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IGN Review of Happy Feet
There's no denying the mass market appeal of baby penguins. I mean, have you seen those little buggers? The cuteness factor alone is enough to drive the advertising campaign for the new movie Happy Feet. Unfortunately, it's not enough to make Midway and A2M's new game a great experience. Sure, the game is super cute, and it has a couple of nice elements peppered throughout, but overall Happy Feet's DS production is thin ice.
Happy Feet follows the story of Mumble, an Emperor penguin living in Antartica. Mumble is the best dancer of all the other Emperor penguins. However, his "happy feet" don't make up for his inability to sing. In fact, Mumble's singing voice is so painfully terrible it makes him a laughing stock. There's some sort of story involved with this, but it assumes you've seen the flick as it gets lost in the weak cutscenes. Screen from the movie, accompany a pretty vague narration of the plot, along with some dialogue that isn't always attributed to any one particular character. A scene with two penguins getting into an argument, or a scene with a penguin chasing after a huge fishing ship should not lead into a dancing rhythm game. To those who haven't spent the ten bucks (or six bucks at matinee and kids' prices), it makes no sense.
Because there are only two types of gameplay, the people working on the story had to try and force the story to work. Apparently all of penguin's troubles are solved by sliding on their belly, or dancing. That's it. I can't tell if the developers were going to make Happy Feet a collection of minigames and ran out of idea, or if they were going to make it a full fledged rhythm game and just half-assed it.
At least these two gameplay modes are pulled off solidly. The rhythm games are like a toned down version of Elite Beat Agents; players have to tap circles on the touch screen, timing the taps with the enclosing circles around it. Even though you can play it visually, the idea is to tap the screen to the specific beat of the song. In this case players tap to the rhythm of a meaty sampling from the actual Happy Feet soundtrack. Three tracks are recycled towards the end of the game, but we get songs from KC and the Sunshine Band, Stevie Wonder, as well as the Britney Murphy-recorded version of Queen's "Somebody to Love." The rhythm games are good length thanks to the full versions of the songs, and at the very least the response is spot on...an important feature for a rhythm design to have.
The other aspect of Happy Feet involves players guiding Mumble on the touchscreen as he slides on his belly down icy slopes. Mumble must either reach the end before time runs out, or collect items on his way down. The belly sliding is fast enough to be fun, and controls well enough not to get too frustrating for kids. As the game progresses, the levels get more complex, with more obstacles, speed boosts, ramps, and even corkscrews.
Despite the crazy environments, the whole Antarctic feel stays strong. The levels offer a variety of different environments, and even though they're all snowy levels, the level designers managed to created significant differences that make it actually feel like it's a different level. The rhythm games have a dancing Mumble that animates very fluidly. The model gets his groove on and players tap on the lower screen. The better players do, the more energetic his dancing is. It's adorable to the max.
The ultimate problem with Happy Feet is that the two different level styles just can't support the entire production. Anyone trained in the art of Dance Dance Revolution can blow through these rhythm portions without a problem, and the belly races barely offer any challenge for anyone beyond the young, non-gaming crowd. There are very few surprises between the levels as the DS game plays out parallel to the film, and without a variety of different games it's hard for it to hold the gamer's interest.
©2006-12-01, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved
Happy Feet follows the story of Mumble, an Emperor penguin living in Antartica. Mumble is the best dancer of all the other Emperor penguins. However, his "happy feet" don't make up for his inability to sing. In fact, Mumble's singing voice is so painfully terrible it makes him a laughing stock. There's some sort of story involved with this, but it assumes you've seen the flick as it gets lost in the weak cutscenes. Screen from the movie, accompany a pretty vague narration of the plot, along with some dialogue that isn't always attributed to any one particular character. A scene with two penguins getting into an argument, or a scene with a penguin chasing after a huge fishing ship should not lead into a dancing rhythm game. To those who haven't spent the ten bucks (or six bucks at matinee and kids' prices), it makes no sense.
Because there are only two types of gameplay, the people working on the story had to try and force the story to work. Apparently all of penguin's troubles are solved by sliding on their belly, or dancing. That's it. I can't tell if the developers were going to make Happy Feet a collection of minigames and ran out of idea, or if they were going to make it a full fledged rhythm game and just half-assed it.
At least these two gameplay modes are pulled off solidly. The rhythm games are like a toned down version of Elite Beat Agents; players have to tap circles on the touch screen, timing the taps with the enclosing circles around it. Even though you can play it visually, the idea is to tap the screen to the specific beat of the song. In this case players tap to the rhythm of a meaty sampling from the actual Happy Feet soundtrack. Three tracks are recycled towards the end of the game, but we get songs from KC and the Sunshine Band, Stevie Wonder, as well as the Britney Murphy-recorded version of Queen's "Somebody to Love." The rhythm games are good length thanks to the full versions of the songs, and at the very least the response is spot on...an important feature for a rhythm design to have.
The other aspect of Happy Feet involves players guiding Mumble on the touchscreen as he slides on his belly down icy slopes. Mumble must either reach the end before time runs out, or collect items on his way down. The belly sliding is fast enough to be fun, and controls well enough not to get too frustrating for kids. As the game progresses, the levels get more complex, with more obstacles, speed boosts, ramps, and even corkscrews.
Despite the crazy environments, the whole Antarctic feel stays strong. The levels offer a variety of different environments, and even though they're all snowy levels, the level designers managed to created significant differences that make it actually feel like it's a different level. The rhythm games have a dancing Mumble that animates very fluidly. The model gets his groove on and players tap on the lower screen. The better players do, the more energetic his dancing is. It's adorable to the max.
The ultimate problem with Happy Feet is that the two different level styles just can't support the entire production. Anyone trained in the art of Dance Dance Revolution can blow through these rhythm portions without a problem, and the belly races barely offer any challenge for anyone beyond the young, non-gaming crowd. There are very few surprises between the levels as the DS game plays out parallel to the film, and without a variety of different games it's hard for it to hold the gamer's interest.
©2006-12-01, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved