Garten of Banban
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| Garten of Banban | |
|---|---|
 Gaze upon the raw, unfiltered artistic expression of our winsome protagonists![1] | |
| Developer(s) | Euphoric Brothers |
| Publisher(s) | Euphoric Brothers |
| Director(s) | Euphoric Brothers |
| Producer(s) | Euphoric Brothers |
| Designer(s) | Euphoric Brothers |
| Artist(s) | Euphoric Brothers |
| Writer(s) | Microsoft Copilot |
| Engine | Unreal Engine 5 |
| Platform(s) | |
| Release |
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| Genre | Mascot horror |
| Mode(s) | Single-player |
If one were to translate the auditory chaos of Simlish, the phrase Garten of Banban might well resolve to "Square water tastes purple". In actual fact, that is the moniker slapped onto a series of "bargain basement" independent video games brought into existence by the Brothers Euphoric (Faris Euphoric and Ghepo Euphoric). Their preternatural grasp of "mascot horror", a genre the duo have arguably ascended beyond Five Nights at Freddy's and Poppy Playtime, birthed this masterwork on Steam, January 6, 2023.
Within its debut year, Banban conquered Steam with four sequels and inundated toy aisles with a tidal wave of merchandise – a truly remarkable achievement for two relative unknowns whose catalogue of prior chefs-d'œuvre includes the unforgettable Introvert: A School Shooter Simulator. Subject to both negative and unexpectedly enthusiastic reviews, some critics have failed to recognise the purported mastery of the "mascot horror" genre demonstrated by the Brothers Euphoric, whose creative choices seemingly transcend the need for a conventionally coherent player experience, much like their understanding of Roman numerals transcends the need for a "V" after an "I" when they get to six.
Gameplay[edit | edit source]
Once upon a time, Banban's Kindergarten – a mysterious establishment that bears more resemblance to an abandoned office complex than a nursery[2] – was condemned by local authorities in the wake of missing cases involving children who dared set foot anywhere near the facility. Players take on the role of a concerned parent who, instead of calling said authorities like a normal person, decides to personally infiltrate the cursed facility in pursuit of their missing child, a task that proves increasingly difficult insofar as one forgets about said obligation due to budget-level lighting, aggressively vague objectives, and puzzles programmed to waste as much of one's time as legally permissible.
Armed with nothing but an insurmountably high-poly drone and a rectangular remote control with a circular button of similar topology that functions with the precision of a buttered spoon, players must navigate a labyrinth of lifeless corridors with walls embellished with the motivational likenesses of the kindergarten's mascots, brought to life in what appears to be MS Paint by a sentient potato granted access to a colour wheel. Should you lose a life in the game, the screen will fade into black oblivion, illuminated only by a single random letter of the alphabet, as if the game is passive-aggressively grading your performance in real time. Environmental storytelling is present, in the sense that the environment exists and vaguely suggests that something happened here. Probably.
Games[edit | edit source]
- Garten of Banban (2023)
Released on January 6, 2023, for the PlayStation 5 as the console's very first game, Garten of Banban I – the inaugural entry in the saga – reportedly caused Hideo Kojima to briefly consider becoming a fisherman.
In this historic title, players explore the eerily silent offices, barren halls, and lone playroom of a "kindergarten" suspiciously devoid of children, teachers, and anything resembling responsible design, all in search of their missing child. This plot point is swiftly abandoned in favour of being stared at by wall art that may or may not be sentient, smashing oversized red buttons with a drone that controls like a lobotomized frisbee, football-kicking chairs across the floor with enough motion blur to qualify as interdimensional travel, collecting the eggs of a drugged ostrich that is out for ketchup and forcibly shoving them down its throat[3], and proceeding down a lift only to be confronted by Jumbo Josh.
