Eight Toys That Should Never, Under Any Circumstances, Be Turned Into Videogames
The junky G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra hits stores this week. We dug through the old CG toy vault and came up with eight toys that should never become videogames.
8/5/2009 9:07 AM | 18 Comments | Page 1 of 2
Scott Jones
Status: Coffee makes me feel 4-percent sexier.
In the old days, big blockbuster movies would be turned into cheap collectible glasses that would come with your meal at McDonald's. These glasses were fun to drink milk out of through Krazy Straws, but they eventually wound up being shattered in the dishwasher.
Then, as mankind evolved and we put a man on the moon and color on our televisions, movies got turned into terrible videogames (see: every videogame made before
Spider-Man 2). Eventually, as time passed, movies got turned into somewhat decent videogames (see:
Spider-Man 2).
Then, as more time passed, we entered a Second Dark Age, when movies got turned into bad videogames again (see:
Superman Returns). Then something strange happened; in a bizarre role-reversal, videogames actually began getting turned into terrible movies (see: "Doom," "Silent Hill," "Resident Evil").
Still more time passed. Things got really odd when rides at amusement parks started getting turned into movies and then got turned into videogames (see:
Pirates of the Caribbean).
Now, almost a decade into the new millennium, it seems anything can become a movie or a videogame or a TV show or a hit pop/rock song. Yes, it's official: The world is completely out of ideas. And when the world is out of ideas, the world drinks more alcohol and turns nostalgic and begins to steal ideas from the past. That way, instead of inventing anything new (which is very, very, very hard), it can take some known property and pretend to give it some gravitas. And then it can go back to drinking its beloved alcohol.
We here at Crispy Gamer are full-time gamers, but we're also part-time activists. We want to protect the past from being exploited by the future alcohol quaffers. Thus, here's a list of toys that Crispy Gamer has declared totally off-limits, and shipped to an undisclosed location in New Jersey so that the world never has to endure their inevitable videogame tie-ins.
8.
Furby
Background: The fuzzy little faux-sentient gadget looked and acted like an inebriated Gremlin with a frontal lobotomy.
Famous for: Scaring the shit out of owners by waking them up in the pre-dawn dark as the cursed piece of crude electronics began involuntarily began speaking in "Furbish."
Why it should never be a game: The CGI intro movie alone -- of Furbies speaking Furbish to one another in their cute Furby village -- makes us double over and hold our stomachs and cry hot tears of misery.
7.
Slinky
Background: The little bedspring-that-could was invented by a naval engineer in the '40s.
Famous for: Walking downstairs, alone or in pairs; making a "slinkety" sound; getting tangled up so severely that it had to eventually make its slinkety sound in the nearest trash can.
Why it should never be a game: We can already imagine the pitch meeting: "Use the Wii Remote and Nunchuk attachment to 'walk' the Slinky through the game world." We can also imagine, very clearly, the impending apocalypse. BOOOOOOM.
6.
Rubik's Cube
Background: Ernő Rubik cursed the world in the '70s with this six-faced, evil-cube puzzle. Fun Fact That We Just Made Up: No matter where you are, there are at least two Rubik's Cubes within a six-foot radius of you at all times.
Famous for: Aiding young children in their ability to invent new, creative ways to use expletives.
Why it should never be a game: Adding arms and legs to Pac-Man for his animated series and subsequent videogames = terrible idea. Adding arms and legs to a Rubik's Cube and giving it a lousy English accent = another terrible idea.
5.
Lite-Brite
Background: Invented in the '60s, this toy was designed to help children who were just plain terrible at making original arts and/or crafts.
Famous for: Tiny multicolored pegs that would magically get lost until you only had about 100 greens left.
Why it should never be a game: No videogame could ever match the aesthetic satisfaction of popping a tiny plastic peg through a black sheet of paper while a radioactive bulb bathes your face in cancer-making rays.
