Discover at your own risk. FurryMUCK.

FurryMUCK
(location deliberately left unsaid)

Rule number one: do not, under any circumstances whatsoever, attempt to have any contact or dealings whatsoever with FurryMUCK unless (a) you have never been sickened, frightened or nauseated by anything in your life, or (b) you are very, very drunk.

Rule number two: even if the above criteria are met, you may still very seriously wish to consider dealing in any way, shape or form whatsoever with FurryMUCK.

I'm no expert on internet trash, but I am fairly certain that this is quite simply the most horrifying, disgusting, all out creepy online activity ever devised. And that makes it even more horrific: talented, gifted artists have actually participated in and helped breathe life into this appalling travesty. What on earth were these people thinking? Surely they, as I once was, must have been lured on to this thing under some kind of false pretenses. Were they as innocent as I was when they were pulled onto it? Did they know what they were getting themselves into? Did they understand beforehand what this actually was? I've heard that at least a few of these said talented individuals still defend their time on this thing to this day, but I have the feeling that they are really in just a powerful state of denial.

I have given this a listing here on my "Your Stuff SUCKS" page, but for your personal health and safety, I am in no way, shape or form recommending it. Vile acts are commited by these people both online and in real life which surpass the imaginations of even the most jaded trashmongers. If for some reasons of your own devising you should choose against my warnings to fortify both your courage and your stomach and get within close vicinity of this, I hereby guarantee you that you will never forget the experience.

It was the very first online activity of its kind ever devised, and is the main home base of that bizarre cult known as the "furries", who I am now convinced after being forced to deal with them for several years against my will are quite simply the most sick, twisted, perverted, and most severely disturbed group of individuals ever to congregate.

So how do I begin to describe something like this, and how did I end up getting accidentally connected with it?

How indeed. I was at the San Diego ComiCon back in 1992 with my portfolio talking to various individuals from various studios hoping to find work, when this one particular individual from England happened to be looking over my shoulder at my samples. He asked if he could have one of my business cards because he said he liked the design I had created for it. I had innocently handed it over to him, never guessing that I would regret that simple act to my dying days or how much misery this one said individual would end up causing me as a result of meeting me.

He proceeded to introduce me to a group of individuals at the table I was at, and all of them acted as though they all wanted to instantly love me. Then they announced that, in order to celebrate this "important find", they were going to take me out to dinner. I had someplace modest in mind, but they insisted on this wildly expensive Japanese restaurant, in the ritziest area of town you could possibly imagine, picking out a big table long enough to seat everybody at and insisting on seating me at its head. Of course, the tab was picked up. It didn't take very long for me to realize that something unusual was going on, that this was actually recruitment. Right away, I thought to myself, something was wrong. This was not what normally happens with a group of art fans. I excused myself. But my troubles were far from over.

When I got home, I was suddenly finding myself bombarded by mail, bizarre packages, and various weirdos all writing me and calling my number out of the blue, including this guy. Suddenly, my peaceful little existance of quietly creating cartoons and pursuing my career was blown sky high.

Meanwhile, the individual responsible for dragging me into the middle of all this nonsense was going absolutely berzerk buying me cartloads of presents. Several times I actually attempted to return the things so he could get his money back, but he had deliberately destroyed the receipts so I couldn't do so. All the while it was becoming more and more obvious to me that it was very, very painfully important to said individual that I like this, that I join. Which told me that there were to be brownie points of some kind or other to be had by my joining. Again, a very bad sign.

My family had actually allowed him to come out for a period of time to visit them because my mother was charmed by his written letters, but they instantly regretted it forever afterwards. In the words of my mother, "That was a very selfish young man who came out here."

And he kept pestering me to join some program without explaining to me what it was, simply because he said it was the most "convenient" way to stay in touch. Because my family thought it was important for me to be a good witness to this guy, I tried signing up at the time just to give him one more chance, not to mention to shut him up. That program turned out to be, you guessed it, a little number called FurryMUCK, which I didn't even know the name of until after I had followed his instructions. And after I saw what it was and how blatantly I had been lured on to it, I was horrified and wanted nothing to do with it.

