Game 'Mad Nurse' from Firebird

While doing some reading on Retro Gamer issue 178 article about CRL's horror adventure games I found a side note on other bloody 8-bit games, where they mention 'Mad Nurse'.

I got curious...

It reads: "A cheap and cheery platformer is perhaps not where you would expect to find notoriously controversial game design, but here was the ability to electrocute, poison or drop babies down lift shafts. All done with a cheeky sense of humour, but a slighly disturbing one, nonetheless."

I can't believe I missed this game back in the 80's!!

But now that I am older this doesn't feel right, so how could a publisher put such a game out in the market? Didn't Firbird get lambasted for that?
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Comments

  • edited February 2018
    Yeah, I first heard about this game when reading Dan Whitehead's Speccy Nation book. There's a section called "Never Again" detailing games that probably couldn't be made today, and this is included.
    Post edited by Daren on
  • People used to have a sense of humour before Twitter
  • What is Twitter?

    And how would that affect someone's sense of humor?

  • It wasn't about 'the ability' to do any of those things - the aim of the game was to prevent any of those things happening. How is rescuing babies from such hazards any different to any other game character (babies included) having to face spiked pits, fireballs, or prostitutes with electric prods*?

    Where's the public outcry over the cruelty to animals exhibited in Lemmings?

    Spoiler:
    Joefish
    - IONIAN-GAMES.com -
  • Good old Mad Nurse! I knew about it from a review in Sinclair User, but only played it under emulation. Yes, the gameplay is rather thin and there is not much variety, but as long as budget games go, it ain't bad at all. Moreover, the bizarre setting, plus the added novelty value of performing such acts as stopping babies with tranquilizer gas to prevent them from electrocuting themselves by putting their little fingers in wall sockets, or falling to their deaths in the lift shaft (the review you mention is inaccurate enough, the game requires you to put all babies in their little beds in fact) made it an instant favorite for me.
  • edited February 2018
    Incidentally, Lemmings was the first thing that came to my mind.

    But then again I never liked that game or actually played it, so perhaps that's why when I first read about Mad Nurse on Retro Gamer my stomach felt weird...

    Ok, if the goal is to prevent the terrible accidents from happening I suppose that changes something. Nevertheless I still don't feel at ease with the setting of the game because it relates very closely to real life situations whereas babies vs. spiked pits, fireballs, or prostitutes with electric prods sounds more like a parent's nightmare.



    Post edited by Renegade on
  • edited February 2018
    What about that game that came with one of the mags. You're a nekkid lady running outside picking up babies or embryos. Was there a story behind that one? Don't remember the name of it. (Bear a grudge! -Ed)
    Post edited by F_Clowder on
    What now?
  • F_Clowder wrote: »
    What about that game that came with one of the mags. You're a nekkid lady running outside picking up babies or embryos. Was there a story behind that one? Don't remember the name of it. (Bear a grudge! -Ed)
    No, it was Brat Attack, and the sprite was supposed to be Sinclair User's contributor Tamara Howard, who did not look at all like it; it was probably the only time in a Spectrum game that the sprite looked better than the real thing
    :))
  • Mad Nurse is a game that certainly wouldn't be made today, especially as you can see babies falling down lift shafts or sticking their fingers in electrical sockets and getting fried.
    The trouble with tribbles is.......
  • zx1 wrote: »
    Mad Nurse is a game that certainly wouldn't be made today, especially as you can see babies falling down lift shafts or sticking their fingers in electrical sockets and getting fried.

    I have to concur.

    And that is not the only one, I just remembered that two years earlier the infamous sex-crime was released (well, not exactly) but still was available to kids to buy from certain shops (and then pirate-copy to everyone interested in trying the game).

    I should know, I was one of them, I just didn't understand at the time the meaning of rape.

    Looking back now it seems almost impossible how such a game slipped unnoticed or didn't cause some unrest.



  • I find it inoffensive , while I've seen phone games where the only 'fun' involved is to watch your blocky character have their limbs fall off to a rain pixel blood...Which seems much worse, maybe due to intent. Those sort of Speccy games didn't do me any harm... Didn't desensitize me at all... The graphical restrictions of the time made it akin to cartoon violence - which is probably why it seems ok... And now I just find them quirky.
  • I've got a whole section in one of my JSW remakes called the Jesus Juice Factory, one screen has Jacko throwing babies up into the air, and exploding when they hit the floor.

    Does that make me a bad person? :))
    Every night is curry night!
  • You know the answer to that Boozy! I'm sure that the others will have suggestions of their own...
  • zx1 wrote: »
    Mad Nurse is a game that certainly wouldn't be made today, especially as you can see babies falling down lift shafts or sticking their fingers in electrical sockets and getting fried.

    You haven't heard of the two player game on steam Who's Your Daddy where one player is the dad trying to make the house safe for the baby and the other player is the baby trying to kill himself?

