Aqua Teen Hunger Force Zombie Ninja Pro-Am Review

Aqua Teen Hunger Force Zombie Ninja Pro Am is going to be a big seller despite the bad review it got from the person that was suffering from hemorrhoids over at IGN. Gather around youngin’s and let a 46 year old lady who actually has a sense of humor tell you about Aqua Teens. This isn’t a game to wax over with melancholia about the destiny of the games industry. It isn’t meant for that. It is meant to be a good time, and it sure is…Aqua Teen Hunger Force Zombie Ninja Pro-Am is a hilarious spin off from the strange but funny Adult Swim Comic. The Aqua Teens have a special place in the hearts of Massachusetts residents like myself who got a reality check when the viral marketing program that consisted of placing lite brite ads around Boston brought the city to its’ knees a few months back. It galvanized my position as an ATHF fan. Leave it to a bunch of stoned weirdoes to shine a light on the aggressive, greedy and bilious mayor of Boston. The stunt was a wake up call that harshly pointed out the ineffectuality and downright ignorance of the homeland security in Boston when they detonated toys. If they couldn’t tell an explosive device from a battery powered light, they should have been fired from the bomb squad. This is why comedy is important. It provides checks and balances. Even in the games industry. All that ruckus was worth at least a point on future reviews from me.

The franchise is designed by the staff at Williams Street obviously for those who appreciate the surreal and random style of Adult Swim humor. If you are drunk or high, or just wish you were, you will enjoy this game as soon as you turn it on. From the voice overs on the menu screens that yell at you for wasting their time, and degenerating their pixels, to the insults in huge red letters that tell you “YOU SUCK”, you can tell that the game is a send up of other big budget movie games that have tried and failed. Instead these guys are attempting to entertain you with the suckiness. This is a game that you buy because you want to laugh.

Game-Play

It’s ostensibly a golf game. It is so not Tiger Woods either. In fact if you have thrown the controller across the room while playing the more serious golf games, then you will appreciate the levity of this game. It’s a golf game from hell. If real golf was like this everyone would want to play. It’s like going to mini golf on an acid trip

You do actually play golf, but you also exterminate Carl’s crabs, obtain spray bottles of pest aside for the pubic lice, skirt rivers of pus-like god knows what, and somehow still try to golf while being mobbed by maniacal trees. There are a host of pick ups including those that will give access to 12 minute-long Cameo Clips of characters from the show. Other items include a ren faire sword, lightening bolts for Frylock, and a hot dog that will turn Meatwad into a target that gets eaten by baddies while you attempt to put. Meatwad gets abused often, one power up allows you to golf by hitting him instead of the golf ball. Additionally there is cart racing against the two alien frat boys in a a golf kart with roof-mounted homing missiles. How is this not fun?

There’s the Foreigner Belt that Carl wears proudly in one of the episodes, which turns enemies to ice. Bags of tortilla chips called ‘Enchaladitos’ are the health pick ups that increase the health of Master Shake or Frylock who’s heath icons start to look pretty emaciated once they start to take hits. Collecting the sandwiches called ‘Broodwich’ unlock another level.

The camera works well. the golf game engine does what it is meant to, and the carts drive somehow without falling over. The game has it’s own version of physics. But for a movie game it all is in working order.

Sound and Music

The voice over work is fantastic. They say some crazy things that would likely have to be bleeped for TV. All the original voice actors are there. That is what makes it so funny and such good party fodder. MC Chris, Andy Merrill and Andrew W.K. “Party All The Time.” appear. There are guitar riffs and some rap throughout. There are a multitude of one liners that are pretty funny. But it does get repetitive, as you would expect. Even in Evil Dead where the jokes also were pretty good eventually got repetitive after a while.

Conclusions

If you aren’t an Aqua Teens fan, you won’t ‘get’ this game. If you’ve never seen the cartoon, rent a DVD first to see if it is for you. It is pretty bent stuff so it is not for everyone. You can watch four full episodes on the game disk that are unlocked which makes it worth the buy. They add to the ’story line’ in the game. I imagine this game to have a ton of re-playablity. The levels aren’t very difficult, but you’ll want to play it over and over to get everything and get better scores besides ‘triple suckiness.” This is a funny time waster that you can look forward to when you need stress relief. I give Aqua Teen Hunger Force Zombie Ninja Pro Am an inspired 7.5 out of 10.

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