Rocky & Bullwinkle takes the world of the 1959-1964 cartoon and clumsily crams it into a second-rate WarioWare knockoff. It’s not a bad idea, as the large cast of characters and multiple themes bring a number of different frantic and fractured microgames to mind. Well, my mind, anyway. But this Xbox Live Arcade release doesn’t capture enough of the look, sound, and feel of the cartoon, making the whole project come off like an unofficial Flash game with shaky control.
There are over 100 microgames, and each one is assigned to a different “show,” much the same way different games were assigned to different characters in WarioWare. Here, the shows are based on one character or sub-show from the cartoon, giving you a Bullwinkle set, one for Rocky, one for Boris & Natasha, one for Aesop & Son, and so on. Your first goal is to clear all seven of the main shows. A show gives you a randomly selected batch of games from each set, as well as one boss game. You can fail the main games, lose a life, and continue forward, but you’ll have to clear the boss game each time it comes up to proceed. Clearing it gives you an extra life and raises the difficulty up a level, making all of the games a bit more difficult. There are five levels of difficulty in all.
Most of the games are too simple, like a dart-throwing game where all you do is point crosshairs at a dartboard–you don’t need to actually throw the dart. But since you’re kept on a short time limit, you need to work quickly. That worked in WarioWare, but here, you’re shown a screen telling you exactly what game is coming up next and how to control it, and you have to hit A to proceed to the next game. The pause between games prevents Rocky & Bullwinkle from developing any tension at all. Furthermore, some games have unclear controls. Some games want you to press the two trigger buttons, but the game doesn’t make it clear if you should pound them as quickly as possible or build up a rhythm between the two buttons. As a result, I ended up having a fair amount of trouble with games using the triggers. The game also has camera support, which make some games use the camera in lieu of the standard controls. So instead of hitting A, you’ll jump up and down, and so on. I gave that a shot and quickly gave up because it didn’t seem fun or particularly interesting.
As you play, you earn boxtops, which can be used to purchase items, some of which just make it easier to earn more boxtops. Some give you score boosts. The only one that felt useful was a scrooching gun, which adds one more bubble of time to each game’s countdown.
The game is bright and colorful, and it occasionally looks pretty good. But sometimes the artwork just doesn’t look true to the original characters, and all of the movement is very rough, making the whole game move like a bad Flash cartoon. The audio isn’t much better. Only a few vocal samples have been included, and most of the trademark music from the cartoon series isn’t here. Instead, there’s a bunch of too-smooth music that sounds like someone pressed the “give me something inoffensive” button on a piece of sequencing software. A handful of grainy, small clips of the cartoon are also included, but the only show between games or before you start playing, and there’s no sound. They’re kind of pointless.
But then, you could say that the entire game is kind of pointless. It’s not awful, but it could certainly be a lot better. As a big fan of WarioWare and Bullwinkle, I can totally see how those two concepts could be mashed together, and I can see how people would think it’d result in something exciting. But this $10 Xbox Live Arcade release fails to excite, leaving behind a game with no originality and not much excitement, either.
69 Comments
Wow, this game just looks crazy. I started laughing when I saw you playing it on my friends list.
Rocky & Bullwinkle. Once a beloved childhood icon. Now a running gag in the videogame industry.
I thought you were only gonna review games you were personally interested in?
I would have never expected something good from a game like this.
I so wish there could be a decent Rocky and Bullwinkle game. I swear to god, I would pay full retail price for it. Extra money if there was a cameo by Mr. Peabody and Sherman.
He said he likes Bullwinkle…so obviously there was some interest there to check out the game and see how it turned out.Needless to say 100% agree,this is definately a pass.
did anyone really expect this to be any good I mean, the rocky and bullwinkle cartoons weren’t very good from the beginning it’s just that the cartoon got famous for whatever reason and now licenses are being passed around for it to make some money. They don’t care if it’s any good.
Make a new how to build a bomb!!! And a new midnight brown album to!!!
i would never even had reviewed this IMO
This game was disapointing, but that dosen’t mean it isn’t worth while, for me atleast. I was and still am a huge R&B fan, so Ill probably end up buying it sooner or later, despite the reviews.
Early adopters of this game got a free Rocky and Bullwinkle DVD if they got all of the achievements, so I think it was worth the purchase, being one of those early adopters.
would a warioware clone even be fun without some crazy kind of control (wiimote and the touchscreen)?
This game is a criminal misuse of the Bullwinkle license. For Shame.
for those of us not from the states and younger than 40 here is what this game is based on
http://youtube.com/watch?v=gShfemIddlo
As soon as I saw this game I though “Wow, that is going to suck.” Looks like I was right.
Wow … 800 MS Points … totally not worth it. WarioWare owns!
Where do you guys go to get news of all these games coming out for the XBLA?
I loaded the demo up, saw it was a Wariorware clone, played about 5 minutes then deleted it. It wasn’t super terrible awful, but it certainly wasn’t worth 800msp, probably not even 400.
Hey Jeff, most people know not to touch this game…
I have an idea, how about put up a review for DarkSector!
Yeah that works!
