Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs

         

 

I've never been so physically mad at a game as I was with Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, which was probably my favorite book as a child. In the book, the town of Chewandswallow where food inexplicably falls from the sky, restaurants have no roofs, pedestrians keep a knives and forks in their pockets just in case, and life is good. But then things go wrong. The town is sieged with ever increasing portions of food - a giant pancake covers the elementary school! - and a decision is made to abandon the town. The populace constructs boats out of massive slabs of stale bread, lashed together with peanut butter and sails made of pizza slices. There

was a book sequel called "Pickles to Pittsburgh" but that didn't capture my imagination the same way Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs did.

 

For the game (and movie) the food falling from the sky is the result of an invention gone wrong. I have a problem with this. So rather than put myself through torture to see how they took a beloved piece of literature and

turn it into pulp for this new generation, I turned it over to my kids.

 

This is the kind of game perfectly suited for kids. The graphics are big and bright, the levels are straightforward enough that there's never a situation where they'll get lost, and the co-op play means there's no shouting about "It's my turn!" as they clean-up the town with Cuisinart-esque implements, which are a lot of fun to use according my kids.
 

Maybe the only stumbling point for the kids is the lack of tutorial. The controls aren't terribly complex but it does mean a learning curve, though not as steep as something like G-Force, which felt a lot like a Gears of War clone for kids. My 10-year old described the game as "easy to control" but for the first couple of hours, my 7-year old was constantly asking for help (and I get to look like a video game god as I tromp everything).

I have to hand final say to the kids though because this is not a game aimed at my demographic.

 

"I would give this game an 8 because of the two-player mode and the great weapons." There you have it.

 

- Aaron Simmer