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Barbie Game Girl review

Game: Barbie Game Girl
Platform: Game Boy
Genre: Action (Platformer)
Developer: Imagineering Inc.

Reader review by lisanne

August 08, 2007

Firstly a disclaimer is warranted. Barbie Game Girl is not, strictly speaking, a game. See, the word "game" generally brings connotations of something which is fun and which you play, and with Barbie Game Girl you do neither. There is nothing fun about this and the playing experience is non-existent. Instead you sit around bashing the buttons in a desperate bid to get Barbie to JUST FUCKING STEER, with your mood becoming increasingly dark and irritable. Eventually, rainclouds form over your head from your condensed sweat and precipitation begins, which makes your mood even worse. From there it's a steady decline into drink and eventually, insanity. Yes, it's that bad.

Barbie is a Game Girl, she is. In this context it means she wants to buy some shoes and match up pairs of bows, but in the real world it means something quite different. Judging from her choice of outfit, or lack thereof, one could suggest that the title is rather fitting. After all, we all love to play with dolls, don't we? They're like little people you can dress as you please and bend and contort to your every whim and desire, but this particular Barbie will do anything but. She's one of those modern women, with her own mind. Meaning she controls like a shopping cart with a wheel missing.

Assuming that you manage to vicariously steer Barbie in the correct general direction through the mall, you have to dodge various obstacles such as some little shooting floor things and bouncing furbies. I don't know about you, but I see those things in my own local mall all the time. Pesky little critters. Like Barbie, all I can do is jump inelegantly over them, like a sheep trying to get over a fence that is slightly too high. Occasionally, little moving platforms come along for you to jump onto. These move hilariously slowly, making the whole game laughably easy, since jumping from platform to platform is basically the extent of the challenge throughout the entire game. But considering that this is aimed at six year old girls, it was never going to be Intellectapalooza.

Barbie participates in a dull and uninspiring side-scrolling platform mission to buy shoes or something. There are other distractions along her way in the form of playing games of pairs with bows and necklaces and other sparkly things, ready to brainwash a whole new generation of six year old girls to be gold-diggers. Primed in their gold-digging tendencies, they will then be ready to go out into the world and get pimped out, like Beach Fun Barbie and Bling Bling Hip Hop Ho Barbie. Incidentally, Barbie recently split up with Ken and started dating some new surfer-type man. Adultery is bad, kids! Especially with a long-haired layabout! Don't copy Barbie, wear full-body smocks and cook dinner for your husband to whom you will be devoted to the point of having no mind of your own.

The graphics are unspeakably dull and so is the whole game. The challenge is zero and the replayability is so low that I am starting to wonder why on earth I decided to relive the experience by writing this review. Meh, I think I made my point.

Rating: 1/10

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