First 20 Seconds of Play: Bask in the frustratingly unresponsive movement controls, seethe at the clumsy attack capabilities, marvel at how little you care.

Year: 2004

Dev/Pub: Sony paid some poor stooges to put this together. I'd tell you to pray for them but they're most likely already dead.

Download it from: http://sonypictures.com/movies/anacondas/site/

Story: You are corporate privateers for the pharmaceutical giant: Wexell-Hall. You are boating deep into the jungle prime-evil to retrieve a sample of the mythical "blood orchid" (which apparently only blooms once every seven years, and we know this for sure about a plant which by its very nature is mysterious...wtg). The Blood Orchid is said to slow down cellular growth; the modern fountain of youth. The game picks up after your genius guide manages to tip the boat into the drink because he steered it over a 50ft waterfall. From there you spend the entire time marching through repetitive, poorly designed, and unimaginative landscape battling reptiles and other poachers, until you find your precious blood orchid. The movie was needless to say a piece of shit in a gym sock, and the game fares no better.

The Demo: After gathering your party of 5 (ugh), you continue to look for the orchid even though you've lost all your supplies, mode of transport, and are running short on time. I didn't invest any effort into remembering any of the characters names so I'll list them as best I can. #1 We've got White Pride Leader or "WPL" (who happens to be sporting the most hardcore bowl cut this side of the great wall), #2 Is the "Everywoman" #3 is boat guide and resident badass-Token Asian guy who I will refer to as "Captain AZN" #4 is Doc and rounding us out at #5 Homogenized Hollywood blackman who I will refer to as "Sambo".

Gameplay: As I said before the controls are pretty bad. I liken trying to use these controls to receiving a novacaine injection into your penis then trying to force yourself upon someone's garden hose, only to be arrested by a local militia and beaten with a sack of screwdrivers while they yell Pro-American epithets at eachother for sexual pleasure, but enough about my trip to Michigan. Throw in an unnecesary jump button, constant lockups and strange camera problems and you've got yourself a castratingly good time. (btw if you're with the Michigan state militia I want to thank you all for a wonderful time, the scars are fading, but the memories will last a lifetime)

Weapons: Choose between a pistol a shotgun or the almighty beatin' stick. Everyone is equipped with one of these sticks and rightfully so, because that is 92.6% of the gameplay. Forget trying to hit anything with bullets, as you will find that completely innefective and hard if not impossible to aim. Not only is there 1.5 second pause after you click and before you fire but you are locked in place, making moving targets all but impossible. If up close you can hit them with a gun but at that point nothing can rival the damage per second of your mighty wooden club. Sadly that is the meat of the game, stumbling your way around the poorly designed level running into low hills and small horribly clipped rocks, you spend your time beating snakes unmerciful. While walking, your companions are as direction savvy as a dead whale, but when you start to wail on something they rush in and help you rodney king the thing into submission; That seems to be the only high point of the AI, The rest of the time you might as well be herding retarded cats. All of the characters are equipped with the White Power Mana bar as well, and can do charged attacks (which wreathes your weapon in the blue flame of prejeduce). Another great feature of the enemy animals is that they seem all have a common tiny hit box. This hit box which must be hit to register any damage is usually towards the back end of the creature making it all so natural when you have to surround a portion of the snake 3/4 of the way to the tail, while the head flails away trying to strike at you. The humans enemies succumb to similar tactics but when activated into fight mode, will sometimes excitedly run back and forth, which takes the fun out of killing their friends while they are seemingly doing laps nearby. All the stick pounding that takes place makes me think this game is inappropriately named. Sure its vaguely related to the movie in that they both suck harder than shop vacs, but a better title would have been "Reptile Gangbeating Psuedo Jungle Hunt Simulator Adventure." That's right: "RGPJHSA" the smash hit of the summer.

Sound: The sound effects are distracting and pedestrian at best. Its a wonder that they managed to mess up a traditional "jungle" soundscape. A few birds, light wind, the occaisional rapist monkey howl, and you're in business but no. The fighting sounds are just a couple grades below utilitarian, an *unf* noise plays when you hit-end of story.

Graphics: As I'm learning from various websites, Borneo has a wide variety of landscapes, from beaches to mountains to river valley. But this movie takes place in the middle of the Jungle, and the game seems like it should feel...I dunno, more tropical. Instead they opted mainly for Open plains, or swamps inspired by Northern California Marin. Aside from the animals moving quizzically, and spinning around while they attack you they generally all look like a First semester art student's first attempts at 3d modeling. The color scheme manages to choke, and cough up a pallete that turns an opportunity to present us with a vibrant rain forest with an all around dissapointment, that looks ruddy and can be likened to a misused prostate.

Good: Party members efficiently carry out gang violence. The Inventory interface seems to have received the most attention in this game. No visible bugs or flaws, items are very clear.

Bad: When installed this game puts a shortcut in the immediate links under your start menu.

What we can Deduce: Taking into account the crude arrangement of landscape, retarded party management, and a Terri Schiavo inspired control scheme, it tells us much about who these people were, but also gives us in anteresting clue as to what they were after. As I said before the "demo" that was released in 2004, is the same as the full version they have out now, indicating that they were probably working on something bigger. I think that if we look at the fact that the most polished feature is the Inventory system, and the sprawling open landscape and meaningless tasks and check points exists with so little story infused, there is only one possibly explanation: They were building a Massively Multiplayer Online Snake Hunting RPG. That is the only possible reason you have the heads up map with the enemies on it, the listless AI, and partying system, paired with a keen inventory system.

What the full game must be like: Just imagine what sick and twisted individual would pay a monthly fee for the RGPJHS-MMO. And how much would it be? $4 $12 even $18? You have to like killing snakes a whole fuck lot to try and play this game more than once let alone join a snake killer guild, or get an epic reptile mount.

Game in 7 words or less: Glad Sony didn't make a retail version

Best Bug: Trying to shoot too fast, and using the mouse at all can cause the camera to permanently shift to the side of your character looking downward.

Score: 2/7 Hills - There are a lot of things that could have knocked this right down to a 1. but the fact that it did not actually become an MMO is good, and this game sucks pretty hard but it is not outright horrible does not merit the lowest score. Instead mediocrity holds fast and we are left with an itching and a burning sensation.