 Review By: Siou Choy |
Developer: | Barking Lizards |
| Publisher: | THQ | |
| Genre: | Action | |
| ESRB: | Everyone | |
| # Of Players: | 1 | |
| Online Play: | N/A | |
| Accessories: | N/A | |
| Buy Now: |   |
You can always tell where the money is at – with even the slightest impetus, anything and everything can and will be made into a video game. Doesn’t matter whether the source material is a movie, sport, or as in this case, an atrocious TV show. For those of you (myself gratefully included among this group) that aren’t familiar with some piece of tripe called “Zoey 101”, be thankful. Count your lucky stars, make note of your blessings, and say a prayer of thanks to your deity of choice. If the script writing comes off even one tenth as abominable as that of its GBA counterpart, the show’s very existence gives firm and blatant confirmation to all those reports of the “dumbing down” of American society. Seriously, the fact that someone could be paid to write such an asinine, banal scenario and stiff, unrealistic dialogue is utterly beyond belief…even on Nickelodeon terms.
It would seem, though I’m proud to say I can’t confirm, that Zoey 101 revolves around a group of bizarrely plastic and soulless soundalike (if not lookalike) teens attending a boarding school called Pacific Coast Academy. The main focus of the story follows the putative straight man and “star” of the show, the equally (if not more) talentless sister of Britney Spears. Yep, we’re talking about the famous Jamie Lynn Spears as “Zoey”. Hey, kids! Can you say Frank Stallone?
As already noted, the dialogue in the game will literally leave you cringing, pondering if it could possibly be anywhere vaguely approaching this level of pathetic talentlessness in its televised counterpart. Having suffered through this abomination of a game, I just could not muster the slightest dregs of desire to punish myself by finding out. I’m not kidding, this is really beyond belief. I want the name(s) of the scriptwriters for this game, if not the TV series. They should be posted in a public place, and offered up to the general public, to be held up to ridicule and mass scorn. In all seriousness, as a thinking individual forced to subject myself to this grammar school level screenwriting, I feel I have been abused! And I actually remember liking the puerile but amusing antics of Saved by the Bell, California Dreams, and Hey Dude back in the day, so it’s not like I’m holding this up to Shakespeare, for comparison…
OK, moving on. The main plot of the game (such as it is) is to try to bring everyone in the school, be it the girls, boys, or even the faculty together as friends (awww, ain’t that sweet? Spears must be a regular Mother Teresa. Please). You’re given a series of mini-games each semester, which each group (the girls, the boys, and the faculty) must successfully complete in order to move on to the next semester. Of course, it doesn’t seem to matter which group you choose to play as, since you play as the same character, going through the exact same scenario from the exact same point of view each and every time. So even if you decide to play as, say, the faculty, you’ll still be playing as Zoey (or one of her girlfriends), with the same dialogue, same cutscene, and same challenge…each of which gets repeated 3 times (and each of which you must play through and beat) for no apparent reason other than to drive the reluctant gamer into fits of yelling and raised blood pressure. What other game can you think of where you beat a challenge or level, only to have to repeat it 2 more times, complete with the exact same dialogue, scenario, and character level? No experience, no extras, no change in difficulty or setting…the exact same thing, 3 times over. Who the heck designed this, the Marquis De Sade?
You may have picked up something else strange by now. Yes, that’s right - it seems like the game is deliberately trying to turn this whole thing, through dialogue and plot, into some sort of battle of the sexes…despite the fact that the stated objective of the game is that you’re supposed to somehow make friends with everyone! While this supposed objective (to make friends with everyone, and everyone friends) is ostensibly accomplished (leap of faith required here) by completing “Requests” (read, those annoying mini-games) and “Dares” (those same exact mini-games, but slightly harder), what it really seems to be all about is showing up those boys (who seem to have it in for those girls) and showing them who’s best on the basketball court, or what have you. Now, seriously – feminized or not, how many times can you beat that wimpy looking toothpick “Logan” (subtract extra points for his folks naming him after a comic book character) in basketball (or any other game) and have him want to be your friend? More likely, the kid would hate your guts, and spend all his free time dissing you (at the least), if not actively persecuting you and trying to “get you back” for showing him up…great advice for making friends and influencing people, Nickelodeon! Dale Carnegie, this is not…
Posted: 2007-05-20 13:28:15 PST