Crusty Demons

The Good
I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again and again: “I don’t want to be smart; I just never ever want to make a bad decision again.” Intelligence is overrated; all those inspirational posters in libraries with kittens have sayings like, “Knowledge is power,” but what will intelligence bring you? Sadness. That’s because the more you know, the more you realize you don’t know.

It’s a modern-day nerd conceit: if you are smart enough, you can learn anything. The best contemporary example of this is the insanely popular CSI television show and its many off-shoots. If you’ve never heard of CSI, this is the premise: a bunch of geek scientist cops solve crime. This translates as a theme to: there is nothing that can not be learned, just the same as the modern-day nerd conceit. CSI throws out half a century’s worth of detective shows all in favor of cold, methodical calculating. “What’s that, Columbo? You gotta hunch? Screw you and your intuition!”

However, as I’ve come out and admitted, we’re not all smart. Now that we’re in the Age of Information and the lowly nerd has come out on top, how can we comply? By playing to our strengths. And how do we play to our strengths? We do so by making our weaknesses into our strengths!

That’s this game. This game is stupid. It knows it. Crusty Demons revels in its own sheer stupidity and comes out on top because of it.

The Crusty Demons game is based on a real-life stunt troupe of the same name who perform extreme stunts on dirt bikes that range from spectacular (mid-air ramp tricks) to stupid (lighting each other on fire). While characters in the game are based on reality, the premise of the game isn’t: the Devil appears before the Crusty Demons and offers them immortality for their souls. Of course the idiots accept only to find that while they cannot die, they still feel pain. Knowing that the customer is always right, the Devil offers to return their souls if they manage to entertain him.

A genius premise. Crusty Demons is a sure-fire boredom-delayer because on any risk taken by the gamer they are rewarded, whether they succeed or lose. Genuis. I’m sure there are other extreme-sports games that play better and have better combos and all that, but I’m sure they won’t reward you when failing a stunt by showing the rider’s graphic death. Ragdoll physics try to illustrate the thoroughly enjoyable sight of how a human body would impact on concrete. The amount of blood loss and trauma of broken bones are accompanied by stats and x-rays.

A succinct way of describing this game is that you are simultaneously thrilled at pulling off a difficult combo as you are thrilled at watching a stunt go horrifically wrong. No mid’s or even low’s here, people.

Perhaps not a flattering way to license your name and image; that Rolando guy for one wouldn’t want his soccer game to have a riot mini-game function. But if you make a living by launching yourself into the air on purpose, recklessly, well you can’t be that smart. It isn’t difficult to see how this game was inspired.

The stupidity doesn’t stop there, neither does the rewarding of stupidity. Crusty Demons has the best unlockable content it can provide to its target demographic of young, stupid white males: movies of naked stupid, white females. To drive the stupid train home, the movies are taken at Crusty Demon shows where these chicks, inspired by the stupidity, flash their sweater meat to the camera as if to say, “I don’t want to be left out!” Who wants to rescue a princess? Who wants to unlock alternate skins for their protagonist so they can play through again as a chef? We want milk bags!


The Bad
The idea and premise behind it is sound, it’s too bad the game developers couldn’t actually program a decent game. Long load times, bad graphics, bad controls, dodgy physics, insufferable game play…the list goes on and on. There are a number of good reasons why everyone plays Tony Hawk games and not this one: short load times (or none), good graphics, good controls, great physics, great game play…the list goes on and on. All of Crusty Demon’s problems could be solved if the developers had more money, time and about one million people willing to buy this bad game.

No wishing on my part will excuse all the shortcomings of this game, so just to make it clear, I’ll state emphatically: this is a poor game. Still, you know why triple A games are made? Because everyone buys them. It doesn’t mean they are WORTH playing, however.

I’ve criticized games for falling into the GTA III “boredom-delayer” syndrome, and is one would surely fit the mould. However, Crusty Demons moves past simple time-killing by the strength of its premise as well as its concept of risk-rewarding; this goes to encourage wilder risk-taking and inspire more playing. That’s the kind of inspiration you’d want from a generic extreme sports game where you’re just going to be grinding out combo after rote-memorized combo.

This “inspired stupidity” is what Jackass: The Game only wished it had, but then that game is made by a bunch of suits who make money. Crusty Demons by far is a superior game, but then Jackass: The Game obviously sold more copies. Who stupid now?

The Bottom Line
Be true to yourself.