
	Platform Wii Genre Adventure / Action Publisher Disney Interactive Developer Étranges Libellules ESRB E +10 (Everyone) Released March 2, 2010

- Expansive interactive world - Co-op play is a nice addition - Polished and fun!

- You don’t die, you only lose points making it a bit too easy for older players - Upgrades are a bit of work to obtain and don’t make much difference - Why can’t this thing be on the 360 or PS3 so I can see those beautiful backgrounds in high resolution?

Review: Just Dance (Wii) Review: Rabbids Go Home (Wii) Review: Need for Speed: Nitro (Wii)
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Alice in Wonderland

Score: 8.0 / 10

It’s not often that I really enjoy playing a licensed movie game. You know the track record. It’s pretty much a cash grab with the poor studios tasked with developing these things on a tight budget and a fixed timeline that usually equals disaster. There have been exceptions over the years, but I have to admit I wasn’t expecting to find that exception here.

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First of all, I will admit that the game gets a little repetitive after a while … and it’s way too easy. However, it’s targeted towards kids.

The game sees you playing the roles of up to five characters with different abilities. The March Hare can use Telekinesis for example, allowing you to move bricks and create bridges for your character to get across. Often times you will have to switch back and forth between character

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types to implement certain things to defeat enemies. Like any typical third person action game on the Wii, you’ll use the Nunchuk to move and the Wiimote to control special features.

Good use of the Wiimote is used with a requirement to shake, rattle and roll being used from time to time. Not too much, not too little, it’s just right. Like porridge.

The game makes use of quick time events like many of its bigger and badder cousins but does so in an effective way.

So what makes this game different? It’s hard to tell really. I haven’t seen the movie yet so I can’t say that I was drawn into the connections of the Tim Burton-esque art style. I just found that wandering around the world was fun. I wanted to find out what was behind the next door. I kept playing much longer than I ever thought I would.

The game is not without issues. I still don’t understand why in 2010 we have to have “save points”. But hey, game developers, if the techno-behemoth of God of War III can use them I suppose we have to let Alice in Wonderland get away with it. You collect coins for upgrades that you can only get if you find the corresponding chess piece – wherever the heck they are and why they’re not on the board is never really answered but after you burn a few times in the game (trying to figure something out) you don’t really lose lives but you start losing these coins. That’s a bit frustrating but I suppose everything in the world has a cost.

If you’ve got pre-teen kids they are going to love this game and the co-op mode will allow you to join in the fun. When the kids are not around, and you think nobody else is looking, pop the disc in yourself. You just never know what you’re going to find down that rabbit hole.

- Syd Bolton

(April 10, 2010)

Syd Bolton surrounds himself in thousands of classic video games at the Personal Computer Museum in Brantford, Ontario, Canada.