"Zombies Ate My Neighbours", 1993.

A game no Hallowe'en would be complete without, a paean to a century of B-movies and a return visit from distinguished extinguished development house Lucasarts, who we commemorated earlier this year. This scan is from Retrogamingaustralia and it was worth borrowing, because the game is awesome.

"I LAUGHED. I CRIED.
I SCREAMED BLOODY MURDER."

-Anita Placetohide
Amityville Herald

Only Konami could bring something so demented and sick to your Super NES and your Sega Genesis. Action! Adventure! A real scream! A must see!

"55 levels of sheer terror.
Not a dry seat in the house."

-Washington Post Mortum

"MORE FRIGHTENING THAN YOUR MOM AT A THRASH CONCERT.."

-Slash Meehup - Rolling Tombstone

Thrilling performances by two teenage stars who must save cheerleaders, babies and BBQ-happy neighbors from every monster that ever stalked the cineplex.

"Somebody help me! Help me please!"

- B.A. Goner - New York Times Up

Fifty-five B-horror movies rolled into one are now slaying in your neighborhood. Scream to the sounds of "Hedgemaze Chainsaw Mayhem," "Mars Needs Cheerleaders" and "Weird Kids on the Block." Find your way through a "chopping" mall, a grocery store, mysterious monster islands, a haunted house and your own Zombie infested backyard. Run, swim and trampoline over hedges to escape hordes of Zombies, Chainsaw Maniacs, Mummies, Evil Dolls, Lizard Men, Blobs, Vampires, Giant Ants, Martians and more. Or take them out with your uzi squirt gun, exploding soda pop, bazookas and weed wackers. In a pinch use one of your collectible power-ups like secret potions and bobo clown decoys. Go it alone or as a Zombie squad of two. The game goes on and on and on. Run for your life! It just won't die!!

So much to say, but so little needs to be said. The ad demonstrates a Lucasfilmian wit above and beyond what we see in most Konami ads -- is it possible they marketed it in-house? Or is it just that they have so much to work with? Of course kids wouldn't appreciate the nods to movies from the '50s or the references to the Washington Post, New York Time Out and Rolling Stone (well, unless they're real keeners) but the stylish silliness has them square in its uzi sights. (Ah, and Amityville, we haven't seen you since Jaws!)

This great game had a Day of the Tentacle easter egg (not just the bobo clown decoys) and enjoyed a Genesis-exclusive sequel, Ghoul Patrol. We wouldn't really see another game revisiting this territory until Destroy All Humans, and even that has a much narrower (if deeper) point of reference. If you pop open only one game in an emulator today, make it this one.

"Splatterhouse 3", Genesis, 1993.

I don't know what happened to the intermediary sequel, but next up we have an ad for a horrific game, courtesy of Benj from Vintage Computing. With a touch of Friday the 13th's masked-face motif, we bring you: Splatterhouse 3 - Splatter with a Vengeance.

HE'S BACK!

Splatterhouse 3 for the Sega Genesis is the kind of game rating systems were invented for. Check out the screen shots and see for yourself. [screenshot]
So fun you could lose your head over it!

[screenshot]
Don't get all choked up!

[screenshot]
Get your kicks!

[screenshot]
Wear a mask and pack a powerful punch.

[screenshot]
Pow! Right in the kisser!

[screenshot]
Walk on the wild side!

[screenshot]
You've gotta have guts!

• 16 megs of gruesome graphics!
• Deadly New Weapons!
• 6 levels of monster bashing mayhem!
• Killer special moves!
• Non-linear game play!
• Multiple endings!
• Password support!

Warning: This game contains scenes of graphic violence that may not be suitable for younger players.

The first point is absolutely correct: game rating systems were a new state of affairs at this time, though probably not implemented with the intent this ad suggests -- to spur sales of outrageously adult content. Where "adult" means, I suppose, gratuitous.

