Attack of the Mutant Penguins

"Attack of the Mutant Penguins" is an ancient game from 1995, ported from the Atari Jaguar (yeah, Atari had a 16 bit console, and it died hard). It's a whopping 29 years old at the time of this review. The game lacks support for any modern gaming display resolutions (or widescreen monitors), hasn't been modernised or updated to run smoothly on modern gaming PCs. Despite this lack of modernisation, it carries a pretty high price tag for such an ancient game. This seems to have been put on Steam as a nostalgia gouge, or just a cash grab to try profit from abandonware. This is an obscure 2D top down brawler/action game with an esoteric "haha look at me I'm weird" theme, not a particularly popular genre to begin with, so failing badly at it was an impressive feat. You may be wondering why a crap rejected 1990's Atari Jaguar game belongs on Steam and the answer is, you're right, it doesn't. This is another abandonware cash grab by Piko Interactive, who swindle their hands onto old abandoned/broken/dead games then try to swindle Steam gamers into paying them for someone else's old abandoned game. Ethical? Nope. Gameplay is mediocre in this weird action brawler, with obtuse gameplay that involves collecting gremlins and shoving them into chests so you can unlock weapons like dynamite which you use to blow up the titular mutant penguins. The name itself is clearly a ripoff of the old Commodore 64 cartridge game, "Attack of the Mutant Camels" but the innovative developers replaced "Camel" with "Penguin". I wonder why the Atari Jaguar failed. Anyway. The gameplay is clunky and unintuitive... and that, combined with the unclear and obtuse direction for the game leads to an ultimately terrible gaming experience so it's no surprise this one went straight into the bargain bins at the front of the store, where they were ignored, until presumably they were sent to join E.T. cartridges in a landfill. From a technical perspective, the game doesn't meet basic minimum requirements that most PC gamers expect as standard. A choice was made to use obsolete, decades old retro pixel "art" as a substitute for contemporary PC graphics. It's unclear if this is due to lack of budget or talent, regardless, the overall visual quality of the game is extremely low as a result. There's no option to change the resolution and no useful graphics tweaks. There's no way to ensure this is running at the native resolution of your display. There's no guarantee this game will look right on any PC as a result of this hamfisted design decision. The game only displays in 4:3 pillarboxed aspect ratio, due to the age of the game, it predates the 16:9 widescreen gaming standard established back in 2006. It's possible they're marketing this towards people using an old CRT they found in a dumpster, or this game is being specifically marketed towards people gaming on PC's from 1995... either way, this isn't really acceptable in the modern era of PC gaming. It's obviously not going to look right on a modern 16:9 gaming display. Because this is designed for consoles, it carries a number of deliberate design deficiencies. Compromises were made to cater to the inferior console gaming appliances that the game was designed for. These are unfortunate compromises and limitations that PC gamers shouldn't be forced to accept, but it's evident that PC was a second thought for the console-centric developers. The game is deficient as a result of these choices, and would have been so much better without the handicaps that designing games for consoles forces upon a game. Once more, console peasants have made gaming worse for everyone. These technical defects push this game below acceptable standards for any modern PC game. The poor quality of this game is reflected by how many people spent time with it. At the time of this review, SteamDB shows the all-time peak player number was only 2 players. This is a remarkably low number, and now, the only player activity occurs once or twice a month, presumably someone loading it up to see what it is then quickly uninstalling it. Considering there's over 120 million gamers on Steam and well over 50,000 games for gamers to choose from, the overwhelming lack of interest in this low quality game is to be expected. "Attack of the Mutant Penguins" is relatively expensive for an abandonware nostalgia gouge, at $8 USD, and it's not worth it. The game is just too old, hasn't been modernised. And as the old saying goes, you can't go home again. Even when it was new, this was never a triple-A game. This is the kind of game that went almost directly from the warehouse into the cheap bargain bins at the front of the shop. Now, on Steam, without any modernisation? This is impossible to recommend. For comparison, the $8 asking price for this game could get you games like "Don't Starve Together", "Borderlands 2" or "Battlefield V". Quality, professionally made games like those are frequently on sale cheaper than this. There's also thousands of free, superior quality games on Steam. [quote][b][url=https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/marketing/profile]Profile Features Limited![/url][/b] Valve have marked this game as "Profile Features Limited" at the time of this review. This is usually caused by poor sales figures and low community acceptance for the game (to date). Until this status changes, this game will not give you +1 to your Game Collector badge count, appear in profile achievements or any other Steam meta-accomplishments, nor can it be displayed in some profile showcases. If these factors are important to you, it may be worth holding off before buying this game.[/quote]

