Code Monkeys

I barely heard anything about this show, but I happened to be watching G4 the night the series premiered, and I have to say I was stunned. This is, quite simply, the best video game related cartoon EVER. Every part of this show is a reference to videogames, from the health bar and score at the top of the screen, to the brief "PAUSE" message right before commercials (including the trademark pause ding like Mario games have). The humor is a lot like Aqua Teen Hunger Force, though the stories are more cohesive than ATHF's. The show has the visual style of an 8-bit game (a close comparison would be to the Rise of the Mushroom Kingdom series at VGDC.com, although stylistically it looks more like River City Ransom) However, this innocent presentation belies the highly offensive content, which includes plenty of swearing, lots of video game violence, and even one scene were one character paints his penis green after a hard night of partying. Yet, so much attention is put into little details, where hardcore gamers will notice many things from many old classic games and probably read into many things that casual viewers wouldn't even notice. If G4 ever needed a show to get them more attention from the masses, this would be it. Whether that's a good thing or not is yet to be seen, but I can say that Code Monkeys is brilliant and I hope it stays on the air for a long time.

Alright, so I'm a kid of the 90s. I grew up on NES and SNES games, and the old 8-bit and 16-bit technology is just nostalgia to me. I loved it, and still do. Now that I'm in my upper teens, I am able to enjoy everything this show has to offer, and not just the appearance...although the appearance in and of itself is extremely enjoyable as well.

The show rules, man. Inventive characters and good voice acting combined with out-of-the-park hilarity and a plethora of references to early gaming makes this show one of the absolute funniest I have ever seen. It's something that you don't have to be extremely in-tune with the gaming community to enjoy, and yet being part of it makes the show all the more enjoyable.

Some people may not like it because of its odd and sometimes inappropriate humor, some may not like it because it reminds them of that one level that they just couldn't beat when they were an acne-infested junior in high school, dropping quarter after quarter into that dang machine to no avail. And some may not like it because they simply can't be pleased.

Thankfully, I am not one of those people. This show gets a 10/10 for me. I certainly hope that they continue with the show and make more seasons of the fine, fine product that is Code Monkeys.

*GAME OVER*

As a hardcore gamer geek, this show really speaks to me. I've been gaming for twenty-some years and counting, and this wonderful show is riddled with game-related jokes from start to finish. I don't expect non-gamers to appreciate it too well, but anybody that's spend a decade or two with a game controller in hand should find the show entertaining enough.

It has the silly absurdity of South Park, not to mention the vulgarity, but the cast of characters are adults working at a fictitious game development studio. The art direction is interesting because it's obviously intended to appear like a classic 8-bit video game, on a system like the NES, complete with overly-pixilated character sprites. Each episode is intended to appear as if playing some sort of weird video game, with each show beginning with a start screen and ending with a "game over" screen, and typical in-game stuff like a score or health meter appears at the top of the screen, though sometimes swapped out with other gaming oddities like items collected. The show pauses for commercial breaks.

I wouldn't recommend this show to non-gamers, but to the hundreds of millions of gamers out there, this show comes highly recommended.

I found Code Monkeys a great time-waster. Along with The IT Crowd on G4TechTV, both these shows have an original flavour that feels new - at least until Adult Swim brings back the Venture brothers. Like the Venture brothers and honestly, Arrested Development, I find the humour layered and easy to watch repeatedly just to pick up on the embedded 80's pop culture references and visual gags you missed the first time you watched it. (with a WTF look on your face, no doubt) Hat's off to the writers and animators for really thinking out some of the visuals that only a few hard-core gamers over 40 might get. Pop culture references are great to hear (Steve Wozniak from Apple and "Bellecovision" for example) and watching the programming hacks proudly crank out these atrocious games is hilarious. Borderline racist, sexist, vulgar and generally no boundaries to contain the direction they want to take the episode, it's a poke at the terrible games we used to enjoy when we were young - with some updated Seth MacFarlane-esquire dialogue thrown in for good measure. It's not going to be for everyone's taste but for some late-night PVR viewing, it goes down good with a bottle of night-time cough syrup, hit from the bong or even straight-up.

code monkeys is a great show... in fact one of the best to hit g-4 since x-play. It is actually something to watch that has the humor of shows like south park, family guy, and a lot of original stuff. And it manages to make every episode have a bunch of moments that you and your friends will constantly be quoting the next day.

aright, down to business, I've already established code monkeys is great, but what makes it so great? well...

graphics- if you want to get technical they're a combination of 8 bit characters in a somewhat 32 bit environment. The characters flow and although their mouths can only make 4 different poses they still manage to pull off the talking audio- the voice acting is amazing, if they want a character to be crazy, he's crazy, if they want a dumb a$$, then hes dumb... and it executions it with some of the funnest lines I've heard in a long time humor- "I leaned over to kiss your face, but i punched it instead" style- with a bar up above to mock classic video game menus and features and all of the words being in 8 bit and the fire and bullets mocking Zelda and Contra its an awesome experience.

overall- ITS AWESOME