This is another lazy ad; Namco designed the game and could no doubt find many relevant remarks to make about the game and what differentiates it from its predecessors, but it looks like the US office just decided to make some weak jokes and fling things that look like punchlines but have no humour. Is "wear a mask and pack a powerful punch" a paraphrase of "speak softly and carry a big stick"? "Walk on the wild side": this blog's obligatory Lou Reed memorial tribute. We should hope that the new weapons are deadly and that the special moves are killer, otherwise they're kind of missing the point. Where does the phrase "monster bash" originate? The next two items redundantly reinforce each other: non-linear and with multiple ending. Then it wraps up by kind of apologetically asserting what it boldly proclaimed in the opening: indeed, this house is filled with splatter.

And for a bonus, here's another version (from World 1-1 at extralives) of an ad for Splatterhouse 1 we saw last year, this time in two-page form:

SPLATTERHOUSE

JUST KEEP TELLING YOURSELF
IT'S ONLY A VIDEO GAME...
ONLY A VIDEO GAME...
ONLY A VIDEO GAME...

It started as a college field trip to an old and somehow evil mansion. You just wanted to study the gruesome experiments of the world's most renowned, yet twisted parapsychologist.

Then, things started going wrong. Terribly wrong.

The last things you remember were a blood curdling scream and a dull thwack to the back of your skull.

You awaken to find someone or something has taken your girlfriend, and to save her you'll have to slaughter seven levels of monstrous ghouls.

You're about to find out exactly why this horrible place is called Splatterhouse.

And why no one has ever entered, and lived long enough to talk about it.

[screenshot]
To get a ghoul's attention, try a two-by-four to the head. (The slime stains should come out in the wash.)

[screenshot]
He's got a chainsaw. You've got a 12-gauge shotgun. Who will cut who in half?

[screenshot]
Punch and kick the bloody guts before they suck the life out of you. That surgical get-up you're wearing is quite attractive.

[screenshot]
Killing the head is tough. To have a ghost of a chance, try the two-by-four again.

[screenshot]
How tough is this maggot-eaten boss? You've got to give him a hand, he uses his head.

Manufacturer's suggested retail price for the TurboGrafx-16 system is $159.99.

No, it's not then that things started going terribly wrong; the premise is terribly wrong from the start. And if no one ever lived long enough to talk about it, how would the horrible place have achieved its name? Did it begin as a utensils-free buffet?

I imagine the problem in this game isn't attracting the ghouls' attention. How will guts suck the life out of you, do they have little mouths or stomas? Repeated mention of the 2x4 isn't selling me on the imaginative variety of player weapons available. A boss who manifests as a head and a hand is described in terms of a head and a hand. That isn't figurative language, you're just saying what you see!

And finally: will this bloody game convince you all on its own to purchase a TurboGrafx-16? (History suggests that the answer is: no.)

"The Legacy: Realm of Terror", MS-DOS, 1992.

This is the last game that Magnetic Scrolls ever made, after perfecting their craft as the "British Infocom". The end of the line for the commercial text adventures was a baffling crossroads that no one really made it through unscathed. So from those vaunted wits we have a haunted house that doesn't know if it wants to be Myst or Doom.

HOME IS WHERE THE HEART STOPS.

MOVING CAN BE SUCH A HARROWING EXPERIENCE. ESPECIALLY WHEN YOU'RE THE SOLE INHERITOR OF THE BLOODCURDLING WINTHROP HOUSE.

LUCKY YOU. FOR THE PAST 400 YEARS, YOUR EVIL ANCESTORS HAVE BEEN PLANNING A HOUSEWARMING PARTY JUST FOR YOU. AND IF THEY HAVE IT THEIR WAY, THIS IS ONE PARTY YOU WON'T BE LEAVING.

IN THIS PIECE OF UNREAL ESTATE, YOU'LL EXPLORE UP TO 400 TERROR-RIDDEN ROOMS IN A DESPERATE STRUGGLE TO STAY ALIVE. YOU'LL ENCOUNTER PUZZLES, MAGICAL ITEMS, AND FORBIDDEN BOOKS. AND YOU'LL MEET THE HIDEOUS HOSTS WHO KNOW WHAT EVIL FORCES ARE BEHIND THIS NIGHTMARE.

