Date:08/06/2007 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2007/06/08/stories/2007060818760200.htm

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Online game spoofs Paris Hilton's jail term

The Games Show Network has launched `The Prison Life'

Heiress with a much-hyphenated profession (TV star-model-singer-actor-socialite) Paris Hilton's woes never seem to end: now, it's a new online game spoofing her jail term. The Games Show Network has launched `The Prison Life', a spinoff on the name of her television show with best friend Nicole Richie, `The Simple Life'.

Paris was sentenced to undergo 23 days in the lock-up beginning June 4 for violating her probation following a drunk driving arrest last year.

The game features a cartoon version of the socialite in an orange jumpsuit and over-sized sunglasses, working at a conveyor belt under the supervision of an intimidating prison warden. The objective is to get Paris to stamp a series of California licence plates. Her pet chihuahua Tinkerbell is also part of the game, except here it is called Clinkerbell, and is more of an impediment to the heiress.

The player gains points when Clinkerbell makes it to the end of the conveyer belt, but if the dog gets squashed, points are lost. The licence plates carry letters that read as words and phrases making unkind digs at Hilton's high profile, extravagant and wild lifestyle - for example `PRTY GRL', `RCH-DAD' and `DRV2FST'.

The website gsn.com has previously capitalised on several celebrity-based sensational news items for their games, including one based on actor Mel Gibson's infamous drunken, anti-semitic outburst when caught for drunken driving. It also features `Freezer Burns - A Global Warning' based on Al Gore's film on global warming, `An Inconvenient Truth'.

Susan Muthalaly

Susan Muthalaly