|
|
             |
|
|
|
|
|
Platform: Xbox Genre: Puzzle Publisher: Microsoft Developer: Mediavision ESRB: E (Everyone) Released: Q4 2002 Support AE! Buy Games Here:
Be notified of site updates. Sign-up for the Newsletter sent out twice weekly. Enter E-Mail Address Below: |
Sneakers
Score: 4.0 / 10 |
|
|
Pros: -
Fur shading highlights better-than-average graphics -
At least Microsoft is trying to make games for all ages - Young children (eight and under) think it’s fun
|
Cons: -
Anyone over the age of nine won’t want to play much -
Rail-driven gameplay can make everything much more difficult - If this is a kid’s game, why are some of the rats almost impossible to find?
|
|
|
"...I was asked at every opportunity, “Daddy, can we play Sneakers with you?”"
|
||
|
Anyone
out shopping for a new Xbox game this Christmas season be aware that
there are a few warning signs that clue you in to the fact of whether a
game is good or not. When considering a potential purchase, if a
particular title was released in Japan first, changed its name for its
stateside release, is infested with rodents and set in France, is priced
at a mere $30US while Xbox games usually cost $50US, and is only
available at one retail outlet (Toys R Us, a kiddie-store no less),
expect red lights to be flashing bright and sirens to be shrilling at a
high decibel level when you pull out your wallet.
If
you choose to ignore the warning signs and buy this awful and poorly
designed game please put your money back in your wallet, go home, sit
down at your computer and send me an email at the address listed below.
I’ll send you my home mailing address right away. Because if you’re
willing to throw away your money on a coaster such as Sneakers, then if
you send that $30 bucks my way I can go buy a new Xbox S controller and
at least one of us will enjoy an Xbox-related purchase.
Originally
released in Japan as Nezmix, the game has you in the role of the hero,
the mouse Apollo and his band of fellow mice in their battle against the
evil rats (is there any other kind?), complete in their evilness with
their Nazi-inspired garb. The rats steal Apollo and the other mice’s
food, and it’s up to Apollo and his mice crew of Brutus, Tiki, Bonnie,
Watt, and Pete to defeat the rats and reclaim their meal. The action
takes place in the houses and the streets of Paris, France.
Make
no mistake about it, with its sugary-sweet story and characters, the
cutesy Sneakers is designed for the extremely younger gamer. The one
positive about the game is that for the first time I was actually able
to sit my four-year-old daughter Leah on my lap and play an Xbox game
together that she enjoyed. Unlike the PS2 or GameCube the Xbox doesn’t
gear itself in any manner towards younger children, which makes the
arrival of Sneakers on the Xbox’s roster even stranger. In a household
with four kids, only Leah and her eight-year-old sister Samantha showed
any interest when I played Sneakers.
Their
two older siblings (age 11 and 14) had absolutely no desire to play. For
the initial few days I loaded up the game for this review (I wouldn’t
play this game for pleasure, that’s for sure) I was asked at every
opportunity, “Daddy, can we play Sneakers with you?” Although
playing a game with my children was enjoyable, the fact that it was
Sneakers they wanted to play made me cringe every time they asked me.
Now’s
probably a good time to explain why I don’t like this game much. It
comes down to the very weak gameplay and control of Sneakers. As I said,
the game is geared towards a young audience, so Sneakers basic gameplay
isn’t very challenging and can be downright sleep inducing for older
gamers. It breaks down to performing two main goals: finding the rats on
each level, eliminating them from each mini-section of the level, and
then battling them. None of these goals require much gaming skill. In an
attempt to make the game a little bit of a challenge, the developers
make it almost impossible to find the last rat of the approximately 30
you must find on each level.
When
a rat is found, it adds to the amount of time left on each stage. Once
that timer winds down to zero, the game ends unless you have found and
defeated in battle all the rats. Finding most of your vermin enemies is
relatively easy. The rats do nothing to avoid being caught. Oh, they
sometimes are hidden in what are supposed to be hard-to-see places, but
again it comes down to just one rat being difficult to find on each
stage. Once a rat is found, pushing the controller’s X button to
target him and then the A button eliminates him from the total of rats.
Another
difficulty with Sneakers is that it is rail-driven, meaning you are
relegated to going only in the direction that the game will allow you on
any particular level. This is extremely frustrating, because a game
where there are hidden enemies playing a game of hide and seek needs to
have complete freedom for the gamer to go exploring. This rail-driven
action was probably done to make it easier for young children to
navigate through the levels, but it actually made it harder.
My
youngsters were unable to play without my assistance because of the
inability to avoid going in rail-driven circles while searching for
rats. If you do actually find all the rats, you must return to their
turf (red-hatted rats populate one area of a level, blue-hatted another,
and so on) and battle them. Here’s another non-challenging
undertaking. Hit two buttons and defeating rats is a snap, even against
the supposedly tougher boss rats. It takes less than a minute for each
battle to end. There is supposedly the threat of you losing some of your
comrades in battle, but don’t believe it. Tap a few buttons, and the
rats are easily dispatched.
The
shame is that the lousy and simplistic gameplay takes away from the fact
that this is actually a nice-looking Xbox title. The most impressive
feature is the fur shading effects applied to the mice. Fur shading
allows the developer to show each and every strand of the mice’s fur,
and the results are impressive. The levels are bright and cartoony in
their appearance and are just as sharp looking as Sneaker’s mice.
Sound effects are again right out of Saturday-morning cartoons, and have
that annoying tendency to get you humming them after you have stopped
playing the game. But good looks and sound are wasted on a title with
such appalling gameplay, even for a kid’s title.
Sneakers is nothing more than a showcase of the Xbox’s graphical abilities which anybody over the age of nine won’t even want to play more than once. What could have potentially been a fun game that could be enjoyed by youngsters in Xbox-owning households is a total disaster in most facets except the game’s visuals and music. Microsoft would have been wiser scrapping Sneakers instead of trying to sell this embarrassing title -- this is one game that should have never made it out of development. Just because kids think it’s cute and fun doesn’t mean it’s actually good. Anybody remember Teletubbies?
- Lee Cieniawa (December 2, 2002)
Search for Related Topics:
...More Puzzle Game Reviews...
|
||