CAN YOU TAKE THE TENSION? WILL YOUR MAGIC COMBAT SKILLS WORK AGAINST LOATHSOME GARGOYLES OR DEATH LEECHES? WILL YOUR NEW HOUSE DRIVE YOU COMPLETELY INSANE?

ALL YOU KNOW IS THAT TIME IS RUNNING OUT. THE HEAVENS ARE ALIGNING. AND THERE'S A LOT OF HOUSECLEANING TO BE DONE.

THE LEGACY: REALM OF TERROR FROM MICROPROSE. PROOF THAT THERE'S NO PLACE LIKE HOME. AT LEAST NOT IN THIS WORLD.

SPINE-TINGLING GRAPHICS WILL TURN YOU CHALK-WHITE WITH HORROR!

HAIR-RAISING COMBAT WITH GROTESQUE CREATURES!

STUPEFYING STUMPERS IN SURREAL ROOMS!

You kind of get the feeling that much of this copy originated from the publisher, who just has to sell the thing, rather than from the developers who put blood and tears into the project and could speak about it passionately. (Publishers are just passionate about their ROI.) The plot probably isn't as dopey as it sounds. Why am I so special that my ancestors, the sinister Winthrops (could have tried harder for a sinister name, guys) have been plotting my downfall since before I was a gleam in my grandfather's grandfather's eye? Well, because it might make for a good game. Writers everywhere need to come up with answers for "once the nature of the situation is made obvious, why doesn't the protagonist just head out of Dodge?" The standard answer is "to rescue his girlfriend", and only slightly less common is the "it's his blood legacy, wherever he goes he takes it with him" trope.

"Unreal estate" I like -- that was a missed opportunity by the author of the Choice of Games title "Eerie Estate Agent", a unique game that actually takes the quotidian approach to haunting that this ad merely feigns.

400 rooms doesn't excite me, it concerns me. "Up to 400 rooms" tells me that many of them (maybe 395?) do not play necessary roles in the completion of the game. Filler, then? Mazes? You can't play this numbers game because Time Zone and Snowball took the cake a long time ago. "You'll encounter puzzles, magical items, and forbidden books." Is it true that the end boss has a copy of Lady Chatterley's Lover in his back pocket? That list sounds a bit bored, a bit "what are three things this game contains?" rather than "what are the three most critical elements of this game?"

Leeches are bad enough, folks. They don't have to be death leeches. That's gilding the lily. Then MicroProse asserts itself once again and demonstrates that it's lost the thread by making a baffling Wizard of Oz reference that works even less well than the mangled aphorism the ad opens with. Then it's like... guys, we have six lines left and we've run out of screen shots. What are some boring old horror cliches we can invoke to fill space? I'm actually very fond of "stupefying stumpers in surreal rooms". Note that there's no value judgement there, it's a knife that cuts both ways. I kind of hope that someday I can make a game that someone will apply that description to.

"Waxworks", MS-DOS, 1992.

So, what's the most frightening thing about wax? OK, we're in consensus, as is the artist for this ad. And is there a second frightening thing about it? Yes, you in the back? What? Well, okay, a Brazilian bikini wax is indeed a harrowing prospect, but I was thinking something more along the lines of... the uncanny sensation that the realistic wax models in museums might somehow become animated, sapient and murderous. Isn't that one universal? Well, take it from these chappies from the land of Madame Tussaud's...

Jack wasn't nimble.

Jack wasn't quick

So Jack became a candlestick.

No other fantasy role-playing experience delivers the undiluted horror of WAXWORKS for the IBM PC. Descend into five vast worlds of molten terror, battling over 100 evil denizens that occupy the WAXWORKS. Decaying graveyard ghouls, man-eating plants, bloodthirsty Egyptian priests -- even Jack the Ripper -- are all dying to enter the world of the living with only you in their way. But stand warned: the first-person perspective, VGA color graphics are not for the squeamish. WAXWORKS. It all boils down to terror.

