Okay, so once again I am trying to relaunch this blog of mine again. Usually when I do that I like to come back with something big that people actually care about. I like to do a system review or a profile of a legendary game that everyone has played. So this time I'm doing Three Stooges. Sorry it's some game that nobody cares about, but I already wrote about Zelda and Mario and this game happens to be fresh on my mind. I have gotten so far behind that I hardly even remember many of the games that I have played through. Also, I am tired from work and a little dizzy from my new medication. So Three Stooges is what you are getting. Enjoy!
There are two things I want you to take away from this article. The first is the term "multi-genre action." This is a term that is applied to games like Three Stooges which have multiple styles of gameplay. Usually this means that it is split up into a bunch of puny mini-games. This is a style of game that took a long time to perfect. Nintendo got it right many years later with the Mario Party and WarioWare series, but back in the 80s and 90s it was usually a way to use licensed characters without making much of a game around them. These games were almost always a failure. Outside of olympic style games like Track and Field it is hard to think of one worth playing. Three Stooges is actually one of the better ones and it still kinda sucks. I am surprised that so many companies kept trying to go for the "multi-genre action" because they sucked and nobody liked them. I guess the concept sounded good on paper.
In this game The Stooges are trying to save the orphanage by raising money, which I am pretty sure was the plot of that recent movie that everyone hated. To do this you have to play a bunch of mini games over the course of 30 days. You select them by pushing the button at the right time. I suppose this does keep you from just playing the one game you are good at over and over which is always a problem with games like this. The games themselves are playable, but they don't make a lot of sense without instructions. Even after I read how to do it I don't understand the cracker eating contest. Am I supposed to eat those little round things or the ones that look like shredded wheat? Why does Curly keep screaming? Oh well, I always make a lot of money one this one. Perhaps it's better if I don't understand. Anyway, you do this kind of thing for 30 turns and then hopefully earn enough money. I was able to finish it and did not have a bad time doing so. This article could probably end right here if not for something else I noticed about this game.
This brings me to the second thing I want you to take away from this article, and that is how much love is in The Three Stooges. I honestly can't think of a licensed game from the era that cared more for its properties. Right from the opening screen which has the Stooges clowning around over their old movie intro and making fun of Ghostbusters you can tell that this game mostly exists because some programmers out there really loved Three Stooges. They go so far as to make sure the mini games all come from Stooges shorts. They cared about the characters too much to have them jumping over bottomless pits, avoiding spikes, and dodging lava rocks. They have the stooges doing what they should be doing: throwing pies, beating each other up, and racing through hospitals. They even put in some early digitized voice acting which actually sounds like the Stooges. That aspect of the game is very impressive.
And that's where the trouble lies with profiling this game. It is a game that kinda sucks, but it was made with love and care. They didn't just throw it together to make money, they wanted to make something that plays more like a tribute. In that respect it is a rousing success. Just don't expect any remarkable gameplay. With that revelation it is time to close. Hopefully I won't take so long getting back next time.
