M.C. Kids (1992)

“If it’s your job to eat a frog, it’s best to do it first thing in the morning. And If it’s your job to eat two frogs, it’s best to eat the biggest one first.”
-Mark Twain

Rage Mage Reviews!

Sorry to ruin your perception of our society as a utopia but we live in a world where a fast food chain became powerful enough to create its own video game propaganda. McDonald’s. The would-be overlord of humankind. Of all the horrors of the 90’s, the creation of the interactive commercial that was M.C. Kids is up there with the worst of the worst. Unloving parents paid to put it in their homes in front of the children they didn’t love. They should’ve just hired the Burger King to shoot up their family. It would’ve been faster and they could’ve had it their way.

Because we all know that the hedonists at McDonald’s are trying to kill us, wipe out the poor and impoverished through their dirt cheap menu items made of membranes and battery acid, then rule the world from their Antarctic strongholds and usher in a new, hyper-evolved super-race of red and yellow tattooed vegans. Why else would they sell 10lbs of salty potatoes for a dollar, or 5lbs of oozing, pink rat-meat between two stale buns for a handful of chump-change?

Sure, they’ve tried to brighten things up and move away from this reputation of “widow makers” with the inclusion of their “cafe” McSalads and McSmoothies, McDeepFriedSugarCubes and McMorphine, but M.C. Kids is still out there. This NES side-scrolling platformer is still skulking around in the shadows of Ebay and emulator-hosting websites, on the prowl for anyone it can lure in with its sweet, sweet, buttery lies.

The game starts out innocently enough. Two kids (conveniently African-American and Caucasian for indoctrination purposes) are hanging out in a tent reading a book. Their names are Mick and Mack, by the way. Clever. Are both their last names “Donaldz”?

Everyone’s least favorite mascot was showing off his magic bag when the Hamburglar pilfered the package from the unpopular pedophile! Zounds! It’s up to Mick (or if you’re given to ethnic pandering, Mack) to hunt down the Hamburglar and serve up a super-sized order of brutal justice, Punisher-style. Because like any good future tyrant, Ronald McDonald is going to make a kid chase down his stolen property for him. It’s a glorified chore but you should be honored and proud that you were chosen for this task by the white-faced Führer McDespot.

What ensues will inevitably remind you of Super Mario Bros. 3, which looks like Michelangelo’s butt-naked David next to this greasy rubbish. You’ve got an overworld to waddle about where you can access various stages. In each stage you can collect golden arches, pick up and throw blocks, dive into zippers (uhhh….) and grab a card that unveils a picture piece by piece (like digital strip poker but from McDonald’s). Collect enough cards and you can move on to the next “world” in McDonald’s land and visit the next franchise character that hasn’t been relevant since Al Gore.

Yeah they dusted off the cobwebs to bring back not only Ronald himself but Birdie the Early Bird, the Professor, and Grimace. I always thought that last name was odd, since that’s the face you make during a triple-quarter-pounder McDiarrhea.

Eventually you catch up with the Hamburglar, or some crap like that. Use your block hurling skills borrowed from Super Mario Bros. 2 to knock some sense in the magic bag gone rogue. Grab Ronald’s bag of forbidden arts and return it to him for a kiss for a job well done. Just in time for another picnic! I wonder what we’ll have…

The 8-Bit Review
Visuals: 2/10
If the clothes make the man and the graphics make the game, then this game is a prepubescent nightmare of acid-tones and oily dishwater. And you’re a frickin’ hobo.

Audio: 2/10
Now I realize why my parents were always upset when we ate at McDonald’s. It wasn’t because of the crushing debt they suffered which ended up doing them in when they couldn’t pay back the mob. It wasn’t because they could somehow tell that I would grow up to be a stain on their white shag carpets. It was because of the music McDonald’s blared through crackling speakers around the ballpit, where we inevitably found ourselves for my afternoon ritual of whining, screaming, and throwing up. The music sounded like this (Warning: Backmasking in music has been proven to instill obedience to McDonald’s brand).

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4rAdDljGe0&w=560&h=315]

Gameplay: 3/10
You’ll swear you’ve played this game before. That’s because you have. It’s every platformer you’ve ever played. The only difference? They slapped the golden arches all over this thing like tramp stamps.

Narrative: 2/10
Witness a plot as convoluted as Ronald’s arteries, where uneducated children are whisked away by promises of fortune and adventure, only to be treated like cogs in an all-powerful, all-controlling corporate machine. Hey, it’s just like real life working in the food industry. Searching for the magic bag is just a red herring.

Scariness: 8/10
You don’t think clowns are scary? How about the cashiers?

Challenge: 4/10
M.C. Kids isn’t so much difficult as it is tedious, like all those trips to the dietician to try to bring down your six-digit cholesterol.

Uniqueness: 2/10
Considering how much of this game is repackaged and printed under a different label, I can’t say it’s very unique at all. But what else would we expect from a company who has long been calling tofu and bits of old cardboard “hamburger meat”? It isn’t even the only McDonald’s video game out there. Yes, there’s more. You’ll never sleep again. Only now you want to go get some Chicken McNuggets. Right now.

My Personal Grade: 2/10
I’m hatin’ it. Visit for the depression. Stay for the McDiabetes.

Aggregated Score: 3.1

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