Unofficially a species of Elvira 3, harnessing the tech and sinister themes of the two Elvira games (and, heh, "Elvira 0", Personal Nightmare -- adapted by Alan Cox from AberMUD 5 code!), this is one tough game. I always wondered at the precise logistics informing the ad art -- the wax fills the throat and coats the tip of the nose but somehow fails to pool in the eye sockets? Or it has been chipped and peeled away from there to lend the ad extra punch? I give hats off to the artist for rolling with such an esoteric order and depicting it in such a way as can be understood more or less at a glance. (How would you depict "asphyxiated and coated in wax, barring bloodshot, terror-filled eyes" in a round of Eat Poop You Cat? Everyone would just keep glossing over the exceptional elements and you end up with Han Solo in carbonite every time.) The big slogan unfortunately just makes me think of Rolling Stones songs. (Anything reminiscent of Stones songs is unfortunate.) (Edit: not 5 minutes after penning these words, what comes on the radio? I've got to be more careful...)

The small print says Adventure Soft UK, but the line of games was released through the "HorrorSoft" label (under publisher Accolade in the US, as you can see), and the warning is fair: these games didn't hold back on delivering punchy shocks. (The Adventure Soft UK story is a whole other post, taking us from a Scott Adams "Adventureland" UK importer to licensed Fighting Fantasy adaptations, the consummate graphical adventure presentation of the first two Simon the Sorcerer games, and on to Dark Corners of the Earth -- long after most of their competitors had been put out to pasture. I belive Simon Woodroffe is currently heading Rare, a fellow traveler through the ages. Erk, I probably shared a similar tangent back when I wrote about Ironsword.) (Come to think about it, I believe there was an earlier text adventure game by Brian Howarth, also entitled Waxworks.)

The first sentence of the blurb is weird, establishing that no other game is, well, this game. Well, yes I suppose that's true. The numbers are casually tossed around to impress (as if we could be impressed by the implication of "we didn't find enough in any of these rich settings to build an entire game around") and if you count on your fingers you note that the fifth of the five vast worlds remains unnamed, a surprise reserved for the exclusive enjoyment of the game's players. "Dying to enter the world of the living" works; "boils down to terror" not so much. Please put your living statue game on hold, I am interested in learning more about the process by which wax is refined!

Of the four screenshots presented, only the lower right-most appears to represent any kind of interactive gameplay, and you know, I don't think offering him a papyrus is really the most strategic option at that point. (Remember the ubiquity of "Egyptian" levels in games? When did we leave our ludological Egyptology fixation behind? Did the platform games wear it out?)

Speaking of worn out, could they say WAXWORKS a few more times? Not without someone catching on, I suppose.

"Flesh Feast", Windows, 1997.

Since we're getting to the gruesome point in our pre-Hallowe'en run-up, let's get serious.

Death. Life is squeezed out of a body, until nothing remains but a cold, inanimate corpse.

Resurrection. The corpse comes back to life, lacking spirit or soul. In order to live, it must feed.
On humans.

Solid! The nose is, surprisingly, intact, though the ears don't seem to have fared as well, and the scraps of hair are very effective. Was this fellow's mouth so jagged before death or does zombification add points to your teeth? Snarling upper lip or just decayed away? It's a new take on zombie eyes, and the church in the background (hello, body-eating followers of a man returned from the dead) is a very nice touch.

The blurb is also very adeptly handled. But what is the product being advertised here? Turn the page for a double spread!

Send the dead to their graves.
Again.

FLESH FEAST. Six feet below the earth, worms are crawling through empty caskets. Above ground, the putrid stench of rotting flesh hangs in the air as corpses claim victims to feed their insatiable hunger.

The dead have mysteriously come back to life, and Nasat Island has gone from premier[e] tourist destination to nightmarish human hunting ground, where nobody is safe.

Survive the island's many terror-filled sectors using weapons and wit to eliminate wave after wave of ravenous undead hordes. Rescue the remaining survivors and strategize your escape.

