Leisure Suit Larry Magna Cum Laude – Review

Warning: Due to the ‘adult’ (guffaw) nature of this title this review may well be laden with naughty talk, you have been warned. First off I thought… why… why did someone make this title and more insanely why do you want to review this title? And then it hit me, because you love gaming and you want to see if this is a joke or not and so with such thoughts I delved into the distasteful depths of Larry’s world, here’s what I discovered…

Story time, relax and I’ll tell you…. Once upon a time there was a short, repressed, lunkhead named Larry Lovage, nephew of legendary short love machine (ugh) Leisure Suit Larry of Sierra games gone by. Young Larry is at College and is lacking loving and so in a pledge to his uncle he decides to go sow his nasty little seeds. He’s trying desperately to get onto a visiting dating show called ‘Swingles’ and has to pass certain criteria to do so. That is essentially it, that’s the game, get laid loser or die trying because you wont get on Swingles without some ‘affection tokens’, though I think they should have been called %$£! tokens myself because affection has little to do with it.

I do love my mini games… but when they involve swimming sperm across a horizontal screen I have to question the world, the developers and most importantly the purchaser. Gameplay is essentially a walk about, meet a girl, play a mini game or perform a task and try to get laid. The game pauses between each section and loads… and loads… you play another section and so on and so forth, with little optimization it seems given the load times. Strangely many of the mini games would probably be quite good, were they not intrinsically linked to getting beaver. More disturbing than the thought that some of the mini games are fun is the fact that Larry likes to get the ladies drunk to get his wicked way, yes, honestly, the term used in game for alcohol mixed for a female target is and I quote “A-Grade Panty Peeler”. I think the developers missed a prime addition to the game however by omitting GHB, rohypnol and ketamine, I mean if getting the girls totally smashed to get into their pants is ok, why not date rape drugs? They could have used the same process to sneak it into her juice, A, Y, B, B, X, A and in!! She’s mine!!

Pretty colors don’t necessarily make for a pretty game…. The graphics in Leisure Suit Larry are nice and fairly reminiscent of say, the Simpson’s hit and run, a sort of cartoon look and feel. I can’t really slate the overall look of the title for the graphics themselves because they’re colorful, bright and do the job they’re meant to, what I can say however is that they are misleading. With the volume turned down a small child might be quite taken by sections of this game, I assume the idea here was to not make the game overtly realistic and thus avoid a definite ban in more countries than has been the case already (the title is apparently banned downunder).

Players, lend me your ears… the sound in Leisure Suit Larry is actually pretty good, the voice acting and dialogue is also good for this type of title, that meaning crude, rude and unabashed. There are no subtitles in the options so that’s a shame for the deaf gamers out there. The introductory tutorial level is written on screen as Uncle Larry shows you the ropes so at least there’s a little saving grace there for the deaf gamer. Sound overall does the job, you’ve got your college inhabitants and various other characters most of whom spurt profanity at points that would make a sailor blush, I’d place examples but I don’t want to upset any prudes who may be reading, suffice to say the F word is prevalent as well as many far more colourful crude connotations.

Grrl Gamers rejoice…. That you have the choice as to whether to buy this title or not because if it came (oh the puns) for free with your xbox you’d have it on ebay so fast your head would spin and nobody likes spinning heads. This game is the epitome of sexist crap that we female gamers and yes, I think it is fairly safe to say, most intelligent male gamers quiver at and scream WHY WHY WHY when it’s released. Given the 18 rating on it I’m truly bewildered as to why anyone over that age would part with gaming allowance for this whilst sober. Sure the mini games can be fun but saying you bought this title for the mini games is like saying you buy playboy for the articles, ya know what I’m sayin? Overall there is nothing in this title for the grrl gamer, not even the dancing mini game can edge it in our favour.

Overall I’m fairly lost for words because I’ve done a little research and it really bothers me that this title is averaging 7 in most reviews. Why am I mentioning that? Well, because I am a fan of Vivendi titles generally and I’m about to totally pan this one, but feel in all fairness that if it is getting 7’s or 8’s elsewhere that perhaps I’ve truly missed something, perhaps it’s because I’m female, whatever the reason I’m letting you all know that not everyone detests this pile of sexist, stereotyping, misogynist, homophobic crap like I did. To quote the game itself and coming from a female gamers point of view “this smells like ass”. Of course if peeing in public, shagging drunk girls and believing that a short unintelligent moron could actually shag anything is your cup of cocoa, then you have just hit upon the game of the century.

2.5 for the mini games.

Review by Eden

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