It may have been extremely simple, but the original Putt-Putt game, Putt-Putt Joins the Parade, was still what I would consider a good edutainment game. It was colorful, had bouncy music, a charm about it that I couldn’t place with many other titles, and it was easy enough to where young players could easily jump into it and have a great time with it. And hey, the game was successful enough to where it would not only continue to get installments for years to come after that title, but it would also be the main mascot series for Humongous Entertainment. Quite impressive for a game about a stupid-ass purple car. But anyways, for their next installment in this series, they would be taking Putt-Putt out of Cartown, and throw him into the stars, which would result in the next game which would be released just a year later, Putt-Putt Goes to the Moon.

When I reviewed the original game, my one “complaint” about the whole thing was that the game was pretty standard when you took everything into account. Not only was the entire game pretty straightforward with what you needed to do (which makes complete sense, but worth pointing out anyway), but the setting and scenario in general was just pretty boring. It could entertain a VERY young audience, but not too many others. Thankfully though, with this game, not only are we traveling to the moon, but we also get to see the many wonders of space, which makes for a much more interesting game to play and watch. However… it is still just more Putt-Putt at the end of the day. It changes practically nothing about its gameplay when compared to the original game, and it could be seen as more straightforward then the previous game, but again, for younger players and big fans of Putt-Putt, it can still be fun for how short it can be.

The story is, once again, spelled out to you in the title, but it still remains pretty fun for an edutainment game, and there is a little more there then just Putt-Putt going to the moon, the graphics are pretty much the exact same as the original game, but it still manages to look good, and since it mainly takes place in space, there are a lot more interesting characters and things to see, the music is, once again, pretty pleasant and welcoming in many occasions, while also changing up to fit whatever scenario is occurring in the game, the control is the exact same as the original, so moving on, and the gameplay is almost identical to that of the original game, except this time in brand new world with brand new things to do.

The game is, once again, a point-’n-click adventure game, where you take control of Putt-Putt, now accompanied by Pep from the previous game, explore many different areas both on Earth and on the Moon, click on literally anything you see to either see what anything does or try to find some way to advance forward in your quest, gather plenty of items that can be useful to helping you out on your journey, and play plenty of simplistic minigames if you get tired of the main game at any point. If this all sounds extremely familiar to you, that is because it is pretty much the exact same as the previous game. Nothing about the gameplay is changed up whatsoever from the original, which may not bother much younger players all that much, but it could bother other kids who want more from their game about a talking car going to space (kids are picky, what can I say).

Like I mentioned earlier though, I think I do prefer this game to the original overall just because it has a much more interesting premise and setting. Not to say that the premise of the original game was bad, and the setting was fine for what it was, but it was all so mundane, and while everything around it was all appropriately wacky and silly, it was all still pretty standard, basically just being like real life except with, you know, car people. Now that we are in space and on the moon, there are many different types of alien creatures to see and futuristic things to interact with. Yes, a lot of it is structured around common conventions that we use, but it is still made just that little more interesting for the audience playing it. But, with that being said, if you don’t give a shit about space or aliens, and you didn’t really vibe with the gameplay of the previous, then this definitely won’t convince you otherwise.

Overall, despite changing practically nothing about the base game and how you complete it, I would say that this game is slightly better than the original Putt-Putt just because of the more interesting setting and characters that you can find and interact with. I would definitely recommend it as a game you can give to your kid to play and enjoy, as it would definitely keep them busy for quite some time and keep them entertained all the way. Although, with that being said, I have to ask a question: I can understand why Putt-Putt doesn’t suffocate in space, cause he is a car, but how come Pep doesn’t just straight up die while on the moon? Last time I checked, the moon doesn’t have oxygen, so he definitely would not have survived that trip.

Game #408

Every now and then you get that 4 AM stroke of inspiration to go and play a licensed GBA game based on the feature film adaptation of one of your favorite television shows as a child. I'm sure this is a universal experience.

+1 Soul Point for having the primary item Arnold collects be footballs. A genuinely inspired choice.

-1 Soul Point for committing the cardinal sin of any licensed game of a children's cartoon, which is failure to have a cheap midi version of the theme song play when you boot up the title screen.

The final level has you do battle with evil businessman Alphonse Perrier du von Scheck (whom the Hey Arnold! wiki describes as the "secondary antagonist of the Nickelodeon animated Hey Arnold! franchise") for control of Arnold's neighborhood. He walks back and forth, lazily throwing handkerchiefs at you while you toss wadded-up chewing gum in return. In defeat, he stomps his foot and exits stage left. A scene before the credits depicts him in handcuffs, loaded into the back of a police paddy wagon, presumably for selling nuclear secrets to Iran.

I can now slumber in peace.

I have sat here for what feels like an eternity trying my best to think of an intro for this thing. I have had a few ideas that I have had swirling around in my tiny little peanut of a brain, but honestly, none of them would be enough to properly convey any of my feelings towards this product properly, or bring up any kind of compelling argument that could be made about it. So, instead, I may as well go ahead and start this off by giving you a list of things you could do instead of checking out this product.

Playing Something Else

Going Outside

Getting a Pet and Taking Care of It

Hang Out With Friends

Find a Romantic Partner and Share Experiences with Each Other

Robbing a Ba-

Yeah, it’s random, but it perfectly fits whatever tone this thing is trying to go for. It’s Plumbers Don’t Wear Ties, people!

