ChickenJump

What do a young lady, a construction worker, a soldier, an alien, a wizard, The Flash and Batman have in common? Well it’s obvious, they are all participating in the annual ‘Jumping over oncoming traffic’ ritual… which goes totally wrong at one point and people start to die. That’s ChickenJump for you, a wonderful and totally whacky game.

In ChickenJump things are very simple and complicated at the same time. Each player that joins in the fun is given only one key that makes his or her character jump. The goal is simple, jump at the right time to avoid being smashed to pieces by oncoming traffic and be the last one to make it out alive. And also survive the biggest number of waves, duh!

Having 8 people crowding over the same keyboard playing the same game is totally possible and fun but if some have boundary issues, the game offers support for console controllers.

In ChickenJump the character you play is randomly given and there are so many possibilities that you might give up trying to remember them all. The game rocks pretty nifty voxel based graphics which raise the casualness of the experience even more.

It looks like such a harmless and laidback game, but don’t be fooled by its apparent innocence. ChickenJump gets really tough, really fast. Each wave you successfully clear sends off a new one that comes with increased speed and this continues to happen until you prove to everyone that you have superhuman reflexes or you die.

What’s wonderful is that ChickenJump entertains you with some very strange and amusing traffic that comes your way. A tipped over fire truck with two police officers on it slides casually, hippie filled vans come at you with vengence, some drivers like to ride on the windshields and much much more.

ChickenJump is ridiculous, so ridiculous you can’t stay away from it. What’s missing are some whimsical pieces of chat between the players or the possibility to create your own characters. For example I’d enjoy the game even more playing as Kenny from South Park, you know why.