About a month ago, we did a toungue-in-cheek article about the future video games featuring five absurd and hypothetical games inspired by the music industry. Well, the new Daniel Johnston iPhone game would not have been out-of-place on that list. Hi, How Are You? is a conventional puzzle-platformer built around the Johnston mythology. It features his music and various characters from his art. In the game, the player must rescue Laurie, a real-life muse of Johnston’s from way back when. It’s totally ridiculous and very very cool.

I’m not really a fan of these kind of iPhone games. Navigating 3D space by tilting your phone or with a touch-controlled virtual joystick (the game gives you both options) is a pain in the ass. Most of the challenge in these games seems to be derived from the sloppiness of their mechanics. That said, this is a very straight-forward and simply designed game. It’s completely worth it just to marvel at the absurdity of a world constructed from Daniel Johnston imagery.

This kind of stuff is great. Let’s hope we keep seeing more of the same. Rod Stewart Pong, anyone?