This is not a video game. It just isn’t. It may try to convince you in every way that it is one, as it is something you put in a gaming console, and you do indeed control with a video game controller, but despite all of that, it is still not a video game. In fact, I’m not even sure what it is, and I am pretty positive that most of you probably can’t accurately describe what it is either. What we do know is that it was a… thing that was released for the 3DO Interactive, and it is considered to be one of the worst “video games” of all time, and you know what? They are correct. It is an absolute piece of shit, one that has seemingly no redeeming qualities whatsoever, and it is absolutely painful to “play through” for most people. However, despite all that… I can’t say I really hate it all that much. Don’t get me wrong, it is complete garbage, there is no other way to describe it, but given how awfully bizarre and weird it is, as well as how unashamedly cheap and revolting it can be, it is something I just can’t get mad at, as it knows what it is, and it isn’t ashamed of it. I guess I’ll just have to be ashamed of it for both of us.

The story is, on its surface, a basic love story, as you are primarily meant to find a way to get John and Jane, the two most generic protagonists ever, to fall in love, which may seem boring, but don’t worry, as there are plenty of events and circumstances that will arise that will get in the way of all this, while also making you question what the fuck you are even looking at, the graphics are……. well, can I even call them graphics, as for most of the game, it just consists of a bunch of still images that “detail” what is happening at that point, which makes no sense, considering there is a full video at the beginning of the game, so why couldn’t the rest of the game be like that, the music is… something to say the least, with none of the tracks fitting what is happening in the game, and all of them being terrible, the control is just, like, two buttons or so, with one being to select a choice, and the others being to swap between them, and the “gameplay” is pretty much what you would get out of a visual novel, but this isn’t a visual novel, so it doesn’t work at all, and it baffles my mind.

This… thing is something I guess you could pretend is a visual novel, where you have to watch the story as it goes on, and at points in the “game”, you are given the option to choose what happens at that point in the story, and… that is pretty much it. There is no other gameplay, interactivity, or anything of the sort. You just press a button at certain points, and watch it all unfold. So, what exactly does unfold in the story of Plumbers Don’t Wear Ties? Well, only the most uncomfortable and poorly constructed love story imaginable, which involves things like a narrator that constantly interrupts the story to tell you how much of a disgusting piece of shit you are (takes one to know one, buddy), a bunch of unnecessary filters that plague many of the images and make it all a complete eyesore, graphics, effects, and transitions that look like they were made on either Microsoft Paint or a PowerPoint presentation, and a bunch of random elements placed everywhere that I can only assume were meant to confuse the fuck out of you and do nothing else. And not to mention, on top of that, there is also the fact that the entire conflict in the game centers around an act of workplace/sexual harassment, which leaves us with something definitely shouldn’t have existed in the first place, and makes me wanna actually a get a copy of this game and destroy it.

It absolutely boggles my mind that something like this even exists at all. No matter how much I watch it on YouTube (because lord knows I am never going to “play” it again), I just can’t for the life of me imagine what the purpose of this “game” was, or even who it was made for. Was it made for gamers? No, because there is no gameplay to speak of, so nobody is gonna want to try to play it. Was it made for people who wanna get their rocks off? No, because who the hell is gonna get aroused by a bunch of low-quality images slapped together on a slideshow reel? Was it made for absolutely nobody? No, because anybody who does know about it still ends up confusingly fascinated by it, so there must be some reason that it exists, but I can’t find it! And yet, somehow, it ends up getting a rerelease on modern consoles that was distributed just one or two months ago, because as we all know, this is DEFINITELY the best way to spend the $35 dollars that I had just lying around. I was just gonna burn it all and snort the ashes, but nonononono, CLEARLY I need to use it to put this thing onto my Switch and infect it for the rest of its life.

And yet, somehow, after all this time of knowing about and having “played” it myself… I can’t bring myself to hate it. Yes, it is horrible in every conceivable way, and the fact that it was sold for money TWICE is an absolute crime against nature, and yet, when you take a look at the product itself, you can see just how much it really doesn’t give a shit. It will do whatever it wants whenever it feels like during the story, and you kinda just have to go along with it. Wanna have the narrator wear a chicken mask, and also fight some random other person at one point, even going as far as to kill them? Sure, why not? Wanna have a blooper in the middle of an “intense” scene? Be my guest! Wanna put a random PNG of a cartoon raccoon driving a go-kart in a bunch of random places for no reason? But of course! Nothing makes sense in Toontown! All of these things are actually in the "game", and it turns it all into what I can only describe as a fever dream, and at this point, I am ready to just fully embrace whatever this thing is and stop questioning logic. Common sense is for the weak, and I am tired of being weak.

Overall, despite the fact that it has some sort of insane appeal, this is still one of the worst things that has ever been made by human hands, and it has forever poisoned the minds of many, including myself. If you have somehow gone long enough without “playing” or watching it for yourself, do yourself a favor and don’t do it. Yeah, it may be fun for a bit, but it really doesn’t warrant any more attention than anyone, including myself, has already given it. But, before we go and forget this thing ever existed, I just wanna point out one more thing: the title is a FUCKING LIE, because there is a “scene” in the game that has John, who just so happens to be a plumber, wearing a tie. You can’t even get a title for this game that isn’t messing with you.

“Game” #405