Bloody Boobs

Russ Meyer once said that "nothing is obscene providing it is done in bad taste." And he would know, since he made an entire career out of casting large breasted women with minimal acting talent to star in his campy movies. He was one of the purveyors of the sexploitation movement, giving audiences exactly what they wanted with films like Wild Gals of the Naked West and Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!

I'm reminded of Russ Meyer's long and storied career as I go to review Bloody Boobs, the debut game from developer Eduard Bulashov. This is a survival horror game built around the idea that sex sells, just like so many of those cheesy movies from the 1960s and 70s. But here's the difference: While movies like Beyond the Valley of the Dolls and Mondo Topless were propelled almost entirely by their sex appeal, they were also incredibly entertaining films that were often weird and unpredictable. Bloody Boobs, on the other hand, is little more than a cynical attempt to sucker horny gamers into buying a terrible game.

Let's face it; this is not going to be a glowing review. I didn't care for this game, and it's easy to see why. But instead of jumping right into the negativity, perhaps we should focus on a few of the things I like about Bloody Boobs. For starters, this is a potentially awesome set-up for a survival horror game. You play a captured woman who is next in line to be sacrificed to the ancient gods. She flees and is forced to pray at four altars to escape with all of her body parts intact.

I also think the game controls well. The customizable character zips around the underground dungeon and is good at cornering, making it easy to dodge obstacles while running through the maze. And speaking of which, I think the labyrinthine setting is atmospheric and sets a great tone. I can see how this could be a great setting for a creepy horror game.

But this is not a creepy horror game, and every one of those positives can be turned around and used against it. I mean, sure, the concept is theoretically sound, but the execution is all wrong. This is a game where you run around and pray at altars. That's it. No, really, that's the whole game. You find the four altars and then race into the exit. Congratulations, you won.

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Now, I know what you're thinking: The levels probably change every time, so it's full of replayability. But that's not actually true. While the description touts "partially random generation," I didn't see much of that in my playthroughs. In fact, after I memorized where the altars are located, I was able to race through the dungeon in just a few minutes. Perhaps there were minor differences between plays, but I didn't notice any.

We're told at the start to avoid anything that doesn't have boobs, which pretty much means the creepy crawly demons roaming the halls. Of course, it's hard to know if they have boobs or not, because they spend the entire game hugging the ground and chasing behind the girls. These monsters are fairly easy to avoid and can be destroyed using landmines. But like I said, once you know where the altars are, chances are you won't have many issues avoiding the devilish creatures.

I suppose some gamers may want to get more life out of the game by playing it online. This too is incredibly limited, offering matches you won't way to play for very long. The upside is that you can control the demon monsters and chase bikini-clad women, though the creatures use a variation of Resident Evil's tank controls and aren't much fun to play.

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It's also shocking how limited the character creation options are. We're given only a couple faces to choose from and not very many accessories. And if you think that we'll be able to select from a bunch of different costumes, then you need to guess again. We're basically given a swimsuit and dominatrix gear, just enough to get the game onto Steam. But hey, at least there are four sizes of boobs to choose from.

This is not a good game. But not because I'm morally outraged or offended, I'll be the first to say that this concept can be done well. The problem with Bloody Boobs is that there's nothing to it. The core mechanics are paper thin and you can beat the game in only a couple minutes. It hopes you'll be more interested in the women than the gameplay, which seems like a bad decision. In a world where finding porn is only a Google search away, I honestly don't know why anybody would buy Bloody Boobs.