What is Garten of Banban?

Garten of Banban is a series of computer video games where you play as a parent who is looking for his child after all the toddlers disappeared from the Kindergarten in which they were studying. Despite its poor quality and its uninteresting lore, this video game is extremely popular, specially among children. 

Garten of Banban is supposed to be a horror game but it can barely make you nervous. It is a Mascot Horror video game, a kind of video game where the player is hunted by usually family-friendly mascots who are evil. It usually involves some evil corporation infusing people's souls inside the mascot. 

It's popularity is the only reason I decided to make a brief post about it, because I don't understand why people are so obsessed with it. Its like Smells Like Teen Spirit, a song which is extremely abominable and unlikable and yet people went so mad with it that they somehow remember this song better than the others. Would it be diabolical intervention? Maybe yes, maybe not. But as a religious parent, it is your duty to learn, even if you forget. 

The Lore

There is nothing deep on the story of the game: There was a Kindergarten which also had a secret underground complex in which clay figures where injected DNA and given life with a fantasy substance called Givanium. Giving life to clay figures is something only God can do, and outside of breeding and IVF I don't see how you can give life with anything, no matter how fancy you name it. 

These creatures were meant to be with the toddlers for some reason, but something went awry and the children disappeared. You have to solve extremely easy puzzles to find out what is going on, eventually descending deeply into the iceberg. There you find multiple colorful characters, as well as notes describing their formation. 

The Characters

Banban is the titular character. He looks like a cookie cutter demon character. Banban has 2 personalities: one in which he is friendly but calculating and cold, and another where he goes insane and starts attacking people. 

His name is similar to the name Balban, the demon responsible for the possession of Magdalena de la Cruz, a spanish nun. Balban and his girlfriend played miracle pranks on the spanish royalty for money until their circus was discovered.

Banbaleena is like a female version of Banban. A cookie cutter demon character, but she is white and has a bow She thinks she is a teacher, and she has the only creepy jumpscare in the whole games:

Stinger Flynn is an orange jellyfish with one eye. Stinger Flynn says he would love to be a brainless jellyfish, floating around with no purpose instead of being in his current form. 

Forgive me if I am wrong, but I feel this kind of melancholic existential drivel is not something that would drive 8th year old children crazy for a video game. On the other hand I have been depressed before and I understand why someone on this state would wish to be a brainless jellyfish with no torments. 

Stinger Flynn is highly intelligent and apparently has physic poison, because he induces hallucinations on the player character. Is this a reference to drugs or it was just because the developers thought it would be good? I don't know, but I think you should be informed. 

Bouncelia is a purple kangaroo that keeps her pouch closed shut. Bitter-Giggle is an ugly cookie cutter character with a green, bald side and a purple, hairy side. If Two-Faced Joker manages to make the kangaroo laugh, she will release from her pouch three evil entities.

The Shady Developers: Euphoric Brothers

The Euphoric Brothers have been widely criticized for their poor game designing, specially on the programming of the characters. 

However, they have also been rightly condemned by making a "comedy game" about school shootings. It would be terrible if a child learns about this game through Garten of Banban and plays it. 

It seems to us that the Euphoric Brothers are provocateurs willing to turn attention to themselves by scandal and controversy. However, even if our impressions are wrong, I think this people should not be admired by children. 

Conclusion 

What is Garten of Banban? A waste of time. Why is it so popular? Part of its fame may very well come from funny or charismatic gamers who scream hilariously while streaming the game on Twitch or You Tube. But even then, why are the gamers playing it on the first place? Other mascot horror games like Joyville or My Friendly Neighborhood, who offer more interesting stories or puzzles, have not induced such an expansive obsession.

Perhaps it is the fact that it is not scary? Children want to play horror games because it is fashionable, but darker games like Dead Space give them nightmares so they prefer to take it tame. 

In any way, let's hope that the popularity of this thing will not worsen our current condition.  

Some Nice Little Anecdotes from the Novus Ordo

 When I was a teen (around late 2015 early 2016) we used to assist every Thursday to a small novus ordo "youth group" in a very ugly hotel full of spiders, weeds and uncanny green carpets. We would sit upon the dirt of the creepy playground near the pool, play some "meaningful" games and maybe receive some information on typical mexican novus ordo conservative talking points like the pro-life movement, the divine mercy devotion or the poor. 

Mass migration was a talking point as well. In our town we used to receive the visits of this poor souls, coming from central america all sun-baked and hungry, the dried out prey of human traffickers, american groomers and drug dealers. They prowled around the streets asking for money or food, and would bless those who gave them charity. To say that the mexican people would be nice to them is a lie; many of them were rude or just ignored them. 

The reason there were so many of them is that the railways passed very near to our town; if the train was going slow, they could leap from it.

 Right in front of those railways there was some sort of adobe shed, stuffed with food and other good things. When the train passed in front of them, people would throw food bags or medicines to the migrants, hoping they would benefit from it. 

Out not-so-bright "youth group" took us excitedly in a trip to the railways, as if we were to see the zookeeper feeding orcas or monkeys.  There was a dude right there and he explained us how he ran his charity organization. They would throw food if the migrants could not stop, and if they managed to descend, they would provide them medicines, a shower, warm clothings and maybe a place to sleep. 

All of this is very nice, but of course it is not the whole story. The illegals are victims of the establishment just as everyone else. 

The guy told us that instead of giving them money, we should give them food or bottled water. Why? because giving them money would make them wish to stay in Mexico. 

Yes, I am not lying. This dude didn't wanted illegals on his land. Also, I realize now he said something very stupid, because if we gave them money, they would probably start buying food first. He told us some migrants would express their desire to stay in Mexico and he would tell them no. "They should go to the United States" "Such was their intention, that's their final destination". 

And all of this was very surprising to me, because in Mexico they would have it easier in some ways. There would be less language barriers and their culture, while different, is probably very similar to ours. Not all mexican towns are ridden with rampant insecurity and mass shootings; in fact our state is pretty safe. 

If they continued their long travel to the US, they would face the difficulties that arise from travelling illegally: human traffickers, angry locals, unscrupulous coyotes and of course the dangers of the desert,  diseases and starvation. Do they not travel to help their families back in their countries? Months of travelling to America would mean their children would be going on without help for longer. But this guy didn't care. "Such was their intention, that's their final destination". 

And nobody objected to his sayings. After seeing the "feed the migrant" show, we left the place and went back home. 

This was around the last months we remained in the novus ordo. First, we stopped going to the liturgy of encounter with the bread. This started around November 2015. Then we dropped the youth group. I think the final straw came in March 2016, when my father and my brother went to the celebration in Ash Wednesday and there was a nun consecrating hosts. 

The last novus ordo liturgy I attended to was a depressing "sunday mass" accompanied with some sort of band, celebrated on the street under a white plastic canopy, all the picnic chairs looking at a square house garage full of religious images. 

I have never gone to a novus ordo mass since then, and I don't miss it.