Videogames are predominately played by males, and as surging sales of Rockstar's Grand Theft Auto franchise have shown, there's a huge market for the male demographic. The newly formed Topheavy Studios (run by Jeff Spangenberg, former head of Retro Studios, which was responsible for the GameCube hit Metroid Prime) set out just over a year ago to create a videogame for this demographic. Appropriately named The Guy Game, Topheavy's unique new home console title is the very epitome of that goal.
The Facts
Features topless, M-rated nudity
Integrates drinking game A**hole, allowing for custom rules
20 episodes, each with multiple girls
Custom FMVs were filmed on the beach
Diversified by the 3D BallzOut challenges
Color commentary mocks you as you play along
1-4 players
The Guy Game, which is still looking for a publisher, is aimed squarely at testosterone-laden college students, spring breakers, and, well, any red-blooded American guy. Forming a sinful trinity, it combines boozing, nudity, and revelry. There's no question that it's a party game. It sets itself apart from other party games in that you don't have to pretend that it's a drinking game or fathom special party rules to make it work. Admit it: you've tried to turn everything from Super Monkey Ball to Eye Toy into alcohol-driven party games. The Guy Game doesn't pretend to be anything else; it's style is a blend of Girls Gone Wild, the long-standing drinking game A**hole, and, well...You Don't Know Jack.
Yes, it has trivia. In fact, that's the major foundation of The Guy Game. It just happens that drinking and looking at naked girls is the motivating factor. Here's how it works. It's a one- to four-player game, but naturally the more the merrier. All of you line up in front of the TV, have an alcoholic beverage handy, grab a controller and get ready to party. You can all enter your own name handles, or you can use the supplied ones such as "Crammit" or "Jimmyhat." After that, it's on to the trivia. You all are presented with a question, and the answers are tied to one of the four face buttons on the controller. The quicker your buzz in, the more cash you get. Since the game revolves around the general concept of A**hole, this is important, because each player is designated as President, Vice President, Treasurer, or the A**hole. This is important, because the President gets to choose drinking rules, veto past drinking rules, or custom create his own. He has other perks, too, like using button commands to get the commentators to mock fellow players.
Where does the nudity come in? Everywhere. When you begin a game, you also choose your favorite girl, like you would a character. Depending on what your ranking is, she will be wearing less clothing on the point round-up screen. In other words, the more questions you get right, the more flesh you'll see of your favorite girl. The nudity drives the trivia too, though. All the questions you get are also being presented to real, next-door hotties that were filmed on spring break. It's presented via cut-scenes, and depending on whether or not the girls get the question right, they have to flash the crowds (and you).
There's a catch, though, and it's called the Flash-O-Meter. After each real trivia question, you have to guess whether or not the girl(s) got the answer right or wrong -- and all four players answers tally up on the Flash-O-Meter. Meaning, if someone gets it wrong, you're girls are going to be censored. You won't get to see any jugs to begin with; they are censored on a three-level system. The meter is rated Soft & Squishy, Sorta Chubby, and Super Stiff. When it's in the Soft zone, the girls have a big, The Guy Game logo over their jumblies. When you push it into the Sorta Chubby area, you'll see a hint of flesh, but it will be pixilated and blurred. Finally when you all reach the Super Stiff zone, you'll see the girls' above-the-waist goods. That's as far as it goes, for all you naughty folks wondering if you see more.
But, Topheavy didn't stop with just trivia. The rounds, or Episodes as they are called, are broken up into several stages. The second stage of play is called BallzOut, which a bunch of mini-games designed around clever ball physics. One BallzOut challenge sees four opponents rolling around a square stage (complete with the President's girl that gradually goes topless) in an attempt to gather points by pushing hundreds of smaller balls out of the arena, pushing each other out, and collecting power ups. There are a few special moves that make it quite fun to play, but it's really the solid physics, which sends tons of spheres flying around, that makes it work. We were also shown a soccer-type mini-game, and Topheavy noted there may be more.
What you have to remember is that due to the inclusion of A**rules, such as "You have to take a drink of you say someone's first name," or "You must drink if you say a word that begins with S or ends with S," or whatever you custom rule may be, the chances that you're buzzed or even drunk are pretty good. There's no way for the game to keep track of when you break these rules, so it's up to the players to police each other and enforce the rules. Unfortunately, there's also no functionality in the game to bust people; we wouldn't mind seeing something visual included in the game to compliment this element. We could see some of these fine ladies ordering "You screwed up. Chug it, moron," with the player's namehandle highlighted. Nonetheless, it would still require policing from the individual players -- they'd have to hit some button combo even if such a function were available.
The final round of the Episode is one of the most interesting. By this point you should be pretty wired, and hopefully your Flash-O-Meter is in the red zone so you can see some flesh. Here you see the girls who have been answering the questions participate in things like Topless Jumprope, or bouncy-ball racing...again, topless. It's up to the players to choose their favorite girl and bet some of the cash they've earned before the festivities are played via the FMV cut-scenes. If your girl wins, you make back double what you bet.
The game concept isn't exactly innovative, but it is unique. It seems to answer the call of all those male gamers out there who just want to play their Xbox, PS2 or whatever console it ends up on, have a few drinks, and party. It doesn't pretend to be more than that. For this reason, we're somewhat excited by it. However, without a price point set and no publisher, The Guy Game is still looking for its place in the market. We here at IGN would like to see it set somewhere close to the $30 price point, and if it catches on installments could be offered up.
Right now, though, we've only got our preview time to go by. And, if you were wondering, we didn't get plastered for our 10am demonstration. In fact, only a few of us drink on the job (we're kidding, duh!). In other words, there will come a time when an IGN editor plays The Guy Game in the proper setting, with revelry, responsible drinking (of course), and plenty of good friends. But that time is not now, and we've only whet our appetite for The Guy Game's possibilities when it releases sometime later this year (Topheavy is hopeful it will arrive by summer or in time for spring break).