Game “Preservation”
Mommy’s Best Games has acquired the IPs of “legendary” arcade developerOccidental Designand is wringing them for every last drop of latent cash by releasing the long-lostBumpy Grumpyon PC.
Occidental Design was the horrifically disfigured lovechild of Baer Sternmidden and William S. Fushnell, who were behind such controversial classics asRip ‘n’ Tear,Xordian Knot, andHellbombers.Bumpy Grumpyhad a regional test back in 1983, but never saw the light of day beyond that. Occidental Design then faced bankruptcy multiple times before giving up in the face of horrible poverty in the early ‘90s.
For almost all of us, this will be the first time we get to experienceBumpy Grumpy, and it’s actually quite surprising that Mommy’s Best Games was able to salvage working code from the diseased corpse of Occidental Design.
Not really.
I wasn’t planning on even doing this bit. Since my editors would likely be mad at me for misleading our readership, I should probably stop here. I only recently escaped the Destructoid Death Maze after the last incident. I can’t bear to be thrown back in there.
For real, though
Mommy’s Best Games head guy, Nathan Fouts, emailed me with this ruse. They’ve set up a website doling out the “history” of Occidental Design, and the whole thing is pretty fun. Creatinga fake historyof a retro-inspired game is a pretty great way to market it, and I enjoyed reading through it.
Bumpy Grumpyis actually a real game, though, and there’s aSteam page to prove it. Mommy’s Best Games was behindShoot 1UP, which you’d probably recognize if you hung around XBLA back in the early ‘10s. It’s the shoot-’em-up that advertised itself using the lady with robot tits. I never even played it, but I can absolutely remember those metallic mammaries.
WhileBumpy Grumpyis a lane-changing driving game, and that isn’t exactly the most unheard of genre, its commitment to the lost arcade aesthetic is a nice draw. Its marketing has certainly grabbed my attention, so well played.
Currently,Bumpy Grumpywill release strictly on PC. No release window has been given.