- Garten of Banban II (2023)
The first Banban game with a price - unlike its free predecessor - Garten of Banban II plunges the player beneath the subterranean depths of the Garten, which is essentially a void with office buildings and Occupational Safety and Health Administration violations. Here, four ominous towers loom over the abyss like budget obelisks, while a pale, featureless face eerily spies upon us from the shadow, continuing its uninvited cameo streak across the series for reasons nobody, not even the developers, seem willing to explain.
Upon scouring these sectors semi-consciously for their missing child, players are treated to such mind-numbing highlights as: being pursued through a maze by Nabnab[4], a blue spider with four legs; extracting Givanium from multicolored goblins; sitting obediently in a classroom where breathing is frowned upon; and ferrying baby cassowaries back to their nest one by one, fulfilling the sacred "Pick-Shit-Up-And-Put-It-Somewhere" commandment that every Banban installment now religiously obeys.
Following a "puzzle" that involves directing cannons at large, honking buttons and a parkour course designed with anything but a kindergartener in mind, the game concludes with a limp chase sequence before politely shoving the player down yet another lift, and all without coming even a foot closer to rescuing their missing kid.
- Garten of Banban III (2023)
Introduced to the world on May 5, 2023, Garten of Banban III has the player navigate across a map that has been divided into four via a lift that travels through vast, black limbo. This lift is activated via a purple keycard that can only be obtained once yet another "Pick-Shit-Up-And-Put-It-Somewhere" minigame is completed. After travelling across the lift we enter an enormous room and are introduced to Stinger Flynn, an orange cycloptic jellyfish with an apparent gunshot to his head who appears to be capable of size manipulation; during the ensuing dream sequence it is evident that one car can fit him perfectly, whereas by the end of the game, he out-Jumboes the Josh.
After being forced to repeat the same cannon-firing minigame from Banban II albeit from Stinger's point of view, and undergoing another "Pick-Shit-Up-And-Put-It-Somewhere" minigame involving purple buckets, the player heads to the Medical Sector to commit medical malpractice by injecting Nabnab's newly introduced girlfriend Aneelabnab with Givanium, all in the name of coaxing a four-legged spider out of hiding. Fail to smash the drone into buttons and administer the wrong mixture of drugs to her and the player will be left questioning whether they had a mild stroke as a sudden loud noise blares from the speakers, as a set of sharp teeth appear on screen for less than 0.2 seconds.
Subsequent to a surreal sequence involving a car crash in the desert, which is apparently a vivid daydream conjured by Stinger Flynn, the player succeeds through a pathway accessible via a yellow keycard. This is obtained after completing a minigame that somehow showcases Jumbo Josh's "photographic memory", despite the fact that every other character insists he's more gorilla than genius. The player eventually happens upon a green hallway, where–after being tasked with solving an algebra puzzle[5] and footslogging through a comedically long series of 41 doors, each unlockable with the same keycard–they are tasked with the mission of taking down a two-headed tortoise by lighting fireworks on its tongue and hammering even more red buttons.
Upon affixing a pair of ice cream cones to a grey mannequin named Mr. Kabob Man, the player drags him into a vast chamber where the Opila Bird's offspring awaits. With each movement, the mannequin delivers a fresh batch of such witty one-liners as "three stones with one bird", in the wake of his Ban-banning from a stand-up gig. Should the player manage to land on the ostrich's husband with just the right amount of precision, somehow avoiding death regardless of whether or not they actually stick the landing, the game rewards them with a soliloquy from Stinger Flynn and a chase sequence with Banban. After all that, the player is left to descend yet another lift, their missing children still unaccounted for, but somehow no less lost in the chaos.
- Garten of Banban IV (2023)
Unveiled to Steam on August 9, 2023, Garten of Banban IV wastes no time by abruptly launching players into a chase scene against the two-headed tortoise from III, now made dramatically more intense thanks largely to some aggressive camera shaking. After blacking out while reaching a yellow remote control, the player awakens in the clutches of I Forgot His Name "The Frog Dude" who proceeds to interrogate them with all the menace of a damp towel. As The Frog Dude directs us to "The Kingdom" where it is revealed that he is the sheriff under the reign of Queen Bouncelia, a giant, lubed-up lean-loving kangaroo whose tail clips lazily through her throne and whose entire royal duty consists of reigning supreme over a kindergarten, because, evidently, toddlers require a full-blown monarchy to regulate nap time and crayon distribution.
