It’s a pixelated life!

Is it just me, or are children’s video games getting weirder and weirder?

 Nintendo DS has a number of “virtual” games out.  One is called “Cooking Mama” in which “Mama” (the person playing the game) virtually chops, fries, slices, cuts meat, flips, cooks, and arranges food on plates.  Cooking Mama has recently started advertising an all new version of the game–”Cooking Mama World Kitchen”–with recipes from all arond the world.  The commercial actually includes the disclaimer: “Cooking Mama isn’t intended to replace your real mama.  She just cooks better.”  Real sensitive.  And if the whole virtual reality thing isn’t weird enough, the game gets creepy too.  If at any stage of meal preparation ”Mama” messes up, Satanic-looking “Mama” with flames in her eyes pops up on the screen, which says “Don’t worry, Mama will fix it!”

Another virtual Nintendo DS game, this one called “My Baby”, lets players put to bed, nurture, tickle, feed, change, and control the dreams of a simulated baby.  Throughout the game, the baby grows (both in size and in intellect), and a doctor periodically stops by to quiz you on the rules about keeping babies, well….not dead.  Oh, but the coolest thing is that you can control your simulated baby’s dreams.  You can also put up virtual “Big Brother is Watching You” posters, and virtually remove the word “I” from the simulated world.  Well….I’m actually kidding about that last part.

In case whiny little brats aren’t your thing, Nintendo DS also has virtual reality games for those of us who would like to live vicariously through whiny older brats.  In “Imagine Movie Star” you are Hollywood’s next “It” girl.  Go to parties and nightclubs you’d never be invited to in the real world.  Wear the latest trends.  Go to auditions.  Make friends–with other pixelated celebs, that is.  And most of all, forget the fact that nobody showed up to your birthday party, and the fact that you were egged at the school dance.   

Wow.  So I just noticed that each little segment got more and more cynical.  I’ve been watching the House marathon on USA; I can’t help but taking on his tone.