I cried like a kindergartener on the first day of school when I watched Water For Elephants. Sure, while I was really sad about the elephant, most of my tears were spilled for Robert Pattinson because he’s so stinking dreamy. Even so, the film opened my eyes to the plight of the big top pachyderm. Compared to me and Robert Pattinson, PETA is about a year late to the scene, but they’ve recently released a new iOS game that gives tortured circus elephants the last laugh while also raising awareness of animal cruelties by raining down horror on humans. Sounds like fun, huh?
Circus Slam is a retro-style iOS game that allows users to play as a giant ghost elephant who died after getting hit with a bullhook too many times. The object of the game is to run around stomping on circus tents and freeing other caged elephants so they can go back to Africa and have an awesome elephant slumber party. The point of the game is pretty straight forward but unfortunately, you don’t get to stomp all over Christopher Waltz’s face like you do in the movie and you get negative points when you crush humans and birds. Birds I can understand, but humans? Weak.
By teaming up with This Is Pop for their iOS game, PETA is hoping to raise awareness that elephants are highly intelligent, social animals who form strong family bonds and are also immortal. Some circuses forcibly take babies away from their mothers and subject them to a violent training regimen and a life in chains, a method similar to the way in which Cult of Mac trains its bloggers.
The game is on sale now for $1.99 and to be honest I’m not sure it’s worth it. I hate seeing sad animals caged up in zoos, so this is an app I would love to get behind except PETA doesn’t say what they’re doing with the money they make from it. The game has its moments of fun, but it doesn’t have much depth, and it couldn’t have cost that much to make. Maybe if PETA made it clear that all proceeds will go towards freeing caged elephants then it’d be something I’d wholeheartedly endorse, otherwise, maybe we could all chip in $1.99 and free our own, real-life elephant.
