Ratatouille
The upside is that Patton Oswald is the rat, the downside its in the kitchen.
Tags: Ratatouille Categories: Game Cube Reviews, PS2 Reviews, Reviews
Posted by Mike "Two Tone" McConnell on Jul 23rd, 2007
| Title | Players | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Ratatouille (title page) | 1 | ||
| Developer | Publisher | Genre | Online |
| Action | No | ||
 |
Pixar makes great movies for both kids and adults, but the console version of Ratatouille is only for one of these audiences. For a platformer, Ratatouille does a great job of both control and level design. Although lacking a whole lot of footage from the movie, it does feature voice over work by Patton Oswald. In addition to what makes it a passable game, there is even humor within the game material itself. Such as when you go through the tutorial, and Remy asks Emile where he learned all this stuff, he looks back with a confused look on his face, “I have no idea, but I have to teach you this stuff.”
 |
The PS2 version seems to ape the other console versions fairly well, but the whole experience is kept generic enough to port easily It’s the same with the GameCube version, although it is surprising that there is even a GameCube version considering that most developers abandoned the platform the day after the Wii came out. In fact, beyond attacking by swinging the Wii remote there isn’t the usual poor adaptation of controls to the Wii. The porting from one platform to another is horrendously generic with no reason to pick up one over the other.
 |
There is a huge story version here, you’ll spend a fair amount of time before you crack even the surface on this title. In addition there are three different “mini-games” that are actually scattered through out the story mode. Once you complete them there they will be available from the main menu, and more-importantly for multiplayer. Like most of the mini-game frenzies that have been tacked on this summer, it isn’t an in depth amount of material. The slide game is fun once or twice, but the level design is far too monotonous. There are challenge levels with the same platform action as the main game, and it doesn’t add anything but points to the completion percentage. The cooking game is kind of a bore as well being nothing more than matching ingredients on cue. While one should never expect much from mini-games, these are particularly weak.
 |
The main game is the same 3-D platformer that has been rehashed with new skins every few months for the last ten years. There isn’t anything terrible here, but there isn’t anything exciting either. The levels are nice, but there just doesn’t seem to be anything to the actual experience that can draw a player into the game. There just isn’t enough to differentiate this from any other platformer with or without mini-games.
| What Works | Score |
|---|---|
|
+ Should entertain a kid or two for a few hours |
5.5 |
| What Doesn't | |
|
- Weak mini games with generic design - Not much as far as innovation here (go get a good game for your kids) |
|
| Under the Shrink-wrap | |
| You've seen this before and you will see it again. Just wait until the next big kids movie comes out. | |
[ Post the first comment | View related posts ]
Tags: Ratatouille
Posted by Mike "Two Tone" McConnell on Jul 23rd, 2007 and is filed under Game Cube Reviews, PS2 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.