It was only after all of that I learned that this guy was in fact one of the programmers behind this thing, and was something called a "furry". It was only at this point that I finally had some kind of name to tag all these weirdos with, as I had been thinking for years, "What on earth, who ARE all these people, and why won't they go away and leave me alone?"

It took forever to get them away, and how I wish I could go back in time to stop myself from giving that guy my business card, because then I would have been spared all of the hell I had to put up with in his wake which so severly damaged my lifelong faith and belief in human nature, including his asking me for a few samples of my work back in 1992 which I had given him copies of under the condition that he not copy or give them out -- only to learn afterward that he had posted them all over something called the internet (which I knew nothing about) with my full name, address and phone number on them, thus the reason for my suddenly being flooded with hundreds of creepy "furries", not to mention unauthorized samples of my work being passed around all over the place, including a concept I had created in '89 which I would much later discovered to my horror had been stolen for an "original" Pixar movie called Up.

In other words, I was suddenly being besieged by hundreds of "furries", and I didn't know what hit me.

FurryMUCK is filled with wall-to-wall weirdos, perverts and nutjobs of every walk and persuasion, and that is the overall major appeal of it, to those who find it appealing. What seems to happen here really is meant to be happening, and often really is. These people aren't just going through the motions of everything you see here. They really do want and desire to do, and in many cases in the real world very often do do, everything and more that they are doing. That is the thing's overall redeeming quality, you might say. If the events on FurryMUCK were only simulated as some kind of sick joke, it would be merely depraved and disgusting.

And yet, because it genuinely and accurately reflects the real honest-to-God actions and behaviour of real people, the thing as a whole takes on a sick, twisted kind of documentary status. There is a powerful temptation, however vague, to praise FurryMUCK just for demonstrating to you personally whether or not you have the stomach to take it. It is a temptation I can personally resist, thank you very much.

The "furries" love to claim themselves to the media as being a charming people, innocent and kind, who do not mean the slightest bit of harm to anyone, and are perfectly normal and healthy. Nevertheless, their public relation stunts and overall public behaviour, despite these claims, have the tendency to deliberately use shock as a means to draw attention to themselves. They have basically done everything they can to jumpstart their consciousness within the public's overall genuine awareness, and that can be regarded in their case as being understandable. After all, when you're a brand new lifestylist cult and you want to make your presence known in the world, hey, you do what you gotta go. The "furries"' personal ambitions and claims have grown, but the technology of FurryMUCK itself has apparently not, and its overall features and mechanics resemble that of a traditional text adventure game, right down to the compass directions and inventory commands.

I kept asking myself during the proceedings of what I was forced to deal with during that long period of hell whether there was anything that these people wouldn't do. Over and over again. And each time I asked, I got a loud, resounding "no" for an answer. There were certain things I got in the mail from them and certain things they began to say and do that had me thinking, "No. They're not really going to do that. No human being in their right mind would even think about doing that. They wouldn't possibly go that far." And then, they did it, right before me. I refuse to go into any sort of detail because I do not want to cause my readers to vomit, but you can't begin to imagine what goes on with these people. I've spent a decade now desperately attempting to forget what I was forced to witness.

I'm giving it points for amusement, however, because I couldn't help but laugh at the incredible lengths these people go through to ignore having to deal with reality. They treated their furryMUCK program just like the real world, and if they kiss you, slap you, or throw you against the walls in one of those cutesy little online actions of theirs, you are expected to react and behave accordingly: and they freeze, seemingly genuinely confused and bewildered, not knowing what to do next, when you do not. The actions and behaviour of these people are completely ridiculous, and the things they say include such exclamations as, "Could you kindly tell me what gender I currently am? I forgot who I was last having sex with." The effect of watching all of these completely pathetic online losers dsperately going out of their way to avoid getting a life is absolutely hilarious, and in that aspect, this is a carnival-style freak sideshow of the highest order.

And then there were the things they did which made me laugh, and I mean I really laughed, because I just couldn't believe how far they were going.

