by BrianC - April 16, 2005

This life of Hugh Hefner is what many people all over world dream to have. Cyberlore�s Playboy: The Mansion promises just that. Playboy: The Mansion delivers this lifestyle by allowing you to play as Hugh Hefner as he begins to build up his empire with the accompaniment of a girl on each arm. As the Man himself you will do whatever it takes to establish your own published empire by throwing parties, talking with clients and topless girls, and shake hands with some of the world�s most recognizable people.

The Sims or Playboy: The Mansion?

The game begins with you, as Hefner, in the infamous Playboy Mansion. In the mission mode you are given a set of goals to accomplish in order to publish your first magazine and begin creating your business. To put your fist magazine into print and have it hit the newsstands you must acquire one cover shot, one centerfold, one article, one interview, one essay, and one pictorial. To do this you have to first hire a staff of journalists, photographers, and girls. To get the cover shots and interviews you have to make friends and convince certain celebrities to be in the magazine.

Its fine and dandy to know that you have to meet, talk, and convince these different characters to appear one way or another in your magazine. But how do you find these people to do this? Well you throw parties of course. You can set up a party with different themes such as casual or formal or even a pool party! Once you have decided, you then have to invite certain celebrities and journalists to your party so that you can meet them and have a wild and crazy good time. Making intricate networks of friends and associates is one of the most important aspects of getting your magazine published and to become successful, but the task of doing so is surprisingly simply and as such remains to present a challenge and leaves you wishing you were doing something else with your time. The dialogue box is very simply to navigate which can save you some time in the process of making friends, business partners, and intimate relationships. Another thing you can do to make your parties a success other than having packs of beautiful Playboy Bunnies hosting it, is buying loads and loads of cool stuff for the mansion. You can decorate the mansion just as you would a house in the Sims by purchasing decorations and furniture ranging from a plant to an almost $30,000 entertainment system to rock out your mansion.

Free-form mode parallels the Sims far more, even though you still have to publish a magazine, in that you do not have a series of goals to achieve and you can just play and build your mansion and empire as you see fit.

Playboy should = good looking girls

The looks of this game brings nothing new to the yard. If you didn�t know exactly what game was running in your PlayStation 2 and saw this, chances are you would brush it off as someone was playing a good old game of The Sims. There are some differences though, such as the scantily clad characters which are fun for anyone. Even though there are a variety of skimpy clothes that you can see the Playboy Bunnies running around in, you will begin to notice that after a while the girls begin to all look the same. That is probably because there does not seem to be a large enough pool of character models for the game. The camera angle is a slight overhead view mirrored straight from The Sims�did we mention this game looks almost identical to The Sims?

I wish I had a super-cool stereo

The sounds presented in this game are nothing special. The voices seem as if they aren�t very excited when they need to be. The adult situations also bring up new sounds which are new to most games. With the purchase of a super-cool stereo system, you can have some new background music play throughout the game.

Anything Playboy Is Fun For Me

Even though this game brings little that is new there still is the fact that you can build up something from nothing, or if you do the mission-mode a little bit of something already set up for you. The premise behind Playboy: The Mansion is fun and as such you will have a good time as you make new friends and take pictures of your playmates in whatever outfits you see fit. Even with all of this stuff the game still leaves you feeling like there is something missing.

Adult Swim--All Kids Out of This Section

As the title suggests there are adult situations presented in Playboy: The Mansion. As you build up your relationships with different women you can proceed to hung and kiss them. Making out is the next step and then comes the big finish, sex. While this seems like a great idea for any Playboy fan�or for most males anyway�this game presents it in a cartoon-ish style that makes you ask the question, �am I supposed to take this sex scene for real or just laugh?� You can have sex on different pieces of furniture and that changes it up by putting you in different positions with your intimate partner, but even with these different positions the sounds associated with the performance only vary slightly. The lack of your shorts being removed also leaves room for giggles as you go through this part of the game. Playboy Bunny on Playboy Bunny is also a part of this game which brings just about as much fun to the game as does your own personal sex scenes as Hugh.

Wrapping it up...

Overall this game has not brought very much to the gaming world other than a few sex scenes and girl-on-girl kissing to a Sims-like game. If you are a diehard Sims fan and like the idea of Playboy, than this is the game for you; otherwise I suggest sticking to reading the magazine (that is if you are old enough). The ability to replay this game also depends on how much you like the Sims-style gameplay. Perhaps Playboy: The Mansion would have been a better idea as an expansion for The Sims than a stand alone game. Should you go out and buy this game? Probably not, but if you do than it won�t be a complete waste of money.