Plumbers Don't Wear Ties
Encyclopedia
Plumbers Don't Wear Ties is an adult
Adult video game
An adult video game is a video game which has significant sexual content , and are therefore intended for an adult audience. Adult games can fall into many genres and have diverse gameplay.-PC and console:...
graphic adventure game
Graphic adventure game
A graphic adventure game is a form of adventure game. They are distinct from text adventures. Whereas a player must actively observe using commands such as "look" in a text-based adventure, graphic adventures revolutionized gameplay by making use of natural human perception...
produced and released by Kirin Entertainment in 1994. Kirin's first published game, John and Jane are being pressured by their respective parents to find a suitable spouse, and it's up to the player to get John and Jane together. The game has received very negative reviews due to criticism of the game's voice acting and lack of gameplay style. Another commonly criticized aspect of the game is that it is simply a slideshow rather than being played in Full Motion Video
Full motion video
Full motion video based games are video games that rely upon pre-recorded TV-quality movie or animation rather than sprites, vectors, or 3D models to display action in the game. In the early 1990s a diverse set of games utilized this format...
as advertised on the box.
Overview
The game takes place in Los AngelesLos Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
, in the early 1990s, with John and Jane being pressured by their respective parents to find a suitable spouse. John is a plumber and Jane is going to a prospective job interview. When Jane's prospective boss attempts to rape her after telling her to have sex with him to get a job, John comes in and saves her.
The only Gameplay (interaction) is where the player gets to choose the story line (usually two choices) in a DVD menu style manner, although there is only one right choice. At certain points in the game, the player has the opportunity to choose what actions John or Jane will do; making the right choices will bring the characters together, while making the wrong choices will result in commentary from the game's two narrators, who sometimes fight each other. If enough bad choices are made, the player is given the choice to restart the game or try and make the right choice.
A full motion video
Full motion video
Full motion video based games are video games that rely upon pre-recorded TV-quality movie or animation rather than sprites, vectors, or 3D models to display action in the game. In the early 1990s a diverse set of games utilized this format...
clip features Jane introducing the player to the main objective and basic rules of the game. From that point onwards the entire format is that of still photographs with actors reading dialogue. The narrator also changes once during the game, before being changed back to the original a few scenes later.
Reception
Critical response to the game was overwhelmingly negative. In giving the game a 15% rating, Diego Antico wrote, "It's hard to determine where Plumbers Don't Wear Ties is at its most horrendous. Is it in the pathetic music department? The graphics (or its lack thereof)? The awful gameplay?" AllgameAllgame
Allgame is a commercial database of information about arcade games, video games and console manufacturers.Allgame is owned by All Media Guide, along with Allmusic and Allmovie....
gave the game one star. The site made note of how despite it being advertised as full motion video, it was simply a slideshow. In The Video Game Bible, Andy Slaven said that the "humorous" results from choosing the wrong option "can't save this title from being horrible."
Video Games & Computer Entertainment magazine criticized the game for being all just "still pictures of the director's friends acting like goofballs and delivering bad voiceovers.", also stating " Not even the promise of some naked pictures could save this disc from becoming a joke around here. Avoid this one at all costs, it looks like a bad Public Access show and that's the pits." They also listed the game #1 in PC Gamer's "Must NOT Buy" list, statng "Plumbers Don't Wear Ties is a shallow, hateful waste of a game, and may very well be responsible for having killed the 3DO, interactive fiction, and the whale."
As been said in a IGN
IGN
IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment...
article, Travis Fahs said that the game "became the symbol for everything that was wrong with giving a license to anyone that wanted one." In another article on Uproxx, Dan Seitz said it was "essentially a Skinemax movie…except it’s made entirely of still images, and it was an alleged game for the 3DO, that you can actually play along to, since it’s a “game” the same way a series of DVD menus is a game."
Cast
- Edward J. Foster - John
- Jeanne BasoneJeanne BasoneJeanne Basone is an American female professional wrestler, actress, model and stuntwoman best known by her ring name Hollywood in Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling.-Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling:...
- Jane - Paul Bokor - Thresher
- Harry Armis - Narrator (male) / Jane's father