Review: Nicktoons – SpongeBob And Friends – Battle For Volcano Island (GBA) ~ Again?

PS2 version article

Wait, what? I already talked about this game… True, but for the GBA month, I decided to review the GBA version of this game. The game that actually made me buy the PS2 version. I found out about this game when my local game store still had a renting system. I rented this game and I finished it after renting it three times. Surprisingly, nobody deleted my save files. Anyway, I wanted to buy myself a copy of this game, but I haven’t been able to. If somebody has a copy of this game lying around, please contact me. I would love to buy it. Since I really like it this game. But that isn’t what this article is about, isn’t it? This article is about how the game is. It’s a review. So, let’s take a look at Nicktoons – Battle For Volcano Island. How good or how bad is it? Keep in mind that I’m doing this review out of memory and the first few levels I was able to play through some alternative means. 

Different story?

So, I already to a look to the PS2 version of this game. Let me tell you, apart from some characters, the story is exactly the same. In the GBA version, there are fewer characters you can play with, but I think that is for the better in this version.

So, in this game you are summoned to free Volcano Island from an evil entity. It’s a story that will appeal to children, but it will be bad in the eyes of adults. I could start bashing the game for this, but I think that would be unfair.

The game is aimed at children and people who like a nice platforming game. Those games have in most cases no real deep story or character development. Most platformers add another genre to have a better story.

This game is at its core a platformer. So, the tutorial shouldn’t take long. Don’t worry, in this game the tutorial doesn’t take long at all. The first level isn’t challenging, but it’s a great way to learn the ropes of the game.

How does it play?

So, you play as one of 4 Nicktoons. Each character has their own special abilities. SpongeBob can go through dirt, Patrick can use his air pants to float through the air, Timmy can stretch his arms to … crazy lengths and Danny can use his ghost powers to a certain extent.

The game isn’t very long, but its length is quite decent. There are 4 worlds with each 4 levels. Then you have an additional final boss fight. Let me tell you, the final boss fight is a real test of your skills with this game.

Something that might have crossed your mind is that this game is easy. I urge you to think twice about that. The game isn’t as easy as you might think. That’s due to the amazing checkpoint system.

Each time you get hit, you lose a heart. Five hits, and it’s game over. Each hit sends you back to the last visited checkpoint. Each new checkpoint you visit gives you back one heart. So, if you aren’t careful, you have to redo a level over and over again.

There is some replay value in this game as well. In each level, there are several golden hearts. If you gather enough of them, you unlock a special level. But getting the golden hearts is the really tricky part. They are sometimes hidden but most of the time hidden in plain sight. The kicker is that they need pixel perfect reflexes. The golden hearts get added to your total heart count at the end. So, if you get hit, you lose your special golden heart. I promise you, it gets challenging in some places.

Each world has a theme. Well, sort of. The nice thing is that you don’t have to beat every level in order. You have a hub world where you can go and play any level you have unlocked.

The music?

Some levels might have a bit of back tracking, but it’s done in such a way you don’t really notice if you don’t pay attention to it. Since in those levels you go back differently because you gained a new ability.

Visually, this game looks how it should. Bright and colorful. In my opinion it looks extremely pleasant on the Game Boy screen and made me play this game to the very end. Everything has that Nickelodeon vibe over it and all the art styles of the different series mixed without something that stands out.

In terms of the animation, well, it’s quite basic. Nothing really special but it gets the job done without a problem. I don’t have any complaints there.

The music is what it is. It isn’t too memorable, but it isn’t forgettable either. I had the tunes stuck in my head for a couple of days but as soon as I played some different games, I forgot about them. Honestly, I don’t think the game has bad music. No, it’s quite decent but not good. I have that feeling that there could have been done more with the music. The same goes for the sound effects or rather the lack of variety. There aren’t a lot of sound effects in this game. So, I sometimes felt that the action wasn’t… well, action-y.

