How do you feel after you’ve spent a few hours on a midway, riding the Tilt-a-Whirl and eating cotton candy while trudging through a dusty fairgrounds? You will feel much the same after buying and playing Carnival Games; slightly nauseous, gritty and greasy at the same time, and taken. The carneys have urged you into unnecessary and foolish purchases while maintaining the whole cheesy façade thing.

But this feeling is the only aspect of Carnival Games that rings true. You have been taken. None of the purported carnival atmosphere has any ring of realism to it. The twenty-five games (ranging from Dunk Tank to Milk Can Toss) have no chance to succeed. Inherently, these tasks have no depth in real life and Global Star, the publisher, has made no inroads to realism. Once you play the game (and usually succeed), you have no desire to play again. Perhaps in that way, Carnival Games does mirror real life.

The prizes are beyond belief. Gee-gaws, stuffed animals, and other fuzzy-looking prizes also reflect the real prizes you get at a carnival but who cares about getting video representations? Unlocked games only reprise earlier games with more difficult twists so you can be done with this abomination of an attempt at diversity.

Some of the auxiliary booths show some fun but that soon pales as well as you grow glassy-eyed from fried dough and giant sodas and the same carney shouting at you.