Then, in the climactic finale, penetrate the complex that houses the secrets to the dead's resurrection. FLESH FEAST. IF YOU'RE ONLY CONSUMED BY FEAR, YOU'RE ONE OF THE LUCKY ONES.

SINGLE AND MULTIPLAYER MODES UP TO 8 PLAYERS. PLAY AS HUMANS OR ZOMBIES IN HEAD-TO-HEAD "EAT YOUR FRIENDS" DEATH MATCHES ON THE HEAT.NET INTERNET GAME NETWORK AND LAN.
[SCREENSHOT]>
CINEMATIC STORYLINE FEATURING 17 LEVELS OF CARNAGE AND MULTIPLE SUB-PLOTS.
[SCREENSHOT]>
SIMULTANEOUSLY DIRECT THE ACTIONS OF FOUR HUMANS OR FULLY CONTROL ONE CHARACTER.
[SCREENSHOT]>
OVER 50 DIFFERENT WEAPONS AND DOZENS OF GRUESOME DEATH TRAPS.
Now we'll see what you're made of.

That's a, er, wide stance! How long is a chainsaw blade that reaches almost to the ground and how many of those can you lay end to end between your two feet? I suppose that depends on how high it's being held -- waist level? Wait a sec, we don't even see knees here. Just how long are those shins, anyhow? Moving right along... The pack of living dead appears to contain some stylishly long-maned potentially repeating zombies -- I've heard that hair and fingernails continue to grow for up to two weeks after death but this is ridiculous. And are the left-moon and red-cloud zombies pursuing us carefully balanced on single legs? The shadows are deliberate but inconsistant reference points. Center right ground zombie -- emerging from the grave or just cut in half? Barring the teaser cover model, these zombies are actually surprisingly gore-free, but what they lack in decay they make up for in exaggerated claw-hands. They're either going to gore, fondle or tickle you. (Or maybe more than one of the above simultaneously, for new heights in simulated horror.)

Given the high speed of its moving parts, I have to wonder just how tenacious that zombie gore on the chainsaw blade really is. Though it looks good, it gives me the impression of a party cold cuts tray carefully toothpicked on to the tool for the photoshoot. And the graveyard -- was this really a planned community facility? It seems somewhat haphazardly strewn, headstones facing hither and yon with no real scheme or pattern. Inadequate feng shui will bring your deceased ancestors back from the dead! (or at least provide you the refreshment of a cold can of Coca-Cola.)

The ad copy here isn't any more specific than it needs to be, largely focusing on atmospherics without falling into pitfalls of stupid wordplay or camp as well as distancing from the mood by getting too deep (though that digression into Heat.net is halfway there) into technical and game mechanics jargon. The phrases that stand out -- "using weapons and wit" -- are positive ones. Rescue survivors? Strategize escape? For something that seems so superficially Army of Darkness-ish (okay, those are Deadites, that's very different) as this centrefold portrays, there appears to be deeper gameplay at heart. The closing slogans -- also well executed.

Outside of this ad, I've never heard of this game, which suggests that it wasn't all that and a back of chips -- but by advertising standards I find it intriguing and consistent. Is the game underrated or just oversold? (Looking back at old warez: another way something can come back from the dead.)

"Chiller", NES, 1990.

And the pendulum swings back toward genuinely disturbing games. This one was by Exidy, no stranger to antisocial controvery following their pedestrian-mulching simulator, the unlicensed Death Race. Also unnerving: rather than just phoning in their work, the artist here seems to be uncannily into his subject matter, as if he spends all day drawing scribbly doodles of zombies on all his notebooks, guitar cases, carving them on to benches, airbrushing them on to hot rods and tattooing them on his buds. The overall effect is one of mud, a precursor to Quake's earthy palette, but there's no lack of love for the linework and the obsessive cross-hatch. Zombies, maan! Dude, zommmmbies! Let's put on some Iron Maiden and roll a fattie!

Two Player Simultaneous Action

CHILLER

For play on the Nintendo Entertainment System

$19.95
Suggested Retail for Chiller only.