Anyway, I think I’ll leave it here for my review. I talked about what I wanted to talk about. Let’s go straight on to my conclusion. For the people who are new here, I usually never talk about a game in-depth because I want to leave some things to surprise you when you decide to play this game.

Conclusion

The bad:

– The music is so-so.

– Weak story, but good enough for the kids.

– The placement of the golden hearts is just brutal.

The good:

+ Amazing visuals.

+ Great level design.

+ Addictive gameplay. (You truly have to use all characters)

Final thoughts:

Okay, I think it’s quite clear that I like this game. I think it’s one of the best games I played on the GBA. Like my last review, this game is an overlooked game because … It looks like a kids game. There are a lot of elements in there for more veteran gamers and there are elements in there for the younger gamers.

This game is a must-buy or must play if you are a big GBA fan or a big fan of platformers.

Thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article, but until then… Have a great rest of your day and take care.

Score: 80/100

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NekoJonez: Top 10 ~ My least favorite games.

There is a lot of shitty games on the market. Yet, in this list, you won’t see a lot of those “easy targets”. This list contains games that you might like or might be good. But the next 5 games I don’t find myself enjoying or there is too much broken in the game for me to finish it. This list is in a totally random order as well. I also challenged myself with picking releases on Steam, Gameboy, PC… And no easy targets like badly programmed Android apps with misguiding information on the market space. So, which games on this list do you dislike as well? And what are your most disliked games list? And why? So, without any further ado, and hoping that my introduction is long enough, for nicer lay-out sake, let’s start this list. Shall we?

#1: Aladdin (Gameboy)

Arpegi review

What more can I say about this shit that I haven’t told in my original review on my personal blog yet? Nothing much. I remember that I lend this game together with Duck Tales from a cousin. In the day, I was happy to even play shitty games since my parents were extremely strict in buying games for me.

But now, that I got this game from somebody who wanted to give away his collection, I feel a bit sad owning this game. Especially when I those reviews from the better SNES and Sega versions. The jealousy raises extremely fast.

I don’t understand how IGN can let this game pass. There are so many faults with this game that it’s a real shame that people play this game out of only nostalgia and therefore defend it.

Terrible controls, confusing health system, random crashes, bad graphics and even worse weapon range destroy this game completely.

#2: Barbie: Game Girl (Gameboy)

 

Wikipedia page

You can now go and judge me all you want, but sometimes I get my games from friends who want to give their old collection, that was gathering dust, to me. A school friend from high school gave me her old Gameboy games as a sort of goodbye gift.

Honestly, when I was a kid, I rarely played my sisters games. One of them was Barbie’s Secret Agent on the Gameboy Advance, and honestly, it’s a rather nice game. I even dare to go as far to recommend it for children and for a good and easy game snack.

So, I thought that it couldn’t be that bad. Oh man, was I proven wrong? This game is extremely bad. One of the worst Gameboy games I ever played.

Weird animations, confusing power-ups, too long death scene, LJN bad jumping, bad sound effects and irritating music just make this game pull your hair out. It’s not even worth to use it to torture your sister with it. It’s that bad.

#3: The cat and the coup (Steam)

Steam page

An interesting designed game doesn’t mean that you’ll get an interesting game. As I tried to review this game and failed to write a great article, I use this opportunity to rip it apart.

Due to its absurd art style, the message and meaning this game tries to deliver get lost extremely quickly. That makes my senses to try to enjoy the actual game. But the game is so boring that you better stay away from it. Unless you enjoy these types of “different games.”

It’s free on Steam, so no harm is done to your wallet. But some puzzles ask too precise timing, the art is just a mess, the menu doesn’t save your settings and confusing progress makes this a bad game. Such a shame while it tries to deliver a message about a president… I think.

#4: Playmobil Interactive – Top Secret Agents (DS)

Arpegi review

I played the first Playmobil game on DS. If I remember correctly, it was the one about knights and kingdoms. It was rather enjoyable. I also played Playmobil Hype on the Gameboy Color. Such a hidden game in the library of Gameboy Color games.

