If the cover of Get Rich or Die Gaming doesn’t alert you that this game is going to be more ridiculous than talking turtles bathing in radioactive slime who learn karate from a man-turned-into-talking rat, then I think you’d better have your rational capacitors re-evaluated. The dapper cigar-munching fourteen-year-old with sleazy ladies draped over his arms like an acne-riddled Hugh Hefner pretty much tells you everything you need to know about this game: it’s a awfully sleazy, poorly produced, and insanely hilarious.
Movies have long enjoyed the kitsch of being so bad they’re good, but those are difficult, shark-infested waters for games to tread. Games are far more mechanical than movies, and if the mechanics don’t work, games typically aren’t worth the time. But, as I played through GRoDG’s pathetically short thirty-or-so minutes story, I found myself overlooking the shoddy mechanics and overall craptacular game aspect of it and enjoying the balls-to-the-ceiling insanity of its choppy animation, surreal story and nonsensically profane dialogue.
It’s impossible to say GRoDG is a good game; in fact, it may be one of the worst I’ve ever played, but I sure as hell enjoyed playing it. It’s 90s-style adventure game where the protagonist talks to people and solves light puzzles in his quest to make money and become a “baller.” Aong the way, he meets a cast of characters that make about as much sense as the average episode of Sealab 2021 viewed in backwards chunks Memento style.
Designed in the land of talking kangaroos and beer-drenched boomerangs, all of the characters speak with an Australian accent of some degree, but half of the lines are delivered with over-the-top enthusiasm, while the other half seem like they were read straight from the page. It’s as if one half of the dialogue was somehow able to suck the life out of the other half. The actual lines themselves are absurd, profane and often make little sense in, but it’s the unpredictability and total randomness of the game that makes it so much fun to play.
From an actual gameplay perspective, GRoDG is an absolute mess. The controls are barely functional, and I’m not even sure why you have the ability to walk around. Everything of importance is controlled through the cursor, and the proximity to items or even people isn’t every a factor in dialogue or interaction. There’s no save system but since the game is only about half an hour long, that doesn’t matter much.
Even at just a dollar, I can’t say I’d suggest purchasing Get Rich or Die Gaming, but I honestly can’t say I regret buying it. There are tons of better games out there to spend money on, but none of them can match the experience of Get Rich or Die Gaming. Trainwrecks like this game simply must be witnessed to be fully appreciated, so I’d highly recommend at least checking out the free demo.
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Get Rich or Die Trying was purchased for 80 MS points ($1).
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