The Frog Dude, the player, and the Opila chick from the last chapter all board an elevator that drops off at four different sectors[6] where the former, unfazed by the utter lack of relevance, cheerfully babbles on about his endlessly dreary backstory, all the while maintaining that unnervingly wide grin plastered on his face as though it's his full-time job. Upon arriving at the ventilation sector, the player is briefly trapped in a room with Bittergiggle "The Jester", a creature intricately crafted using the default MS Paint shapes, who smokes seventeen packs of "make-people-laugh" a day and with humour as sharp as a hexagram and as rounded as a thought bubble, has somehow convinced himself that a knock-knock joke is the key to world peace. He is swiftly "toadsted" by The Frog Dude, however. After navigating through a series of vents in which Nabnab is out for blood, the player finds one of three elusive gears required to make the obligatory lift function at the end of the chapter.
Queen Bouncelia advises the player to seek out Banban and Stinger Flynn, the latter of whom promptly yanks us into yet another dream sequence, this time starring none other than Choo Choo Charles[7], ironically the character in the game with the fewest polygons, who pops in for about ten seconds before presumably realising he's wandered into the wrong indie horror franchise and promptly self-destructing out of sheer embarrassment. Upon returning to the station where Banban is waiting, the player heads to the Feeding Sector in pursuit of the second lift gear, but not after Nabnab, living up to his name, nab-nabs Mr. Kabob Man in broad dim-light. This high-stakes heist escalates into a dramatic fight to the death between Banban and Nabnab, a clash marked especially by the lights flickering wildly and the characters inexplicably striking new poses every time the room blinks back into view.
After slotting the second gear into the lift, the player must next trudge off to the Employment Exercise Sector in search of the third gear, but not after another rousing pep talk from the Queen. Following a memory game, the ever-helpful Jester arranges a showdown against a mutant cat-dinosaur hybrid who heroically knocks itself out by charging headfirst into no fewer than four buttons in quick succession and screaming. One "Pick-Shit-Up-And-Put-It-Somewhere" minigame later, the player gets the third gear, the Jester bullies us for sport and then scampers to the Kingdom to make the queen laugh, blissfully unaware that the "Naughty Ones", an army of slate-grey slugs, are primed to erupt from her pouch and plunge everything into chaos the moment she so much as chuckles. Spoiler alert: she does. The Frog Dude, ever the helpful companion, directs us to the lift – where Stinger Flynn is waiting – for a hasty getaway from the Jester, ensuring we make a clean escape with no missing children for now.
- Garten of Banban VI (2023)
Despite Garten of Banban VI chronologically being the fifth entry to the Banban franchise, following off from IV and all, VI, the Roman numeral for six, is in the title of the video game. Ghepo Euphoric has since confirmed this to be the result of their initial assumption that the "I" in "VI" was just a stylish exclamation mark. Released on December 20, 2023, VI plunges the player into another massive murky enclosure lit only by a sparse row of dying streetlamps, where they and The Frog Dude cling to the light lest they be kidnapped by the Naughty Ones. The player is then made to strap a lamplight onto their drone in preparation for the inevitable trek through the map's obligatory four sectors, but not before some thrilling pipe-parkour into a wooden shack containing a ballerina-cow hybrid that jumpscares the player, accompanied by a bafflingly xenophobic note under a stock Spanish dictionary model describing Hispanics as "strange".
