Gaming Trend

Gaming Trend Review

by Ron Burke

Shrek, Fiona, Donkey, and the gang are back for another comedic swipe at the fairy tales we all grew up with in their new movie Shrek the Third.  Activision and Amaze Entertainment are also teaming up to bring us the game adaptation with the same name. When we last left Shrek and the gang they had reconciled their differences with Fiona’s royal parents and short-circuited a plan to usurp the throne by Prince Charming.  Everything seemed to be going in the right direction, but things have a way of changing quickly in Far Far Away. 

Faced with the uneasy prospect of being named King of Far Far Away, Shrek, Donkey, and Puss in Boots set out on an epic quest to find a suitable heir to the throne, Fiona’s rebellious cousin, Arthur.  While Shrek and the gang are out trying to find Arthur, Prince Charming seizes the opportunity to storm the city with an army of villains in a bold power play.  Will Shrek, Donkey, and Puss in Boots be able to return Arthur to the castle before Prince Charming seizes the throne? 

Review PC:

• Dell XPS M170 Laptop
• Intel Pentium M 2Ghz
• 2GB RAM
• GeForce Go 7800 GTX

Minimum System Requirements:

• 3D hardware accelerator card required - 100% DirectX(R) 9.0c-compliant 64 MB video card and drivers*
• Microsoft(R) Windows(R) XP
• Pentium(R) III 800MHz or Athlon(TM) 800MHz or higher processor
• 512 MB of RAM
• 3 GB of uncompressed hard disk space (plus 300 MB for the Windows(R) swap file and 12 KB free for saved games)
• A 100% Windows(R) XP-compatible computer system including:
• DirectX(R) 9.0c (Included)         
• 100% DirectX(R) 9.0c-compliant true 16-bit sound card and drivers
• 100% Windows(R) XP- compatible mouse, keyboard and drivers
• 100% Windows(R) XP- compatible quad speed DVD-ROM drive (600 K/sec sustained transfer rate) and drivers
*Supported Chipsets for Windows XP
All NVIDIA(R) GeForce(R) 4 Ti 4200 64mb and better chipsets
All ATI(R) Radeon(R) 8500 64mb  and better chipsets

*Important Note: Some 3D accelerator cards with the chipsets listed here may not be compatible with the 3D acceleration features utilized by SHReK the THiRD. Please refer to your hardware manufacturer for 100% DirectX(R) 9.0c compatibility.

The Graphics in Shrek the Third are rather rough for a PC title.  Jagged edges, flat and blurry textures, some weak or incomplete animations, and to top it off, framerate problems plague the game from start to finish.  Granted, I didn’t expect Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, but I did at least expect a bit of normal mapping.  There are some exceptions to the detail scale – some of the armor in the game, most notably on Arthur and a few of the black knights you’ll encounter later on.  You’ll also see a good bit of detail in some of the castle backgrounds, but it does little to push the hardware on a moderately equipped PC.  That said, at least the framerate is stable, unlike the Xbox 360 version.  The game supports from 640x480 to 1600x1200 resolution but other than subtitles, this represents the extent of the graphic options.

The game features a few pre-rendered cutscenes that help set up the storyline, but most of the storyline is told via the in-game engine.  Unfortunately, this touches on one of my personal pet peeves – unskippable cutscenes.  Other than the pre-rendered videos, you cannot skip any cutscenes in the game.

All in all, the graphics are a mixture of both good and bad.  Some scenes look the part, and others look like they might have come from the Wii or PS2 version.  Nowhere is this more apparent than the first level with “The Mysterious Prisoner” in the castle.  The bottom half of the walls are nicely detailed, and the upper half are blurry and unrefined.  This would probably be fine if it was at a distance, but unfortunately it is in plain view. It only gets better when you are standing directly in front of the wall. There is a demo for the PC on the official site, as well as one on the Xbox Live Marketplace, so you can give it a spin to see for yourself.

As with previous Shrek titles, Shrek the Third uses celebrity impersonators to bring the characters to life. And just as before, they do a decent job, if not quite perfect. Similarly, the sounds sound like they could be from a movie, if not quite perfect. What is pretty perfect is the music. The soundtrack for the game does a fantastic job of recreating the moving score from the movies, giving the cutscenes and gameplay a bit more movie tie-in authenticity.

Anyone who has played a platformer on the PC recently knows that a controller is the way to go, but we’ll cover both.  I’ve included the controller section from the 360 version below for ease of use and we’ll talk about the PC version below that.