At Last - Affordable Arcade Cartridges Now Available to Play at Home!

Play with light gun, zapper or control pad

New enhanced pinpoint accuracy

Rapidfire mode

Multiple levels

Hidden objects

Arcade quality graphics

To order:
Visit your retailer or call (602) 961-4022

Two New Titles:
Deathrace and Crossbow
coming soon.
For play on the Nintendo Entertainment System.

Affordable Fun!
SHAREDATA

For those not in the know, Chiller is basically the no-holds-barred light gun game taking players on a tour through a mad scientist's graveyard grounds and into his torture chamber. Some shooting games would penalize you for catching innocent collateral damage in the crossfire, and then there is this game, that rewards you with bonus points for sharpshooting the rope holding the guillotine blade away from the innocent victim's neck. Essentially it's a provocative "Hot Coffee" kind of idea, except if GTA: San Andreas did away with all the walking, driving and shooting business and was just repeated bouts of poorly-conceived, blockily-rendered intercourse. Wouldn't that be outrageous? It'll be so controversial our best business option will be to throw it at the market at bargain prices.

Some thoughts about the ad: allowing a second player in a target-shooting game is basically a no-cost feature. When you put a price in bold type in your ad, it's not intended as a "suggestion" -- and it's understood that it's meant to refer to your product, and not other unspecified goods... that's kind of how an ad works: "my product... a price! Is there a relationship between the two or is this ad totally abstract? Ask your retailer and find out!"

By "arcade cartridges", do they mean conversions of arcade games on cartridge for home consoles? This is 1990, so we're several years past the heyday of the Atari 2600, who kind of trailblazed the "affordable arcade cartridges ... to play at home". Guys, you didn't just invent the home video game. Maybe you could tell us something about your game instead? Ooh, it supports light gun and zapper. (?!) "Enhanced pinpoint accuracy" must be jargon for "you will think you hit the target, but we reduced its on-screen pixel footprint." Rapidfire? Zombie vs. gatling gun simulator! (Sorry -- as you can see, the protagonist's hand is wielding a magic wand, making this pre-Catacombs, pre-Hexen fantasy violence somehow more palatable to Nintendo of America.) If the arcade quality graphics are anything like the art quality of this ad (hm, no screenshots, even!) then that might not be a huge selling point. My recollection is indeed that the game enjoyed a workmanlike "programmer art" aesthetic. And what's this coming up? Deathrace? Did I call it or what? One imagines Crossbow will basically be this game, but with more Robin Hood and less Night of the Living Dead. Were these advertised conversions ever released?

Well yes, sharing data does make the fun affordable. May as well name your company "SneakerNet."

As a bonus, here's the arcade flyer -- basically the ad that promoted the game to video arcade owners, convincing them what good moneymakers the arcade cabinets will be. They're not buying the games because they're fun, but because it's a purchase that gives them access to a resource: the contents of your pockets. I got this one from an entry on the game over at World 1-1.

CHILLER
YOU'VE HEARD ABOUT IT! YOU'VE READ ABOUT IT
NOW YOU CAN HOWL ABOUT IT!!! CHILLER IS
NOW PLAYING
ON THE COIN-OP AMUSEMENT VIDEO SCREEN!

HORROR -- the popular motion picture genre that has entertained generations of show-goers is now yours on an Exidy video gun.
ACTION -- the theme is a scream but the skill is an equal thrill. Video dexterity married with "Hollywood horror" adds up to a piece your customers should love to play.
FLEXIBILITY -- CHILLER is available complete or as a conversion for previous Exidy guns. It's another long-lasting money-earner in our proven series of video target attractions.

Borrow a card from the movie industry's deck and deal yourself a winning hand with CHILLER.

This earlier artwork is more sophisticated, in a '70s horror comix sort of way. Brings to mind Bill Gaines' defense before a Senate subcommittee regarding the use of the "female decapitation" motif on cover art, telling them just how much worse they could have drawn it on their EC covers, shortly before inadvertently singlehandedly bringing about the Comics Code Authority. Nice psychedelic logo -- we're much closer to the '70s here than anything for the NES, which had really left that groovy era well and truly behind.