And then there were the moments when they went even further, and I stopped laughing. Oh my God, that's not at all funny. That's just flat out inappropriate. That is just completely and totally inhuman. I swear, I squinted in horror as I saw those moments, just denying what I was witnessing.

Let me put it to you this way: if I had managed to get through all those years of being forced to deal with all of that without a single, solitary objection to any of it, I would have been every bit as sick, twisted and perverted as the "furries" themselves.

Thank God I'm healthy.

Since I was thoroughly repulsed and horrified by FurryMUCK and everything connected with it, but found it genuinely and uniquely funny at the same time, the only two choices I could see was to either give it its own entry here on this site or to completely ignore it altogether and leave it unmentioned simply because I know that the very fact that I have gone on and on reporting what an insult to humanity this activity is would automatically make certain people believe that it can't possible be that bad -- well-meaning people who would very understandably and desperately want to believe that no group of modern individuals could be this vile.

My reasoning for choosing the former goes like this: the only good thing I can see about the whole godawful nightmare is that it now puts me in an excellent position to warn people about it, especially parents with impressionable children. And the reason I call the "furries" a "cult" is because they fit the definition of one: a group of individuals who do not allow for nor encourage individual thought and is difficult for its members to leave.

So consider this a public service. You have been warned.

A child with a toy (in this case, a camera) is still a child.

The Doom Generation (1995)
Independantly made (of course)
Starring James Duval, Rose McGowan, Johnathon Schaech (who's looks have the tendency to remind me of Jim Morrison only even more demented)
Written and directed by Gregg Araki
Rated NC-17 (For graphic sex, (supposedly) adult-intended violence, wildly exaggerated frat-themed mayhem, general annoyance/irritation factor, going to childish lengths at attempts to shock and offend audience)
Length: 82 minutes


"Craig! No, no, no. No no! OMG! Just saw Quickie Mart on utube (Doom generation). No more.. Lol!"

That was an actual text message sent my way by a good friend of mine on January 22, 2011 at 9:14 PM after he had apparently discovered for the very first time a notorious scene from Gregg Araki's The Doom Generation on Youtube, and obviously he was so stunned at what he saw that his message carried uncharacteristic (for him) typos. See, he had expressed interest in seeing the film because he had heard that Skinny Puppy have a cameo in it, and I immediately warned him strongly against seeing it, citing The Mutant Reviewers From Hell's own bludgeoned observations after subjecting themselves to this thing. I myself had only recently gotten around to seeing it: after reading said comments from said Mutant Reviewers years ago, I had sworn to myself that I would avoid this movie like the plague.

Well, I finally gave in to curiosity simply because I wanted to discover for myself what all the wretching was about, an act I normally don't do in situations like this, and am happy to report that I actually survived this movie with my brain completely intact. Yes, I know that the violence is intended to be incredibly gruesome. Yes, I know that the language is horrendous, that the movie is offensive, grotesque, etc. But there are reasons I was able to survive this film so well, and I'll get to those in a minute.

The Doom Generation is intended both as a wild parody of teenage road movies and an excuse to attempt shocking the audience. There really isn't very much of a plot, if at all: the film starts off in a wild underground dance club where we first see everyone thrashing around to NIN as we then see the cut-out words "Welcome to Hell" in the wall with flames torching behind them. We first meet agitated Amy Blue (Rose McGowan) expressing her disgusted annoyance with a cigarette dangling from her mouth. We then are introduced to Jordan White (James Duval, who you may recall from Donnie Darko), who appears as a highly naive but basically good kid. The two have only been an item for about three months or so, and as Amy remarks on how she wants to get out of the place, Jordan suggests, "Want to go to heaven?"

We then cut to see them going at it in Amy's car while pondering the pros and cons of going all the way, when suddenly Xavier Red (Johnathon Schaech) invades the car after a violent brawl with a gang of goons portrayed by none other than Skinny Puppy in that cameo I mentioned previously. Off they go on an odyssey that has them "heading north" in random fashion, stopping for various variations of wildly exaggerated fast food along the way while Amy keeps getting persistently mistaken for somebody's ex who always vows to kill her, Xavier always ends up killing someone, and afterwards they end up staying in some hotel or other while Xavier always challenges their notions of sexuality, normality, freedom, morals, etc.

