Son of the Mask Review

Anannya Sen ’s Review

A game based on the film out right now. Check out the cool graphics and funny animation in this platformer.

I never saw Son of the Mask so I don't know whether the film is any good. The game, however is not bad.

Graphically is where the game is strongest with very cute looking graphics which match the mood of the film perfectly. The characters are well drawn and the animation when they are moving, flying or getting jumped on is quite comical. So too is the effect when baby gets a balloon head or spins around. There is plenty of colour and the game just looks vibrant. Plus they have managed to get the mask itself looking pretty accurate.

The sound is there, but the intro tune is very short, repetitive and annoying after a while. There are sound effects when you pick things up, shoot, die, jump etc, but nothing much more than a simple tone. I think some more work was required.

Control wise the game is quite straightforward. Use the D or key pad to move the character around, up will jump and down will spin. When you have some gumballs to shoot, shoot them with the main button or 5.

The playability is ok, if a little hard at times. The objective is to collect sweets as you progress through the levels. The life bar is denoted by how much milk you have and you can pick up this as well as gumballs to fire at enemies. The 'enemies' are characters from the film such as the dog and the dad (tim). You can jump on them to stun them and jump a bit higher to reach those hard to get places. There is also a balloon head effect which when you get will enable you to float to higher areas. But that's pretty much it really, a simple platformer. The enemies are pretty tough and the main problem I found was that there wasn't a lot of ammunition on each level and the spinning didn't have any effect on anything! It's pretty easy to get hit several times in quick succession and mistime your jumps. Before you know it your life will be gone and it's back to the last save point. If you love platformers you will like this, but the difficulty level is a bit off.

Lastability wise, the game isn't so bad. There are plenty of levels to keep you occupied and there are also save points mid level (the mask icons themselves). The game will save your progress and has a highscore feature. As platform games go, this one requires a fair amount of time and effort to master and not being a huge fan, it didn't really do much for me.