By Rodney Alan Greenblat
"Dazzeloids' wacky stories and goofy songs and sound effects make it
a MUST HAVE for your CD-ROM library."
"This could be the Rocky and Bullwinkle of multimedia if it weren't
so marvelously childlike."
Do the Dazzeloids make Ren & Stimpy look like Lassie &
Hello Kitty? Not quite, but these cyberheroes are pretty darn strange.
(If we didn't come right out and say so, you might sue. In fact, if you're
feeling litigious, please do not watch "Stinkabod's Dream.") But the animations
are so brilliant, the palette so electric, the script so silly, and the
message so appealing (think for yourself! be goofy! turn off the tube!)
that we fell for the Dazzeloids hook, line, and sinker.
Who are they? Creatures from a mondo bizarro somewhere to the left of
Pee-wee's Playhouse, whose mission is to save the hapless Habitroids from
total, mind-numbing boredom. They're Stinkabod Lamé (daredevil,
prankster, slamdancer), Yendor Talbneerg (technoid supreme), and Titan
Rose (muscleman and poet who speaks in rhyming couplets). Their fearless
commander is the idealistic Anne Dilly Whim, out to avenge her sister's
death of boredom in front of the TV. The Dazzeloids' nemesis is the Mediogre,
head of the BLANDO Corporation and power-mad capitalist worm, and his sniveling
techno-weasel sidekick, Pin Bleeper.
In "A Child Is Bored" the Dazzeloids step in to save little Jeremy Gerbilman
from brain-washed zombification caused by an excess of BLANDO programming.
The outcome of this adventure depends on which Dazzeloid is sent to the
rescue. Stinkabod performs his inspired Dance of Silliness; Yendor straps
his Brain Fun Stimulation Device to the child's shriveled cranium (you
choose the mode: Bloat, Spin, Morph, Crunch...)
The Dazzeloids' mission in "Banker, Spare that Petshop" is to save the
smelly Probe 'n' Poke Petshop (familiar to fans of Rodney's Wonder Window)
from being sucked into the void of the Mediogre's Transglumifier to make
room for another bank. "Dazzeloid Dreams" offers a glimpse of the heroes'
psyches (more, perhaps, than you want to know) with totally weird dream
sequences.
Dazzeloids is crammed with choices--narrated text with
definitions of both real and fanciful words, strange poems, interactive
screens, bizarre sound effects, and enough hilarious surprises to entertain
for hours. Rodney admits that Dazzeloids may contain material unsuitable
for hamsters, but his kids love it, and so do ours. |