Goatmoose

Holy crap, what a title. Both in reference to the game, and the literal title.

Last week, XBLA was offering Penny Arcade to Gold members for 50% of its usually jacked $20.00 price. While I’m not a comic reader of any sort, I was aware of Penny Arcade and had read it before with delight. I was intrigued to see this game, as the basis of Penny Arcade has been years of insult towards the gaming industry, so putting together a PA game was sort of like deliberately stepping in a pile of your own crap to see if you could come out clean. It certainly required some stones to do, but it worked out – at least for the most part.

Anyone who loves Penny Arcade will automatically love this game. That’s a given. Anyone who hates Penny Arcade will automatically hate this game. Also a given. For anyone who doesn’t know much about Penny Arcade, it will depend on whether or not you subscribe to the dark, explicit, off-color humor that they are known for. Chances are, if you frequent Goatmoose, you love it. From robots who have a urination attack to dry humping oranges to beating hobos with a rake, this game is quite an abnormal adventure.

It’s an RPG, but not in the typical sense. You can see your enemies coming, so you can prep yourself to attack them. Your health is completely recharged after every fight, so the game is pretty easy. There are also way more pickups than are generally necessary, so you’re almost always pretty well-equipped to deal with what comes at you. If those things sound like ingredients for a crappy game, they could be – but only if the rest of the game wasn’t rather strong.

The game is hilarious. It’s nothing but joke after inappropriate joke. Some fail, some are flat dumb, but most aren’t. Most of them are spot-on bits of crude giggly. The atmosphere, music and characters are brilliant. You play as a new PA person, gender and look customizable (but limited to 1920s aristocrat garb) with lots of different facial/physical control. You choose how he interacts with the other characters and it’s all very swell. The environment is creepy and intriguing, despite being short and rather linear, and it’s very wet – if the title didn’t imply that directly enough. It’s H.P. Lovecraft in a fart joke.

The team gets ready to mess some robots up.

Combat is fun. It’s standard turn-based RPG style, and while it’s not super advanced, there are moments when you can pair up your attacks with your fellow teammates or utilize certain items against an enemy to give you the edge. For instance, throwing an orange at the little urinating robots makes them turn their backs on you for quite some time. Obviously…

The $20 (1600MS points) pricetag is steep, even for an RPG. The game takes no more than 8 hours and doesn’t hold a lot of replay value – plus, it’s only the first episode in a longer story. If you are a gamer who loves RPGs and can’t deal with a simplistic one this short, you won’t like this title. I found it a welcome change, as most RPGs these days all feel the same – this clearly doesn’t. There’s not a lot of depth, the play is simple, the style is high and the humor is tops. Glean from that what you will – but know that if you’re into callous jokes and innovative gaming, you’ll get a kick out of Penny Arcade.