If you are one of those who think they know just about everything that there
is to know about Britney Spears and Nsync, then M-TV trl Trivia is the game for
you. trl Trivia is a game show-like trivia game that draws its inspiration
from games such as You Don't Know Jack. One to four players compete
to answer pop culture trivia questions in 25 different categories. Most of
the questions are of the timed multiple choice variety, where the player who
wants to answer the questions "buzzes in" by pressing a keyboard key
and then selects the number corresponding to the right answer. Right
answers are rewarded with points, while wrong answers result in a point
penalty. Other game variations include placing four things in
chronological order and a speed round which requires players to press their key
whenever a response flashes on the screen that is related to a given person,
band, or movie. At the end of 6 or 9 rounds, depending on the length of
game selected at the beginning, the player with the most points wins.
The game opens with the view from a camera moving through the set of the M-TV
show which inspired the game. After that, though, the graphics are very
basic and simply feature question and answer screens which all seem to be drawn
with the same 16 color palette. The game does provide the voice of M-TV VJ
Brian McFayden (but, curiously, not that of the show's host, Carson Daly) as the
emcee of the game. However, his sound bites are severely limited and
you'll hear just about all of them after playing one game. The repetitive
nature of McFayden's comments make the voiceovers annoying and do not give the
game the game show feel that the designers probably intended.
It might have been possible for some to overlook these annoyances if the game
provided a satisfying mental challenge. Unfortunately, the questions are
very heavily biased towards preteen pop, so if you don't know much about Britney
or Dawson's Creek, you're in for a long and excruciating experience. Even
questions from what seem like unrelated topics still seem to be tied back to
Britney. For example, one of the questions in a sports category asks in
which Britney video is she seen with a football. The game does feature
1,000 questions, but it appears that about 900 of those are dedicated to Britney
Spears, Nsync, or Dawson's Creek. If you are buying this game for someone
who lives and breathes this corner of American 'culture', then it might provide
some entertainment. All others should probably pass.
In The End, This Game Hath Been Rated: 44%.
A very narrow appeal and very basic production values are just two of the
reasons why most people should pass on this game.
System Requirements: 233 MHz Pentium II CPU; 32 MB RAM; 4 MB
Video RAM; 4x CD-ROM; 90 MB Hard Drive Space; Mouse.
