What if? Beauty and the Beast TV

[Gabriel]

Along with Jem, I have another secret viewing pleasure, the late 80s Beauty and the Beast TV show. Nowadays, I don't know what I see in it, but for some reason, I can get past the maudlin nature of the thing and enjoy watching it. For a time in the late 80s, the show was almost iconic. For 15 minutes, Vincent (the Beast to Sarah Connor's Beauty) captured the imagination. I recall reading somewhere that the show resonated with 30-something year old housewives, and I was a definite exception being a follower of the show who happened to be a teen male when it first aired. Perhaps it's a good thing the show didn't catch on with the younger viewers. It spared us another scourge of the late 80s, the inevitable licensed NES game.

 

I just got done watching an episode from the second season set called Remember Love. In it, Vincent sees how much crappier the world would have been had he died as a child. In the spirit of that episode, let's try to envision a world where a Beauty and the Beast game had been sold.

 

It's almost a foregone conclusion that had a NES game been made, it would have been a platformer developed by monkeys and published by Akklaim. The game would almost certainly have put Vincent in control of the player armed with jumping and clawing ability. The plot would involve rescuing Katherine from Paracelsus (the big baddie of the show) and killing lots and lots and lots and lots of ninjas along the way.

 

Don't laugh. There's actually an episode of the show where Vincent spends the climax slaughtering ninjas. At least it would have a vague prcedent in the source material.

 

So, armed with shitty controls, an attack with a range to make Karate by Froggo look good, and an endless stream of ninjas (pallette swaps optional), Vincent progresses through several levels of bossess. The levels write themselves to the creative impaired licensed property developers. There's the world below (some caves). The city (just like any other city). A warehouse (just like any other warehouse). An alley or two. And there would probably be some posh office building stage. These would simply be window dressing as the same random enemies and patterns would appear throughout, and any level structure would be identical.

 

Bosses? They have Paracelsus, what do you want? Do you expect it to actually be based on the show? I suppose the game could have a robot and maybe a leader ninja. OOOO! How about a giant floating eyeball?? Those were pretty popular.

 

I suppose it would also need some other TV show elements. Still pictures of a few other characters from the show, along with about 10 lines from the show quoted out of context would probably suffice. The monkeys would probably want to make those pictures black and white or rust and black in order to make them look really spiffy and evocative of a TV show based game.

 

Vincent needs to be a one hit wonder. In addition, since the controls are going to suck, there need to be lots of random challenges which require precision control to even consider accomplishing. Ninjas and other hazards should be much faster than Vincent and take about 20 to 30 hits to kill. If the monkeys are smart (or at least sadistic), they'll add in a restrictive timer which causes automatic death when it runs out. There also need to be blind jumps, lots and lots of blind jumps. And any death needs to kick the player back to the start of the level.

 

I'd mention powerups, but this is a licensed game made by monkeys. There wouldn't be any. That might make the game playable in some fashion. Jumping and kicking is enough for the kiddies.

 

Oh, and it needs a single looping tune which plays throughout the entire game. Imagine the joy listening to an off key Beauty and Beast theme coming from the NES could create! Imagine playing this game for hours on end with that out of key music playing without pause. It brings a tear to my eye.

 

On the plus side, we could possibly look forward to a Angry Video Game Nerd treatment of the title. On the minus side... it would have existed. I think, like Vincent in the episode mentioned above, we should thank our lucky stars.

 

And maybe watch some Jem. There's another game we missed out on. Jem could have jumped around and beaten up ninjas and giant eyeballs with microphone.

[moycon]

And maybe watch some Jem. There's another game we missed out on. Jem could have jumped around and beaten up ninjas and giant eyeballs with microphone.

 

I'm pretty sure Jem has fallen on hard times if she's even alive at all. Following the failure of her show in the 80's her drinking got worst and after a brief stint in the porn industry she was reduced to high dollar prostitution (most of which was spent on booze) Eventually as her looks faded she was reduced to giving $5 hand jobs to support a newly aquired crack habit.

 

Shades of Barbara Payton for sure.

 

Poor Jem. I'm afraid any ninja beating she does now we wouldn't be interested in.

[Gabriel]

I'm pretty sure Jem has fallen on hard times if she's even alive at all. Following the failure of her show in the 80's her drinking got worst and after a brief stint in the porn industry she was reduced to high dollar prostitution

 

My blood runs cold

My memory has just been sold

My angel is the centerfold

Angel is the centerfold

[2600Lives]

I thought that Jem had shacked up with Raimbow Brite and was selling lesbian porn out of their basement.

 

I never understood the attraction of the show. Now, I'm a HUGE Ron Perlman fan. I think, honestly, it's his line "War. War never changes." from Fallout that hooked me on the game initially, and I love him as Hellboy. The B&tB show, though, I never got. During that time, let's see what I was watching...

 

The A-Team

Airwolf

Cheers

Moonlighting

Night Court

Married With Children

Max Headroom

 

I have a buddy who absolutely worships the show, though, and snatched the DVDs the day they came out.

[Atarifever]

I tried to watch some Jem lately, and man is that bad. I used to watch it with my sister when I was a kid, but it has not aged well. Now if they were going to make a game about any show from when I was a kid it should be Teddy Ruxpin. That show was epic. Think about it. In the first episode he's just some stupid iliop who meets a couple goofballs, and by the end of it he's discovered the crazy hermit guy is his long lost father, has fought mud mnsters, Aztecs (Gatangs), giants, etc and has overthrown M.A.V.O and the Supreme Opressor. THE SUPREME OPRESSOR! That name alone is worth a game. And best of all, the whole deal is just one big story, unlike stuff like The Care Bears.

[+davidcalgary29]

I recall reading somewhere that the show resonated with 30-something year old housewives, and I was a definite exception being a follower of the show who happened to be a teen male when it first aired. Perhaps it's a good thing the show didn't catch on with the younger viewers.

 

Oh, you weren't alone.

 

In my mind, though, Beauty and the Beast would have been one of Sierra's attempts to infiltrate the 'adult' market with a dual-perspective romantic drama; random samples of digitized samples would have spiced up the action. Sucky, yet secretly pleasurable and addicting.

[A Sprite]

WTF? I google my work, see people talking about my prototype, and instead of being like "Wow, that's pretty good for a monkey, considering the deadline!" I see second guessing all my team's design decisions, 20 years later - fuck you, they didn't feed us until we sent a playable beta, stamped "FINAL CODE". Every button does what it's supposed to, and there's even a digitized Linda Hamilton giving you advice all the way through - the eyeball was fucking public domain, sure, but it weeps BLOOD! That's art! That's my soul in that scene! I eeee eeee EEEEE EEEE! *flings shit back at you*

 

Edited July 30, 2007 by A Sprite

[Gabriel]

WTF? I google my work, see people talking about my prototype, and instead of being like "Wow, that's pretty good for a monkey, considering the deadline!" I see second guessing all my team's design decisions, 20 years later - fuck you, they didn't feed us until we sent a playable beta, stamped "FINAL CODE". Every button does what it's supposed to, and there's even a digitized Linda Hamilton giving you advice all the way through - the eyeball was fucking public domain, sure, but it weeps BLOOD! That's art! That's my soul in that scene! I eeee eeee EEEEE EEEE! *flings shit back at you*

 

 

I love you.