 Hello and welcome to my bungalow of blood. Join me and my roommates, Dr. Ed, Nurse Natasha, Gary Gray, and Hans the Butler as we talk about all things horror. Today, I'd like to talk about what I think is one of the most underrated horror video games of all time. Wait! You play video games? Growing up in the early 90s, who didn't have an NES? I didn't. Well, to tell you the truth, I've never been a huge gamer. As a kid, I rarely ever played a game until it's completion and only had a handful of games. Super Mario Bros. 3. Everyone had that. Back to the future 2 and 3. What a complete piece of shit. And Maniac Mansion. Ooh, I've never heard of that one. During recess at school, all the other kids would be talking about Metroid and Castlevania. I had mentioned my favorite video game of all time, Maniac Mansion. No one knew what the hell I was talking about. Maniac Mansion was the only video game I ever got totally immersed in and obsessed with. As soon as I saw that cover art, I had to play it. I wanted to be just like Sid with the yellow skinny tie, black suit, and cool shades. Unfortunately, I went bald. And within seconds of gameplay and hearing that infectious music, I was sucked right in. And being a young horror movie fan growing up on mad scientist and monster movies, it was the perfect game for me. Let me guess, you're an only child. I will admit that I'm not a video game expert, but growing up in the 90s, I didn't know any other kid who played this game. And now more than 30 years later, I don't really hear much about it at all. So I've come to the conclusion that Maniac Mansion is one of the most underrated horror video games of all time. No, you're wrong. It's Hugo's House of Horrors. Actually, it is very similar to the DOS adventure game Hugo's House of Horrors. But sorry, Ed, this came out first. It's much better. It's much harder and way more groundbreaking. And it has a sexy nerters! Maniac Mansion was developed by Lucasfilm Games. George Lucas from Star Wars? Yes, it was founded by George Lucas and was later renamed LucasArts. The mansion in the game is actually modeled after his real mansion on Skywalker Wrench. The game was conceived by Ron Gilbert and Gary Winnick in 1985. They wanted to make a video game inspired by B-Hore movies. My kind of game! After two years of hard work, writing and programming, Maniac Mansion was released in 1987 on several different platforms. The Commodore 64, the Apple II, the IBM PC, the Amiga, the Atari ST, and eventually on the NES, which is the version I owned. And they all had different graphics and a different soundtrack. The Amiga had the best graphics! The NES version had the best soundtrack. It's fucking kickass! Just look at the NES opening scene. The title is drenched in blood. We see a meteor crashing next to a mansion on a hill, then all the lights in the mansion turn on. Been there done that! You play as the main character Dave, who has to save his girlfriend Sandy who is abducted by the evil Dr. Fred who lives in this spooky mansion. Dr. Fred sounds too much like Dr. Ed. This guy's gonna give me a bad rap. You pick two of his friends to help you save Sandy. You can pick from Bernard, Razer, Wendy, Jeff, Sid, and Michael, each of which have a different skill set. But how do you know who to choose? Well that's the great thing about this game. You have to beat it differently depending on the characters you choose, resulting in multiple different endings. But how do you play the game? Well Maniac Mansion is a point and click adventure game where you have to collect items and clues, making your way through the mansion to get to Dr. Fred's secret lab to save Sandy. All while trying not to get yourself killed or getting caught by the house's other inhabitants. A pair of severed tentacles, Nurse Edna and Weird Ed. Hey who are you calling weird, asshole? As a kid I got bored of side-scroller games very easily, so this was a perfect game for a strange little guy like me. I got to stretch my imagination, exploring my dream house, a mad scientist mansion. It had a blood splattered chainsaw hanging on the kitchen wall, a dungeon with secret escape routes, a bathroom with a dead corpse hanging in the tub, secret doors, rooms and passageways. All while trying to find this elusive laboratory, this was right in my wheelhouse and it was fucking hard. It doesn't sound like this game was for kids. I don't think this game was for kids. From the immensely complicated chain of events you have to set in motion to beat the game to its very very dark sense of humor, it was really geared towards adults. I have a sick sense of humor, give me an example. Well just to name a few, when Nurse Edna catches you she brings you down to the dungeon and she says she should have kept you tied to her bed instead. On the shower tiles is written for a good time called Edna. And just look at her room, look at that bed, look at the heart shaped pillows. Nurse Edna is a sex fiend. Another example of the very dark sense of humor in the game is you can steal a weird Ed's hamster, put it in the microwave and make it explode. Oh no! Not to mention all the crazy ways you can kill off the kids. If you give Ed's nuked hamster back to him, which is a very sick thing to do, Ed will kill you. If you decide to fill up a jar with the radioactive water in the pool and put it in the microwave, the steam will kill you. You can drain the outdoor pool to reveal a nuclear reactor. If you turn the water back on with the kids still in the pool, you'll drown them. There's also ways to kill all the kids at once. If you don't refill the pool in time, the reactor will overheat and the house will explode? You got it, and if you push the mysterious red button in the pool, the house will explode. And if you shut off the power to the house and wait too long before turning it back on, you win? The house will explode. So many glorious ways to die, but how do you beat the game? Now that is a loaded question, because it depends on the characters that you choose. It's a long, stressful journey to get to the secret lab. You have to do all sorts of crazy things, like use an exercise machine to get strong enough to pull the grate out from under the house, to then drain the pool to get objects at the bottom. You have to find paint remover and use it on a random wall to reveal a secret door. You have to find a blank tape, take it upstairs to the music room, put it in the tape recorder, record a high pitch that is on the record player, bring the tape back downstairs, play it in the living room stereo system, then the chandelier will explode