Then I played Playmobil – Pirates on the DS. While it was a step down from the first DS game, it was still rather enjoyable.

Then this “gem” came. And man, while I already ripped this game apart in my original review, I still wish I could rip it a new one again.

This game is complete and utter sh*t compared to what Playmobil games where in the past. From bugged out controls we go to the most cheesy names.

I read a review that this game is a great pass time for kids. But don’t give them this, they deserve better. Give this to your kid when it was naughty. It’s a passable game, but …. Wait, I take that back. It’s a great game to use for an easy rip-apart target.

#5: Nickelodeon – Avatar – The Legend Of Aang (PC)

Arpegi’s First Impression

I promised to finish it, but honestly, I deleted it for now. I continued to play it after my first impression article on my blog but I gave up. I couldn’t take the utter failure that is this game.

I even ran into more problems than just the ones I mentioned. Yes, even more, broken-ness in a game. I’m so disappointed at THQ to be a part of this failure. They brought us way better content then this quick cash in.

I own several Avatar games. One on Gameboy advance and another one on PS2. And they pass with ease. They are really good. I even finished the Gameboy Advance game several times.

I wish I had never played this game, to begin with. It had a lot of potential and with a big name like that, it could have been great merchandise and a nice collector item. Yet, even to collectors of Avatar, I say, don’t even dare to torrent this game to take a look. You will regret it so much.

It’s ugly, the controls make no sense, the menu is idiotic, the shortness of the game is displayed on the box, the installation makes the disc spin extremely fast, the installation instructions are on the disc itself… Read more of the faults in my original article.

5 “honorable” mentions.

So, before we close this article, let’s get a bit lazy. I was planning to make a top 10 but I’m tired from a heavy day in college. And I wanted to publish two articles like promised. Also, they installed new outlets in my gaming room so I have to take care of the wiring setup I had. Anyways, the five other games with a short description why I don’t like them, go!

1. Disney’s Story Studio: Mulan (PS1) – This game made me shudder beyond belief. It’s a kids game but it holds your hand a lot. While it’s one of the best games on this list, I didn’t enjoy my experience.
2. Flikken 2 – Moord in het hotel Ganda (PC) (Dutch link) – So, making a game from a TV series makes for bad results. But what if you have a local TV show that gets re-created in a game in a country that isn’t ready for gaming studios? You get a rip-off of a game that gets boring extremely quickly.
3. The Bard’s Tale (PS2) – I just couldn’t get into the humor. I found it actually more annoying to play then funny. Or I just played it on the wrong system.
4. Dune (PC) – They just tried a tad bit TOO hard with this game. And it makes me dislike the game for its faults. I can’t get into it.
5. Fortune Summoners: Secret of the Elemental Stone (PC) – I expected a lot more of the developer. They failed to deliver here.

Final words

While I totally changed my mind of which articles I was going to write today, I think this list turned out pretty good. I had this list sitting in a word document since the start of September. And I’m glad to finally write it. Of course, it went under a lot of changes, but which list doesn’t.

Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed this (mini-rant) list. If you want to read my latest review, go over to my personal blog. My latest, 16th, review is a special one since the developers of an Android game mailed me to review their game. And so I did…

First Impression: Nicktoons – Spongebob and Friends – Battle For Volcano Island (PS2) ~ Thou Are Summoned

(Little blog news: Sorry for not writing a lot. I’m extremely busy. Follow me on my Twitter for updates.)

