Pre order Scribblenauts For a... Rooster Hat?

[futuramaguy42]

IGN says the only bad thing are the controls. They say Maxwell doesn't always respond to the taps. They should have just used d-pad control.

BTW this is from the podcast, I don't have the link, i just read this in a gamespot thread.

[fastbilly1]

Anyone play it yet?

[Reverend]

I just got the game and the hat, but I haven't had time to play it yet.

[ejamer]

I've spent a couple hours playing my copy and can comment. I'll try to keep things mostly spoiler free.

First off, my expectations going in: I loved the concept of being able to write anything, but expected that the game would control like crap from watching videos. I also expected some buggy behavior because it sounds like a QA nightmare.

Now for my experience...

The bad:
Maxwell pretty much does control like crap, although slightly better than I expected. Most of the time you won't have problems getting things to work... but know upfront that there is no precision to the controls! Also, it's harder to get things to interact the way you want. Many nouns don't have enough verbs assigned to them to let you really do whatever you want - for example, I threw a shrimp on the BBQ but couldn't actually cook it. Also, there are some things that you think *should* work that just don't. One puzzle level had ice you could dig through. To speed things up, I tried typing LAVA and setting that on the ice to quickly melt through... but nothing happened except for me being disappointed. It's also worth noting that sprites are reused quite often. Anytime similar words can be represented with the same object, they are. This makes sense, but might still disappoint someone who expected everything to be unique.

The good:
There are so many cool and funny little things to see. Some things won't work the way you want, but figuring out what does and what doesn't is part of the fun! The title screen acts as a sandbox -- allowing you to type in anything you want and basically create your own interactions. If that was the whole game, I would've been happy. But there are also a ton of different puzzles to solve as well. Puzzles are mostly ok (not awesome) but do have some great surprises to uncover and will help give you ideas about what objects you can use when building your own levels or just fooling around.

Overall, I'm thrilled with the game. There is more than enough to keep me coming back to play, although I find that usually short bursts are more enjoyable than extended sessions. How much you enjoy the game will depend on your imagination and creativity because it's easy to get stuck in a rut using the same few objects repeatedly to solve puzzles if you aren't careful. It's also worth noting that much of the "fun" in this game is discovering interactions yourself. Using the strategy guide or reading all of the spoilers online would probably limit your enjoyment.

Is it game of the year? Probably not. But is it worth playing and owning? I am holding onto my copy... at least until a sequel shows up!

[Ack]

I just watched them play it on Backloggery. To score a soccer goal, Try4ce put down a brick wall, spawned in a helicopter, and then used a rope to airlift the goalie out of the way to the other side of the wall. And then he spawned a soccer ball and scored.

Earlier, I watched him use chloroform on a guy to knock him out. I do believe I'm going to have to get this.

[BogusMeatFactory]

It is a must get with anyone with at least a decent vocabulary.

A great story to convince people to play this is game is how I handled a puzzle.

I had to collect a star that was dangling by a rope over a lava pit. Next to my character was a trip wire that, when crossed released the rope and melted the star, causing me to fail the mission. Here is how I handled the situation. I created a hobo, to stend on the ledge next to the lava pit. I then tied a chain from him to the star. I create a sandwich that was just out of reach from the hobo, causing him to constantly move away from the lava pit in an attempt to eat it. I crossed the trip wire, releasing the original rope, the hobo could then reach the sandwich, causing him to pull the star to safety for me to collect.