Nicktoons: Battle for Volcano Island
If you need the remote, give your kids their Spongebob Fix with this new game.
Tags: Nicktoons: Battle for Volcano Island Categories: DS Reviews, GBA Reviews, Reviews
Posted by Mike "Two Tone" McConnell on Nov 27th, 2006
| Title | Players | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Nicktoons: Battle for Volcano Island (title page) | 1 | ||
| Developer | Publisher | Genre | Online |
| Party | No | ||
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As of late, there has been a slew of horrid licensed game based around cartoon properties. From half developed games sent out with bugs, to games that don’t even use the IP correctly; you can be sure that none of them have been worth playing. The worse part about it is that these games do one thing that game developers should never, ever do, assume that kids are stupid. Nicktoons Battle for Volcano Island breaks both of these trends. The game has an odd premise – a wise old crab trying to save the world of Volcano Island (it is never really clear, but as it seems there is bit of a riff on Kingdom Hearts with doorways between worlds) to bring together various Nicktoon characters as his chosen ones.
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The selectable characters are; Timmy Turner (Fairly Odd Parents), Spongebob Squarepants, and Danny Phantom. Jimmy Neutron and a cavalcade of secondary characters from the different series assist them. Ever present on screen is the Fairly Odd Parents themselves. They don’t do much on the GBA version, but on the DS they are directed by the stylus to uncover gems, and interact with the environment.
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Volcano Island itself is a typical video game island. There are rainforest locales full of high cliffs, and inexplicably springy leaves to propel one to the highest peaks. The GBA version isn’t too detailed, but the DS goes into a great amount of detail for just a simple game. There are caves, and beaches to explore as well, traversing between portals to get from location to location. On the DS there is an overworld map to track progress through the game.
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While the concept is straightforward enough, there is a lot to do in this game. With a fair difficulty curve, and infinite lives, this game isn’t going to present too much of a problem to any age group, but is engaging enough to hold interest. Over the last few years platform games have become about amassing various objects. Nicktoons have happily eliminated this portion of the game in favor of a streamlined experience. This allows the game to operate, and the player can focus on the game, rather than scouring each level for a specific trinket. The difficulty rises incrementally enough that standing on its own is no challenge.
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While this may be the leader of the pack for the licensed games, there are still shortcomings. The DS mini-games stand out as a glaring flaw. They don’t have any real incentive, and are pretty much the same fruit catching between every level. The stages change, but it always stays the same. They manage to detract from the game more than they add to it. The GBA version is missing the better explanations of the storyline. It seems to be more a skeletal port of the DS version.
While each game has it’s bad parts, each is a great choice for the soon approaching holidays. While all of you out there over 12 may not be particularly impressed, this will be a great game for kids. Well, as long as they are part of the Nicktoons cult. Those on the outside will probably not know what’s going on.
| What Works | Score |
|---|---|
|
+ Nice graphics + Good difficulty curve + Good use of license |
8.0 |
| What Doesn't | |
|
- GBA version lacks storyline detail - DS mini-games come up short |
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| Under the Shrink-wrap | |
| This is one of the few games released for the holiday buzz that seems to measure up to being a game, not an advertisement. | |
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Tags: Nicktoons: Battle for Volcano Island
Posted by Mike "Two Tone" McConnell on Nov 27th, 2006 and is filed under DS Reviews, GBA Reviews, Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can post a comment, or trackback from your own site.