Wikipedia entry

Back when the gameboy advance SP was the latest of the latest gameboy’s from Nintendo, I could rent out games from a local game store. The same one I buy most of my games at today. I love those guys. They are extremely friendly, talk with you about games, have an amazing helpdesk… Lot of advantages. For those who are interested in some Belgium culture while learning about my opinion of the games I play, here is the site of my game store. But be warned, it’s in Dutch. Game Mania is just awesome. I rented the latest Zelda game, which was the Minish Cap, and a few other games. The GBA version of this game was among them. Bummed out that I had to return the GBA version because it was so awesome I looked all over for this game. Sadly enough, I wasn’t able to find a copy for myself. Until one day I passed by and saw this in the 2nd hand PS2 games shelf. I was thrilled. Finally a copy of this game for myself. Not the one I wanted but hey, it’s a start. My expectations where high. I tried to set them really low to avoid a major disappointment but I was happily surprised. This game is pretty great. Why, I’ll explain in this article. But don’t let you get fooled by the fact it’s a kid’s game. Don’t judge a book on it’s cover, or a game on it’s box-art. Who knows, there might be a great gem inside. Anyways, let me know in the comments how I did in this article and your views on this game. Even when you didn’t play it. So, here we go. 

Open yet closed?

Expect it, I’ll make a lot of references and comparisions to the GBA version of this game. Something I really liked in the GBA version is the fact you could walk around and pick the order of the levels yourself. Of course, parts where locked away until you reached a certain point of the game, but you didn’t had to finish all the levels in one section before you could advance to the next section.

If this game works with the same idea, I can’t tell just yet. From what I see now, it’s a tad bit more linear. But there is a central hub. And here is the neat thing, you are free to explore the whole thing. The restrictions from the GBA version aren’t there.

But what I really like in this version of the game is how the story is presented to you. It’s a big improvement above the GBA version where the story was somewhat absent. Your goal in this game was a bit unclear, since it was only explained at the start and the end of the game. The cut-scenes in this game really aids to bring character to the story and really makes the game more fun.

Damage?

This game got a lot of marks from me. But one thing makes me doubt if this game is actually worth all my praise. The absence of a proper health display is worrying. You have to guess how many hits you can still take before you die. And the only thing that happens after a lot of hits is that your green behind the still image of the character changes into orange and then into red. In the GBA version you had a limit amount of hearts. And that provided a bit more challenge. With the actual amount of health you have in this game, it gets a whole lot easier.

Another thing where this game loses points is that the music is forgettable. Don’t get me wrong, it’s does it’s job but it’s actually not good enough to want to download the OST or get it stuck in your head. On the other hand, the voice work get a big thumbs up. I really like the sound effects and I think they add more then the music to the game. The voices really makes the funny story come to live. I also like the nods to previous games and to the series of the characters who are in the game.

Graphically this game is colorful and pretty. This helps a lot when you want to explore the world since it’s a blast to do. And here is where it gets even more interesting. Thanks to a whole ton of collect-ables and unlock-ables, this game’s replay value skyrockets. And then the possibility to take multiple paths helps a lot too. Exploring this colorful world is really fun to do. And this is backed up by a lovely short loading screen where great animations are displayed.

Speaking of which, the animation in this game is good. I really like the attention to detail in some parts. Patrick’s health display also changes the more hits you receive. I didn’t see it happening with the other characters though. I really like how this game all comes together.

Finish?

I think I might finish this game in order to review this one. I actually think they deserve it for this game.

The level design is extremely well done. They added in spawners that pop out more enemies for you to fight until you destroy the source. The combat works great for a kids game but isn’t more then mashing the attack button.

The control scheme is alright. To my knowledge, there are two different settings. But I didn’t had any complaints about it while playing this game.

I also found out that this game might be short. After finishing two levels, the save file said I completed 20% of the game. Hopefully this is a mistake since if the game is extremely short, the marks will fall in the review.

Thankfully, the game is multiplayer too. You can play this game with two players. Or that’s what I can gather with the empty not used space and the mention of “player 1”. So, I have to check on that.

Anyways, that’s all for this game. Thanks for reading and I hope to catch you at a next read. But I’m now going to continue playing games to make new articles for you guys. Cheers!

First Impression: Nickelodeon – Avatar: The Legend Of Aang (PC) ~ A messy pile of junk.

