Neighbors from Hell... I've experienced a few of those in my lifetime. And I've been On Vacation where some decidedly nasty and uncouth folks' seemed to be there solely to make everyone else's life a living hell. But if you're like me, you probably never knew there was a "reality TV" game series based on them, now did you?

So what is Neighbors From Hell: On Vacation>? For starters, it's an extremely unique and creatively comedic strategy game where the whole premise of the game is to play pranks on your nasty neighbor, and it's all done for audience laughs. Here's the setup: the "game" is centered on the exploits of a "reality television" show called Neighbors from Hell. The host, Woody, has a camera crew that follows him around (ala The Office) as he plays practical jokes (ala MTV's Punk'd) on the obscenely unpleasant "neighbor from hell" and his nearly as obscene mother. In order to progress through the show's 14 episodes (the game's 14 levels), you need to score high viewer ratings. This is achieved by successfully executing pranks on them - without being caught.

In this sequel, the neighbor decides to go on a vacation, and it's up to Woody and his crew to make sure he gets inundated by all the delicious slapstick-ian tomfoolery that you can dish out. OV sports six different "episode" locations including a cruise ship, China, India, and Mexico. Controls couldn't be simpler. To say OV is a point 'n' click game is overstating things. As you'll soon learn, the crux of the game involves looking for objects that can be used with other "fixed" items within the environment. You'll spend the majority of your time trying to find which two objects go great together... not unlike chocolate and peanut butter.
For instance, you'll search the bathroom and find a bar of soap that you take upstairs to the kitchen and mix with a puddle of water in order to make the neighbor slip and fall. Or you'll find a felt tip marker in a bedroom dresser that let's you draw a face on the picture of the hellish neighbor's mother in the living room. Eggs found in the refrigerator work wonders when popped into the microwave, or putting laxatives in the beer, or plugging up the toilet with a roll of tissue paper... juvenile, crude, slapstick comedy at its finest!

Each "episode" is split into several different sections on the screen, which scroll sideways and up and down to expand the viewing area. You control Woody, who is able to roam about freely looking for stuff and setting up pranks. The nasty neighbor usually follows a routine of fairly pointless tasks illustrated by pictographs that appear in thought bubbles. It's imperative you watch these as it tells you what he's going to do next because you do not want to get caught red-handed. If you do, you'll receive a serious beating at the calloused hands of the unruly thug and the "episode" comes to a screeching halt in failure, not to mention poor ratings. Each new show has an allotted number of pranks that you must accomplish successfully, and the number increases with each succeeding episode. Obviously, as you progress it becomes more and more difficult since there are more objects to search, targets to avoid, and more elaborate pranks to pull off (which require more and more time to set up).

All of this comedic merriment is presented in a very "cartoony" look that's perfectly suited for a game like this. It reminded me a lot of the dynamically clay-mated duo of Wallace & Gromit. So don't let the insanely low system requirements (when was the last time you saw a game that only asked for a Pentium II 233 MHz, sporting 128 megs of system RAM and a lowly 8 megs of video ram?) fool you. This game looks good, and the best part is, it can be played on virtually any existing computer in use today. A big plus in today's industry that requires high-end machines to run most games!

It does have one problem though, and it's a whopper. After a few hours of play it all seems very repetitive. You'll use the same pranks over and over, and even though the episode designs look good and are interesting, it all just starts feeling the same after awhile. Because of this, I found myself incapable of playing this game for an extended period of time... and by "extended period" I mean something in the neighborhood of twenty minutes. In short bursts though, it's a politically incorrect great time! But it's not something you'll spend hours upon hours playing. With that said, this isn't a very long game anyway, so playing in small increments will help draw NFW: OV out... possibly keeping you busy until you go on your own vacation!