Feb 11 2009
Video Game Preview: Clay Bennett’s Franchise Robber
We here at Trail Post love to play video games. The personal fave around Trail Post central is Rock Band 2, both due to our undying love of rhythm and annoying our neighbors. Nothing can beat belting out Squeeze’s “Tempted” at 2 in the morning, with the happy knowledge that no one on the block will be able to sleep due to you.
Anyway, earlier today, an brown envelope with no return address was found on our doorstep. Inside was a copy of a game that we have never heard of. Maybe it was in deep beta or something weird like that. Trail Post does not know much about software or how to program it.
Enticing, to be sure.
It was a copy of Clay Bennett’s Franchise Robber. Oddly enough, it was beautiful, mixing all sorts of genres and had some true emotional resonance towards the end. It opens as a strict sim, as you build Bennett’s empire and attempt to sow the seeds of discontent around the NBA in then-failing franchises such as the Bucks, Blazers, and Sonics. When you get a chance to buy a team, you have a clever Parappa the Rapper-styled mini-game where you lie about your intentions to stay in the city, all while secretly hiring the staff to work the machinations to move the team to Oklahoma City. After that, there’s a part with some true moral ambiguity. You can choose to run the team you’ve bought with competence, and turn them into a championship contender and have the whole city you’re in come to love you; or you can follow the dark path, and drive the team into the ground all while begging for money for a new facility. It’s truly up to you. While the selection of teams is low, the depth of the sim and the range of choices quickly made up for that. The court proceedings are in the Phoenix Wright style, and always fun to play. There’s definitely a direction the game wants to take you, but you have to appreciate that they leave your options ambiguous.
Like any other Xbox 360 game it had a series of Achievements to unlock for worthless Gamer Points to show how much of a nerd you are to friends over Xbox Live.
Still, I really felt that the last level where you blow away Starbucks-drinking zombies Halo-style a little gratuitous.
