Game 141: Wayne’s World - Introduction (1993)

By Michael

Last week, we wrote a blog post looking forward to the next “Year Ahead” post, when we choose the games to be played for the blog in the future.  Today, I’m cursing the 1993 post.  Yes, I’m looking at you, Andy Panthro.  See, he spent 200 of his valuable, hard-earned, CPU-harvested CAPs to force an unsuspecting TAG reviewer to play a game that normally wouldn’t have been on the list.  This is, of course, the 1993 adventure game Wayne’s World from Capstone Entertainment, not to be confused with two different action platformers released the same year, also under the same name.

Capstone Entertainment... that sounds vaguely familiar (and also is likely an oxymoron).  Hmmm... oh, yeah, they also produced the critically-acclaimed Beverly Hillbillies game, based on a TV series from the 1960s that Ilmari recently played here.

Before you count this game out, though, let’s talk about the Saturday Night Live skit turned movie that brought us here.  After all, this movie shows up right next to The Blues Brothers as the top-rated SNL movie of all time.

It started in a high school slacker’s basement in Aurora, Illinois, a suburb of the city of Chicago.  Wayne Campbell likes to hang out in his parents’ basement with his friends, particularly his best friend Garth Algar.  (They would become college-age by the time of the movie, but still slackers in the true 90s sense of the word.)  

One of the things they like to do together is broadcast a small-ticket variety show from the basement, on the town’s local community access TV station.  They talk about their favorite topics, like movies, cars, and girls... wait, I mean, BABES.  One that turns them on?  Schwing!

The actor who plays Wayne is one of SNL’s later great success stories.  Mike Meyers would go on to do many things, including the Shrek franchise and the Austin Powers series.  Dana Carvey (Garth) chose a less active role after the movie, choosing to focus on raising a family instead, but still was a well-revered comedian from his time on the show.

Anyway, the skit proved to be very popular over the years it would be used on SNL, and at some point, they decided it would be perfect fodder for a feature film.  Myers and Carvey were joined by Tia Carrere, as Wayne’s love interest, and special appearances by Ed O’Neill, Chris Farley, Alice Cooper, and Meat Loaf, among others.  And one other star of note:  Brat-Pack member Rob Lowe of St. Elmo's Fire fame.  This was the film that restarted his TV and film career after he took a break.  This was because of a sex tape incident in 1988, which, connecting it to the adventure gaming world, was referenced in Leisure Suit Larry 5.

He had been mainly doing stage work and B-grade movies after the scandal, until this film redeemed him.  From there, it was on to Tommy Boy and The West Wing.  Now, between those reruns and the ads for Atkins, along with newer TV series like Parks & Recreation, if we actually did watch regular TV anymore, we couldn’t avoid seeing his face.

But back to the movie.  Wayne and Garth are still broadcasting their show, but Rob Lowe’s character is a sneaky, shady producer for a big TV station, wanting to steal Wayne’s World for his station, since it apparently has a massive underground following.  So, he cons the boys into selling over the rights, and then ruins the show by trying to over-commercialize it.  The boys plot their revenge and get their show back, and Rob Lowe’s character even learns a lesson or two.

So on to the game.  The introduction is basically an episode of the show, with unseen call-in guests.

And wow, they got the boys to voice the game... NOT!

They cut out snippets of dialog from the movie and used them when they could.  So, this line was fully voiced.  But other lines, sometimes only one word here and there, like “NOT!” or “Schwing!”

So, Wayne tells us it’s the “CALL-IN time” on the show, where you, the viewer, can express your opinion about babes, videos, or even Garth’s mom... “Hey man!  That’s not funny!”

So, who’s the first caller?

Oh, game designers, I see what you did there.  What a clever name... AS-IF!

So, the first caller, C.L., calls himself a local community access program reviewer.  He makes some useful suggestions, such as changing the rotation of the show’s logo to counter-clockwise instead of clockwise, and that Garth should switch to being left-handed, to improve visual symmetry.  “Sorry chump, no can do.  Garth’s not in his right mind.”

None of that was spoken.  Then they shoehorned this line in:

Which was fully spoken, because it’s a line from the film.

After some more stupidity from the caller, the boys dismiss him and look to the next caller.  He had an alien encounter, where a spaceship flew up right next to his car and they looked right at him.  Garth joined in, telling about his experience, and then the caller said he was beamed aboard the ship.  

“No way!”

But the boys called the caller on B.S. when he claimed the leader was as hot as Madonna.  “There is nothing in the universe that looks better than Madonna in her cones!”

Another call.  Myron D. Witherspoon II, who is a proud member of the Decency Referendum Against Grossness.

Ugh.

Moving on to the last caller.  And the plot exposition we’ve been waiting for.  The next caller is a woman who wishes to stay anonymous.  “Yeah, I work at the mayor’s office.  He’s into balancing the budget, you know?”  So, the community access station they broadcast on is going to go away, unless there’s donations of $50,000 made to cover the cost of running the station.

She doesn’t mean the modern definition of the word, but that could happen to them nowadays.

And after some brief credits, on to the game play.

They start by talking to each other, and here’s something promising:  a dialog tree.

So, what should we do?  If we click on the wrong answers, Wayne dismisses them, but they remain in the list.  I click on all the obvious wrong answers first before landing on the right one: “Let’s go get a pizza and think about it...”  That gives Wayne the idea to have a “Pizza-Thon”.  Is that like a telethon?  Is it legal?

Yes, they’ll have people call in and order pizza from them, for an outrageous charitable donation.

“Uh, Wayne... how do you make pizza?”

“You dial up the pizza parlor and say, ‘Yo!  I’d like a pepperoni pizza, pronto!  Party on, pizza person!’”

So yes, they’ll need some help with that.  

We need to make a list of things to do.  Another dialog tree, and the same as before:  if you click on the right ones in the list, they get added to your list (“That’s a good idea, Garth.”), but Wayne dismisses the wrong ones.

Looks like we need advertising, pizza ingredients, a place to cook the pizza, a comedian, an electronic totals board, some serious television time, a cool music act, more video equipment, phone volunteers and delivery people, and maybe even a magician.

Time to get started!  Place your bets!  We’ve played two other games from Capstone in 1993, most recently, Ilmari’s visit to the Beverly Hillbillies, and earlier, Torch checked out An American Tail: The Computer Adventures of Fievel and His Friends.  The average score between the two of them was 34.  Just what am I getting myself into here?

Session Time: 10 minutes

Note Regarding Spoilers and Companion Assist Points: There's a set of rules regarding spoilers and companion assist points. Please read it here before making any comments that could be considered a spoiler in any way. The short of it is that no CAPs will be given for hints or spoilers given in advance of me requiring one. As this is an introductory post, it's an opportunity for readers to bet 10 CAPs (only if they already have them) that I won't be able to solve a puzzle without putting in an official Request for Assistance: remember to use ROT13 for betting. If you get it right, you will be rewarded with 20 CAPs in return. It's also your chance to predict what the final rating will be for the game. Voters can predict whatever score they want, regardless of whether someone else has already chosen it. All correct (or nearest) votes will go into a draw.