Zero Punctuation: Scribblenauts

[Ammadessi]

Who cares who it's aimed most squarely at? There are enough quality games designed for adults or for everyone (truly) that it is well worth purchasing. Although lately I'm finding the release list a bit thin for my tastes, I've gotten well more than my money's worth from just ten games:

Three Castlevanias
Two Advance Wars
Two Etrian Odysseys
Two Dragon Quests
Contra 4

I probably own about 30 DS games though (although I would happily lose 15 of them). I'm 29 y.o.

You're still missing the point that I said "mostly". statistics mean nothing to the individual, I'm just saying every DS gamer i've met is no older than 14.

Therefore because most candy is bought to give to children, obviously no adults like candy except for a few mutants, am I right? There's no age limit on any console, and just because one might be more appealing to children doesn't mean it's any less of a legitimate gaming platform.

I didn't say there wouldn't be exceptions. Can't you just let me have my opinion?

I just think you're being unnecessarily stubborn about it. There are a lot of fun games on the DS and discounting it on a tenuous opinion only means that you're missing out. It's like fanboyism, in a sense, like all the Ps3 owners who wouldn't give Bioshock the time of day simply because it was an Xbox360 game.

But I digress. You're allowed to have your opinions, just as much as I'm allowed to try and call you out when they're silly.

 

[Captain Pancake]

I just think you're being unnecessarily stubborn about it. There are a lot of fun games on the DS and discounting it on a tenuous opinion only means that you're missing out. It's like fanboyism, in a sense, like all the Ps3 owners who wouldn't give Bioshock the time of day simply because it was an Xbox360 game.

But I digress. You're allowed to have your opinions, just as much as I'm allowed to try and call you out when they're silly.

Look, It's not that i'm missing out. My brother has a DS, so I could play it whenever I want. I don't play because none of the games appeal to me. I was just making an observation, however uneducated it may have been.

 

[rize]

Although. Spawning a Cuthulu does sound appealing. But that is only interesting thing.

I wonder how far it goes, could you say spawn someone else, like Dagon?

If you spawn "god" and "zues" you get two identical looking celestial beings that kick the crap out of everyone. It's possible there are behavior differences, but I haven't noticed. There are a ton of things like this in the game where various different words spawn the same thing.

And often an adjective in front of a world is ignored so that a "long ladder" spawns a "ladder" (you can use a magnifying glass tool to see the final name of whatever you spawned). It would be preferable if the game told you there is no "long ladder" consider half the adjectives are added after the original item was insufficient and two identical copies of an item aren't going to help.

Yes, the game is deeply flawed. My point: I don't know if Dagon is in it, but if he is, he probably looks the same as Satan and Devil.

 

[Ammadessi]

Although. Spawning a Cuthulu does sound appealing. But that is only interesting thing.

I wonder how far it goes, could you say spawn someone else, like Dagon?

If you spawn "god" and "zues" you get two identical looking celestial beings that kick the crap out of everyone. It's possible there are behavior differences, but I haven't noticed. There are a ton of things like this in the game where various different words spawn the same thing.

5th Cell reused a lot of the models so they didn't have to draw everything. Interestingly enough, I spawned God and a vampire and to my surprise the vampire bit God, turned him into a zombie, then they both wailed on Maxwell. I thought it was pretty funny.

 

[Vicioussama]

So since I'm tired as hell, someone wanna tell me what the joke is with

"Ph'nglui mglw'nafh yahtzee r'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn"

lol

Also, awesome review, I really wasn't expecting this game to be that good tbh. I don't expect anything decent from the DS (and yet tardos think it's better than the PSP lol, at least I can use that as a pure MP3 and pretend I'm not a social reject playing video games in public)

Oh ya, PSP has far more better games (it just could use a second analog stick to really make all games and their controls far better)

 

[gamegod25]

From what I've seen and heard Scribblenauts is more a proof of concept than a game.

 

[samsonguy920]

Sooo

Is Yahtzee avoiding ODST like the plague or something? Or is it still Aussie release dates screwing him over?

You've obviously missed Yahtzee's enthusiasm for Halo games, as in he has none. I get the impression he'd rather play a JRPG than a Halo game. Me? I'd rather play ODST myself. Especially instead of Scribblenauts...

 

[AlexFromOmaha]

Great... A DS game... Because that's what I'm dying to get, a kiddie game for a DS...
Thanks..
Next week can we get a game anyone cares about and actually on some level talks about... And likes?

This is uninformed, to say the least.

Scribblenauts cleaned up at E3. Tons of awards. Lots of chatter. So, yeah, it's a game that people care about and talk about.

Because the DS is a much more popular console than anything else currently in production, Scribblenauts has a fair chance to sell more copies than there are PS3's on the market. Just in case you missed the significance there, it's possible that Scribblenauts will have more sales than there are people in the world who even consider buying any PS3 game, even in passing. (Not that having only a DS and PC for my gaming stops me from watching ZP--Yahtzee's funny, and his accent is kinda sexy.)

If anything, this says to me that Escapist does actually pay attention to the gaming community at large. These are the sorts of games that sell, not Halo, not Arkham Asylum, but things like Pokemon and Scribblenauts.

I think Yahtzee unintentionally highlighted one of the game's best assets. Yeah, everyone has their helicopter-rope-Cthulu (mine's roc-lasso-ooze), but the game has the "advanced" badges for each level just for that purpose, and Yahtzee let slip that he wasn't very good at it. My nine year old niece, on the other hand, was even better at it than I was. Isn't it a great testament to game design when a child's thinking is more highly rewarded than an adult's? Yeah, the controls are horrible, but if you're frustrated because you've gotten so used to pushing X to not die to win games...isn't this awesome proof-of-concept?

 

[lwm3398]

I really loved this game. I've been waiting two weeks, through Rock Band and Darkest of Days for Scribblenauts. I really thought it was a gem in the shit pool, maybe with a few mistakes by the gem's cutter, but, shit, what do you expect? Nothing's perfect.

But you make some good points, helicopter, rope, Cthulu.

But you didn't even talk about the Playground! Or was that the "Put on the spot" thing? Whatever, great review.

 

[CrysisMcGee]

I liked the review, as usual. The game sounds interesting. I'd play it if I had a DS. Also, this is sort of a throw back to old adventure games, where you had to type in what you wanted to do. As in Quest For Glory, Or King's Quest.

 

[Pendragon9]

Ah, he does bring up alot of good points. All that freedom won't help if the play control sucks.

And here I had great hopes for the game. Oh well.

 

[Vicioussama]

so no one knows the joke at the end? lol

 

[Dannie]

I tried Scribblenauts but I got bored pretty fast. :/

 

[cobaltfram]

Gotta say, best-written, best-paced review in a while. The ending was brilliant, I gotta say.

 

[Aptspire]

It is stars for the star borne ones
also..."At the bottom of the abyss Yahtzee lies, not dead but dreaming"

 

[Vicioussama]

^ is that what was at the end in the credits? lol

 

[LGC Pominator]

Sooo

Is Yahtzee avoiding ODST like the plague or something? Or is it still Aussie release dates screwing him over?

You've obviously missed Yahtzee's enthusiasm for Halo games, as in he has none. I get the impression he'd rather play a JRPG than a Halo game. Me? I'd rather play ODST myself. Especially instead of Scribblenauts...

yeah I know that Yahtzee isnt exactly the biggest fan of halo, however one would think that a highly hyped game in a series of extremely popular games which is very different to all of the other games in the series might be a nice thing to jump on for the man