Game Physics Gone Horribly Wrong
Developers spend a lot of time making sure their games are solid, but sometimes things still fall through the cracks, and glitches in the graphics or physics can occur. Normally, these glitches are minor and don't detract from the game experience, but sometimes they're truly off-putting and tear down your suspension of disbelief. Here we have some examples of just how wrong things can get when physics in games start to break down. Warning: NSFW content ahead.
Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim - Extreme Ice Form Shout
The powerful Ice Form Shout technique from Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim renders an opponent frozen, turning them into a sort of ice statue. In this physics glitch video from Jayce Brinkman, we see what happens if the player character gets hit with an Ice Shout from atop a tall mountain: once frozen, he topples over the edge of the cliff and goes tumbling down the mountain like some kind of cartoonish snowball. Things start getting weird as his Dragonborn character spins out of control and falls strangely, bouncing around at different speeds and directions, as if struggling to roll down the mountain properly. By some miracle, he lands at the bottom of the mountain and becomes unfrozen, seemingly unhurt by his tumble. If there was a safe way to be frozen and then fall down a mountain only to land safely and thaw out at the bottom, we'd totally do it.
Grand Theft Auto IV - Skidding Cars
After seeing this physics glitch from Grand Theft Auto IV, you might think twice about stealing cars again. While it's normal for a game of this size to have some mistakes, the video that YouTube user Michael offers up shows us the effects of friction physics going haywire. In the clip, we see cars flying around like pinballs bouncing around a table, getting flung into the ocean, and skidding around corners while flipping. We just hope the roll cages in these vehicles are solid. Could you imagine walking down the streets of your city and seeing a bunch of cars performing weird death ballet around every corner?
Fallout 4 - Dancing Mutant Hound Corpse
In this Fallout 4 video, posted by YouTube user VideoDeadGaming, we see the Sole Survivor turn the corner only to be met with the fangs and unusual musculature of a mutant hound. The player makes short work of the dog, but then something strange happens to the corpse as it seems to get stuck to a trash can and then starts spinning around in place. Thanks to the added music in the clip, it appears as if the hound's corpse is breakdancing and pulling off some spectacular headspins worthy of the legendary Rock Steady Crew. The player wanders around for a bit and kills some mutants, only to come back and find that the hound's corpse is still going crazy with that trash bin on its head. Let's just be thankful it wasn't some Super Mutant Behemoth or a Deathclaw.
Battlefield 3 - Long Neck Crawl
Want some nightmare fuel? Look no further than this horrifying glitch from Battlefield 3, which unfolded when a player dropped down to the ground to crawl. We understand that crawling behind cover while enemies are laying down suppressing fire is a great tactic, but we're pretty sure that stretching out your neck and walking on your knees is not a viable tactic when avoiding bullets. We've heard of sticking your neck out for your team, but this kind of takes it a little too far. The video from MikeWindsorr shows this bizarre glitch in action—don't blame us if you wake up screaming tonight.
Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag - Funny Face Glitch
Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag is full of swashbuckling action. There also happens to be a lot of excitement during the game's downtime, especially in cutscenes like this one, posted by Sir Fragilis XP Allergist, in which Edward Kenway seems to be locked into an unnervingly slack-jawed, toothy frown. We're not quite sure what to call this expression, but we'll go with "Horrifying Bad Intentions Face." The only thing that might make this scene more frightening is if demonic worms started crawling out of his maw.
Heavy Rain - Jayden's Scary Face
Speaking of scary faces, here's a clip courtesy of daveyt88, featuring Jayden from Heavy Rain almost morphing into Pyramid Head from Silent Hill while sitting down at a desk. For whatever reason, Jayden's face seems to explode into a myriad of polygons, elongating in all directions. It's appropriate that he's got a confused expression, because that's exactly how we feel after seeing his head go absolutely bonkers. We apologize if you were sipping on something while watching that otherwordly transformation.
Saints Row the Third - Crazy Car Antics
We've watched the cars in Grand Theft Auto 4 going nuts, so it's only fair to offer equal time to crazy cars in Saints Row the Third. In SaberUK's video, we see the streets of Steelport terrorized by the player character's car as it bounces and spins before finally blowing up. The way it twitches and spins is reminiscent of scenes from The Exorcist, and makes us wonder whether this is really a physics glitch or maybe one of the first examples of demonic video game possession.
Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion - Melting Guard
We understand that the Elder Scrolls games can imbue you with great power and give you the ability to wield magic spells, but we're fairly certain that being able to melt people was never supposed to be part of the deal. In mywafflecopter's video, we're treated to a fight between the player character and a guard. The player casted Debilitate on the guard before entering a shop. The guard followed, eager to do his job and apprehend the player. We see Debilitate being cast on the guard again—and he crumples under the weight of existence and seemingly melts into a puddle on the floor. It almost looks as if all of his flesh drips off, then reforms wearing the armor once more. Is this the most terrifying spell in Oblivion? Yeah, it probably is.
Dead Space - Body Bags Go Berserk
Isaac Clarke, the main character in the Dead Space series, has seen a lot of horrific things during his adventures thanks to the onslaught of the Necromorphs. This alien zombies can't be killed by destroying the head or removing the brain, so they're even scarier to deal with than the normal shamblers that we're used to seeing. And even though he's seen his fair share of nightmare-inducing monsters, one of the scariest things he's ever encountered is highlighted in SqueezeDontPull's video. Here we see a slew of body bags that have been strewn about in a room. Isaac stomps on one of the bags, which sends it flying into the air while twitching uncontrollably. One bag hits another and soon enough, a chain reaction starts that makes all of the bags flop around like crazy. Super disturbing and super gross. We'll be seeing these in our dreams tonight.
'Rise of the Tomb Raider' - Boats Go A-Flyin'
We've seen cars go flying, body bags flopping around, and breakdancing corpses, and now we're going to deal with boats sailing through the air. In this video from Rise of the Tomb Raider, the second game in the Tomb Raider reboot series, Lara's walking around a ruin, doing Tomb Raider things, when we see a whole mess of debris bouncing around the screen. One object in particular is a wooden boat that appears to gun for Lara herself a few times. Miss Croft might be an archaeological prodigy and has experienced a good amount of supernatural phenomena, but she'd be hard-pressed to explain this kind of weirdness.