MTV's Beavis and Butt-Head in Virtual Stupidity

The Good
I have never seen a single episode of Beavis and Butthead in my life. I've seen little excerpts from commercials of that Time Life collection of them, and it seemed pretty funny. But I haven't seen the actual show before. And Virtual Stupidity is still one of the funniest games I have ever played in my entire life.

Beavis and Butthead in Virtual Stupidity begins the same way an episode of the show would. There is the "don't try this at home" warning, the duo laughing over the guitar theme song, and the episode name. It's familiar to some, but not to me, and kind of made me chuckle a bit. And soon, the game begins.

The plot of Virtual Stupidity isn't the deepest thing in the world. It's basically this: Todd is cool, Beavis and Butthead want to be cool, Beavis and Butthead try to get in his gang, things are laughed at. From what I've heard about the show, this seems a lot like it. And although it didn't take much thinking to come up with that, the plot totally fits. It's a great way to string all the silly situations in the game together.

The game interface is very easy to use. Like many point and click adventures, there are many cursor modes: look, use/pick up, talk to, walk, and use inventory item. Right clicking brings up a verb coin (one of the most pleasing looking verb coins I've ever seen, mind you) that you can use to select cursor modes or open your inventory from. The cursors are very well drawn, and are designed with Beavis and Butthead in mind. My favorite cursor is the use mode, which turns shows I Love You in sign language when it goes over a hotspot.

The graphics are quite well done, and are in the style of the TV show. They're nothing spectacular, but the fact that they remain true to the series is good enough for me.

The sound is one of the places that the game truly shines. The sound effects are something you'd expect from the TV show, as is the music. Since the TV show has very good music and sound effects, the game does as well. The voice acting is the best part of the sound. All the series' voice actors lend their talent to the game for their characters, and deliver extremely well. I think I at least snorted or chuckled out loud every time Beavis or Butthead spoke.

Virtual Stupidity is also side-splittingly funny. All the humorous tendencies from the show are here, such as Beavis and Butthead head banging as a short burst of rock music plays whenever something good happens. The game's script is also to-notch, and humor can be spontaneous, random, or stupid but always funny. Whenever you use the look cursor on something, Beavis and Butthead will say a different thing for each hotspot, and it's always funny.

The puzzles in the game provided a good challenge to me, as I'm a veteran adventure game player who usually needs a walkthrough.

The Bad
There are very few problems with Virtual Stupidity. They are notable however. One minigame is required to complete the game, called Hock-a-Loogie. The game isn't very easy, and not explained very well either. It took me 120 hits to figure out I needed to right click to spit a green loogie. The game felt very out of place, and I thought another cleverly designed puzzle could replace it with better results.

The game was one of the first Windows 95 games to ever be released, and the developers apparently felt obligated to make it run in a window. The size can be increased to up to three times the original 320x240 resolution, but this makes the AVI cutscenes very blurry. I also couldn't get the Full Screen option to work. It could be because I have Windows XP, a 17-inch monitor, or 1152x864 resolution, but I would've liked to see the full screen.

The Bottom Line
Beavis and Butthead in Virtual Stupidity is one of the funniest games ever released. If you don't get the point of the show, the game's no different, but for those who appreciate that kind of humor, you'll love it.

Now I need to get that collection of episodes. What's the number to call again?