Here is a title, and theme, that is more in tune with my pseudonym, and my filthy little mind: Leisure Suit Larry Wet Dreams Don’t Dry, rebooted by Crazy Bunch.
I grew up on computer games, actual computer games that came on floppies (heh heh), and at that time in history, point and click adventure games were one of the most prominent genres and consequently, one of my preferred type of games. Most people cite The Secret of Monkey Island as the ultimate, and it’s certainly up there. However, the first point and clicks I was playing were Sierra games, not LucasArts. My choice? The Police Quest Series, Space Quest and of course, Leisure Suit Larry.
Jeitaro
Leisure Suit Larry Wet Dreams Don’t Dry Switch Review
This review will be full of sleazy references, but if that’s not what you’re into, you’ll hate the game. It may also contain nuts. I’m not going to give a full history of the series, but just a few details to speed this up:
- Larry’s goal is to get his end away.
- He seldom does.
- Larry, Larry Laffer, is the
pornpoor man’s Bond with the same buffoonery as Inspector Gadget. He’ not the sharpest tool, but usually cums out on top. - There are six (count ’em) main titles available; episode four doesn’t exist, and we don’t talk about Leisure Suit Larry: Box Office Bust or how he conveniently changed his name to Larry Lovage.
That’s not an exhaustive list so do your own research. Perhaps by playing the games. I’ve played them all except for the mobile game, and while they’re fundamentally flawed, there’s a redeeming quality about them that gives me an enormous sense of sentiment. Yes, I know they’re pervy, but it’s relatively harmless and no different than coming-of-age teen films and screwball comedies.
They’re mostly dated attitudes, but most importantly, the Leisure Suit Larry series understands its market: boys with hairy palms and generation X folk trying to relive their youth.
Paying Tribute To The Suit
Leisure Suit Larry Wet Dreams Don’t Dry pays tribute to all the games before it, and if you were there the first time or reliving them by going through abandonware or heaven forbid, got a cheap copy of Leisure Suit Larry: Box Office Bust, you’re likely to get a lot of the in-jokes. They aren’t that important though to understand as the goal is to get laid through a variety of fetch quests.
Larry awakes in the sewers, having been on ice since the late 80s (the last official title was Leisure Suit Larry: Love For Sail! in 1996), he literally surfaces in the modern age and has some catching up to do. He’s stuck in his ways, and he doesn’t share the consensus, so he’s mostly fumbling about as usual by trying to get laid, but also get his bearings with new technology, notably social media.
Instagram and Tinder are referred to, as well Apple, represented by tech giant Prune (their logo shaped like a lady garden). In one instance of dialogue, Larry asks the assistants at the Prune Brainiac counter how are sales, and there’s a snide response saying that it’s quiet as everyone knows a new device is coming out. Such is the times.
The Timber (Tinder) app is the driving force for the game as Larry is out to get the highest possible rating so that he can date Faith, a top executive at Prune. Larry will go on dates and in the process run fetch quests to help his partners so that they will, in turn, give him a high rating on Timber. This will then lead you to Faith’s heart, or in Larry’s case, her underwear.
The Modern Larry Laffer
On the first appraisal, I wasn’t that impressed with the new Larry. He’s lost a lot of weight, got significantly taller and has more hair. It also took me a while to get used to his voice as well as it was quite cringe, though it is the original voice actor. But, the rest of the cast, with one exception of a bimbo stereotype, was excellent.
As for the actual gameplay, I enjoyed it. There really is a resurgence in point and click games at the moment on the Nintendo Switch, and I have to say, I love it. There’s no rush with these sort of games, and like Leisure Suit Larry Wet Dreams Don’t Dry’s peers, it’s a bit of escapism too. The artwork is fantastic, and truly recaptures a rebooted take on the world of New Lost Wages really well.
I will say that the controls were a bit clumsy at times. The left stick moves Larry and the right stick for selecting things to interact with. It’ll never beat a mouse, but it is what it is. Jumping through the menu system was counterintuitive as I often would select an item in error, deselect it, then jump back out of the menu.
It’s not going to drive you crazy, but for the whole time playing Leisure Suit Larry Wet Dreams Don’t Dry, I couldn’t get used to some of the buttons and would end up going in and out of the menu like a teen closing the multiple sessions he has open when his folks walk in while typing one-handed.
Where’s Willy?
Leisure Suit Larry Wet Dreams Don’t Dry is like one of those books popular in the 90s: Magic Eye of Cocks. You only have to look around just briefly in a scene to see some sort of phallic reference or a gaping hole. Is it just cheap jokes? Yes, but it’s on par with the originals and in that scenario, it’s fabulous.
Larry has never been a role model, but as a male (on paper), some of us nerds/geeks can identify what it’s like to be desperate, but in a likeable way. Not me. I’m a fanny magnet.
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The puzzles are the same as always – combine a used toilet roll with an XL condom and cheese coated dildo to make a rat trap. Once you have the rat, drop it into the back of a fruit machine to get it to malfunction. I mean, this is a classic point and click, right?
Talk Dirty To Me
Another niggle about Leisure Suit Larry Wet Dreams Don’t Dry is the lack of dialogue responses. Selecting from a list is often very funny, and some of the cheap gags like 69 made me chuckle (we’ve identified my mentality, folks), but the reactions from the NPCs don’t really relate to what Larry has said. While I don’t expect there to be multiple paths in a classic point and click adventure game, I would have like to have seen a few more consequences to what you say, or the narrative oh so slightly swerve in a different direction.
The same can apply to the various items you can collect. If you try to combine an object, it’s typically the same canned response that they don’t go together. If you decide to use an item with an NPC, the same occurs – he/she wouldn’t like that.
Adventure games like this aren’t always logical, so you need the room to experiment a little. There’s still going to be a wall you smash into, not knowing what to do next, but it would have been nice to have a bit more variety and perhaps make the experimentation a little more enjoyable. A title that goes this right was The Wardrobe: Enhanced Edition – almost an entirely individual response for every bit of interaction.
And one last negative, the Timber app is an unusual addition. Access it from the phone menu, and you can see profiles to swipe left or right with. They’re usually random, unlocking new ones as you progress. However, liking them or not, it has no impact on the game at all. Some of them are funny, but seeing them over and over again gets monotonous with immediate effect. I would have liked this to have a more prominent reaction in the game.
The Money Shot
Who’s Leisure Suit Larry Wet Dreams Don’t Dry for then? Pervs. Well, a little. But it’s mostly for folk like me reliving their youth or those into their point and click adventures. Anyone not interested in going back and forth to the same locations or who doesn’t find the number 69 funny will get bored and think this is stupid. If that isn’t you, Leisure Suit Larry Wet Dreams Don’t Dry is an excellent homage to the original series and worthy of being added to the official catalogue of Laffer.
Wanna buy it? Show some love (or lust) by purchasing from my personalised Amazon link so I can buy some Kleenex.
The women (and men) have the power in Leisure Suit Larry, not Larry. You begin to feel for the fellow – he’s pretty pathetic, but to some degree, that’s what makes him equally charming and not just a horn dog. He means well, but a lot of the time he needs the dangling carrot of bumping uglies to give him that little push. Besides, it has one of my all-time favourite jingles in a game. I’m likely to hum it for the rest of the afternoon.
