Super Chicken Jumper | PS4

Bullsh*t! Bullsh*t!! Bullsh*t!!! You say "Bullsh*t" out loud three times in front of your favorite gaming rig, and EastAsiaSoft's "Super Chicken Jumper" will Bullsh*t you. If you thought Flappy Bird was bad you ain't seen nothing yet. This randomly generated, and player predictive auto-runner/jumper has you attempting to do the impossible. In fact I don't think the game was actually meant to be beaten it's so stacked against your every effort. You actually earn trophies for dying a lot, and if that's not telling I don't know what is.

As a president appointed savior you, the chicken, must battle the evil that is XX. A terrorist organization that is creating monsters to take over the world. As a flightless master of disguise, gadgets, and weapons you are tasked with running, jumping, attacking, and dodging all manner of creatures and obstacles as you go to fight the fiend at the end of each set of runs. Each time you fail, the entire run from the creatures to the static obstacles, are randomized creating a pattern of threats that are both unpredictable, and also geared towards cheating you of your finish line victory. As short as each run may be it is a hard lesson in not giving up. Perhaps the hardest version of that lesson ever created. It will test your willingness to see it through to the end in every imaginable way. If you have anxiety issues be warned. It is wholly unforgiving, and rigged to read your every move.

Dare I say it but compared to the difficulty of the Soulsborne genre, "Super Chicken Jumper" beats those games by a country mile. I'm not even joking. At least with Soulsborne games you can grind your way through, and learn enemy patterns and positions. Here though there are no concrete patterns to learn. Everything from obstacle placement to creature patterns are randomized, and roguelike to the extreme. Not only that, but the enemies themselves seemingly know your next move before you press a button. As if there's predictive programming at play. The game might be sentient for all I know.

As a Chicken agent without a voice you are summoned by Mrs. President. A woman president with a penchant for punchlines, and puns without the humor. Accompanied by a group of girls with personality quirks, and flaws Chicken is given the gist of each mission before it's mission directors lay back and watch it fail, time and time again. Almost as if they expect nothing less than failure. When you succeed, in the rare instances you do, they act surprised. Leading you onward to the next objective or boss battle, in kind.

As you automatically run, and manually jump via the press of a button through short story driven stages within the Story Mode you will be tasked with dodging, and taking out enemies/obstacles up to the marked finish line meter that follows your progress. This includes using the items, and weapons obtained through each set of runs. There are eight items and eight weapons in total. The items gift mobility and jumping options while the weapons give you a means with which to clear obstacles, and enemies. Most of what you'll be doing is jumping and dodging to the best of your ability as weapons hardly help in most situations outside of the boss battles. When you do make it to a boss their patterns are also random in nature, and dealing a hit will depend solely on the boss you are facing. Each boss has a life bar that must be depleted by either direct weapon contact or by bouncing back that boss's projectiles towards it.

Between the running and jumping lies contextual conversations accented by pixel avatar art and sandwiched between the wacky words of Chicken, Mrs. President, and her agents. A comic relief setup to lighten the impact of the frustration caused by the many unavoidable deaths you'll face while playing. Somewhere in the midst of it all though is a definitive end, and rewards for efforts rendered. Seeing it through to the end though is a true test of patience, and perseverance. Do you have what it takes to defy all odds?

Beyond the Story gameplay does come in two other alternative modes of play. There is a story free Arcade style mode without the story bits as well as an Endless mode which keeps the main mechanics intact including the randomized elements. It's a little something different, but something that's just as frustrating, if not more so. 

Bonuses in this mettle testing mission impossible include three different screen filters, and some graphics adjustments. You have the base indie graphics, a CRT scanline filter, and a B&W old school filter for changing the visuals with. Additionally you can toggle on/off the wavy animations making it less nauseating. The game has moving parallax panels for the foreground, and background which can create motion sickness situations for the gamer. Something to keep in mind when playing.

The Verdict ...

At first I was really digging the artistic design of "Super Chicken Jumper". It had a cool Chicken protagonist, and an interesting assortment of support characters, but all that was lost to gameplay that was purposefully meant to cheat the gamer. The randomization of features, and the predictive nature of enemy patterns made a playthrough a true Sisyphean feat. The probability of anyone completing this game, and muscling through the bullsh*t to earn all trophies is almost zero. I wish, in all honesty, that patterns were static, and obstacle placement equally as so. It would have made for a challenging, but doable experience. Sadly, that is not the case. Thus it fails to earn my support. Unless you are glutton for punishment, and enjoy that sort of thing this is not a game that's worth your money. It could make for some hilarious streams though ...