Monsters Vs Aliens Review (360)

Monsters Vs Aliens is a great family film, why has the game failed on so many levels?

Monsters Vs Aliens has burst onto our screens and has been nothing short of brilliant, mixing enough fun and laughs to entertain the whole family, featuring voice acting from Hollywood stars Seth Rogan (Zack and Miri, Superbad), Hugh Laurie (House), Renee Zellweger (Bridget Jones’ Diary, Bee Movie) and Reese Witherspoon (Legally Blonde, Four Christmases) Monsters Vs Aliens has something for everyone. The Evil Gallaxhar has invaded the Earth in search of his precious quandomonium…oops sorry, quantonium (if you have seen the movie you will know what I’m talking about!). Anyway, the president has ordered that the Monsters that have been in captivity for some time under the supervision of General W. R Monger be released and stop this threat on civilisation. Is this game of the film yet another cheap cash in on a popular title or can Activision break the mould on the mediocrity that every other movie – videogame has provided us?

Gameplay centres around 3 of the monsters, Gigantica, The Missing Link, and B.O.B. Given the distinct abilities of the different monsters, throwing them all together to fight off evil alien robots was not going to be easy and so Activision thought it best to set up separate area levels for these characters, you switch from one character to the next to inevitably “work together” to complete your quest. This only helps to make the game slow and repetitive and you often have to complete 3 different sections for each character to complete a level. The Gigantica stages are set up as boring ‘skate away from an enemy’ or ‘skate towards an enemy’ missions and are often just repeated levels of those visited earlier. The Missing Link levels, however, are slightly better, given his abilities as a fighter, you progress by destroying separate parts of the giant Robots your team mates are fighting, such as a huge hand or arm. The B.O.B sections however, are the best, adding a sort of puzzle element to the mix, yet still remaining relatively pointless to the big picture. The indestructible gelatinous mass can also squeeze through grates and swallow enemies before spitting them out to destroy another target.

Activision have opted for another “Let’s not bother” situation.

As Monsters Vs Aliens is mainly aimed at the younger generation, it is safe to say that this game is not at all challenging to the over fives. For anyone over the age of seven, you may get bored towards the end, but to anyone else, you WILL get bored by the end of the second chapter. Mainly due to this title’s repetitive gameplay, once you have seen chapter one, you have seen everything else. It is easy to think that this game is “just another cash in” and yes, that may be the case, but Monsters Vs Aliens does utilise each characters abilities to an adequate potential and can be fun given the “D.N.A” points system. Although saying that, you won’t really care about it that much.

Given the detail in DreamWorks’s new motion picture, it was not going to be easy converting this detail into a videogame but some effort would have been nice. It looks and feels like Activision has taken the game and thrown it through a Next gen polishing machine and kept the results. The animation is sluggish, slow, and repetitive. The visual effects are of a slightly higher standard given various shimmer effects. The characters are not detailed enough and often look flat compared to the environment. The enemies are all look the same, once you have seen one, you have seen them all, again often looking flat but not as bad as the main characters. Add to this the worst voice acting you could imagine, throw in the most repetitive dialogue you can think of and you are pretty much done. Dr Cockroach never seems to stop saying “The Missing Link” and you will want to burn your ears in frustration. For once you would just like him to refer to him as ‘Link’…hell, Missing Link would be acceptable, but not “THE Missing Link” two hundred times throughout the adventure.

A.I is another point where Activision have opted for another “Let’s not bother” situation. Normal sentry enemies are all fought the same way with each character. Gigantica dash attacks them, The Missing Link fights them and B.O.B eats them and spits them at other enemies. The fact is, these enemies are stupid, and more often than not they will just stand there waiting for you to take them down. Bigger opponents are again fought in the same way; with every destruction sequence triggered the same as before, again adding to the repetition. Boss battles are fought a little better as, the levels before you have in fact actually been weakening them up for your final attack and have not been pointless as first thought.

Given these many, many flaws, ‘Monsters Vs Aliens’ does provide huge replay value. As you progress through the adventure you unlock D.N.A, a kind of in game cash if you like. You spend this D.N.A in the lab and although it does not earn you additional power ups for the characters, it does allow you to unlock concept art from both the game and the motion picture, audio commentary, movie stills and even early storyboard footage. To get access to all of this content however, Activision has introduced monster challenges that can be attempted by two players co-operatively. The second player will also get the chance to play as Dr Cockroach, unavailable in the main game. This is obviously where all of the effort has come and decided to stay for the night, and that’s about all it stays for because as with the main game, there is not really any reason for you to continue.

Timeframe, you are looking at about 4-5 hours for the average gamer, but because this is aimed at the younger generation, expect this to take 8-10 hours dependant on their ability. That is however, if you decide to stay for the long haul, and unless you REALLY want to complete this game 100%, the novelty will soon wear off. You won’t really bother with the additional features either, leaving this title very short lived.

When all is said and done, ‘Monsters Vs Aliens: The Videogame’ loosely follows the exploits of the Monsters on their quest to save the world from the evil Gallaxhar and his invading drones of mass destruction. The word ‘Loosely’ being the word of importance here as yes, all the main characters make an appearance, and sure, it has some of the key environments from the film. However, the actors have not provided voiceovers for the game, and so we are yet again forced to listen to cheap imitations of the real thing. This, alongside the repetitive gameplay, average graphics and physics engine makes for a well below par movie tie in. Very short lived and unchallenging for the under seven’s, this will not even appeal to the most diehard fans of the film. Go see the movie, buy it on DVD/Blu Ray and just leave this well alone. Another movie licence wasted.