemed great at the time, others were at least a little bit of fun, but nowadays, they've aged abysmally. Like the worst-aged NES games of all time, there are a handful of SNES titles that are way worse than you remember. From classics that feel as if they should be far better than they actually are to games that were perhaps never great in the first place, these SNES titles should probably be avoided from here on out. Of course, this is not to say that they weren't groundbreaking at the time, but rather that times change, and that titles that once seemed truly impressive are a lot less spectacular once scrutinized properly. 6 Star Fox Star Fox was an incredibly innovative title for the time, its impressive 3D graphics predating the revolutionary adoption of the format years later with the likes of Super Mario 64. There is no denying that, if you were a child back in 1993, Star Fox would have astounded you. There truly was nothing like it. However, that is also the game's curse, as its strive to push for complex 3D visuals rendered it incapable of being future-proofed. Star Fox on the SNES is a mess now, a game that is rendered almost unplayable due to its sluggish framerate and inconsistent controls. Its visuals, while certainly not without charm, don't look nearly as impressive today as, say, the aforementioned Super Mario 64. Even the game's arcade-inspired format, which was proven to be too limiting in the recently well-received Star Fox remake, feels somewhat antiquated in an era in which arcade games have long since lost their popularity. 5 Flashback Flashback, like Star Fox, was revolutionary for the time thanks to its cinematic ambitions. Of course, it wasn't as if the SNES was devoid of narrative-driven experiences, but few looked as good or were as compelling as Flashback. Its rotoscoped animations for the protagonist's movement and painstakingly crafted cutscenes deliver a story that remains just as engaging and enthralling today as it did all those years ago. Flashback is, in many ways, one of the best story-focused games on the SNES, and that's no easy feat. However, Flashback is not as good as one may remember. Sure, the story is gripping, and the animation is impressive for the time. Yet, Flashback's gameplay, especially on the SNES, was sluggish, partly by design and partly as a consequence of the limitations of the system. Its tank controls made exploration a chore, something that was intentional to maintain a cinematic quality to the movement, but is nevertheless unbelievably frustrating. Suffice it to say, Flashback is not one of the best platformers on the SNES and never was, even if its extremely positive reviews would tell you otherwise. 4 Wolfenstein 3D It is bizarre that Wolfenstein 3D ever made its way to the SNES. Infamous for its extreme gore and use of Nazis as enemies, Wolfenstein 3D was the antithesis of everything Nintendo stood for at the time and absolutely broke practically every single one of its strict censorship rules. One would have thought that the effort required to make Wolfenstein 3D acceptable to be allowed on the SNES wouldn't have been worth it, but, evidently, that wasn't true. Wolfenstein 3D did end up getting an SNES port, and it was dreadful. The many elements that made the game unique and interesting in the first place were stripped back to the point that the game was hardly recognizable. The aforementioned gore and Nazis were completely removed from the game and replaced with generic enemies and a complete absence of blood. This is without mentioning the fact that Wolfenstein 3D ran abysmally on the SNES, which makes for a game that you may have thought was bad then, but is unequivocally way worse than you thought. 3 DOOM Is it any surprise that DOOM is on a list of SNES games that are worse than you remember? Its place on the SNES is strange for all the same reasons as Wolfenstein 3D, although it is perhaps less odd that the effort was poured into porting it to Nintendo's home console, as DOOM was absolutely inescapable. Its presence on every platform made it synonymous with gaming itself and led to it becoming one of the most prolific and beloved shooters of all time. Well, at least outside of the SNES version. Sure, it was great getting a first-person shooter on the SNES (a rare feat indeed), especially one as compelling as the original DOOM. However, the dropped frames, technical woes, and compromised visuals were absolutely not worth it. DOOM runs horribly on the SNES due to the console's hardware limitations, which made it truly the worst version of the game possible. We joke now that everything can run DOOM, but back in the day, there were very few platforms that could do so effectively, and the SNES absolutely was not one of them. 2 Secret of Mana One may be surprised to see Secret of Mana listed alongside the likes of Wolfenstein 3D and Star Fox, especially as it was one of the many SNES RPGs everyone seemed to own, a title that was practically a must-play at the time. Secret of Mana was a gorgeous RPG that helped popularize the series and made it a household name within the JRPG community. While I'm not sure anyone would rank it as highly as Chrono Trigger, people certainly remember this game fondly. Unfortunately, Secret of Mana isn't very good, and I'm not convinced it was ever particularly good. We simply didn't know better. Beyond its aforementioned stunning visuals and phenomenal soundtrack, Secret of Mana had few redeeming qualities. Its gameplay (especially combat) was immensely clunky and often inconsistent, and the game's scope was cut back so much during development that it often feels unfinished and rushed. It certainly isn't even remotely comparable to Chrono Trigger and is far worse than it's believed to be. 1 Drakkhen I imagine it was rather spectacular to play Drakkhen when it first came out on the SNES. It was not only one of the first games to be released on the console in North America, but was also one of the first open-world first-person 3D RPGs. Drakkhen's ambitions were lofty, and the likes of Skyrim owe a significant debt to it and its innovations. Being able to explore its vast world from the outset, its varied classes, unique enemy types, and complete freedom were rarities at the time and made for a truly compelling experience. However, as revolutionary as Drakkhen was, it was never a good game. Even if one were able to overcome the complete lack of guidance and figure out its absurdly complex systems and baffling encounters, Drakkhen was still a brutally difficult game that felt unbalanced and at odds with itself. It was never particularly fun, even if the spectacle of its open world was tremendous, and, as a result, proved to be a bad SNES game that was simply overhyped due to the time it was released on the console and the fact that there really was nothing else like it. Brand Nintendo Original Release Date August 23, 1991 Original MSRP (USD) $199 Hardware Versions SNES Weight 2.12 lbs