Fast-forward to 2017, and South Park came out with its own freemium game, Phone Destroyer. Players are greeted with an opening screen informing them that the game offers in-app purchases you need real money to buy. We were going to begin that last sentence with "To its credit," but no one should get credit for announcing they're doing something shitty right before doing the shitty thing.

Ubisoft

In the game, you can spend as much as $49.99 on a single transaction. With a tap, you can swap a significant amount of hard-earned real money for a fleeting handful of fake cash. You can then swap that fake cash for gold coins. Like every unethical game before it, it's trying to hide its cost in confusing layers of currency abstraction. Suddenly, having a fake clam-based monetary system in your game doesn't seem so stupid.

Ubisoft

UbisoftSo wait, how many pigs of coin gold are in a cash dollar? More than a bear, but less than an elephant? This seems weirdly, almost suspiciously, confusing.

Phone Destroyer also commits one of the most egregious video game crimes: It absolutely gives players who spend real money a competitive advantage. They get access to rare, better cards to use against other players. You can earn these cards naturally in the game, assuming you make enough healthy choices to live an unusually long life. This is unlikely if imaginary South Park battle cards interest you in any way.

The entire game is a predatory addiction vampire that rewards players who spend money, which makes it easier for them to win battles and get that sweet dopamine release, which makes them want to play more, which makes them need to spend more money. If only there was someone who had an international media platform they could use to warn people against this type of thing!

Logging back out of the game, Meg gets the classic "seven days" phone call, meaning she has been ghost-cursed and will die in a week. Strangely, she soon finds some of the same "healing jelly" in the real world while out butting heads with corporate executives and security guards.

Atari, SAYou: OK, that's weird, but not, like, "scary" weird. This Game: Watch out for tektorocks and captain poops, Meg!

In the course of investigating the company and playing more of the ridiculous game within a game, Meg learns that they are making a virus which turns people into monkey monsters in order to make them immune to the Ring ghost's attacks. It's the kind of logic you find only in video games, and not good ones. Here's how the evil executive explains it:

Atari, SA"For our species' sake ... for humanity, Sadako's curse will sweep all over the world, transforming it. So why not improve yourself with the virus? The virus promotes us, allows us beings to evolve further."

Atari, SAAnd then he turns into a monster.

Atari, SAGet him, Meg! He's immune to ghosts, not bullets!

The game ends with Meg fighting Sadako, the ghost girl, on the roof of the corporate headquarters. You'd think that battling a ghost who crawls out of TVs to devour the souls of whoever watches its VHS tape would involve some kind of complicated ritual, possibly involving an RF adapter blessed by the Broadcast Pope. But no, you just shoot her with your gun.

Atari, SAAll the best horror stories end in little girl ghosts getting shot to double-death on a roof.

Now, maybe this won't surprise you, but it gets crazier. After you gun her down, Sadako gives you a vaccine to cure the company's disease. But it's pointless. The world becomes a post-apocalyptic hellscape anyway, and the game ends with you dressed just like your character in that virtual monster-fighting game. It's both a callback and total nonsense written by a madman.

But none of that matters, because Dracula, for the Sega CD, ignores its source material altogether. Here, Keanu's Jonathan Harker is not a timid, helpless accountant engulfed in terror. He's a danger-wading kickmaster who beats bats to death with his lethal hands and feet.

Psygnosis"Eat hot Karate, bat!” -- Keanu Reeves, Bram Stoker's Dracula

The game is not a slow thriller with creepy ass-headed vampires. It's a never-ending mission for the swamp's deadliest bat-puncher to find out what's happening over on the right side of the screen. And he doesn't just kill bats. All kinds of deadly enemies come after you in Dracula for Sega CD.

Psygnosis"Hey, cat. I’m hosting a transfer student from Japan. Have you met him? His name is KARATE.” -- Keanu Reeves, Bram Stoker's Dracula

In the original story, Dracula's victims are complicated, sympathetic characters. You might remember Lucy from the movie, whom Van Helsing and his team try to rescue from Dracula's curse. In the game, Jonathan kicks her in the head until it comes off.

Psygnosis"What’s this behind your ear? Oh look, it’s KARATE.” -- Keanu Reeves, Bram Stoker's Dracula

Then again, the case could be made that Bram Stoker's Dracula for the Sega CD is, in fact, the perfect video game adaptation. If you're going to ignore the source material, you might as well make it your own, and do so as awesomely as possible. That's why Jonathan doesn't sit down for dinner with Dracula on the Sega CD. Instead, our protagonist kicks the old man in the face the moment they meet. Immortal count, meet the way of foot and fist.

Psygnosis"How did you know my one weakness: KARATE?!" - Dracula, Bram Stoker's Dracula

Jacopo (@Jacopo_della_Q) is the author of two books you should read now. This isn't the first time Mike Bedard has noticed when merchandise misses the point of the franchise. You can follow him on Twitter for more of his funny observations. Rani Baker made the video game DEATH SWORD that just won "Most Innovative" at the Intel Buzz Indie Gamedev Showcase and was showcased at the Portland Retro Gaming Convention. You can support the project here. Adam Koski also writes and produces The Vanishing Point podcast, a horror anthology show.

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For more clueless creations, check out 15 Times Characters Missed The Point Their Shows Were Making and 6 Movie Marketing Tie-Ins That Hilariously Missed The Point.

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