Okay, first, the two things I genuinely liked about this film: the hallucinogenic art design and soundtrack. Say what you will about The Doom Generation, it has cool set design even if it is obvious that the budget was scraped from the bottom of a local barrel and wasn't able to pay for what Araki really had in mind. Everything in this film is unbelievably over-the-top, from the pool hall (which is decked out entirely in tin foil) to the grotesque hot dogs they buy at the Quickie Mart. The whole thing suggests a tripped-out nightmare, as though the entire movie is being broadcast through Amy's (who is apparently on crystal the entire film according to what everybody says) drug-enduced point of view and not the genuine reality as seen and experienced by the others. How much of this is real and how much is imagined? (Or, as Jordan puts it at one point, "Ever feel like reality is more twisted than dreams?") I especially liked the black-and-white checkerboard motel room they check into at one point, complete with matching towels. Add to this the fact that The Doom Generation boasts a hot soundtrack, and even though only half of its tracks are available on its soundtrack album it is still worth getting; amazingly, while the movie itself is so determined to be wild, the the soundtrack album release tends to be startlingly beautiful. Check it out sometime if you ever have a few bucks to spare on a used Amazon copy and see if you don't agree.

Too bad the rest of this film is such an atrocious waste. This flick only goes to show that just because you may know how to direct a camera and visuals doesn't necessarily mean you're a good writer with accompanying vision. I found the visuals gross and repulsive, but I actually wasn't grossed out as Araki intended me to be. That's because of two reasons: one, the special effects look incredibly fake and unconvincing, almost to a Goth level, and two, I knew that being grossed out was precisely the reaction Araki wanted me to have. I didn't fall for it, plain and simple; while I'm sure that there are a lot of teens and college-age kids who will all undoubtedly squeal with delight over the notion of seeing so much "objectionable" material in a feature film, older and more mature viewers will see right through it.

They know that other directors -- like oh, say, Quentin Tarantino -- have attempted this approach before. The difference is that other such directors have counterbalanced such an approach with strong, fascinating characters, a good storyline, and dialogue that was at least reasonably intelligent. When watching The Doom Generation, the term "immature" came to mind.

Weirdly, the whole thing also comes across as a film student's project as opposed to a major motion picture; how did this thing manage to get backing and into major theater chains? If it was made for Youtube or was just an independant film showing in small art houses I could be a lot less perplexed by it, as it has all the look and feel of something made in a garage or on a college campus somewhere (obvious wigs and the like add to this impression immensely). But then again, this was made in the age before Youtube, and this was pretty much the only way you could get a movie out there, although I'm still perplexed as to how it happened.

As I say, the whole thing has a strangely surreal feel to it, like the trio have managed to slip into an alternate reality somewhere; as they keep musing to each other in colourful terms, they're just as perplexed as we are and we get the impression that things seemed fairly normally in their lives in terms of surroundings before this film started. I still say that the film may actually be being seen through the eyes of Amy Blue, who constantly reminds us of how she's speeding throughout the entire film and thus explains all the bizarre goings on. In short, the film needs a tad more explanation; while I admit it is fun to stare at and theorize over it a la The Blair Witch Project and try to decipher as to whether that is indeed the case, it feels incomplete both conceptually and physically. And somehow, that shot at the end when their car is seen driving forlornly off into the distance to a haunting little tune that has since become a face of mine has enough of a small hint of beauty to remind me that this film could have been so much more in more capable hands.

Bottom line: if you're feeling particularly adventurous for something unique, then maybe you might want to take a chance on this thing just for a change of pace... otherwise, I can't really recommend it.

EPIC MICKEY: Warren Spector's "Howard The Duck".

