The Game of Life

"The mini-game titled 'Get a LIFE' gives you the best review for this game."

Welcome to the Game of LIFE, one of my favorite board games but this game makes you want to get a life so you'll never have to play games like this again. It has a nice showy presentation but it goes downhill from there.

Story 5/10
I gotta be a little slacking on my comments here as its a board game. Board games really don't have stories so its more like your goal then a story.

The Goal of LIFE is to get a Job, Get married, Buy a house, Raise Kids if you want and then retire as a millionaire. Along the way you'll go through disasters with your house, or your kids and if your still in college studying for exams as an example. The family who has the most money at the end will retire happily.

Gameplay 1.2/10
Imagine yourself Spinning a Spinner and moving the highlighted cursor to make choices. If you can picture that then you've almost seen half the game right there. Sadly this 'highly underused' concept has some more added to it. What's even a worse sight to behold is the fact that no 2 pieces can be on the same spot so a 2 when someone is in front of you moves you 2 spaces but sometimes it'll move you 3 as if someone was standing on that space!

With every space that you land on you'll either get a 3d graphic display of the space that's very dull and not funny at all. Or if your real lucky a 2d cartoon with some of the lamest jokes i've ever seen will pop up for your viewing. Most just make a 'funny' attempt at looking at what the words said in a different way. Others just make you cry.

Here's one when you land on Adopt Twins.

''I don't know Honey the Potatoes are 2 for a $1 too...''

If that's not enough proof how about when you lose a Stock...

''I always thought that taking the shirt of your back was just a sayin''

Or... when you find a Treasure buried...

''Now I know why this treasure was buried in the first place''

Now do you see how lame this is? Hasbro decided to not only kill this game but kill anyone who felt the urge (god help them) to play this game.

Sound 8.7/10
Well Hasbro decided to be smart and give listenable music for most of the game. The music will change as you reach different parts of the game.

You start out in the 1950s in terms of music which has the most annoying tunes ever. Once you hit the 60s things look up some in music, and the 70s sound like a remix of the Shaft theme oddly. The 80s sounds like a megaman song, while the 90s seems like a mix between Country and Sonic (?!). Finally year 2000 is full of futuristic music thats annoying from the get go.

Hasbro figured something out and did well here mostly too bad they didn't work on the rest of it.

Graphics 2/10
Ah Graphics, this is mostly what this game is made up of. Starting with the characters its truly sad why they decided to do it like this but every character head has tiny bodies and enormous ugly heads like that bald teacher on South Park. The way these characters move is horrid to watch as they flail like puppets with big smiles. Creepy...

Moving on to the board its very nicely done and helps boost this score some. The board is very colorful and bright, its full of activity. Plus in each decade you'll drive a different car from an old fashioned car to a futuristic car with no wheels. I just can't figure out why a big bald guys head is coming out of the ground near the end of the 90s part of the game.

Finally we come to the cinemas, which are a large part of the game. The moving from place to place lets you watch the hood of your ever changing car drive through the spaces letting off sound effects when you pass a pay day. This is not only very pointless but it makes you dizzy to boot.

The other cinema you get will either be a 3d clip of a character doing what the space says. If you don't get that you'll get lame jokes in a 2d cartoon making fun of the situation or what it says in the worst possible way.

Controls 8.5/10
Lets make it brief here. The controls are a 10 sadly as they are very responsive and quick. Thankfully the spinner is very odd to control so it gets a 8.5 instead.

Sound Effects 7.2/10
I hate them, from the Chinging of cash to the horrid voices put in for cinemas and the game summarizer. Although the neat idea of putting an announcer in who reads the spaces and tells you whos turn it is, it gets repetitive. I can't score it to low as without this annoyance of summarizing and in Cinemas this game would be worse than it could be. Not being able to see spaces well you'd have no idea whats going on and knowing its your turn is hard to find out too. Reading the lame jokes would be worse than hearing them. At least they can try and make these jokes a little less lame, which they pull of as much as could be expected by anyone.

Mini-Games 1.1/10
What a wreck. How unoriginal and boring the mini-games are. They consist of only chosing a match of money or picking the amount you find for winnings. The dumbest game by far though has to be 'Get a LIFE' where you must spell the word life by randomly trying 6 times to get the word to earn money.

Replay Value 1.1/10
So little. If you play this a few times after you won the first time then you might want to consider seeking help as there might be something wrong in that head of yours. I'd rather stick to the old fashioned version of LIFE.

Replay:Little
Difficulty:Easy
Time:1-2 Hours
CLOSING:
LIFE is a game you want to forget forever, and you should for good reason. Whats the worst part of this game is that I won which didn't even seem possible as i was in 3rd place by the time the game ended from the investing at the end. Weird it was but happy that I don't have to replay that to get first again.

Gameplay:1.2/10
Story:5/10
Sound:8.7/10
Graphics:2/10
Controls:8.5/10
Sound Effects:7.2/10
Mini-Games:1.1/10
Replay Value:1.1/10
OVERALL:4.3 (due to gamefaqs system lets call it a 4)

(^Should be a 1 but I can't argue with math)

Reviewer's Score: 4/10, Originally Posted: 03/12/03, Updated 03/12/03