The Babble Review: Kung Fu Panda the Game

Aaron Burgess — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 15:04:00 GMT

Unfortunately for the often great kids' movies that spawn them, video games based on CGI animated flicks tend to be so generic, bug-laden and unplayable that they end up doing more harm to the franchise than good (I'm looking at you, Ratatouille). So my expectations going into Kung Fu Panda, the new game based off the awesome Jack Black flick many Babble readers have no doubt been standing in line for the past few weekends, were a little less than high. Sometimes, though, it's good to be wrong: Not only is Kung Fu Panda one of the better movie spinoffs to hit game consoles in recent memory; it's also one of the more enjoyable kids' games that've landed in our mailbox this summer.

In a Nutshell: If you're an experienced gamer, you'll probably want to skip Kung Fu Panda altogether. With its tiny learning curve and relatively simple controls, the game can be beaten in a little less time than it takes to sit through the movie. It's a great game for younger players, though, with a fun script (complete with a dead-on Jack Black sound-alike) that uses the film's story as a springboard for bigger tales, as well as a big, jolly sense of humor to balance its cartoonish kung-fu fighting. And just as importantly, unlike so many movie-themed games, it plays as though it's more than a quick cash-in, with actual care put into easily botched stuff like graphics, gameplay and storyline.

Age-Appropriateness: Full disclosure: I reviewed the Xbox 360 and Nintendo DS versions of Kung Fu Panda with my two sons, 7 and 5, fighting for controller time by my side, so right off the bat I defied the game's "E10+" ESRB rating. Odds are, though, that you may not be considering more than the "E" in a game's rating to determine whether it's suitable for your under-10 kiddoes, and with Kung Fu Panda itself being so appealing to a younger audience (in the theater where we saw it, giggling, cheering preschoolers far outranked any 10-year-olds), I figure it's only sensible to put the game in the hands of the age brackets that are probably asking for it. The good news is, at least one of those age brackets had no problem diving into the game and enjoying it -- more on the other in a bit.

Po and two of the Furious Five take on the evil Tai Lung.

Plot and Gameplay: Kung Fu Panda follows its jelly-bellied title character, a bumbling-but-aspirational panda named Po, across multiple stages on his quest to become the fabled Dragon Warrior and stop the recently prison-busted Tai Lung from returning to destroy the village that spawned them both. Sounds just like the movie, right? Well, unlike the movie, the game packs a host of other animal bad guys to take on, and if you thought Tai Lung's nerve strikes were nasty, just wait till you have to rescue a group of baby turtles from the Croc Gang while flying down whitewater rapids and dodging flying arrows. Other levels allow you to play as Po's warrior counterparts, the Furious Five, or as their master, Shifu, while taking on similarly nasty animal crews created just for the game.

Close call: Crane hoists Po and a baby turtle up, up and away from a hungry croc.

As with other multi-console games, your experience with Kung Fu Panda is going to differ depending on the system on which you're playing it. However, even though the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions offer some bonus content and unlockable items , their basic action doesn't differ much from that of the Wii, PS2 and PC versions. Also, with minigames and missions being key parts of the game, the action isn't completely focused on combat (and I do use that term in the jolliest sense here). Of course, combat makes up the best parts of Kung Fu Panda's action, and your kids will have a blast figuring out the different moves and combos for each character as they clobber their way through the game.

Getting Personal (My Kids' Hands-On Experience): Where gameplay was concerned, my 5-year-old suffered most: After getting his butt kicked in a few rounds of combat and not being able to grasp the controls and combo moves as quickly as he'd hoped, he gave up on the Xbox 360 version. Unfortunately, even though the DS version offers a relatively simpler side-scrolling experience (read: you move from one side to the next, hurdling over obstacles and jumping up to different levels as you go), it ended up being twice as frustrating for the little guy, and he gave up after being unable to clear the first few screens. (Poor kid is still just learning to read, so the reading required to follow instructions -- par for the course in many DS games -- usually ends up being a point of frustration, anyway.)

A shot of Tigress in combat, from the Nintendo DS version.

The good news is that his brother, though three years younger than the ESRB's recommended age for Kung Fu Panda, had no trouble getting cozy with the controls and knocking out the bad guys -- although after playing the far more expansive, open-ended and graphics-rich Xbox 360 version of the game, he rarely went back to the DS version. Out of curiosity, I went back to the DS version and found it a blast, and if your kids are familiar with a game like Spider-Man 3 -- which combines the sort of side-scrolling action mentioned above with clever touchscreen controls (in this case, you move with the directional pad and put together your fighting moves with the stylus/touchscreen), they should have no problem getting cozy with this different, but equally solid, version of the game.

Grab your own copy of Kung Fu Panda the Game at Amazon.

droolicious : activision

The Babble Review: Kung Fu Panda the Game