Epic Mickey
Disney/Junction Point Studios
Nintendo Wii
Rated E for everybody (in other words, if your kids won't go to bed, try sicking this one on 'em)

If you're a Disney fan, you've most likely heard by now about the new videogame title Epic Mickey, an exclusive title for the Nintendo Wii released just this 30th of November in time for the holiday season.

Delighted with the results of their first successful major collaberation with an outside company with Kingdom Hearts, a title so massively huge in both scope and popularity that it has gone on to eclipse co-creator Square Enix's own virtually classic Final Fantasy series to become the most popular videogame franchise on the surface of the planet -- not to mention having (apparently) finally learned that merely licensing their creations to be slapped on to a game does not instantly guarantee a successful title -- Disney has once again decided to take the plunge with another collaberation, this time with the help of Junction Point and Warren Spector, the designer behind such classics as Thief, System Shock and Deux Ex, and is hoping lightning will strike twice.

Ignoring their usual "let's wait and see how well it's received first" tactics normally reserved for projects they consider risky and experimental, Disney has launched an enormous advertising campaign this time around, including making collectable editions of both the game (which comes with a making-of disc, console skins and statue) and its official hint book, and plastering the game's images all over Disneyland's shuttle fleet. They're even created a special collectible brush-shaped Wii controller just for the occasion.

I picked up my copy on its launch date and have successfully completed it.

So... is it worth the hype and your hard-earned cash? And is it as brilliant as word-of-mouth claims it to be?

Now before I start in on the details on this title, let me just go out on a limb right now and openly state that Epic Mickey is easily the most absolutely atrocious piece of crap I have personally had the displeasure of playing since the equally horrific King's Quest: Mask of Eternity, and like that other title easily goes down as one of the absolute worst games I have ever played in my entire life. As a matter of fact, it actually manages to beat out even that earlier title simply because it is far more ambitious and so obviously had a lot of huge hopes pinned to it. After selling strongly for its first week or so, the game instantly lost steam the second word got out that it was a burnt Christmas turkey as opposed to the delightful holiday stocking stuffer everyone was expecting. Warren Spector was suddenly in deep, deep trouble when word immediately got out regarding the visuals and camera being so dreadful that Epic Mickey's would-be audience could not even enjoy the natural act of simply looking at his game. But then Spector found himself in deeper trouble still; Epic Mickey has, of course, become a notorious title, a whopping embarrassment of a project that immediately flopped big time after players everywhere ran gagging from their Wiis.

I hear Spector is not taking criticism of this title well: he apparently lashed out wildly at just the camera criticisms alone on MTV, and stands fiercely beside his obvious labor of love. Well, all I have to say is that, as it's his game and he obviously haves his own free copy of it, he is more than welcome to it and to love it to death as much as he pleases, because he may very well be the one and only loyal fan to the horrific mess that is Epic Mickey. If you dare sit through this game, numerous questions will be guaranteed to race through your mind. Here's a sample of what I caught myself wondering as I fought my way through Epic Mickey before finally hawking it in disgust:

1. How did this game manage to get such fairly reasonable scores with critics? It scores something like a 76 on Metacritic alone, and yet it doesn't even score that high. Did Disney pay off critics to write positives on Epic Mickey? Or is it that the reviewers didn't even bother to play beyond the first couple of levels or so when they gave it their official verdict?

2. Were the game testers for Epic Mickey all a bunch of stoners on crack and having a pot party while trying this thing? I keep hearing stories from Disney folks that the title's testers were all supposedly enjoying it so much that they didn't want to give it back. What on earth possessed them to think that this game was actually fun? What were they on that was so strong that they were supposedly so convinced of this game's brilliance? Did Disney spike the refreshments they personally provided for them? Or was that all deliberately made-up hype?

3. Who was the one in charge of quality control here, and exactly what kind of weapon did Spector hold up to their noggin in order to convince them that this title was ready for commercial release? I honestly can't imagine any self respecting professional in their position actually greenlighting this thing as being properly completed. Gameplay as boring and monotonous as all get out, graphics so dark that you can barely see what's going on, terrible controls, awful framerate slowdowns and easily the worst camera in history, and yet they thought that the thing was genuinely FINISHED? What kind of inhuman monster of a slave driver is Specter to get them to let it go out in this condition? And it's not as if the troubles with this title are so slight that they could have missed something.

