Action 52

aka: A52
Moby ID: 7762
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Description official descriptions

Action 52 features 52 different games in a single cartridge. The games are selected from one of three menus and are mostly side scrolling, platform or shooter action games. The games included are:

  1. Fire Breathers
  2. Star-Evil
  3. Illuminator
  4. G-Force Fighters
  5. Oooze
  6. Silver Sword
  7. Critical Bypass
  8. Jupiter Scope
  9. Alfredo and the Fettucinni's
  10. Operation Full-Moon
  11. Dam Busters
  12. Thrusters
  13. Haunted Hills of Wentworth
  14. Chill-Out
  15. Sharks
  16. Megalonia
  17. The French Baker
  18. Atmos-Quake
  19. Meong
  20. Space Dreams
  21. Streemerz
  22. Spread-Fire
  23. Bubblegum Rosie
  24. Micro-Mike
  25. Underground
  26. Rocket Jockey
  27. Non-Human
  28. Cry Baby
  29. Slashers
  30. Crazy Shuffle
  31. Fuzz Power
  32. Shooting Gallery
  33. Lollipops
  34. The Evil Empire
  35. Sombrero's
  36. Storm Over the Desert
  37. Mash-Man
  38. They Came From Outer Space
  39. Laser League
  40. Billy-Bob
  41. City of Doom
  42. Bits and Pieces
  43. Beeps and Blips
  44. Manchester Beat
  45. Boss
  46. Dedant
  47. Hambo's Adventures
  48. Time Warp Tickers
  49. Jigsaw
  50. Ninja Assault
  51. Robbie and the Robots
  52. The Cheetahmen (The Action Gamemaster)

Groups +

Screenshots

Credits (NES version)

6 People

Director (uncredited)
Producer (uncredited)
Designer (uncredited)
Programmer (uncredited)
Artist (uncredited)
Music and Sound Effects (uncredited)

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 8% (based on 6 ratings)

Players

Average score: 0.8 out of 5 (based on 46 ratings with 6 reviews)

It's everything you read here... and more

The Good
Nothing at all

The Bad
Well, this game sucks a looong way... if you can stand this game more than 10 minutes... you are a real hero. It lacks spirit, graphics, sound effects, music... but the most important of all... it lack FUN

The Bottom Line
A horrible compilation of 52 horrible "wanna-be-games"... !! Awful !

NES · by Nicolas Agudelo (5) · 2004

My review of Action 52

The Good
The concept of the idea sounds good. I mean, it's an unlicensed multicart containing 50 games! The music is also pretty good, but those are the only good things about this multicart. (Yes, it's a multicart, not a game.)

The Bad
The games on the cart are unplayable, glitchy, frustrating, and they tend to crash. Also, the price for the NES version is a whopping $200!

The Bottom Line
It's one of the worst games/multicarts ever made, and it's one of the worst NES game ever made!

NES · by OmegaPC777 (8240) · 2016

The most beautifully unsuccessful game ever.

The Good
Well, I like bad games. Action 52 is funny. None of the games are good. Some are hilariously bad. Some are just boring, but in general, the games are just indescribably funnily bad.

Generally speaking, the games are very good in that they tell me that even I can, without any boasting or even any special proof, write better games!

The Bad
All of the games are either shoddily coded, ugly, sound awful, badly designed, or a combination of thereof - and if any of the games doesn't manage to annoy you at all, it will bore you to death. There aren't a single "high-quality" game in the collection, none are better than tech demos written by neophyte NES coders after a week of training. Unless you happen to like bad games, this collection sure isn't going to help you.

The Bottom Line
Once upon a time, there was an unlicensed NES developer called Active Enterprises. They got a bright idea to make a game collection for NES. 52 games in all. They sort of made that thing. And then they tried to sell it to unsuspecting public at 200 USD price tag (the price was later considerably lowered for reasons that should be fairly obvious).

Well, now, thanks to the ROM distribution channels and several helpful websites, everyone can check this game out. The Active Enterprises folks probably won't dare to step out to protect their copyrights - they might be stoned to death by angry NES fans. Not that Action 52 would need any special copyright protection, it keeps people far away it by its own merits already.

This is not a pirate cart - this is a collection of 52 original games. Most of them are simple one-screen things, many even feature scrolling. Most are some kinds of space shooters, driving games, or platform games. Uh... well, that's about that.

And yup, if I say it's original, it's original all right. All of the games are absolutely, unbearably, categorically horrible. I'm actually quite speechless. So horrible that they're funny - well, they're funny if you just downloaded the ROM, they sure aren't funny if you actually spent your pocket money on the cartridge (unless you get really drunk before playing, or got the bright idea to sell the cart to some collector a few decades later - I hear original carts can be valuable these days).

All in all, the whole thing is charmingly bad. The only real reason to hate the makers would be the obvious money-making scam they tried. The games themselves are actually chuckle-worthy if you happen to like to play really bad games every now and then.

This game is best experienced with a company of people who happen to like bad games. Those who don't like bad games may want to do what many people have suggested - get a bunch of people together, and start a drinking game of some sort (just beware of alcohol poisoning!)

NES · by WWWWolf (444) · 2004

[ View all 6 player reviews ]

Trivia

Contest

There was a contest held for this game. If you were to beat level 5 of Ooze, you could enter in a drawing to win $104,000. Unfortunately, Ooze crashes after level 3 making the contest impossible to win.

Inspiration

The creator of Action 52, Vince Perri, got the inspiration to make this game when he saw his son playing an illegal Taiwanese multicart with 40 games on it.

Music

The music loop in the intro is taken from Rob Base's song "It Takes Two".

Information also contributed by Dracula_Marth.

Analytics

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Identifiers +

  • MobyGames ID: 7762
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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Servo.

Additional contributors: Apogee IV, LepricahnsGold, Arejarn, Patrick Bregger, J W.

Game added November 17, 2002. Last modified March 27, 2024.