I guess rumours and word of mouth would result in my hearing and reading about CHILLER, but what exactly is compelling me to howl about it again? My excitement at having it in my pizza parlour, compelling my customers to spew their pepperoni shortly after it enters their mouths? Perhaps every purchase of this game includes a free bite from a lycanthrope at no extra cost.

"The popular motion picture genre". I gather they're talking about (around, really) horror movies here specifically and not motion pictures as a genre unto themselves? "Video gun" is a terrifically blunt way of summing up a light-gun shooter, and would just as easily apply to today's FPS games. There we go again, a dead-end or forgotten phrase: "video dexterity". (The adjective "video" has really fallen by the wayside in favour of "virtual" or "online". I suppose we just don't care that the machine shows us visuals anymore. That said, the fact that this weird pairing of words yields something comprehensible is a testament to some clever scheming.) Here we go -- "Hollywood horror", a la "Universal Monsters" or Ackerman's "Monsters of Movieland". In the early '80s I'm not sure what the competing strains of horror culture were, but there you have it. And then that great DIY bit where the arcade owner could save a couple of bucks by diving elbow-deep into the guts of his "video gun" machine with a soldering iron. I can't imagine a shopkeeper doing that today.

The closing card-game metaphor is weird because of how bland it is -- it could apply to any game, while surely they could come up with a more specific trope fitting this game's subject. (Maybe they did, but it was just a little too outrageous.)

"Fester's Quest", NES, 1989.

The Addams Family enjoyed phenomenal success for a franchise that began as single-panel comic strips. Have you seen the Far Side movies? (Maybe even asked yourself what a Far Side video game would look like?) It's a trickier act to pull off than it seems. The Addams Family movies were very canny, timely works that used great actors in the service of superb characterization. Then in their wake, all these licensed video game adaptations emerged that essentially had nothing to do with the films or anything that came before them, save a vague kind of skinning. (Not that these are any more off-base than, say, M.C. Hammer's rap about the family.) Apparently this game concerns the voyages of feral Uncle Fester in space. Admit it: you were making a space game already, then lucked into this license and decided to dump the characters in. Thing is, the space game wasn't very fun in the first place. (Actually, some commentators note that in many regards this game resembles SunSoft's Blaster Master, which actually is quite fun. But Uncle Fester doesn't drive a giant tank.)

GET THE TITLE THAT JUST MIGHT DRIVE YOU CRAZY!

You rang.

Fester's Quest takes the skeletons out of the closet for a trip to outer space.

If "space games" are your thing, here's the spaciest one yet! With Lurch, Pugsley, Thing, and the rest of the Addams crew at his side, Uncle Fester leads the way in the wildest, wackiest alien shoot-'em-up ever! The action is manic, the graphics explosive, and the story is guaranteed to leave you howling. So find out for yourself how much fun going crazy can be. Get "Fester's Quest." At your favorite dealer now!

Maybe I'm being mean. Still, I have some problems with this ad. 1) The picture caption is clearly not being presented on-screen, bereft of the jaggies gracing Lurch's portrait. But to what end? 2) The little boy in the foreground is clearly not looking at the screen. 3) If the game the boy is playing is this one, he is aggressively button-mashing his way through a non-interactive cut scene.

Are "space games" my thing? Not being talked down to by patronizing adults is my thing. Wild and wacky are filler adjectives, invoked when you don't actually have anything to say. Just because the story will leave me howling doesn't imply that I will be howling in satisfaction. "How much fun crazy can be"? This ad just showed a pulse! Alas, just before it ends.

Then there are some curios in the small print: Sunsoft and Orion Pictures alike licensed the Addams Family characters from Barbare Artists, Inc. But who licensed television rights to Fester's Quest from Orion Pictures? Is that to cover broadcasting gameplay footage over the air? Brand licensing: it's a strange world. (Edit: strangest of all -- this game pre-dates the movies by two years. But evidently they were in the works.