Platform: PC

Developer: Fictiorama Studios, BadLand Games Publishing S.L.

Publisher: Alawar Premium

Release Date: October 24, 2018

Genre:  Point and Click / Simulation / Strategy

Nerd Rating: 7 out of 10

Reviewed by Kikopaff

When I first heard about Do Not Feed the Monkeys, I knew it was going to be a hilarious comment on humanity. It’s not a petting zoo experience. Rather, it’s a videogame about whether or not humans truly have access to privacy. It’s about what we do when we have information about other people. Ultimately, it’s about our obsession with others.

Do Not Feed the Monkeys is an uncomfortable, satirical simulation that opens multiple lenses into the state of modern day society. Its commentary on electoral propaganda, Nazis, and Jehovah’s Witnesses (to name a few) offers a comedic, yet unsettling dialogue because of how honest it is. It’s loaded with references. From the Nigerian prince who needed ridiculous donations to save his kingdom to iconic names thrown around like Steve Jobs, Do Not Feed the Monkeys is so immersive, simply because it’s a world we already recognise.

You play as the newest member of The Primate Observation Club, a secret group that observes people through surveillance cameras and compromised webcams.  As you sabotage the privacy of the people you monitor, you gather information and analyse the finer details. There’s only one rule; you must not feed the people. In other words, interacting or interfering with the subjects results in severe consequences. I will keep my mouth shut to avoid spoilers, but Do Not Feed the Monkeys offers you ways to scheme and interact with the people. You never know what you might encounter after breaking a rule or two.

Keeping tabs on your subjects becomes a set routine as you familiarise yourself with their daily activities. For example, Mr Stattler (who may or may not be an elderly Adolf Hitler) always meets with his caretaker at noon. He usually talks on about how depressed and sick he feels, while his caretaker listens. In the evenings, he’ll watch an old VHS tape that contains familiar events of particular wars he may or may not have led. Despite having limited interactions with the people you monitor, you develop an intimate familiarity of their personalities, values and lifestyles. Do Not Feed the Monkeys shows the power of constant observation and how knowledge truly is power.

Gathering information is simple. Conversations appear in a text dialogue, and some words will appear in yellow. These are hints that you can collect. As you listen to more conversations, you’ll come to conclusions about your subjects. The key is to have a curious mind, as Do Not Feed the Monkeys is ultimately a point-and-click game; the more you interact with everything, the more information you’ll have.

However, gathering information feels tedious. Some conversations can go on for way too long. There also seem to be no rewards for collecting as many details about a person. For example, I gathered everything I could on Mr Stattler, and all of his conversations were getting repetitive. I couldn’t report my information to the Club, so these obsessive notes just stayed on paper, never really bringing any satisfying conclusion or “what’s next?” moment. I tried sending him Happy Pills to help ease his depression, but he rejected the package. In another case, I was spying on a grandma who lived by herself. A robber broke into her house, knocked her out, and that was it. She never woke up, and I didn’t have the option to call the police or replace her cage. Just wasted space. It’s a shame that with such genuinely exciting characters, you’re left hanging dry and with no real objective.

The progression system is also a bit bland. The Primate Observation Club requires you to have a certain number of cages by a set time. Half of the cages you purchase are uneventful feedbacks such as a highway, an airport or the camera hidden in an ATM. You can’t interact with anyone, and there is simply no way for you to gather information. It ends up taking precious space on your monitor and feels redundant.

You’ll also need to manage your personal affairs, such as sleep, diet and income. You’ll quickly learn that taking up side jobs is your way to earn cash. Not only is payment required to purchase more cages, but you also have to pay your landlady the rent and buy your groceries. Balancing your side jobs and earning enough cash feels more rewarding than gathering information on your cages, which is the opposite of Do Not Feed the Monkeys’ appeal. In the end, my experience became more about grinding for more cash and getting enough cages than enjoying the voyeuristic thrill.

But when you do get a cage with families to observe or a financial advisor with a double life, that’s when things get exciting. The cast of characters in Do Not Feed the Monkeys are some of the most hilarious and genuine people I’ve met in videogames. There’s a neighbour who looks oddly like Jesus but is completely lazy and tries to leech off of your spare cash for stupid excuses. One time he knocked on my door and asked for some money to buy a new suit for a job he applied for… a year ago. There’s an elderly mailman who is probably part blind, as he often gets your room number 16 confused with 36. The delivery guy from the game’s equivalent of Uber Eats is also incredibly mysterious, and I think he may or may not be a sociopath.

Do Not Feed the Monkeys borrows its graphic style from LucasArts’ visuals in the 1990s. The ambient sound is realistic and reminiscent of my actual apartment living; someone is hammering on the floor for hours, a sick neighbour won’t stop coughing, and traffic rolls on outside. These subtle touches create an immersive run-down apartment experience and allow you to feel like you’re monitoring a real world, with real people. It’s a shame that there’s no voice-acting as this would’ve added deeper elements into each character.

In the end, Do Not Feed the Monkeys’ conclusion was disappointing and predictable. There are various scenarios and cages to discover, as one playthrough will only show a limited number of characters. But unless you’re a completionist and want to visit every scene, consequence and cage, Do Not Feed the Monkeys is pretty straightforward.

Do Not Feed the Monkeys has a wonderfully weird cast of characters, and its commentary on social, economic and political climates is satirically hilarious and spot-on, but its gameplay experience eventually leans on the side of tedious. If you enjoy meeting funny and authentic characters or enjoy point-and-click games, you should pick up this game. Just don’t expect anything groundbreaking.