It's next to impossible to find political content in
video games—partly because they're big-budget products with an incentive
to play it safe, and partly because while rockers belong to the left, and
shoot-'em-up stars vote with the right, gamers run the gamut from hawks and
Paultards to paranoids and anarchists. (And those are the ones who know it's an
election year.) Even bad boy Grand Theft Auto IV aims most of its jabs at American excess. So it's no surprise that
contrary to its billing, Hail To The Chimp ain't a satire: The references to lawn signs,
ballot-box stuffing, and flip-flopping are watered down, with no connection to
real-life targets, and no sign of slyness or irony. Instead of competing with The
Daily Show, it's closer to Bazooka
Joe.
The election-year theme wraps a collection of
mini-games that are no fun, but in a complicated way. Up to four players
control cartoon animals who run around a series of maps, replaying a handful of
games that entail grabbing or swapping the game-currency clams. Each board has
its own tricks, but even after you learn them, the opportunities to score
points are too random to invite serious strategies. The combat never gets past
sloppy button-mashing, and in certain modes, you can't even get critical status
information, like the number of clams you're holding. And these are just some
of the interface problems that make the game annoying even as the competition
gets intense.