10 TERRIBLE Video Games (That Secretly Saved Franchises)
8. Mortal Kombat: Special Forces
Almost every other game on this list is positively good compared to Mortal Kombat: Special Forces, a follow-up to Mortal Kombat 4 which landed exclusively on the PlayStation in 2000.
Special Forces was a bold - if misguided - attempt to diversify the series, by ditching the traditional beat 'em up style in favour of a third-person action romp with Jax being the single playable character.
You can probably imagine how this went down with fans.
Critics panned the game for its tedious gameplay, poor graphics, and excessive deviation from the core Mortal Kombat experience, cementing that the long-waning franchise had finally hit the bottom of the well.
Special Forces' critical and commercial failure prompted Midway Games to look long and hard at what fans wanted out of the series, which was clearly a back-to-basics approach, leading to the 2002 release of Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance.
Deadly Alliance was widely celebrated as the series' best game in around a decade, successfully updating the formula for a new generation.
Though there has certainly been experimentation with the Mortal Kombat formula in the years since, the series hasn't ever again lost sight of its roots, with NetherRealm Studios taking up terrific stewardship of the property in recent times.
Special Forces slamming into a brick wall as hard as it did made it clear to franchise creator Ed Boon that fans didn't want overpowering gimmicks or radical changes to the central gameplay.