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Classics of Game 137

Game: Cookie's Bustle: Mysterious Bombo World (PC, Mac)

What makes it American Skydiving?

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Classics of Game 136

Game: Cookie's Bustle: Mysterious Bombo World (PC, Mac)

Cookie's Bustle features a strange blend of political violence and charming fantasy. Bombo World is partially inhabited by aliens who are staunchly contested by terrorist forces, a situation Cookie has to navigate while also competing in the Olympics and looking for her grandma. It's hard out there for a five-year-old girl like her.

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Classics of Game 135

Game: Cookie's Bustle: Mysterious Bombo World (PC, Mac)

Copyright woes aside, I do think it's very interesting that CoG devoted so many entries to showing off this game. They may not have been the first person on the internet to cover it, but these entries absolutely contributed to its ensuing momentum. Maybe they simply recognized the broad comedic appeal of Cookie's Bustle and made the most of it, or perhaps they felt strongly enough about it to want to show it off to the rest of the world.

I've seen only a bit of the game outside of these entries but the wikipedia page for Cookie's Bustle has a thorough plot synopsis that just seems insane for a point and click game where you play as a cute bear.

A hundred years prior to the events of the game, aliens crash-landed on Bombo World, a fictional island country in the South Pacific. In exchange for the aliens' technology, the President of Bombo World gave them the northern part of the island, where the aliens established Derocity. However, some of the Bombo World citizens opposed this exchange and has resulted in terrorist activity against the Bombo World government and the aliens.

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Classics of Game 134

Game: Cookie's Bustle: Mysterious Bombo World (PC, Mac)

Here we embark on the strangest leg of our journey. We'll have plenty of time to talk about the game itself, so let's start with why these next few entries don't have Youtube links:

Entries 134-141 all feature Cookie's Bustle, a charming little adventure game from 1999 that was scarcely known until it was found in a collection of obscure Japanese games leaked in 2018. Its feature on Classics of Game in 2019 immediately garnered a fair amount of interest. In 2021-2022, strange and unexplainable circumstances transpired behind closed doors, culminating in most footage of Cookie's Bustle (as well as the game itself) being wiped from Youtube and the internet at large via copyright strikes. CoG was not its only victim, as other streamers like sebmal, MelodyBurst, WordsHere and Retro Pals were caught in the crossfire.

Investigation reveals a number of suspicious factors, such as the claim being initiated by someone named Brandon White from the UK (seemingly no involvement with the developer), as well as the US trademark that perpetuated the initial strikes being attributed to a shell company registered in Andorra. The situation is full of red flags that seem to indicate the work of a very dedicated copyright troll, but a number of details make even this explanation inconclusive.

The most pressing contention is motive: Why Cookie's Bustle? Why go through all this effort, money, and red tape just to spoil people's fun in sharing a lovable, strange computer game from the late 90's? No valid explanation holds any water here. This can only be attributed to pure malevolence, the unfeeling chaos of the universe sliding its way through the fingers of bureaucrats and the unmoderated decisions of detection algorithms. Ours is not to know, only to wonder.

Thankfully, CoG broke radio silence in order to properly archive every one of their videos on Internet Archive, which is how I have this footage for you today. DMCA being what it is makes these strikes basically incontestable, even these posts may be at risk of being taken down eventually. As per the timeless wisdom of MST3K, keep circulating the tapes.

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Game: GOO! GOO! SOUNDY (PS1)

As of writing, this is the longest video in the CoG catalog. It shows a surprising amount of reverence on their part to let us listen to the whole song.

GOO! GOO! SOUNDY is a weird little DDR-style game from Konami with the bonus feature of being able to insert your own music CDs and generate beatmaps to it, similar to Vib Ribbon. This song is one of the game's original tunes, titled Ange.

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Game: Dark Tales From the Lost Soul (PS1)

This marks this game's third appearance after entries 95 and 104, adding onto its accolade as the only game to have been featured more than once (Until entry 134). CoG must really like this one.

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Game: The Mansion of Hidden Souls (Sega Saturn)

So this game has a prequel for Sega CD titled "Yumemi Yakata no Monogatari" and this game is "Shinsetsu Yumemi Yakata: Tobira no Oku ni Dareka ga..." in Japanese. In a baffling localization move, the prequel's titled in the US is "Mansion of Hidden Souls" and this one is "The Mansion of Hidden Souls", despite being an entirely different game and not a remaster or anything.

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Game: Studio P (PS1)

I wanted to know who made this song, but info about this game is scarce, there's not even an upload of the game's soundtrack anywhere. The credits attribute the music to JoeDownStudio and lists 7 individuals, which is somehow funnier than a real answer.

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Game: Download (PC Engine)

Just wait for it, trust me.

Side note, do you have any idea how hard it is to find information about a game called Download?? I was fighting Google tooth and nail to learn anything about this game.

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Game: Perfect Weapon (PS1)

No way.

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will you be talking about the lost (cookie's bustle) classics of game entries?

they're coming up in the queue. stay tuned

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Game: Foreman For Real (Genesis)

The ending of this one always cracks me up.

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Game: Eggs of Steel: Charlie's Eggcellent Adventure (PS1)

I seldom have notes for CoG, but this is one of those instances. They should have shown this version of the death cutscene:

Also, did you know this game was developed by Rhythm & Hues? Bizarre little game.

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Game: GoDai: Elemental Force (PS2)

There's a post I remember seeing a while back that sticks with me. It's been a while since I've read it so I'm sure to mess up some details, but it was some personal prose about being enamored with the player character in Bloodborne. Not in appearance, but in the effortlessness and ease with which they moved; the exhilaration of being in control of something so fast and fierce, but also fragile, like the erratic movements of a small bird. There is beauty in that thing, that dancing, whirling character on your screen who is veritably an extension of your own body. I find that post very moving but it also comes to mind when I watch this video.

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Game: Toys (SNES)

Did YOU know there was a tie-in video game with the hit movie Toys (1992)? I sure didn't.

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Game: Come On Baby (PS2)

A PS2 port of a beloved(??) arcade classic.

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Game: The Lawnmower Man (Genesis)

I've never actually seen it, but I imagine Siskel and Ebert had a lot to say about this part of the movie.