4. Exactly how many gobs of cash did Disney waste on this monstrosity? Apparently it's one of those "undisclosed sum" ordeals, which means that it was insanely expensive and that the company is understandably paranoid regarding revealing how much they spent to make it because they know that the world will be sadly shaking their collective head in disbelief. Like you do after struggling through this thing, which can only be described as a unique form of torture from which you've gotten more entertainment value from root canals. Geez, all that money for this, you keep muttering to yourself in disbelief. What I could have done with money like that.

For those of you who don't know, here's the basic setup: master wizard Yen Sid -- using a magic brush, paint and thinner -- created what appears at first to be a tabletop model of Disneyland, but is in reality a special world called Wasteland, a place where forgotten cartoon characters of the past can live and dwell in peace, unsure of how they came to be there, but knowing that everything would be alright. Retired Disneyland park attractions also appear there as well. Mickey Mouse, sneaking in undetected, observes all this with fascination. After the well-meaning old wizard retires for the evening, Mickey approaches the table because he just can't resist the temptation to play with the brush. At first, it appears that he has created a little figurine of himself, but then his delight turns to horror as the little blob he has painted suddenly becomes a nightmarish version of the famous Phantom Blot (The "Shadow" Blot). In his panic to get away, Mickey accidentally knocks over the thinner, which dissolves into the tabletop Wasteland and ruins it. Many years later after achieving fame and fortune, Mickey is suddenly dragged violently out of bed one night by The Blot down into Wasteland itself, and the adventure begins.

Does this all sound like The Sorceror's Apprentice Part II? Of course it does. Both Disney and their collaboration team have bent over backwards to make sure that nothing in this game clashes with nor interferes with established Disney lore, always a must. What's unique about this project is that it allows the designers to run amok with the Disney archives and pull an American McGee's ALICE on Disneyland.

Indeed, the ALICE influence is all too blatantly obvious at the start of this game, right down to the sinisterly twisted opening laboratory setting and the background music, which at this point borrows heavily from Chris Vrenna's now virtually famous score of that earlier title. It also explores the same maturely crafted psychoanalysis story that encourages the player to look thoughtfully deep inside his or her self, just as ALICE did. And at first I had "ripoff" sirens searing through my brain faster than your average California Screamin' ride. But once you get outside and get to experience Wasteland itself, you'll find that, while the game still wears its ALICE influence boldly on its sleeve, the game settles down and becomes a far friendlier terrain for all ages to explore. In fact, all of the hype, previews and trailers Disney has been throwing at us all year now make the game seem a lot darker and more terrifying than it really is.

There is far too much detail for me to go into here regarding why this game is so terrible, and for me to attempt to do so and explain all the reasons would require an entry of, uh... well, epic proportions; trust me, you have to actually see the game in action for yourself to understand why it's such a disaster. So instead, let me point you over to a Youtube link kicking off a series of videos by an individual who had far more time and (fairly reasonable) patience on his hands to dedicate to this appalling travesty. (IMPORTANT NOTE: the individual in question uses a lot of extreme profanity throughout these videos, so parents please take note.) The videos are like the game itself; they start off harmlessly enough and seem fairly promising, but by the time they've progressed to the point of reaching the end the game has shed all pretense and revealed itself for the trash it truly is.

Epic Mickey is a title so awful that I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if it ends up replacing the Atari 2600 failure E.T. as the most embarrassing moment in gaming history. It is a woebegone and dangerously overhyped dungheap that isn't worth the CD it's printed on, a misfit, a mistake that will be foreverafter known, not as Spector's beloved place in Disney history, but instead as his own personal Howard The Duck. This game is a tremendous artistic and financial risk tossed to the winds. It is the most worthless, ridiculous electronic waste I have ever seen, and remember, I have been playing videogames since the moment they first came out with Pong.

