LOL

Agetec breaks new ground in DS gaming!

L.O.L. gets in your face from the beginning by saying right on the box “If the game is boring, You are boring!” It sounds like a challenge, and it is. It’s a challenge just to write this review because there is so little to this game.

It starts by a host recruiting one to three other players (thankfully only one person has to buy it because it’s single card play) to tasks of their choice. It sounds neat- but it’s not. You’re supposed to throw out challenges like the ones displayed on the box, “Complete the Panda Bear!” “My TV remote can do _____” or my own”This sucks. Who agrees?” After the host sets a time limit for response, everyone has their chance to come up with an answer to be voted on at the end of the round.

It is cute that when waiting for someone to finish you can poke the little men running frantically across your screen to have little annoying squeals or “Are your done yet?” come out on the other players’ end. That sadly, is pretty much the best part. The host reveals each answer one by one for everyone to see and vote on. A victory wins you a little music and gold crown on your name and that’s it. After the host decides that enough rounds have passed they exit and a winner is declared based on how many rounds they won.

There aren’t any graphics to make a comment on really. Once you chuckle at the cheesy 70’s game show like borders and colors, you completely forget about them. The music is worth noting though. L.O.L. rips off the right suspenseful feel of Wario Ware Touched, even down to the wick burning toward the big cartoon bomb. The controls are easy to use seeing as how all you do is draw, write or erase on the screen and then poke the answer you want to vote for.

What all of it comes down to though, once you have bought it, played it, exhausted every inane little game you can come up with, drawn and made jokes about genitalia as much as you can stand and had to finally throw it away because you can’t trade it in, is that THE DS COMES WITH PICTOCHAT FOR FREE! If you want to do anything like L.O.L claims you can have limitless fun doing with their game, then all you have to do is find someone else with a DS, and then chat-FOR FREE.

I know I keep saying “FOR FREE”, but it is the only thing you’ll really be able to think the entire time you play this game. For all the “crazy” possibilities, the set up of time limits and challenges, you can’t even play a game of hangman or tic-tac-toe. It lacks a key board option as well, which makes fitting in everything you want to say difficult or fill-in-the-blanks type challenges aggravating.

It is true, there are technically infinite possibilities for games and game play here and it can be fun to come up with all sorts of challenges. But I just can’t give this game a legitimate score because this program essentially already exists with more font and typing options, wider use and less annoying mechanics. FOR FREE! The quote on the Case really should read more like “Hey kids! How would you like to pay $19.99 to play a mediocre Pictochat?” That way you would at least know you weren’t buying a real game before you put your money down.