Monsters VS Aliens; The Videogame
**NOTE** I played this only because the kid up the street needed help and I ended up doing the whole thing for him. I don't usually play kids games. Apart from the new Banjo Kazooie. That game is rad.
LEGO Star Wars was a landmark in recent gaming history. Not only was it easy and fun for the kids, it was funny, self-mocking, referential and infintely playable for grown ups and older people also. I remember playing that game a LOT, trying to get that last mini-kit and playing as different characters in strange Star Wars situations.
This leads into my bias against kids games that deliver none of the above factors for older audiences, and unfortunately Monsters Vs Aliens; The Video Game dives messily into the murky waters of Gaming Hell. It starts solidly, but can't keep the player's interest for long enough for a number of reasons.
The first of which is the tear-inducing repetition. Lack of variety in games can be a good thing, like in Left 4 Dead, which sticks to what it does best and nails it. But Monsters Vs Aliens simply asks you to play different skins for the same levels for the six hours it will take a competent player to finish it. At one point, I assumed my save file had corrupted due to playing the same level twice, but discovered it was a different level that required me to do the EXACT same tasks, with the EXACT same voice clips and level design as a stage three levels beforehand.
If the level design and gameplay mechanics were innovative enough to hold my interest, it wouldn't matter. But Monsters Vs Aliens is deeply dull and formulaic for its thankfully brief running length and thus could not create any emotion but frustration when certain badly designed sequences killed my character for no discernable reason.
Its a shame, because like WALL-E, Bolt, Ratatouille, Kung Fu Panda and Madagascar 2 before it, Monsters Vs Aliens fails to be anything more than a linear, boring experience soiling a potentially fun license.
LEGO Star Wars is cheap now, go out and buy that instead.