One waffling session from Banbaleena and The Frog Dude later, the player is tasked with tediously shepherding the drone – waiting a full eight seconds between each move – across a breadcrumb trail of dim lampposts to finally reach the Introduction Sector, where the Jester (who claims to have redeemed himself somehow for his past actions) is waiting. After wrangling with a puzzle involving multicoloured sofas and RGB lights, and surviving a brief game of hide-and-seek with the Naughty Ones, the player can finally head off back to the only illuminated room in the obsidian cell where the whole game takes place. The player must then head to the Potentiality Sector to unlock another door switch all in the hopes of exploiting Queen Bouncelia's sceptre; as to how this will help us find our missing child...
Several YouTuber cameos and a round of red button smashing ensue before the star of the franchise, Banban, finally makes his highly anticipated return and points us toward a gymnasium where we are tasked with solving a puzzle that involves the movement of mannequins. However, just as the player begins to make progress, the leader of the Naughty One army, Sir Dadadoo[8] arrives and swiftly incapacitates Banban. In an attempt to demonstrate his valour onto the only onlooker (us, the player) after releasing the Naughty One militia upon the crowd, the Jester makes an attempt to confront Dadadoo, but his efforts are in vain. A minigame comprised of scaring leeches with light then occurs before the third door switch can be turned on.
Stinger Flynn proceeds to blame the player for the current state of affairs, before taking a quick break to daydream about committing vehicular manslaughter against his fellow mascots, because of course he does. Another thrilling round of "Pick-Shit-Up-And-Put-It-Somewhere" follows once the player pummels some more buttons in the Conditioning Sector where we are forced to head to next, just before the player is plummeted down into a boss battle against a giant, screaming Opila Bird who chugged one too many Givanium smoothies in the previous chapter and is now roughly the size of a commuter bus. Once the oversized bird is defeated and the lights are finally switched on, the chest containing the sceptre can at last be unlocked, only for it to be revealed that it's missing a piece.
Banban unleashes a mutated Nabnab on Sir Dadadoo, who attempts to pilfer what remains of the sceptre, while grumbling about the missing piece and querying our protagonists about its whereabouts in his rich, broken accent. In the chaos, the player, Banban and the Jester then charge onward into a hedge maze, conveniently forgetting to bring the sceptre with them. The Jester, true to absolutely no one's surprise, betrays us in his desperate quest for an audience to laugh at his knockoff balloon animal act, promptly transforming into yet another Naughty One. Moments later, Banban and the player are swarmed by Sir Dadadoo's army of possessed mascots. Banban boldly declares he'll "hold them off", which, judging by his track record, means buying us roughly six seconds, as we escape yet again down a lift, this time in search of the elusive surgeon.
- Garten of Banban VII (2024)
Entry number six to the franchise, VII, released on May 10, 2024, revolves around discovering the whereabouts of Jumbo Josh, who was completely MIA in the previous chapter, as he alone supposedly holds the key to defeating the Naughty Ones. But first, the player is forced to endure yet another lore-dump video, heaven forbid we just find a keycard, before finally being allowed access to the surgeon's dimly lit place of refuge, whereupon we are promptly sent to the hospital. We narrowly save the surgeon from making mincemeat out of us by luring him into a rope trap with a rope and sicking a Naughty One on him, only to immediately turn around and kill that too.
The surgeon, identifying himself as Syringeon, rewards the player with an "updated" remote control, though in true Banban fashion, the only upgrade is that it now sports two antennae instead of one, presumably doubling the player's ability to get stuck on walls; naturally, we are blamed for this design flaw, as though we coded it ourselves in a fever dream. Syringeon sends you into the gloomy sprawl of Cityngeon, of which he is the mayor, to interview a series of highly unhelpful and vaguely racist witnesses. Each one insists on speaking a completely different language, ranging from Russian to Portuguese to Morse code tapped out in belches. None provide any coherent leads on Jumbo Josh's location, though one does offer a .png of Josh's head printed on it as "evidence".