SILENT HILL - SHATTERED MEMORIES: "Shattered" Memories? Non-existant more like it

SILENT HILL: SHATTERED MEMORIES
Konami (Sony PSP)

Reviews have generally been warm to this game, and after reading several of them I figured I'd go ahead and give it a try. I was in the mood for a really spooky game (a rarity these days, unfortunately), and it seemed as if the apparently impressive Silent Hill: Shattered Memories might strike the gong. And for the first twenty minutes or so, I had thought that I was going to get my money's worth. Unfortunately, the game begins to collapse all too quickly.

This feels like a really odd thing to say, but my experience in playing this title reminded me strongly of an article I once read by Roger Ebert reviewing The Village. Ebert, upon seeing the movie, had made several comments about it which nailed a lot of my own reactions to Shattered Memories right on the head, among them the statement that it was "based on a premise that cannot support it, a premise so transparent it would be laughable were the movie not so deadly solemn".

He had also gone on to add,"Critics were enjoined after the screening to avoid revealing the plot secrets. That is not because we would spoil the movie for you. It's because if you knew them, you wouldn't want to go. The whole enterprise is a shaggy dog story, and in a way, it is all secrets. I can hardly discuss it at all without being maddingly vague". You're not supposed to talk about the secrets in Shattered Memories. Magazines were even more vague about them than they normally would be, and you're not supposed to spoil any of it, especially that big secret ending that the Silent Hill series is apparently so well known for, for any of your friends or anybody else preparing to play it. And, like the makers of The Village, I'm sure that the game's creators all feel the same way: it's not because it would ruin the game for you, but because it will instantly guarantee your not being suckered into plunking down your hard earned cash for it. So I'm going to be a good sport and try not to give too much away, although to be frank that really isn't saying much since there really isn't that much to give away in the first place -- it only merely seems like it for the first hour or so.

In the beginning of the game we are shown old videotaped footage of a happy father, Harry Mason (aren't they imaginative?), and his equally happy daughter, Cheryl. Clearly their relationship and togetherness knows no bounds, supposedly. Then, late one snowy night, we see Harry's car crash somewhere within the always-spooky town known as Silent Hill. Luckily, he isn't hurt, but his daughter Cheryl is missing. Off he goes to search for her, as all good videogame daddies do, and the gameplay begins.

As Harry, you wander on and on alone through a remarkably detailed town containing disturbingly few inhabitants and lots of atmosphere, solving lots of puzzles along the way. And the further you go, the more Twilight Zone-ish both the story and the situation become. Is Harry crazy? Is he hallucinating? Why all the sudden shifts -- which do come across as incredibly creepy? And, most important of all, what really HAS happened to Cheryl?

At first, the title is a technical marvel. Loading times are ingeniously placed and next to nil, so aside from the occasional slight hiccup the game runs smoothly and without interruption so impressively that you hope other game designers will take their cues from it and adopt the same technique. The cell phone mechanic is ingenious and holds a lot of promise. You'll be even more impressed once you learn just how unchanged the game is from platform to platform; all of them are exactly the same aside from graphics quality. And, at first anyway, the character situations are genuinely intriguing and not a little unnerving as we see sudden... abrupt forks taken, and I'll just leave it at that.

And every once in a while at certain points, the game suddenly switches to a tense moment which have led many critics to praise the game, the moment that turns it into -- as one put it -- true terror. Everything will suddenly freeze up, and you suddenly discover the hard way that you're not alone after all; a horde of bizarre zombielike creatures are after your hide, and you are completely unarmed. Your only option is to run as quickly as you can, desperately rushing through doors and hallways, throwing obstacles down after you in an attempt to slow them down, your only defense being the occasional torch you may be lucky enough to stumble across along the way that will keep them at bay, but only for the short time it remains lit.

Does this all sound exciting? It is -- but only up to a point.

