Since no video game is one hundred percent perfect, people have come to recognize some quirky little patterns, especially in adventure and platform games. There are games that are “stupid funny” or “eerie cool” and so forth. Seymour Goes to Hollywood is “stupid cute.” Starring some breed of unidentified slug-type of gastropod, Seymour Goes to Hollywood is an action adventure hybrid that was developed by Big Red Software and released for play on the personal computer by Codemasters in the early nineties. It was converted to many other formats, including the Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, and the Atari.
The entire game plays out in the third person perspective and features some fun and colorful animated characters and graphics.
The story of Seymour is not unusual, until one takes into account that Seymour is a slug with eyeballs and hands. He wants to go to Hollywood in order to become a famous film star. He has to start at the bottom, like everyone else, and his first big order of business after arriving in limousine style is to get the guard to let him into the Studios. Once inside, Seymour will watch and help on the production of some big films while learning the ropes. Gamers will likely recognize the sets of “King Kong,” “The Wizard of Oz,” “Grease,” and other
classic blockbusters. He will have to do all sorts of “gopher” type jobs, solve problems on the sets and so forth, all in an effort to get noticed and get his big break. The player will have to help Seymour to find lost props, improve morale on the set, and help keep filming running at an acceptable pace.
Seymour Goes to Hollywood is definitely “stupid cute.” Why a slug/blob/alien would go to Hollywood and expect to get cast as a leading man/thing in a major production has no good answer. However, there are almost one hundred different screens filled with puzzles and clues and other fun. The game is richly colored, and brilliantly set up. The soundtrack is awesome too. The puzzles are goofy, but fun to solve and very in character with the plot and Seymour.
Overall, Seymour Goes to Hollywood is a surprisingly brilliant little game. Codemasters threw many of their usual tricks and pranks into the game, as well as their normal humor and fun. There is a large menu of items that are interactive, and with the large number of screens, SGH is not a short play, but rather a drawn-out, time consuming blob of entertainment. It comes strongly recommended for play, especially by fans of adventure games, animated characters, and unidentified white gastropodish creatures!!