A now-possessed Bittergiggle gives chase across the rooftops as we interrogate the denizens of Cityngeon but is toadsted by The Frog Dude who briefly yaps before wounding him in the chest with a star sticker. For the first time in the franchise, The Frog Dude's trademark grin vanishes, replaced by a guilty frown, as he realises that even sticker-based manslaughter has consequences. After another dream sequence courtesy of Stinger Flynn, which, spoiler alert, does not feature Choo Choo Charles, the player can infiltrate the town's only non-barricaded cinema in search of more clues as to where Josh is hiding. Alas, following another game of "Pick-Shit-Up-And-Put-It-Somewhere" with lightbulbs, all that is to be found is a large wooden Trojan bird containing a possessed Opila Bird and her husband, who pursue the player who is left with but a light collar to go from.
After being led by the light-tracking collar (which now apparently doubles as a plot device) to a disjointed medley of memory games, including yet another lesson from a possessed Banbaleena[9] in which we are made to pair the correct to their respective Banban characters – no small feat considering the very green gorilla we are lacks any defining physical characteristics beyond "green" and "large", alongside a Just Dance-esque puzzle that is rudely interrupted by a sentient blob of Givanium speaking in the paulstretched wails of an infant that proceeds to chase the player through the darkness until some more red buttons are smashed with legally mandated urgency, in addition to a maze puzzle with which the Remote 2.0 must be utilised to navigate through the corners of a corridor, a sample of Givanium can finally be provided to lure Jumbo Josh to wherever he be needed, the surgeon having realised that going out and searching for him would take too long.
Sir Dadadoo returns in triumphant villain fashion, now wielding the fully restored sceptre, missing piece included, courtesy of Syringeon, who had been sitting on it the entire time like it was a forgotten USB stick, hence our arrival. Just as Dadadoo prepares to unleash whatever vaguely defined evil powers the sceptre grants him, Jumbo Josh makes his grand entrance, roided out on Givanium fumes and ready to mog the universe. After what is arguably the most epic, gloriously unhinged fight scene in the franchise, Josh promptly eats the sceptre after rendering Dadadoo's army into mincemeat, preventing any further attempts to wield its power for anything other than digestion.
We awaken in the surgeon's hospital next to Stinger Flynn following the defeat of the Naughty Ones, where the familiar mascot mural seen in every chapter of the game now reveals a mysterious blue figure hidden beneath a sticker of Banban. The surgeon punctually silences us once Stinger Flynn points out this glaring detail, before the screen cuts to black with the finality of a judge's gavel, thereby eschewing the franchise's time-honoured tradition of concluding every climax with a suspiciously dramatic descent via elevator. Presumably, the elevator was either out of order or unionising.
- Garten of Banban 0 (2025)
Released on January 29, 2025, Garten of Banban 0 serves as further proof that the Brothers Euphoric either reject the concept of Roman numerals entirely or are engaged in a bold reimagining of them, seeing as there is no Roman numeral for zero. Curiously, it's also the only other free title in the series aside from the original, and the first entry that dares to forgo the now-iconic albeit four-and-a-quarterth-rate drone mechanic, presumably to remind players that walking is still a valid form of movement.
The player, dubbed "Case 4" in this installment, as names are passé, wakes in a suspiciously sterile room reminiscent of both a hospital and a crime scene. Enter Banban, or "Case 6" as he is known in the game, who reassures us that we are not dead, but rather we are unfortunate. After a bit of light banter and light psychological damage, he escorts the player to a park-like facility where Banbaleena, or "Case 7", awaits. Upon laying eyes on the player, she drops the ominous line, "As if one of you wasn't enough...", suggesting either a resemblance to Banban or a shared preference in deodorant.
In true friendship-speedrunning fashion, the player earns Banbaleena's affection by bribing her with a forged A+ test and returning her iconic pink bow tie, proving once again that emotional manipulation is the key to every healthy relationship. Soon after, a game of hide-and-seek with the local Givanium Blobs is interrupted by the arrival of Syringeon, who abducts one of the blobs in the name of science. He alludes to Banban's hidden powers before vanishing, leaving the group to tuck themselves in for the night.
