Originality makes this a great and fun game to play, but dodgey controls let it down

User Rating: 7.5 | Scribblenauts DS
By Dollar75 | Review Date:
Until this year, I had never bought a console for an exclusive. That is until I heard of the release of Scribblenauts. I had been pondering getting a DS for abit, I was keen to buy Professor Layton, but Scribblenauts pushed me over the edge, so I bought one.

Sound
There's nothing really to be had in the sound dept, all of the instructions are in text and the characters voices are just noises. The music does compliment the game though.

Graphics
The style of graphics, I think, are really nicely designed. Its stayed in the confines of the DS' capabilities, but offering some good designs to the objects.

Gameplay
Forgive this bit, but I feel I need to have a rant.
What could have been a great game has been hampered with a very ineffective and inaccurate control system. This is because, they decided to give the controls over to the stylus, rather than the D-Pad (which would have made more sense). Although this isn't a platform game, you still do need to walk and jump with a certain amount of accuracy, but this is virtually impossible to achieve.
The second issue I have with this game is the camera. For some reason, it won't let you take a look around the level for very long until it automatically goes back to the main character. Again, this is frustrating when you want to look ahead to see what you need to do next. With so many buttons on the DS that could have been utilised, the mind boggles why they didn't use them.
Ok, I've got the rant out of the way.
By the sounds of the above, it sounds that if this game is a waste of money, but I wouldn't put the wallet away too quickly. There is alot of fun to be had here and can be quite interesting on how different people will solve puzzles using different objects. I can see what they tried to do with this game and the effort should be commended.


Final Thoughts
This game can be fun and it can get into your head. I found myself thinking about the puzzles when I wasn't playing it.
However, with all of the hype surrounding this game at E3, I thought it would come through with flying colours, but the control system and camera controls let this game down and I found myself skipping levels to avoid the frustration.
The game is worth a 7, but I think with the effort and originality that has gone into it, deserves a 7.5.

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