Teddy a killer in ‘Naughty Bear’
This summer's sleeper hit is called "Naughty Bear," a video game in which you portray a cute, stuffed teddy bear named Naughty who kills other cute stuffed animals -- and tortures them until they commit suicide.
To fans, the violent upheaval of stuffed animals is so comical, they are posting videos on YouTube, laughing about how funny it is.
Here's how Naughty goes psycho. The other bears in his life don't invite him to a birthday party. Then he hears a vengeful, British-sounding narrator-voice in his head, egging him on to murder.
"They are hiding the cake," the voice inside Naughty's head says cheerfully. "Do something about all this nonsense!"
For the rest of the game, you play as Naughty, jogging around a small island, using axes, knives, guns and baseball bats to shoot or beat the stuffing (literally) out of other teddy bears.
In a sense, "Naughty" is just another hack-and-slash game. But two elements make "Naughty" unique, not merely unusual:
A) You portray a protagonist terrorist, earning more points if you terrorize bears, watching them limp in agony before you slay them. The game's instructions read: "This is what we like to call 'stressing the meat.' ... Keep injured bears alive so everyone notices them."
B) You can press a button to scream "boo," which sometimes makes rivals shoot themselves in the head or club themselves to death.
Those are groundbreaking twists in hack-and-slash. I bet a subgenre of terrorist-torture games will emerge, and we'll say they're "Naughty."
However, this game's scope is too narrow, taking place on an island so tiny, a handful of bears barely moves on the thing. The island is drawn rudimentarily. Camera angles can stink. The online multiplayer is too choppy. To me, the killing is so repetitive, "Naughty Bear" is a rental.
Like the violent cartoon "Happy Tree Friends," the tone of "Naughty" is definitely meant to be funny. As in, isn't it funny how -- when you kill Bubbles, Pudding and Nibbles with a golf club -- you hold their heads on the ground and tee their skulls? Kill them all to earn the title, "Total Defluffication."
But if you want a serious point, I'll give you an option:
The psycho-narrator's lightheartedness ("How dreadful!") reminds me of: Daniel Franzese in "Mean Girls" ( "You go, Glenn Coco"); but mostly Malcolm McDowell in "A Clockwork Orange" ("Naughty, naughty, naughty! You filthy old soomka!").
If you remember the truth of "Clockwork Orange" and "Mean Girls," it is that victims often become victimizers and vigilantes.
Likewise, "Naughty Bear" (like old gangsta rap) is a reflection of the society that produced it. That is, America has lived with terror for a decade, causing the tables to turn so that victimized America became the victimizer, torturing real-life POWs and now -- virtual teddy bears!
Then again, maybe the moral is simply: If you throw a birthday party, make sure you invite potential murderers, or else they might murder you.
("Naughty Bear" by 505 Games retails for $50 for Xbox 360 and PS 3 -- Plays mildly fun but too repetitive. Looks poor. Moderately challenging. Rated "T" for violence. Two stars out of four.)
Contact Doug Elfman at delfman@reviewjournal.com. He blogs at reviewjournal.com/elfman.
NEW IN STORES
"Arc Rise Fantasia" (Ignition Entertainment) is a Japanese role-playing fantasy that came out in Japan last summer and finally arrives in America this month.
This is quite the endeavor. Reportedly it can take 60 hours to get from start to finish.
You portray L'arc, a mercenary trying to protect a mythical empire from monsters and dragons, and such.
It's a very traditional, turn-based, role-playing game. You swing a sword that's bigger than your body, even though your arms are thin little things. There's a waifish girl by your side.
And you don't control any of the body-movement action. You can only dispatch your character to one place or another. Then monsters come calling.
Battles ensue, RPG-style. You upgrade weapons with currency you've earned; you choose which real or magical attacks to inflict; then you watch the game carry out your attacks.
The anime style of the look comes with manga-styled dialogue boxes, and hours of cinematic movielike cut scenes to watch, of plot and blooming romance.
As many as three people can take part in your fighting party, as you travel city to city, in this latest effort from the designers of "Luminous Arc."
The Tuesday release retails for $40 for Wii. It's rated "T" for drug reference, fantasy violence, mild suggestive themes, simulated gambling.
"Samantha Swift and the Hidden Roses of Athena" (Navarre) is one of those very, very traditional games that don't move like contemporary video games, or even like board games.
Swift is an archaeologist. She needs to uncover treasures. But she doesn't even really appear on the screen in full much, since this isn't an action-adventure.
Instead, the screen is almost always a static photo-type screen of an archaeological site. You click a scanner button to scan items. You click a shovel button to dig for things. If you find the right combination of items, you move to the next room.
The game retails for $30 for DS. It's rated "E" for comic mischief.
-- By DOUG ELFMAN
