Review: Scribblenauts Showdown

Games series Scribblenauts never went to the PlayStation and Xbox. Some of them remained exclusive for Nintendo platforms , some visited the PC, and a couple more are available on smartphones and tablets. Therefore, I personally was pleased with the announcement of Scribblenauts Showdown... until I remembered that dozens of employees had been dismissed from the 5th Cell studio that created the series , and a completely new team is engaged in the novelty. And instead of a normal project with many levels and mysteries in the trailer showed a set of mini-games for parties. It's a shame to admit it, but after several hours spent in Showdown , hope for a brighter future of the series is no longer necessary.

The main problem with the new game is how different it is from its predecessors. Previously, the character carried a notebook with which he wrote down any words to create all sorts of objects next to him. You could choose from several thousand words, and the nouns were allowed to add adjectives - to specify whether your dinosaur will be small or gigantic, whether you want to build a house of certain materials and so on. For the western audience, it was an opportunity to give vent to fantasy, and Russian-speaking players could easily recognize many new English words and also solved riddles with pleasure. 

Somehow from this idea in Showdownrefused almost completely, making the input of letters an insignificant element of the gameplay. Now we are offered a pack of mini-games that can be played either with artificial intelligence or with a live partner behind one TV. These games are divided into two categories: Wordy and Speedy. The use of different words is important only for the first type, in the second they are not needed at all.

In Wordy, each stage begins with the display of the wheel, which unwinds and stops, pointing the arrow at a random theme. After that, participants should enter a word corresponding to this topic - for example, you will be asked about what insects you know, people of what professions have a vehicle that can be found on the beach or in the forest. Sometimes the conditions become more difficult - the first letter of the word is chosen, and you need to come up with an object or being of a certain form.

To introduce words that are not relevant to the topic, nobody prohibits, but in this case the player does not get bonuses unique for each stage. If the task is to reach the other end of the road by using a suitable word, the number of obstacles will be significantly reduced. And if on the treadmill you choose an animal with a high speed of movement, it will be possible to reach the finish faster than the opponent. That is, you seem to enter words, and something seems to be happening, but this has nothing to do with Scribblenauts , and therefore quickly gets bored.
In Speedy mode, you do not need to enter letters at all, but there mini-games are much easier and more dreary. Click on the buttons appearing on the screen to drag the rope. Shake the gamepad for ten seconds and dig out the treasure. Throw each other's watch until someone's alarm goes off. Even milking a cow in a 1-2-Switch seemed even more original. Showdown consists entirely of trivial mini-games, among which more or less cheerful turned out only a few. In one of them, participants sit on carpets-planes and catch objects falling from above, and the loser is one who will miss five objects. The unpretentious task is complicated by the fact that when the carpets collide, the objects lying on them can fall out, and this is one of the few amusements where you not only thoughtlessly press the buttons.
Fortunately, this is not all available content. There is still a Showdown mode, which combines a "little table" and the same mini-games. Participants get on the ornate path and receive several cards on which it is written, how many steps the character will make when they play. You can not move forward, but push the opponent back, but in any case, almost always will have to win in short confrontations. When you start the mode, you can choose its duration - a short session is completed in about 15 minutes, and the longest will take a little less than an hour. 

In the company of friends, this virtual "desktop" for sure will seem fascinating, but it becomes noticeable the same flaws as in other modes. Mini-games are often repeated - having spent on a new Scribblenauts only one hour, you will see everything that it has to offer.
In addition, in some of them terribly uncomfortable management. Especially strongly annoying mini-game with a helicopter, which must deliver goods to different points. For some reason, you can not control the stick in it - you need to tilt the gamepad in different directions and hold X for movement. The load constantly swings, the helicopter flies past the buildings time and again, and the mood spoils faster. 

In the menu is hidden another mode, called Sandbox. And this is the only thing that at least somehow resembles the classic Scribblenauts. The player takes turns in several small locations, where he needs to solve ten puzzles, creating objects and interacting with living beings. Characters do not talk - they only give small clues, shown in the clouds above their heads. And the entire list of tasks can be viewed in the pause menu.

Here the imagination of the player is not limited - he can print everything that will wander into his head. An animal has a toothache - create a toothbrush or invite a tooth fairy. The frog feels lonely - call for her friend. You can populate the entire location with a variety of creatures, checking to see if there is a word in the local dictionary. Add adjectives, changing the characteristics of animals, forging weapons from the air, recruiting all the professions and surrounding themselves with a crowd of people in unlike suits. Without a touch screen, it's not so difficult to do, as it might seem, - the virtual keyboard is divided into several parts of four letters in each, and by moving the stick you select the desired fragment, and then click on the corresponding buttons on the right side of the gamepad.

However, such levels in the game are catastrophically small - after their passage it seems that this was only a demo version. They seemed to have been added only so that long-time fans of the series would not be indignant. Despite the player's abundance of opportunities, most puzzles have only one solution, so there is nothing inventive in these puzzles either. If earlier we could get an asterisk from a tree by building a ladder, flying on a dragon, creating an ax and hitting the trunk or finding some other ways, in Showdownwe lazily run around the tiny location, click on the buttons and solve puzzles with obvious answers. Even if you do not know that the development of another studio, it will be visible to any fan of the series. They seem to give a lot of imagination, but there is no desire to refine and invent funny and unusual solutions.

Rate: 5/10