and you can get a key. Personally, I've only ever beaten the game with Bernard, who I always thought looked like a popular YouTube personality. I do not look like Bernard! Long story short, Bernard is good with electronics, so he can fix the radio upstairs with a spare tube that you have to find. You can then call the meteor police, who will come and take away the evil meteor that is brainwashing Dr. Fred. As far as I can tell, that's the easiest way to beat the game. You call that easy? You can beat the game a sit and razor both the same way because they're musicians. You actually have to record a demo tape in the music room and then mail it to a publisher. But wait, you just can't open the envelope and put the tape in, because if you do, you can't reseal it because the envelope's already sealed. You actually have to put the envelope in the microwave with a jar of water to steam the envelope open. You can then reseal it and mail it. The publisher loves the demo tape and mails you back a record contract. You use the record contract to bribe the green tentacle, who will then help you get into the secret lab. Wendy's ending is very similar, but she's an aspiring writer, so you actually have to find a manuscript and a vault. She will then revise it and mail it off to the same publisher. That publisher will then send you back a book publishing deal that you use to show to the purple tentacle who will then let you into the lab. Michael's skill is photography and he can develop Weird Ed's secret plans. Weird Ed will then help you get into the lab. All these different events is really just to get past the purple tentacle guarding the laboratory. Once you get past the purple tentacle, you get to Dr. Fred, who's being brainwashed by an evil meteor. Once you get into the secret lab, you can then get to the evil meteorite. First, you have to put on a radioactive suit or else you will die. You can then turn off the mind control machine controlling Dr. Fred. But wait, it's not over yet, you still have to dispose of the meteorite. You can then take the meteorite, put it in the back of the Edsel car in the garage, turn on the car with one of the keys you have found, the car will then drive off into space taking the meteorite with it. But hold on, if you happen to wander into the garage mid-game and turn on the car and have it fly off without the meteorite, you can't beat the game. Holy shit, how would anyone figure out to do all that stuff? Well, the game shipped with a giant poster that was full of clues in the form of a high school bulletin board. Nintendo Power also released an issue with hints and clues. But wait, how do you beat the game with the blonde surfer man? Well, you actually can't beat the game with Jeff, he's got no skills to help you beat the game and neither does the main character Dave. Is that some sort of comment on surfer dudes? Bunch of useless pricks. Maniac Mansion sounds like it would make a great movie. Yes, I always thought that Maniac Mansion would make a great film if done in the style of a campy B-Hore movie. George Lucas should write it. Fuck no! It was developed by LucasArts so maybe there's a slim chance one day it will be adapted to the big screen. The game is very cinematic. Just look at the opening scene in Glorious 8-Bit, the moon lingering large in the sky. Imagine seeing that on a real hilltop on the big screen with the moon glaring down upon our cast of characters. I would actually start the movie off with Dr. Fred abducting Sandy during the opening credits. Then it cuts to Dave barreling down the highway in an old beat-up car with all of his friends crammed in the back as they devise a way to get into the mansion. You couldn't use every aspect of the game in a movie, but you can definitely use most of it. You can build tons of tension as they try to break into the house. Sneaking through the dark hallways trying not to get caught by its inhabitants. There would be a great jump scare when you first encounter Nurse Edna in the kitchen. Just imagine the light from inside of the fridge illuminating her grotesque face. It's just me, silly! And what's a horror movie without some great kills? You can use most of the kills from the game and that's where all the dark humor would come from. Think Night of the Creeps meets the burbs meets people under the stairs. That's exactly what a Maniac Mansion movie should be. Creepy, fun, and campy. If I had the time and money, I'd make a Maniac Mansion fan film right now. I can play Dr. Fred! I can play Nurse Edna! I can play the meteor! In the early 90s there was a show called Maniac Mansion, loosely based off the video game. It was developed by Eugene Levy from SCTV in Schitt's Creek. It also starred as SCTV co-star Joel Flaherty as Dr. Fred. That sounds like it would be great! On paper it does and oh boy was I excited when I found out there's a TV show based on my favorite video game. Until I saw it. It was as boring as fuck! It was just a plain old crappy Canadian sitcom. It had nothing to do with the game whatsoever. All the characters were boring. The mansion was boring. The dark humor and horror elements were all gone. Very loosely based on the game. And somehow it ran for three seasons. Who's watching this shit? It definitely wasn't me and I was a die-hard fan of the game. Every time I see that lame opening with that shitty music it just makes my blood boil. Me too Ed. Me too. And there was no sexy Nurse! How did you ever get the impression Nurse Edna was sexy? I just assumed. Despite it having a really bad TV adaption and not being really popular with the kids, it did leave behind a legacy. The mansion that was built for the game was very cutting edge at the time and was used in several other LucasArts games afterwards. It abolished the horrible syntax adventure game where you had to guess what commands to type in and hope they would work. It spawned a sequel, Day of the Tentacle. And there's even a few fan made movie trailers up on YouTube. And there's also a fan made 3D remake called Meteor Mask that's been in development for a very very long time. Ah that will never be released. So to end my case as to why Maniac Mansion is one of the most underrated horror video games of all time. It was scary, it was funny, it was smart, it had blood and mad scientists and monsters and cool deaths. And no one I knew ever played the game. So if you agree with me and love this game too, please let me know. And hopefully one day we'll see a modern remake of this game or if we're really lucky, a version on the big screen. Directed by Rob Zombie. Over my dead fucking body.