    Go to around 5:30.
    Oh, no. Every time you turn up something monumental and terrible happens.
    I don’t think I have the stomach for it.
    --Raziel (Legend of Kain: Soul Reaver 2)

    https://www.youtube.com/user/VincentTSFP
  • I've got a whole section in one of my JSW remakes called the Jesus Juice Factory, one screen has Jacko throwing babies up into the air, and exploding when they hit the floor.

    Does that make me a bad person? :))

    The church of Wos absolves your sins. Now take these green crayons and draw a picture of Jesus whilst drinking 3 bloody Mary's. Peas be with you.
  • I've got a whole section in one of my JSW remakes called the Jesus Juice Factory, one screen has Jacko throwing babies up into the air, and exploding when they hit the floor.

    Does that make me a bad person? :))

    Failure to create more JSW games can make you a bad person! :))
  • Maybe one day my friend....Maybe one day....
    Every night is curry night!
  • I've got a whole section in one of my JSW remakes called the Jesus Juice Factory, one screen has Jacko throwing babies up into the air, and exploding when they hit the floor.

    Does that make me a bad person? :))

    No, no. It's completely ok to ridicule and offend christianity nowadays. On the other hand, if you had named the section Mohammed Juice Factory, well...

    I seem to remember a game called Mad Muslim, but i must be wrong. Can't find it anywhere...

    Politically correctness has gone way to far, soon we can't talk and write about anything else than the weather.

  • MinerWilly wrote: »
    Politically correctness has gone way to far, soon we can't talk and write about anything else than the weather.

    This is the internet, you can write and talk about anything that's legal, and actually illegal, the same as you always could. If you don't think that's true, you need to go on Twitter more.
  • RobeeeJay wrote: »
    MinerWilly wrote: »
    Politically correctness has gone way to far, soon we can't talk and write about anything else than the weather.

    This is the internet, you can write and talk about anything that's legal, and actually illegal, the same as you always could. If you don't think that's true, you need to go on Twitter more.

    Well yes, what i meant was you can't talk about anything (on the internet or elsewhere) without a lot of people getting offended, and a lot of hate coming your way.
  • pjgames wrote: »

    "...Firebird initially refused to publish the game, because dying babies were too controversial..."

    So even the publisher, initially at least, had some worries.
  • edited February 2018
    MinerWilly wrote: »
    I've got a whole section in one of my JSW remakes called the Jesus Juice Factory, one screen has Jacko throwing babies up into the air, and exploding when they hit the floor.

    Does that make me a bad person? :))

    No, no. It's completely ok to ridicule and offend christianity nowadays. On the other hand, if you had named the section Mohammed Juice Factory, well...

    I seem to remember a game called Mad Muslim, but i must be wrong. Can't find it anywhere...

    Politically correctness has gone way to far, soon we can't talk and write about anything else than the weather.

    Well the Jesus Juice Factory was tied into the whole thing about Wacko Jacko supposedly feeding wine to the kids that stayed at his house in Coke Cans, and the baby throwing bit was from the time the dozy sod dangled his baby over a balcony. So yes I was taking the p*ss, but it was all based on real life stupidity.

    Not that I actually give a sh*t about any religion if truth be told though.
    Post edited by dm_boozefreek on
    Every night is curry night!
  • MinerWilly wrote: »
    I seem to remember a game called Mad Muslim, but i must be wrong. Can't find it anywhere...

    Manic Muslim
  • Vampyre wrote: »
    MinerWilly wrote: »
    I seem to remember a game called Mad Muslim, but i must be wrong. Can't find it anywhere...

    Manic Muslim

    And still to be found in the WoS archive! Glad to be proven wrong there, let's just hope the WoS "office" don't go the same way as the Charlie Hebdon office.

  • Not that I actually give a sh*t about any religion if truth be told though.

    Neither do i, and we should be able to make fun of religion, any religion.

    I remember reading that Salman Rushdie said if he had written The Satanic Verses today he would be considered a racist. The world has changed a lot just in a few years, and not for the better. We're going fast to achieve a world of George Orwell's 1984.

  • RobeeeJay wrote: »
    This is the internet, you can write and talk about anything that's legal, and actually illegal, the same as you always could. If you don't think that's true, you need to go on Twitter more.
    No. Nobody needs to go Twitter more. Not for any reason.
  • Wouldn't it have been easier to put them in bunk beds?
    ...Jacko supposedly feeding wine to the kids that stayed at his house in Coke Cans...
    What now?
  • MinerWilly wrote: »
    Well yes, what i meant was you can't talk about anything (on the internet or elsewhere) without a lot of people getting offended, and a lot of hate coming your way.

    So really, you want to be able to say anything you want, without anyone else saying anything they want back? :)
  • F_Clowder wrote: »
    Wouldn't it have been easier to put them in bunk beds?
    ...Jacko supposedly feeding wine to the kids that stayed at his house in Coke Cans...

    I dunno? Maybe it was easier to machete them to death? But he got them drunk on "Jesus Juice", and touched their knobs, and arses instead...
    Every night is curry night!
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