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| The Entertainment Review |
| Genre: Action/Adventure Developer: Planet Moon Studios Publisher: THQ |
could create a hero, weapons and more by drawing on the touch screen. The title found a lot of success with its mix of player creation
and platform gaming and now a sequel, “Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter,” has been released on both the Nintendo DS and Wii.
Even though the original game never made it to the Wii, “Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter” picks up where the original left off, although
this is using the same character to tell a sequel story that is different than the first one. This time around the Raposa race is living
peacefully in their little village under the new rule of Mayor Mari, when things go awry. Doors are being stolen, important items vanish
and more. It is up to the play to create a hero to fix everything.
Creating stuff in this game is both the hook and the drawback. On the DS players can just draw with their stylus and make everything
look as accurate as their hand would allow. That isn’t the case on the Wii. Here the Wii Remote is the pen, meaning moves are a lot
less precise. They can zoom in close and adjust the size for the stamp or brush, but it is never as well as using a touch screen and
stylus. Players are just moving around on the television screen to make squiggly lines and there is no way to link the DS to the Wii for
better control.
Parts of the paint tool are broken, so when players are messing around with the hero creation, when players create their character’s
head, arms, body and legs, players will run into a couple of bugs. Though there are some issues, players are able to create a lot of
good looking stuff and the items that they create actually seem to fit into the world pretty well, which could not be said for the DS version
of the original game. On the portable version of the game, players had some watercolor looking worlds with primary color user created
pieces. This was a bit of a contrast of pieces that didn’t seem to work together very well. On the Nintendo Wii, all of the pieces are still
simple and bright objects, but so is the rest of the world, making it all mesh together better. When players are working their way through
the level, everything looks like it actually belongs together.
Even better is the implementation of in level creation that doesn’t require players to leave the game play. On the Nintendo DS version,
players have to stop the platform sections of the game to draw paths over pits and create other ways of working through the level. On
the Wii players will come to sections on the screen that are boxes created by either a blue dotted line or a red dotted line. If it’s blue,
players can draw whatever they want, usually horizontal lines for steps or platforms, so that they can jump onto the creation and make it
to unreachable areas. If it is red, it is physics based creation space so anything that players create is going to fall from the box or hang
from a pivotal point when completed.
Players are going to quickly realize that even though the graphics in the game look good, the game is far from perfect. Lots of the
enemies that players will encounter in the game, from either seed spitting bad guys to little baseball looking creatures, tend to blend
into the surroundings a little too well. Players will have many instances where they will be running through a level and run into a bad
guy that wasn’t able to been seen because of the fact that they looked just like the background that they are in.
Also, the pacing of the game is a bit screwed up, but it is still fairly manageable. The trouble is that the game’s levels are broken up in
an odd way. There is the over world map with the townspeople and buildings, but this also has the gateways to the game’s four
platform worlds. When players enter one of these sections they are presented with a handful of levels that unlock one by one. Players
have to get a reason to go to the next world from the townspeople. This means that players will be in a world, need to leave, run around
the over world looking for the next person to send them on a quest, run back to the level and then choose the next available level to
advance in the game.
“Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter” has some great platform part to the game with some nice visuals and ideas, but nothing stands out
too much. Players are able to create stuff, but the Wii Remote makes everything squiggly and looks like a five year old drew it. The
levels are colorful, but they are too long and easily forgettable. The paint tool is easy to get the hang of but it is a little bit broken in some
areas. The over world looks good, but it is boring to run from one side of the map to the other and then back again to the beginning.
Also, the multiplayer is terrible, but that is all there is to say about that. This isn’t necessarily a bad first attempt at the Drawn to Life
franchise on the Wii, but it also isn’t worth running out and buying, maybe worth renting instead.
and platform gaming and now a sequel, “Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter,” has been released on both the Nintendo DS and Wii.
Even though the original game never made it to the Wii, “Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter” picks up where the original left off, although
this is using the same character to tell a sequel story that is different than the first one. This time around the Raposa race is living
peacefully in their little village under the new rule of Mayor Mari, when things go awry. Doors are being stolen, important items vanish
and more. It is up to the play to create a hero to fix everything.
Creating stuff in this game is both the hook and the drawback. On the DS players can just draw with their stylus and make everything
look as accurate as their hand would allow. That isn’t the case on the Wii. Here the Wii Remote is the pen, meaning moves are a lot
less precise. They can zoom in close and adjust the size for the stamp or brush, but it is never as well as using a touch screen and
stylus. Players are just moving around on the television screen to make squiggly lines and there is no way to link the DS to the Wii for
better control.
Parts of the paint tool are broken, so when players are messing around with the hero creation, when players create their character’s
head, arms, body and legs, players will run into a couple of bugs. Though there are some issues, players are able to create a lot of
good looking stuff and the items that they create actually seem to fit into the world pretty well, which could not be said for the DS version
of the original game. On the portable version of the game, players had some watercolor looking worlds with primary color user created
pieces. This was a bit of a contrast of pieces that didn’t seem to work together very well. On the Nintendo Wii, all of the pieces are still
simple and bright objects, but so is the rest of the world, making it all mesh together better. When players are working their way through
the level, everything looks like it actually belongs together.
Even better is the implementation of in level creation that doesn’t require players to leave the game play. On the Nintendo DS version,
players have to stop the platform sections of the game to draw paths over pits and create other ways of working through the level. On
the Wii players will come to sections on the screen that are boxes created by either a blue dotted line or a red dotted line. If it’s blue,
players can draw whatever they want, usually horizontal lines for steps or platforms, so that they can jump onto the creation and make it
to unreachable areas. If it is red, it is physics based creation space so anything that players create is going to fall from the box or hang
from a pivotal point when completed.
Players are going to quickly realize that even though the graphics in the game look good, the game is far from perfect. Lots of the
enemies that players will encounter in the game, from either seed spitting bad guys to little baseball looking creatures, tend to blend
into the surroundings a little too well. Players will have many instances where they will be running through a level and run into a bad
guy that wasn’t able to been seen because of the fact that they looked just like the background that they are in.
Also, the pacing of the game is a bit screwed up, but it is still fairly manageable. The trouble is that the game’s levels are broken up in
an odd way. There is the over world map with the townspeople and buildings, but this also has the gateways to the game’s four
platform worlds. When players enter one of these sections they are presented with a handful of levels that unlock one by one. Players
have to get a reason to go to the next world from the townspeople. This means that players will be in a world, need to leave, run around
the over world looking for the next person to send them on a quest, run back to the level and then choose the next available level to
advance in the game.
“Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter” has some great platform part to the game with some nice visuals and ideas, but nothing stands out
too much. Players are able to create stuff, but the Wii Remote makes everything squiggly and looks like a five year old drew it. The
levels are colorful, but they are too long and easily forgettable. The paint tool is easy to get the hang of but it is a little bit broken in some
areas. The over world looks good, but it is boring to run from one side of the map to the other and then back again to the beginning.
Also, the multiplayer is terrible, but that is all there is to say about that. This isn’t necessarily a bad first attempt at the Drawn to Life
franchise on the Wii, but it also isn’t worth running out and buying, maybe worth renting instead.
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