I had a problem when using the gamepad, so I requested a refund for the game. I got it because of the nostagia since this was one of the titles for the Atari Jaguar. I never played it, so I wanted the experience. However, it runs in DOSbox emulator, and i found it pretty expensive for what it is.

Got it working on the Steam Deck (use the Gamepad controller settings if you're having difficulty), but even so it's just a little too retro for my taste. Game forces things to be on a timer, so not much fun; not enough to take the time to figure the rest of the game out and it is a weird one. More patient retro gamers might like this though.

An incredibly weird and interesting game unfortunately made [b]FAR[/b] too frustrating to recommend. [b]Attack of the Mutant Penguins[/b] is...[b]different[/b]. In some ways good, but in most ways bad. AotMP has a [b]super strange identity[/b] & [b]visual style[/b] that is only further enhanced by its even more [b]bizarre gameplay[/b] and [b]lack of music[/b]. It's a vibe, that's for sure...and believe it or not, that's [b]NOT[/b] a bad thing. In fact, Id argue the really weird choices this game makes from a presentation and concept standpoint is [b]EXACTLY[/b] what makes something like this worth looking at and experiencing. Unfortunately it's [b]everything else[/b] that's the problem. As mentioned earlier, the gameplay itself for AotMP is very weird but actually quite [b]interesting[/b] and [b]fun[/b]! You play as either one of the two little...uh...[b]things[/b] that [b]SEEM[/b] to be small aliens, and use your tools of wack-i-try to bop invading space penguins in funny little hats. Every time you do so, atoms fly about, which enhance your weapon the more you collect, allowing you to bop those little mother f#$%ers [b]even harder[/b] until [b]they explode and die[/b]! And you try to do alllllllll of this before the mutant penguins get on a monster face scale and outweigh your normal friendly penguins whom...also live on that monster face scale...Look man, [b]I told you[/b] this s#$% is weird. And all of that weirdness would be fine & dandy, had it not suffer [b]TREMENDOUSLY[/b] from a [b]lack of polish[/b]. It runs...which I suppose for a game its age [b]IS[/b] commendable...but wow... the whole thing just runs like [b]S#%$[/b]. Frame rates that not only dip below the acceptable 60, but [b]FRANTICALLY[/b] toss and turn any and every which-way it damn well pleases and at any given moment. That [b]ALONE[/b] is enough to chimmy ones chonga's...but then add [b]INCREDIBLY POOR HIT DETECTION[/b] & [b]ABSURD DIFFICULTY/POOR TUTORIAL[/b] and you are left with a game that prefers to test your patience more so than your intelligence or dexterity. Its a shame, because I think there [b]IS[/b] a good game lying in here. And had the [b]frame rate been leveled-out[/b], the [b]hit detection been improved[/b], and the [b]tutorial actually EXPLAIN how to optimally play the f#$%ing game a bit better[/b], I could see a world where [b]Attack of the Mutant Penguins[/b] would actually have been a pretty great time. Its weird and atmospheric vibe along with its super unconventional gameplay and mechanics make it a unique and interesting title. But unfortunately, all of that interest goes right out the window as soon as you make a game [b]this hard and this weird[/b] also [b]run and function like absolute s#$%[/b]. Oh, speaking of which...did I also mention no one knows how to actually [b]SAVE/LOAD[/b] the damn game? Yup, so have fun going all or nothing with this one. If you are [b]REALLY[/b] into weird ones, [b]MAYBE[/b] for an extremely steep discount price you'll [b]STILL[/b] find some fun out of it like I do. But for everyone else...your money is probably better spent elsewhere.

undarated

I have 1 question to whoever made this game? WTF is your problem? This game is not only confusing, but also sucks.

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