Spongebob's Atlantis Squarepantis

Rating Everyone Genre action Publisher THQ External Links Offcial THQ Website

Playstation 2 Ah, another day, another Spongebob title. So I’ve had the, um, “pleasure” of playing previous Spongebob titles, and for some reason I just wasn’t jumping when I heard about this one. While Spongebob is still commanding the overall Nickelodeon schedule, he has lost some of his flare over the years. Over time there have been multiple Spongebob releases in the video game world, such as Battle for Bikini Bottom. And like many other popular cartoons, the gaming market is flooded with quickly made, sloppy titles. Unfortunately this title heads down the same path. But don’t get me wrong, this title does have its good points. You do start the game firing ice-cream loaded tank. While it sounds fun, the lack of moving targets and lame AI takes away from the fun-tastic idea.

In Spongebob’s Atlantis Squarepantis you travel through fourteen levels in kind of a mini game fashion. Such as the tank game (driving/shooter), puzzle solving mazes, rail sliding camera spinners, and a Dance Dance Revolution style game of “hit the flashing button over and over and over” proportions. And as the level drags on, so does the lack of excitement. Dragging the mini-games on for extended amounts of time seems to almost drop the “mini” out of the name, doesn’t it?

Though the levels do threaten to have some fun involved, the mazes are actually well done. Each character has a special ability to get past certain obstacles. Spongebob can flip gates open, Patrick can toss characters across gaps, and Mr. Krabs can count his money. Okay just kidding about the last one, but come on! Mr. Krabs is the best character in the show. Anyway, sounds good right? WRONG! The fixed camera that they use makes you fall off platforms for no reason. Honestly its more work then play. And if you’re a 5-10 year old you’re not looking for work.

The on-rail section is actually kind of memorable of Pokemon Snap. Wow, that’s bringing it back to 1999. Basically, you take pictures of things in a museum as the security guards try to stop you. To stop them you simply throw Krabby patties at them. One scary level though has Sandy Squirrel firing ping pong balls out of Squidward while you watch her face in the reflection of her helmet a la Samus Aran. She really has anger issues. Maybe it’s the whole squirrel in the ocean thing, who knows.

Now about the button mashing DDR/Parrapa the Rapper mini-game. That’s right I went there. You know you’re singing it in your head. “Kick Punch it’s all in your mind!” These parts of the game make the hours seem like days. Instead of the bright idea that makes money, they take a Dragon’s Lair approach and you have to punch in the button combos to keep your characters walking. The buttons don’t match rhythms of walking, music, talking, nothing. Every once and awhile they’ll throw in L1 and R1 but for a kid who doesn’t know their left from right, that’s frustration factor extreme.

No, the game isn’t ALL bad the writing and voice acting matches that of a Spongebob episode. Mr. Krabs isn’t voiced for some terrible reason, and I would love to get an explanation for said problem. Between levels you basically get to watch episode fragments. You can also obtain tokens depending on how well you do during a level and use them to unlock a great feature that I’ll call Director Commentary with Spongebob. With this on, Spongebob makes it seem like the game was shot like a movie and provides little anecdotes about the “filming”.

So in closing I would like to say, “Kick! Punch! It’s all in the mind! If you wanna test I’m sure you’ll find. The things I’ll teach ya, are sure to beat ya. Nevertheless you’ll get a lesson from teacher now Kick!”

I knew you were still singing it!

If you have a child who’s a Spongebob fan this could be an interesting thing to throw in to the pile this Christmas. With its multi console release (also on GBA/DS/and Wii) you are almost guaranteed to own a console it’s on. And if they don’t like it, you can always turn it in for store credit at your local game store.