For the first couple of levels or so I was genuinely enthralled and thought the game was really good; after that though, the whole thing shed its mask and revealed itself for the truly shallow title it actually is. No amount of ultracool atmosphere can absorb the fact that you eventually realize that, unless you're being chased, you are absolutely safe. There are no threats whatsoever while you're exploring. No traps. Nothing, nada, zip, zilch, zero. And when you are being chased, by around the third round the whole exercise of trying to evade the monsters becomes one big exercise in headache-inducing tedium, especially after you realize that there is no limit of lives you have: if you're caught, you simply try all over again until you can get it right. This completely neuters the situation of any feelings regarding real threat, as there really isn't anything at stake. Add to this the fact that you realize that you are in fact running through a giant maze that merely gets bigger and more annoying with each level, and the whole exercise quickly becomes a tremendous snore. You're simply wandering around trying to solve puzzles that hinder your progress safe in the knowledge that nothing is going to harass you in the least until that moment when everything ices over and you roll yours eyes thinking, "Oh for Pete's sake, not again" as you are thrust into yet another tedious chase sequence that's even longer and more boring and irritating than the one before it.

As if to add insult to injury, the "puzzles" in question are... how can I put this? Well, they're absolutely pre-school and an insult to your intelligence. The only way you'll get stumped on them at all is if it's because you're expecting the answer to be far more complicated than it really is. Here's an example: you know how a lot of games have put some variation of "Simon" into them as a form of minigame or puzzle? And how some of them have actually been cute and entertaining (Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep's ice cream machine) while some have been merely inept (the "drumming duo" bit in 9: The Last Resort)? Well, did you think that any game could actually SIMPLIFY the "Simon" concept any more than it actually is? Well, Shattered Memories accomplishes just that. It actually simplifies it! You'll know it when you actually encounter it, and when you do, you'll be thoroughly disgusted that the creators actually believed this posed some sort of challenge upon your person. When "solutions" are needed they aren't even discovered in other areas -- they're ALWAYS just RIGHT THERE in the same area as the puzzle! The only way the entire process could be made any easier was if Harry had been given a step-by-step solution book at the beginning of the game which automatically flashed the answer right on the screen before your eyes the moment you approached a puzzle. Or phone text messages perhaps (which, come to think of it, I seem to recall happening).

The whole thing drones on and on and on in this precise same fashion throughout a game that takes only about a couple of hours or so to complete in its entirety. Harry trudges through the snow. He moves objects. He flips switches. He runs with a torch. He checks his cell phone. He frets over Cheryl. He learns events. He grows confused. He encounters a cop who is just as confused about him (aren't they always?). He sees strange occurances that defy logic. A couple doesn't recognize him. A lady converses with him. Same lady asks him to follow her off to wherever. Doors need to be opened. A school has to be explored. A bridge has to be lowered. Instructions have to be discovered to lower it. Someone answers the phone when Harry calls to ask for them. Isn't it just so convenient that they're available to answer the phone and give them right then and there, in the dead of night at some ungodly hour, right when Harry needs them to.

So we have impressive game mechanics ruined by boring gameplay, unexciting chases, and puzzles that might as well not even exist. That leaves the story. And boy, does it ever do its best to zonk you out, even giving you a good start on occasion here and there. It seems to be getting pret-ty trippy for the longest time. Trippy, but not at all scary. But, again, I'm reminded of that exact same Roger Ebert review of The Village I mentioned earlier in which, without his giving anything away, he states his reaction to that movie's ending by saying.......

No, wait, I just can't quote that review again just in case you haven't read it. This game's too broad a target. I'll just say that his reaction was again exactly like my own to this game's ending, and that I realized what a waste of time this title really was, not to mention that much-ballyhooed secret ending. Seriously. All you see, all you learn and experience, it all comes to naught. It's a huge cop out, a scam, as far as I'm concerned. And speaking of "cops", I think that if that cop you ran into really wanted to help, she would have simply said, "Nothing to see here, please keep moving along, thank you."

Welcome to the page

Welcome to the dubiously titled Your Stuff Sucks. As I'm sure you've guessed, it's a webpage dedicated to what I personally feel are the absolute worst that entertainment has to offer.

Multifaceted, Your Movie Sucks isn't just limited to movies. It will also be reviewing games, books, etc. that I also feel are equally wretched. Please feel free to dive in and enjoy.