 |  |  |  |  |  |  |
| The Entertainment Review |
| Genre: Adventure Developer: Crave Entertainment Publisher: Crave Entertainment |
When “Crayola Colorful Journey” first showed up on shelves, there weren’t very high hopes set for the game. A game that is marketed
to kids from ages 5 and up is usually lacking somewhere in the game, whether it is the quality, the entertainment and the overall
challenge of the game. The concept of the game promoted on the box is a world where players create their own solutions to puzzles,
which would create a bit of curiosity for anyone. Though the game couldn’t really compare to other puzzle platform games like “Prince of
Persia,” the game did have a few redeeming qualities for its target demographic.
The story of the game begins with the player’s character, either a stereotypical boy or a stereotypical girl, walking through a forest.
Players quickly learn that someone has been stealing colors, turning colorful trees and rocks into blank, paper-like representations of
themselves. To help figure out the mystery of the missing colors, players will have to travel through multiple worlds, coloring in all of the
black and white objects along the way. The creativity comes into play when players find themselves up against a wall, in which case
they simply need to use their Crayola crayons and draw a way to get up and over the wall.
After players make their way through the forest, they will learn a little more about what has happened to the colors and will begin their
journey through three other worlds. The exact solutions to each puzzle that is presented will be determined by the player, but they will
get a little bit of help depending on what difficulty level the game is set at.
Although it is impossible to tell by looking at the box or the artwork for the game, “Crayola Colorful Journey” is actually very similar to a
game from the Lemmings series, except in this case players just have a single players that they control. Players must guide their
character through the level, overcoming all obstacles and avoid death, all with the use of the weapon of choice in the game, Crayola
crayons.
Each color draws objects with different properties, creating a large variety of solutions. The red crayon creates objects that stay
wherever they are drawn, and can be walked on even when drawn at slight angles. The blue crayon creates objects that have traction
like red objects, but the objects fall and can be piles up on other surrounding objects. Yellow objects float in water due to their density
and green objects stay where they are drawn but don’t have enough traction to be climbed, making them perfect to use as slides.
Playing the game on the easiest difficulty level won’t take regular Wii players more than an hour or so to get through, but children may
have more trouble drawing the bridges and ramps that are necessary to get through the game because they don’t have as steady of a
hand for the detail needed to complete some of these items. On the intermediate and hard difficulty levels, the character don’t stop to
wait for players to draw anything, so players have to be very quick at blocking them off so they don’t advance too quickly. Even older
gamers will have trouble on the hardest setting, as the main character seems to run through the level with death in mind without the
slightest sense of self-preservation.
One problem with the advanced levels of difficulty is that there are no advanced controls to learn. It would be nice if there was a way for
players to make the D-pad change the color of the crayons being used in the game, or use the plus (+) and minus (-) buttons to control
the zoom level, unfortunately these buttons go completely unused throughout the entire game.
Budget titles that are aimed at children have had very bad reputations for having low level graphics and sound, but “Crayola Colorful
Journey” had much better graphics than many players would expect from such a game. The worlds are very colorful and there is a lot
more happening in each world than just what the player’s character controls. The cut scenes between worlds look like colorful coloring
book pages, but there is a small problem with the game overall, voiceovers.
There are absolutely no voiceovers in the game, even though it is aimed at children that may not be able to read when playing the game
by themselves. Players can claim that the game helps teach reading by only showing the story, but for kids that might be very young, it
would be much more entertaining to have the story read to them. Parents will probably be around when this age of kids are playing the
game, but a nice voiceover could have made the game more than just a simple adventure title.
At $29.99, “Crayola Colorful Journey” is still considered a budget title, so the lack of multiplayer or other advanced features is
completely understandable, but the game may be a little short for even the very easily entertained. The multiple difficulty levels gie the
game a little bit of replayability, but most children are likely to be frustrated by the overall speed of the children in the game. If nothing
else, the concepts in the game are good for kids to learn before taking on bigger and more challenging games.
to kids from ages 5 and up is usually lacking somewhere in the game, whether it is the quality, the entertainment and the overall
challenge of the game. The concept of the game promoted on the box is a world where players create their own solutions to puzzles,
which would create a bit of curiosity for anyone. Though the game couldn’t really compare to other puzzle platform games like “Prince of
Persia,” the game did have a few redeeming qualities for its target demographic.
The story of the game begins with the player’s character, either a stereotypical boy or a stereotypical girl, walking through a forest.
Players quickly learn that someone has been stealing colors, turning colorful trees and rocks into blank, paper-like representations of
themselves. To help figure out the mystery of the missing colors, players will have to travel through multiple worlds, coloring in all of the
black and white objects along the way. The creativity comes into play when players find themselves up against a wall, in which case
they simply need to use their Crayola crayons and draw a way to get up and over the wall.
After players make their way through the forest, they will learn a little more about what has happened to the colors and will begin their
journey through three other worlds. The exact solutions to each puzzle that is presented will be determined by the player, but they will
get a little bit of help depending on what difficulty level the game is set at.
Although it is impossible to tell by looking at the box or the artwork for the game, “Crayola Colorful Journey” is actually very similar to a
game from the Lemmings series, except in this case players just have a single players that they control. Players must guide their
character through the level, overcoming all obstacles and avoid death, all with the use of the weapon of choice in the game, Crayola
crayons.
Each color draws objects with different properties, creating a large variety of solutions. The red crayon creates objects that stay
wherever they are drawn, and can be walked on even when drawn at slight angles. The blue crayon creates objects that have traction
like red objects, but the objects fall and can be piles up on other surrounding objects. Yellow objects float in water due to their density
and green objects stay where they are drawn but don’t have enough traction to be climbed, making them perfect to use as slides.
Playing the game on the easiest difficulty level won’t take regular Wii players more than an hour or so to get through, but children may
have more trouble drawing the bridges and ramps that are necessary to get through the game because they don’t have as steady of a
hand for the detail needed to complete some of these items. On the intermediate and hard difficulty levels, the character don’t stop to
wait for players to draw anything, so players have to be very quick at blocking them off so they don’t advance too quickly. Even older
gamers will have trouble on the hardest setting, as the main character seems to run through the level with death in mind without the
slightest sense of self-preservation.
One problem with the advanced levels of difficulty is that there are no advanced controls to learn. It would be nice if there was a way for
players to make the D-pad change the color of the crayons being used in the game, or use the plus (+) and minus (-) buttons to control
the zoom level, unfortunately these buttons go completely unused throughout the entire game.
Budget titles that are aimed at children have had very bad reputations for having low level graphics and sound, but “Crayola Colorful
Journey” had much better graphics than many players would expect from such a game. The worlds are very colorful and there is a lot
more happening in each world than just what the player’s character controls. The cut scenes between worlds look like colorful coloring
book pages, but there is a small problem with the game overall, voiceovers.
There are absolutely no voiceovers in the game, even though it is aimed at children that may not be able to read when playing the game
by themselves. Players can claim that the game helps teach reading by only showing the story, but for kids that might be very young, it
would be much more entertaining to have the story read to them. Parents will probably be around when this age of kids are playing the
game, but a nice voiceover could have made the game more than just a simple adventure title.
At $29.99, “Crayola Colorful Journey” is still considered a budget title, so the lack of multiplayer or other advanced features is
completely understandable, but the game may be a little short for even the very easily entertained. The multiple difficulty levels gie the
game a little bit of replayability, but most children are likely to be frustrated by the overall speed of the children in the game. If nothing
else, the concepts in the game are good for kids to learn before taking on bigger and more challenging games.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
