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IGN Review of Hannah Montana: Spotlight World Tour
There are three main reasons people click on reviews. The first -- and most boring -- is because they want to know how a game came out. Meanwhile, a ton of people click on the link to have their purchases justified, and a final set of readers just like to watch a game get flogged. This review of Hannah Montana: Spotlight World Tour will probably only benefit those looking to see how this game came out. If you're looking for purchase justification, I can't give it to you because I have no idea why you'd buy this game. However, if you're looking for a scathing commentary on all things Hannah, you won't find it here either.
After playing this game, I really don't have any super-strong feelings for or against this game. It's a title that just exists.
If you don't have a female in your life that's between the age of 3 and 15, the Hannah Montana craze might have passed you by. A Disney television show, Hannah Montana, stars Miley Cyrus (yes, the spawn of the Achey Breaky Heart dude) as a child starlet who balances her normal life as a brunette with the superstardom of her singing blonde persona. The simple concept -- filled with a metrosexual father, annoying brother, and totally awesome friends -- has sold school folders, spun off into a mega-buck concert and captured the heart of the nation.
Spotlight World Tour takes these Hannah Montana facts and tosses in a rhythm game. While one of the game's more than 15 Hannah tunes plays -- including "The Best of Both Worlds," "Old Blue Jeans," etc. -- arrows and icons will scroll across the screen. When the directions enter into the star icon at the end of the scroll bar, you need to move your controller's joysticks to match the icon. "Perfect" means you nailed it and anything else means you were a bit off. In the beginning, you're just matching the pink (left stick) and blue (right stick) directions, but the game does toss in icons that make you click and spin the sticks as well as joystick-rocking mini-games that make Hannah strum an air guitar and slap the hands of her fans. You even sign autographs.
You'll take this controller mastery into four gameplay modes. Dance Party is the game's two-player co-op scene where you and a friend will sing and dance together; Dance Off pits you against your pal; Free Dance is an easy way to jump in and play any song you've unlocked on any stage you've unlocked; and World Tour is the meat of this Miley/Hannah sandwich.
When you start a session of World Tour, you'll play from the third-person perspective and guide Hannah around the backstage area of whatever city you're in -- there are ten places such as New York and Tokyo for your entourage to travel to. As you navigate the concrete corridors and jet around the world, you'll be "treated" to segments reminiscent of the show. Scenes such as Hannah chatting up her dad, the little brother making some crack, the dad telling a joke, and a hokey laugh-track going off. In the dressing room, you can change Hannah's hair style, clothes, accessories and so on as well as scope the souvenirs you've won by rocking the cities you've visited. As the backstage shenanigans continue, you can practice moves, head to the stage for a set of songs, or head out into the world for some shopping. When you complete a song on tour, you'll get a star ranking, a number of fans, and shopping bags. You can take these shopping bags into malls around the globe and buy new outfits and accessories for your teen queen.
With that, you pretty much know all you need to know about the mechanics of Spotlight World Tour. As a rhythm game, it works (I do need to do things in time with the stuff on the screen), but it's never all that hard or interesting. A few months ago, this game shipped for the Wii and IGN's own Mark Bozon talked about how he could see tweeners getting behind the Wiimote-shaking good times. Although the joystick system works on the PlayStation 2, I can't picture any child being excited to play it that way. You're just going to sit there, jerk the sticks, and cruise through the competitions. It's not fun.
Forgetting the functional but boring gameplay, there are a couple of other problems with Spotlight World Tour. The graphics aren't that sharp for the title in general -- Hannah only vaguely looks like Hannah -- but when you're on stage and you go to slap the audience's hands, you're greeted by three people who are rail thin and have super-long arms. The environments tend to be empty, Hannah's hair hangs and moves funny when she walks, and the microphone will disappear during songs.
©2008-08-14, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved
After playing this game, I really don't have any super-strong feelings for or against this game. It's a title that just exists.
If you don't have a female in your life that's between the age of 3 and 15, the Hannah Montana craze might have passed you by. A Disney television show, Hannah Montana, stars Miley Cyrus (yes, the spawn of the Achey Breaky Heart dude) as a child starlet who balances her normal life as a brunette with the superstardom of her singing blonde persona. The simple concept -- filled with a metrosexual father, annoying brother, and totally awesome friends -- has sold school folders, spun off into a mega-buck concert and captured the heart of the nation.
Spotlight World Tour takes these Hannah Montana facts and tosses in a rhythm game. While one of the game's more than 15 Hannah tunes plays -- including "The Best of Both Worlds," "Old Blue Jeans," etc. -- arrows and icons will scroll across the screen. When the directions enter into the star icon at the end of the scroll bar, you need to move your controller's joysticks to match the icon. "Perfect" means you nailed it and anything else means you were a bit off. In the beginning, you're just matching the pink (left stick) and blue (right stick) directions, but the game does toss in icons that make you click and spin the sticks as well as joystick-rocking mini-games that make Hannah strum an air guitar and slap the hands of her fans. You even sign autographs.
You'll take this controller mastery into four gameplay modes. Dance Party is the game's two-player co-op scene where you and a friend will sing and dance together; Dance Off pits you against your pal; Free Dance is an easy way to jump in and play any song you've unlocked on any stage you've unlocked; and World Tour is the meat of this Miley/Hannah sandwich.
When you start a session of World Tour, you'll play from the third-person perspective and guide Hannah around the backstage area of whatever city you're in -- there are ten places such as New York and Tokyo for your entourage to travel to. As you navigate the concrete corridors and jet around the world, you'll be "treated" to segments reminiscent of the show. Scenes such as Hannah chatting up her dad, the little brother making some crack, the dad telling a joke, and a hokey laugh-track going off. In the dressing room, you can change Hannah's hair style, clothes, accessories and so on as well as scope the souvenirs you've won by rocking the cities you've visited. As the backstage shenanigans continue, you can practice moves, head to the stage for a set of songs, or head out into the world for some shopping. When you complete a song on tour, you'll get a star ranking, a number of fans, and shopping bags. You can take these shopping bags into malls around the globe and buy new outfits and accessories for your teen queen.
With that, you pretty much know all you need to know about the mechanics of Spotlight World Tour. As a rhythm game, it works (I do need to do things in time with the stuff on the screen), but it's never all that hard or interesting. A few months ago, this game shipped for the Wii and IGN's own Mark Bozon talked about how he could see tweeners getting behind the Wiimote-shaking good times. Although the joystick system works on the PlayStation 2, I can't picture any child being excited to play it that way. You're just going to sit there, jerk the sticks, and cruise through the competitions. It's not fun.
Forgetting the functional but boring gameplay, there are a couple of other problems with Spotlight World Tour. The graphics aren't that sharp for the title in general -- Hannah only vaguely looks like Hannah -- but when you're on stage and you go to slap the audience's hands, you're greeted by three people who are rail thin and have super-long arms. The environments tend to be empty, Hannah's hair hangs and moves funny when she walks, and the microphone will disappear during songs.
©2008-08-14, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved