Gaming Trend

Gaming Trend Review

by Keith Schleicher

Games released in conjunction with a movie are nothing new.  Movies aimed at kids are more likely to have a game released with them on all the major platforms.  At one time these games were little more than an attempt to cash in on a movie’s popularity and featured horrible gameplay and controls.  Since then developers have taken more care with licensed properties and they have been handled with more care.  Now Vicarious Visions and Activision are bringing out Over the Hedge for the GBA.

Based on the Dreamworks SKG animated film, Over the Hedge takes place during the events of the film.  In OtH, you play as RJ the raccoon and Verne the turtle.  Using these characters, you employ strength and stealth to get through the levels to steal food for your fellow forest-mates living in the woods with you.

The graphics of the main characters are impressive for a GBA game.  You will mostly play as RJ the raccoon and Verne the turtle.  It feels as if Vicarious Visions has squeezed every frame of animation for the two main characters.  Their movements look incredibly fluid as they walk around.    Seeing them pull on rocks and push logs looks very realistic.  Even the other characters from the forest have their own charm to them, even if they don’t move around all that much.

You have a wide variety of backgrounds to travel through within the game.  You travel through the forest, the streets, yards, and people’s homes.  These actually have a much greater variety than you might think.  The living rooms of homes have different arrangements and different colored carpeting.  Even with that, the graphics look very similar throughout the entire game.

The game stumbles a bit with the other characters.  There is a lack of variety in the number of unique characters.  You have a couple of kids that walk around and a couple of adults, and a few pets out in the yard.  They also move very stiffly compared to the main characters.  Still, for a GBA game, the graphics hold up pretty well.

The music in Over the Hedge has a nice variety to it.  It is light-hearted and jovial.  Each of the different areas has their own little theme to it.  It also sounds like some of the themes from the movie were used in making the music for the game.

The sound effects are impressive for a GBA game.  You hear cars driving by and honking at you as you try to go across the road.  The logs and rocks scratch against the ground as you move them.  When completing a mission, your character says “All right!”  While there isn’t a lot you can do with the GBA, it’s still not bad at all.

The controls are very simple, but they are surprisingly deep.  Movement is done with the D-pad.  Hitting the A button gives your character a little movement boost, and the B button will change depending on the situation.  Sometimes it is used for moving objects and other times it is used to hide from other people.

The biggest problem with the controls is how slow your character moves.  It feels like you are moving through molasses during the entire time.  While RJ is a little faster, he doesn’t move as fast as you’d like him to.  Because of the nature of the play style of the game, this can make the game frustrating.

At first, the game seems to have a nice variety in the gameplay.  You move through the forest at first and then infiltrate the home for candies and other food scattered through out the house.  The next level you need to get through the forest, then through the yard, and then go into the house.  The next level you have to cross the street too.

You do notice a few differences between playing as Verne and RJ.  Verne moves slowly, but he can push and pull objects easily.  RJ has a little more speed, but he takes longer to move objects out of his way.

However, once you play through several levels, you figure out that the gameplay is repetitive.  You continue to go through the levels, avoiding enemies and getting through the levels.  While some of the elements are fun at first, they get repetitive.

This isn’t to say that there aren’t some unique gameplay elements in OtH.  Getting through the forest isn’t much of a challenge, but most of the other levels have an element of stealth to them.  You can’t be detected by people, so you hide by either pulling a newspaper out of thin air as RJ or retracting into your shell as Verne.  The lawn has enemies like cats and dogs.  You either slide attack through the lawn as Verne or beat them up using a golf club as RJ.  Inside the house you can distract adults by turning on lights, similar to a knock in Metal Gear Solid.

The biggest issue with the game is that you need to play through the game levels multiple times.  That’s because to progress through the levels you need to collect food, and you’ll need to play through the same level multiple times to progress to the next level.  If the gameplay wasn’t tedious enough, having to play through the levels multiple times really kills the fun.

Still, after you have played the game for a few levels, you have pretty much played the entire game.  There are a couple of unique elements that come up using other characters in the forest and a few boss battles, but it gets too repetitive to stay fresh.

While the game makes you play through the levels multiple times, the game isn’t very long.  It won’t take long to collect enough food items, because each of the individual levels are so short.  While there is a bit of stealth element to the game, your characters move so slow that it can be frustrating performing those portions of the game.  Yet, the other portions of the game are actually easy comparatively.

You do collect candy during the game.  Using the candy you have the ability to unlock a few extras.  However, you really don’t have much reason to unlock them, as they really don’t add very much to the game.

If you have a young child who really enjoyed the movie, they will probably enjoy the game.  It’s a neat way to try to introduce them to some stealth gameplay as well.  Unfortunately, if you aren’t young, you will easily find the game too boring and repetitive.  It’s unfortunate that the game was rather fun to play at first, but dragged down further and further as the game wore on.  If you have any interest in the movie games, you’ll be better off looking at the console or Nintendo DS versions.

Gaming Trend Score

65

1. Graphics: 73
2. Audio: 73
3. Controls: 76
4. Gameplay: 50
5. Value/Replay: 65
6. OVERALL:65