Through this series of blog posts I’ve made a conscious effort to not write about licensed games – games that have their source material in another medium or format. Well, I’m breaking this a bit by writing about The Young Ones, which is a very original game about a TV show.
I loved The Young Ones on TV. That show was a revelation. It was loud, it was needlessly violent, and it was just plain odd. It introduced me to surrealism and slapstick and the sound of Madness. I adored Alexei Sayle. There was a fat guy on TV and people were laughing at his jokes. I was a fat kid not on TV and I wanted so very much for people to laugh at my jokes!
So then I found that there was a Young Ones game on the Commodore 64. Talk about a winning combination, right?
WRONG. The game is more boring than playing Monopoly and wondering what it would be like if you were playing with real money. It’s a game where the four main protagonist wander aimlessly around the house picking up, putting down and talking about all the objects they find. That’s pretty much it. I guess there was a thing you had to do with the items but I couldn’t figure it out for the life of me. I didn’t want this! I wanted a game where you could smack Rick in the head with a cricket bat. Now that’s entertainment.
However, I learned a valuable lesson – never assume a game is good because you liked the license. Take that, fascists!