Image from Spong.com

Wikipedia link to the multiplatform game article.

I’m going to not mess with you guys. This game is a pile of junk. I saw scores of 5 out of 10 for this game but that’s way to much for this disaster. Honestly, I own also the PS2 and GBA version of this game and it’s a lot better then this game. The PC game nearly feels like an insult to the series, gamers and fans of the show alike. I’m even surprised that THQ published this train wreck.  Never have I seen this bad of production quality for a game released in 2007. Yeah, it made me facepalm several times. I bought this game as a free game along two other games and I kind of regret paying my hard earned cash as a student for this game. For any parents that want to buy an Avatar game for their kids, stay away from this game. I’ll fully play this game but it’s already clear to me that this game is going to get an extremely bad score. Let’s dive into my first impressions of this “game”. 

Signs of bad things to come.

I wished I had seen this at the store but the box-art betrays already that this game is actually a bad game. The first thing that betrays the bad state of the game is “Journey through 6 exotic locations.” Yup, six of them. And here is the cherry on the cake, it’s the very first sentence on the box after the expected: “Water. Earth. Fire. Air.” So, the game length must be short. But I can forgive that for a game based on a TV-show since they are mostly meant to milk money out of your pocket(s).

But then I look to the system specs. And this made me drop my jaw. What I saw may shock you. This game, released in 2007, can run on Windows 98/ME/2000 and XP. No mention of Windows Vista, that was released a year before this game. The low system specs really made me worry. 

Then I opened the box. No instruction manual nor advertisements. Odd considering it’s from a TV-Show. But for whatever reason, the developers decided that it’s a good idea to put the installation instructions on the disc itself. I’m quite serious, it’s on the disc. What you need to do when the game doesn’t start automatically.

And it made me skin crawl reading it. Most computers have DVD drives for a while now, and they still use CD’s? Yes, this game is using a CD-Rom. It isn’t shy to hide it. It display this on the disc itself. I had to take other games to actually confirm that other games didn’t have this and some big games didn’t have the CD-Rom logo.

It gets worse.

The lack of (decent) screenshots, I can explain. I had to go and make screenshots myself. This game is actually skipped by a lot of reviewers and that’s another sign of how bad this game is.

In addition to that, the game has no option menu. So, you can’t adjust the controls, or change your screensize. Oh no, that’s too advanced for the developers of this game.

What’s also to advanced is creating an acceptable installation program. It’s as basic as you can get. Even the name is slapped with red letters, almost with paint. With annoying background music. The installation is annoying. Plus the disc spins so fast that I was afraid my disc was going to be damaged.

Then to the launcher. The game is even bad there. It has an option to re-install the game. Sigh, what’s the use? Let’s go to the actual game. Let’s not rant about the bad menu and the possibility to replay the introduction movie. And that the extra button doesn’t have an animation.

In game.

The controls are awkward. You barely use the keyboard. Walking goes extremely slow. The game plays like a point and click game. The dialogues are extremely cheesy and not enjoyable. The tutorial is basically in a conversation and it made me sigh extremely deep. Plus, you can’t click anywhere to go to the next lines in a dialogue. Nope, you need to click exactly on their arrow. Lucky us, that the space bar skips it too.

Above that, they don’t use the buttons on your keyboard. Nope, mostly everything is done with your mouse.

The graphics are a joke. It’s almost made for a portable system. The above view doesn’t help the game visually. But visually it’s even worse as some characters look the same.

The voice acting sounds bad. I even think that it isn’t the original cast that did the voices. And if they did, I’m confused and I can’t believe it.

Invisible walls are everywhere. Even on some places where it isn’t supposed to be.

Plus you can’t sit on an air cloud when trying to attack. Nope, not going to happen.

And finally, you don’t have any visual representation of when the game saves.

I’m going to leave it here. I’ll torture myself with finishing this game but I think I’m clear already, avoid this game. It isn’t worth your money. At all.