Impressions: The Simpsons Game Wii (D'oh!)

[shams]

Wow... I'm really not having a good run with EA this year.

I gave this game (The Simpsons - Wii) a rental tonight, for a bit of fun. I really liked the look of the game, and was hoping to pick it up for cheap sometime.

GOD NO.

This is one of the most lacklustre, and appalling titles I have played for a long time. These are my comments/feelings from the first 10-20min of the game (Wii version). I seriously doubt if the other versions would be any better...

 - the *very* first thing that happened when I launched the game, was my screen went blue. WTF? I was thinking? But then it returned to normal. The game does NOT run in 480p. I was really shocked at this.

 - next, the game menus came up. Create a game, name it and so on. I started moving the Wiimote to find my cursor on screen... only to notice that there wasn't one. Yes - the game - on the Wii - requires you to enter a name by using the nunchuck/analog stick to select letters. By now I was feeling quite distressed. 2min in.

 - the game then jumps into full screen animations (vids) that look like the show - exactly. Looks pretty cool. Except I had no idea what was going on. Apparently, I entered a dream of Homers - which required me to chase a white chocolate bunny. Ok...

 - now the game kicks in. Ok - so its a tutorial level. The controls are terrible. The gameplay is terrible. Its the ultrageneric, "bash-em-up" (1-button attack only - no combos), combined with generic platformer. The camera - when it works - "snaps" to new angles (Z button). Basically no Wiimote controls, or anything interesting.

 - collision issues. A minute or so later, I'm "running on the spot" - against an invisible wall (must have been caught on the edge of some wall...?). Then I manage to die on the spot (for no penalty) around 5 times in a row - thanks to bad placement of the camera (trying to do some 3D jump - and not being able to judge the distance properly). Groan.

 - audio seems to be randomly chosen, looping samples - that have minimal context to the actual world. Within a few seconds I'm over it.

 - fighting some chocolate bunnies by random hammering the B button - my generic animation isn't actually touching them. They are hurting me - but I can't actually tell (except that my health bar is dropping... I think). Then they leave behind some form of pickup - but I can't actually pick them up. They don't seem to be restoring my health - although by this stage I just don't care. 

... 

At one point Homer turned into a big ball, and a flick of the Wiimote made him roll around (or shoot off) in some uncontrollable fashion. Oh god - PLEASE make it stop!

To top it off, the game pulls the "smart-arse" card. Doing a double-jump reveals a "gaming cliche" (1/32). Pulling a lever does another. 

This entire game IS a series of gaming cliches - bad ones. They couldn't even be bothered to come up with original ideas - instead its "cool" to just rip off other games (in the Simpsons Universe context) - i.e. GTA.

After less than 20min of game time - I just can't go on. The level had turned into a badly controlled, generic 3D platformer/action game - that was made tedious/difficult due to a poor camera system. Its just not fun - on any level.

The one saving grace of the game, is the levels are well (graphically) designed - and look a lot like the show. Pity it doesn't run in 480p, so it shimmers and looks like crap on my TV.

...

Doh - 3/10