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I am not ashamed to admit I keep up with the Kardashians on a weekly basis, and I love it. While their antics may be ridiculous, their voices annoying, and their“ reality” not all too real, the Kardashians know how to entertain. One of the things I love about them that I find less common in other reality television stars is their self-reflexivity and awareness of their own power, not just as celebrities, but as business women. The Kardashians have evolved a reality show, arguably created from Kim’ s scandalous sex tape, into a fully fledged empire. They have created numerous spin offs, including, but not limited to Khloe and Lamar, Kocktails with Khloe, Kourtney and Kim Take Miami, and Dash Dolls. Every Kardashian / Jenner sister has her own iPhone app with behind the scenes details of her life; Kendall and Kylie Jenner have their own clothing line; Kylie has a cosmetics line; and of course, they are all working models.
As much as I enjoy Keeping Up With The Kardashians, I wasn’ t immediately in support of their 2014 business venture, Kim Kardashian: Hollywood, the iPhone game. Cosmetics and clothing are the Kardashians’ expertise; video games are not. I assumed the game would be an extremely corny and“ girly” one, where you get to pick outfits and do photo shoots. I have never been interested in those types of games, that is, games where nothing really happens, but you have a character and you can make her look pretty. A day after the game was released, critics were already all over it, calling out the Kardashians- specifically Kim- for inventing yet another attention-seeking marketing ploy. It didn’ t help that the game’ s release coincided with record low ratings for Keeping Up With The Kardashians. About a week after the game came out, a few of my friends started playing it. As the resident Kardashian expert, I finally had to cave and download it, mainly out of fear that I would miss out on secret behind the scenes Kardashian secrets.
Kim Kardashian: Hollywood is very simple. You are a model, new to Hollywood, and you’ re trying to make it to stardom. You start as an E-List celebrity, and are given the opportunity to“ kustomize” your avatar to look like you. With help from the always kind-hearted Kim Kardashian, whom you accidentally bump into on the street, you get an agent and start attending modeling and acting gigs to climb your way up the Hollywood social ladder. Progress is made in the game by tapping items on the screen and using“ energy” to perform certain actions, like folding shirts in the store that you work at, or changing your pose during a photo shoot. Each time an action is completed, stacks of money and sparkling silver stars with K’ s on them fall onto the floor.
The more tasks you complete, the more money and stars you collect, and the more“ fans” you gain. By gaining fans, you climb from an E-List celebrity to an A-Lister. Throughout the game you encounter highstakes obstacles, such as having to decide between two different products to promote, or a knock-off Paris Hilton tweeting mean things about you. Your decisions on how to handle these obstacles affects your character’ s popularity. For instance, if you
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