But slumber is but an illusion. In the dead of night, Banban awakes the player, under the pretense of a "surprise", which history has shown is never followed by cake. Alongside Truffletoot "Case 43", a sentient, mushroom-esque flashlight with a peculiar penchant for "being held", and familiar face Nabnab "Case 8", the crew head toward a sealed door that requires five participants to unlock. The player then heroically collects familiar faces Bittergiggle "Case 17" from a gas chamber and Kittysaurus "Case 26" from nowhere in particular. Upon unlocking the door, Ramamba, a demonically oversized goat-worm hybrid of considerable strength, mass and appetite, otherwise known as "Case 0"[10] emerges from the shadows and proceeds to devour Nabnab whole. Kittysaurus and the Jester give chase.
What follows is a fever dream of goat-worms, betrayal and emotional whiplash as Ramamba slurps up the two mascots before Banban shows up in his dinosaur mode for a park-themed smackdown, ending with everyone miraculously regurgitated and unharmed. Banban then cheerfully suggests another game of hide-and-seek with the unconscious Jester as the seeker, and the player goes along with it. Banban locks them in a closet and reveals they have secretly been "Flumbo" – the mysterious blue Banban teased in VI – the whole time, reminding them that the real tragedy isn't the missing children; it's the missing us.
Film adaptation[edit | edit source]
A feature-length film adaptation of the Garten of Banban franchise – starring genius filmmaker, actor, author and convicted unlawful firearm owner "Daddy" Derek Savage as the eponymous Banban – is in the works and is slated for an October 2033[11] release.
Savage, who will also be serving as director, claims the film will have a plot focusing heavily on "picking up shit and putting it somewhere"; alongside educational segments spliced sporadically throughout the runtime in which Banban delivers considerable musical soliloquies featuring bucketloads of unprecedented rhyming about the philosophy of object relocation, and the occasional pancreas monologue, as confirmed by the following excerpt from a song from the film's soundtrack as previewed at a 420 Awards event:
| “ |
You can call me Banban, 'cause your pancreas is delish |
” |
— "Daddy" Derek Savage
| ||
Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson has expressed interest in starring as Jumbo Josh, whilst Adam Sandler is in talks to inhabit the role of Bittergiggle. A new character called Mike Hunt is also speculated to be in development, with sources close to the production indicating a potential voice acting role for Elon Musk, to whom Savage claims to be willing to shell out a cool $1.2 million.
See also[edit | edit source]
Notes[edit | edit source]
- ↑ From left to right: Nabnab, Queen Bouncelia, Slow Seline, Jumbo Josh, Banbaleena, Banban, Opila Bird, Captain Fiddles, Stinger Flynn, I Forgot His Name "The Frog Dude" (real name redacted for tax reasons), and Aneelabnab.
- ↑ By Garten of Banban II the player is already tasked with the task of meandering aimlessly underground. Game theorists predict the upcoming fifty-seventh entry to the game, Garten of Banban Does-a-Roman-Numeral-for-Negative-One-Exist to take place on Mars.
- ↑ Whether these eggs contain unborn baby ostriches inside of them is a question the Brothers choose not to address.
- ↑ Which is, in a stunning display of reverse creativity, "Banban" spelled backwards.
- ↑ The Euphoric Brothers must have assumed kindergarteners are already tackling quantum physics and differential equations in their spare time. Clearly they've missed the memo that the pioneers of tomorrow can solve for X before they can tie their shoes.
- ↑ Are you beginning to see a pattern here?
- ↑ Or "Chuu Chuu Chawalls" if you prefer Flynn's charmingly concussed pronunciation.
- ↑ Whose name evokes imagery of a daycare graduation ceremony.
- ↑ An experience disturbingly reminiscent of the one in II.
- ↑ pronounced "case-oh"
- ↑ in the Banbanian calendar, that is
