Bad Day on the Midway

Bad Day on the Midway is a CD-ROM game designed and scored by The Residents and a number of other graphic artists, including Jim Ludtke. 

The game was optioned by Ron Howard at Imagine Television for a proposed series to be directed by David Lynch.  After two years of meetings with Lynch, the project was dropped because a script was never agreed upon. Had the project moved forward, The Residents would have not been creatively involved as their contract only gave them consulting roles in the pilot.

The character Timmy was later brought back in a series of short videos by the Residents. Additionally, in 2012 a novel was published based on the game's story.

Gameplay

The player can switch between the various game characters in order to solve a number of puzzles. The game features gameplay elements from point-and-click adventures and has alternative narrative lines, with definite fixed story elements. 

The gameplay is centered around discovery via the different characters and to understand the storyline as a whole, it is necessary to complete the game multiple times. The game is time-limited and decisions made by the player influence the game's timer.

Soundtrack
There was also a soundtrack album (Have a Bad Day, East Side Digital EDS 81202) and some of the game's visuals were brought together in full resolution on The Residents' Icky Flix DVD.

Reception

The game won the 1995 'Macrovision International User Conference Award' in two categories – Best Entertainment Title and Most Innovative Use of Multimedia.

References

External links
Bad Day on the Midway at The Underdogs
Bad Day on the Midway at MobyGames
Infosite on "Bad Day on the Midway" with character descriptions, tech help and game hints

Category:1995 video games
Category:Adventure games
Category:Full motion video based games
Category:Horror video games
Category:Mac OS games
Category:Musician video games
Category:Video games developed in the United States
Category:Windows games