29 March 2008

Offensive Bimbo game angers parents



A new web-based game, Miss Bimbo, is angering parents. It is apparently teaching young women that diets, plastic surgery & breast enhancement surgery are necessary tools for achieving happiness in life.

The purpose of Miss Bimbo is for players to create a virtual "bimbo", help her maintain an ideal appearance (with the help of diet pills and plastic surgery), then buy her presents and send her out partying in order to compete with other players.

That's enough to push Miss Bimbo into "extremely offensive" territory. When players run out of "Bimbo Dollars" (used to purchase items and accomplish tasks like going to the game's plastic surgery clinic for breast enhancement surgery), the game apparently requires them to either send £1.50 text messages—or send cash via PayPal—in order to replenish the in-game funds. Last year, a man in France threatened to sue the developers when he discovered his daughter has racked up roughly $200 in phone charges by sending a number of the pricey text messages in order to increase her character's resources.

In spite of this dubious business practice, it's one that's obviously successful: the French game has over 1.2 million members, and the UK version has attracted over 200,000 players so far...

Full article here: http://arstechnica.com/journals/thumbs.ars/2008/03/28/how-to-anger-women-101

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