Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
This game fell down the chute with Veruca Salt
Tags: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Categories: PS2 Reviews, Reviews, Xbox Reviews
Posted by Daniel "monk" Pelfrey on Aug 15th, 2005
| Title | Players | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (title page) | 1 | ||
| Developer | Publisher | Genre | Online |
| Adventure | No | ||
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Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was a wonderful film that is sure to find its way into the hearts and minds of many a young person. These young people will inevitably be drawn to playing the videogame in order to lengthen their experience. This is a practice that needs to end. The videogame of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory for consoles only goes to show that the same adaptation doesn’t always work for different platforms.
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Where the GBA game was mildly fun and an amusing take and extension of the film, the console versions take that and not only put it in 3D, but virtually leave the gameplay intact, which worked for the handheld, but a different type of gameplay experience is expected. The licenses taken with the film’s plot and story worked on the GBA because of the platform, and don’t translate well to consoles, making the game feel rushed to meet an arbitrary deadline rather than serving to make a good game.
There is plenty of item collecting and platform hopping to be found, but the payoff here is negligible. What we have is a game that could have been something if it were made to be a game rather than a marketing tie-in.
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The visuals are decent and get the job done. The audio, however, shines. While Johnny Depp didn’t allow the game makers to use his likeness (smart move in this case) the rest of the cast is present and accounted for to good effect. The sounds effects are well done and the music is outstanding. Actually, it is rather remarkable that so much attention was paid to the audio side of things and areas like gameplay got the short end of the stick.
I’m going to cut this review short because I’ll just go on about how disappointed I am at how it turned out. Parents – do not get this game for your kids. If they have to play a game based on the film, get them the GBA version. If they need a game for their console, get something good, like Katamari Damacy.
| What Works | Score |
|---|---|
| + The audio is great | 4.9 |
| What Doesn't | |
| - Just a 3D version of the GBA game, which isn't a good thing | |
| Under the Shrink-wrap | |
| Just don't do it, no matter how cheap this is. Buying bad games based on films only reinforces the model. | |
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Tags: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Posted by Daniel "monk" Pelfrey on Aug 15th, 2005 and is filed under PS2 Reviews, Reviews, Xbox 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.
