Hungry Hungry Hippos
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Hungry Hungry Hippos is a board game made for young children currently produced by Hasbro, under the brand of its subsidiary, Milton Bradley. It was introduced in 1978.
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[edit] Gameplay
The game is playable by two to four players and is recommended by the manufacturer for children ages 3 - 6. The object of the game is to use the lever on the back of a player's hippo to consume as many of the twenty white plastic marbles on the playing field as possible. Play ends when all of the marbles have been "eaten" by the hippos. The player whose hippo has "eaten" the most marbles wins.
The shaking of the lightweight playing field during play, particularly when children are pounding on the levers to make their hippos capture marbles, introduces a strong random element to the game. Winning is often a matter of pure luck and not of skill. In a 1990 short story published in The New Yorker (and sarcastically named after the game), Edward Allen wrote, "The object of the game [is essentially] to press your handle down again and again as fast as you can, with no rhythm, no timing, just slam-slam-slam as your hippo surges out to grab marble after marble from the game surface...."[1]
Similar children's games popular in the U.S. include Don't Break the Ice, Don't Spill the Beans, and Ants in the Pants.
[edit] Advertising
Television ads for the game memorably featured a series of brightly-colored cartoon hippos dancing in a conga line and singing, "Hungry Hungry Hip-pos!" to the beat. The older theme offered a mini song:
- "It's a race, it's a chase, hurry up and feed their face!
- Who will win? No one knows! Feed the hungry hip-ip-pos!
- Hungry hungry hippos! (open up and there it goes!)"
The 1970s-era advertisement featured a different song:
- If you wanna win the game you've gotta take good aim
- And get the most marbles with your hippo
- Playin' Hungry Hungry Hippos
- Hungry Hungry Hippos
[edit] Characters
There are four hippos in the game: Lizzie Hippo (purple), Henry Hippo (orange), Homer (green), and Harry (yellow). In some versions of Hungry Hungry Hippos, Henry is replaced by a blue hippo of the same name. The current edition of the game replaces the purple hippo, Lizzie, with a pink one named Happy.
[edit] In popular culture
In the episode of The Simpsons entitled "Mr. Plow", Homer says, "Now we play the waiting game... eh, the waiting game sucks, let's play Hungry Hungry Hippos." Another Simpsons episode, Hungry, Hungry Homer is a reference to the game (as well as Homer being one of the four hippos). It also has a mention in Donnie Darko when Donnie informs his psychiatrist that he always wanted Hungry Hungry Hippos for Christmas but he never got it. The Futurama episode "300 Big Boys" features some homeless men who refer to themselves as "hungry hungry hobos."
[edit] References
- ^ Allen, Edward. "Hungry Hungry Hippos," The New Yorker. 07/30/90. 30. The story is about Allen's experiences the year after he graduated college, much of which was spent watching television and TV commercials.
[edit] External links
- 15-second television ad for Hungry Hungry Hippos, from YouTube.
- The Frantic Marble Munching Game!, a detailed set of game-playing instructions from Hasbro.
- Hungry Hungry Hippos at BoardGameGeek
- Arcade version of Hungry Hungry Hippos