For any game marketed at kids, the control scheme and camera have to be spot-on.  Shrek the Third delivers on some very simple control mechanics and utilizes a camera that moves on its own.  Moving Shrek and the gang is as simple as pointing the left analog stick in the direction you’d like to go.  Beyond this the controls are extremely simple.  The X button is your basic attack, the B button is your strong attack, and the Y button unleashes whatever special move your character has, provided you have enough fairy power to use it.  The A button makes you jump and can be combined with the various attacks.  If things get out of hand, you can unleash a Fairy Dust attack, or in the case of Shrek and Fiona, an Ogre attack that slows down time long enough to regain the upper hand.  Holding the right trigger allows you to block which will prevent almost any attack.  I said that the camera is automatic, but you can zoom the camera out a bit further by hitting the back button, which helps a bit with some of the jumping puzzles.  That said, sometimes the camera is still behind objects that you are attempting to jump around, blocking the view of your landing.  This happens a few times throughout the game and may cause some frustration.  Thankfully, this is mitigated by the fact that there is almost no penalty to falling to your doom – you instantly respawn right before your fateful leap, unharmed.  The only thing you’ll lose is the “Complete the level without dying” objective present in every section of the game.

You can play Shrek the Third with the keyboard, although it is a little less natural than the controller option.  Like a third-person shooter, you’ll use the W, A, S, and D keys to move your character, with the spacebar or right mouse button making your character jump.  You can also hold down the left mouse button and move it around to control your characters, but I found the W, A, S, D configuration to be easier.  The left arrow key throws out a basic attack and the right arrow is your strong attack.  Special moves are mapped to the up arrow, with Q and Tab handling Fair Dust Attack and block, respectively.  If you are inclined, you can remap any control in the game, so you don’t have to be attached to any of the above.

Obviously, Shrek the Third follows the events of the upcoming movie by the same name.  Since the movie comes out after the game I haven’t had the opportunity to compare the two, but if this game follows the rule of movie tie-ins, it also expands on the big screen adaptation by adding more levels and interactions.  Since we are talking about the rules, it is probably time to look into the combat elements of the game. 

Put plainly, Shrek the Third is a button masher.  You’ll spend the vast majority of your time hammering the X button (or arrow key) repeatedly to swat your enemies.  Since your foes move rather quickly, you won’t have the opportunity really utilize the charged strong attack as often as you’d like, but I’ve found that it isn’t even necessary.  You can complete almost every level without taking a single swing at an enemy.  Defeating enemies to rack up combinations and collecting various bric-a-brac including coins and hooks will allow you to purchase unlockables in the gift shop available at the main menu.  With very little variation between your attacks, you’ll find yourself looking forward to the intermingled puzzle elements or minigames. 

The minigames are one of the major highlights to the game, so much so that you can play them outside of the single player mode.  There are 6 minigames including Shrekleboard (shuffleboard), Catacombs Leap (not sure why but I’m reminded of Frogger), Frog Herder (just like it sounds), Ships Ahoy (use cannons to prevent pirates from reaching the shore in their ships), Shooting Gallery (fling tomatoes at the enemy for time and score), and Castle Capture.  Castle Capture lets you launch arrows and boulders at the enemy walls to knock their castle – this mode can be played multiplayer over Xbox Live. 

Those who have played the demo of the game on the Xbox Live Marketplace will agree with me – this game is built on humor and special attacks.  To that end, the game’s humor hits more often than it misses, and the special attacks are fun the first few times you see them.  (Thankfully they change almost every level, but you’ll see the same attack over and over until you reach the next area)  Sleeping Beauty can charm her opponents with her beauty, causing them to turn and fight each other, while Shrek can finger-flick opponents or hip check them unconscious.  Puss in Boots can unleash his inner cuteness, making his enemies swoon, and Fiona still carries her lethal Kung Fu hands and feet into battle.  You’ll also play with other characters, but I won’t ruin the discovery for you.

Perhaps because the game follows the movie, but without all of the dialog and segue,  some of the levels feel rather disconnected.  That isn’t to say that the game is without reward, but Achievement points can’t be your only motivation.  Download the demo and make sure your X button or keyboard can take the abuse on this one.

There are 20 levels in Shrek the Third. Since there is little challenge or risk to falling off cliffs, your only danger is being beaten up by the rather large bosses. The game doesn’t clutter the screen with a hud, so you’ll just have to watch for a tell-tale heartbeat around the screen edges to check your health. Staying out of harm’s way will heal you right up, as will eating whatever flavor of food is appropriate for your current character. You can amp the difficulty by changing it from Easy to Normal to Hard, but even at Hard you’ll not find too much resistance. The multiplayer is rather basic and feels more like a minigame that you might play on a Flash Game site, so it won’t be holding your interest for long. Shrek the Third doesn’t take a lot of chances with its license or gameplay. It is essentially a beat-em-up platformer that provides an extension of the movie with a very light amount of challenge. Your little ones may appreciate it, but I can’t help but feel like there could be more here if it wasn’t tied to a movie release date.

Gaming Trend Score

73

1. Graphics: 70
2. Audio: 85
3. Controls: 80
4. Gameplay: 70
5. Value/Replay: 65
6. OVERALL:73