I’d as well like to see a Dark Sector Game. I played through the whole thing…I have thoughts on it…some good, some not. The points were easy as hell though!
http://www.warp9gaming.com
I meant to say Game Review. Indeed.
played the demo…. died a little inside.
demo is terrible. Ill stick to my warioware
the demo was worse than pimp my ride the game
Thats to bad, I like WarioWare so this could’ve been interesting but definitely going to take a pass now. Missed opportunity.
“Steven
Posted April 22, 2008 at 10:16 am | Permalink
the demo was worse than pimp my ride the game”
But dude, you can ghost ride the whip in that- R+B never stood a chance!
Great to see your back jeff. missing your reviews
please make an icon for the bookmark to giant bomb, im using firefox and its easier to find bookmarks that have icons
Seems like something put together in a few hours with Flash. I disliked some of the minigames purely because the timing was too tight and it was not clear what to do at times.
Jeff and Ryan (and camera guy): I want to see a new episode of your “How To Build A Bomb” feature. Please.
The game should get a - 5 star. it sucks.
Where is hte next How To Build a Bomb? Or any video for that matter?
i want the podcast please…thanks
PEOPLE!! THERE WILL BE NO MORE “HOW TO BUILD A BOMB VIDEO”!!!! Ryan Davis mentioned it on the last podcast if you listened carefully, so please stop asking for the video!!!!!!
No, Ryan said there wouldn’t be a “How to Build a Bomb” AFTER the site was built. The site (bomb) isn’t built yet.
Also PODCAST PLEASE!!!
Hey have you guys seen this news?
http://youtube.com/watch?v=_ogNuGaf7H0
Apparently GTA IV ads on buses in Chicago caused two dozen people to be shot. This is terrible, I’ve heard that GTA IV is going to be even more explicit then that sex simulator Mass Effect.
citan76 please tell me you were kidding about the mass effect sex simulator comment.
The fact that you Jeff and Ryan haven’t posted anything in the entire day is driving me totally nuts.
its podcast day, its always slow on podcast day…btw, where is the podcast??
I need podcast.
Need more podcast..and cowbell.
guess theres no podcast today
Totally saddened by the lack of Podcast here…. Hope nothing crazy went wrong like your bug bombs shorting out your mics. lol
I think I’ll come today.
I guess I’ll go listen to the Hotspot. *sigh*
please guys, don’t make me go to GS and listen to the HS, please i beg you!! the HS is ubearable to listen to now, those guys suck so bad!!!!
Podcast
C’moon guys, this is the only podcast I listen to ever since the Hotspot started to suck.
It’s like the highlight of my week.
Ah well, doesn’t really matter, just sometime this week would be nice.
I love you guys, but lack of updates isn’t a good thing for a fresh website, especially in the games space.
come on…put up your great podcast.
I’m gonna go cry myself to sleep.
WOW… What’s with all the drama in the comments? It’s not the end of the world.
Seriously, it’ll be out tomorrow, geez… and is there some rule that if you don’t listen to a podcast today you’ll die. Quit the crap talking on the HotSpot guys, don’t like it don’t listen…
@ Manny
I don’t know about most people, but I personally only listen to podcasts at work, and with my ridiculous hours and monotonous job, if a podcast is off schedule it does kind of help in making my job even less bearable than it already is.
So I’m just saying, some people do have reasons for wanting a podcast on a regular schedule. That being said, it’s always understandable if it’s unable to be put up for any number of reasons. Just don’t be so quick to hate on people before you know the whole story.
Man, and I was ready for a Podcast…hope nothing crazy happened.
Guys..jesus,give them a break,the site isn’t completely done yet or anything,and they’re still probably constantlly building in their office and have alot of work to do,then want to take a rest a bit i’d imagine.So far its pretty much been every tuesday they’ve had it up.Just cuz its not on schedule for one day isn’t the end of the world.Even though they said Tuesday is there day,ther was never some set it stone date saying “every tuesday” for the podcast either,they’re busy guys,just give em a chance.
I’m not hating on the people who want the podcast today, hey I was bummed about it myself, but people are being so damn melodramatic, “Oh I just have to go back to that damn HotSpot podcast”… they have their own flavor and thats fine. You don’t watch a TV show that you don’t like, so change the channel.
watz wit all the crappy wii and arcade games. Wheres the interviews for GTA4. the ONLY game any1 gives a shit about
What do any of these comments have to do with rocky and Bullwinkle?
lol
because no1 cares about rocky and stickwinckle
Where is the podcast? I need my weekly fix talk about “other stuff and video games”. and packster is right….. I need to know how to build a bomb some more!
Wonder what happened…
No bombcast!?!?!?!?! for shame!
it’s up now guys.
That two-star rating is very generous. I was playing the trial over the weekend with my friends and we came to the “bad flash game” conclusion.
pause: It’s totally understandable, but it’s a bit of a bummer all the same. I don’t mind waiting, but I hope they’ll post something when they need more time, like Rich sometimes did for the Hotspot.
hellow….old school cartoon’s can’t be but just so much.be glade the game designers remember the good old days! if you woun’t pokamon, go buy it.
Wow, that game sounds pretty bad. I am always a fan of microgames, but these just seem unpolished.
I could care less about the review, but the title is absolutely classic. I guess you would have to seen the show to get it, but I appreciate it.
lol. good headline.