Review of TalkSPORT Interactive Quiz DVD

Introduction

Given my experiences with interactive DVDs, I went into this with low expectations: on one hand I thought `Oh no, not another` and on the other, my optimistic streak kicked in and I thought that maybe this would buck the trend and be a DVD that I would play all day.

`talkSPORT Interactive Quiz` has four rounds of ten questions which you can play individually or head to head as a team game. The four rounds are: Alan Brazil`s Sports Breakfast; Hawksbee & Jacobs; The Game and Kick Off.

Video

The fullscreen presentation of the questions is perfectly fine, but the introductions by the presenters looks like it was filmed using an over-the-counter camcorder. The colours during the quiz rounds are overly bright, unnecessarily garish and looking at the screen for any length of time is painful. The budget for this must have been tiny.

Audio

The questions are linked by dreadful music that will live with you for hours after the game has finished and the DVD has been ejected and the introductions are horrendously mixed. Most of the game is silent including, quite bizarrely, most of the video clips.

Conclusion

As with every other interactive DVD I have come across, this is plagued by dreadful loading times (there is a gap of 15 seconds between each question), poor authoring and repetition. The box boasts that the game contains `over 2000 questions!`; I played both the team and single player modes and had one repeated question out of 110 which doesn`t bode well for the longevity of the disc. Also, the DVD is aimed at "true sports fans of all ages" yet some of the questions were obscure, with some about the presenters and were far from topical and I would estimate that 75% were about football. The `Kick Off` round is compiled entirely of football-related questions.

I have never listened to talkSPORT, so the presenters were not people I knew and loved as a regular listener might, yet after playing this game twice I wanted to physically assault each and every one of them. When I get a question about an obscure sporting event wrong, I wouldn`t mind being told `I am sorry but that is the wrong answer`, but many of the responses to incorrect answers were taunts and insults - I was called a `numpty`, a `plonker`, a `clown` and a `mump-head` as well as being told I was hopeless! I wouldn`t mind if they were intelligent and witty ripostes, but the individuals dishing them out rely on a script on their desk, which they obviously and clumsily read, to deliver the introductions.

I have played and reviewed the `Question of Sport` interactive DVD which I thought was poor, but it shines as a beacon of excellence compared to this dismal and depressing offering.