Lion King 1 1/2 (Game Boy Advance) - Review by Andrew

Introduction

Disney Interactive are one of the main multinationals pushing handheld versions of movies, videos and DVD's and even the odd TV series on a regular basis on the GBA. The latest Lion King title has been released in Europe on the back of the successful DVD although Disney and THQ are keen to point out that it is not simply a remake but a whole new adventure and some places even saw it subtitled 'One and a Half'. The original was a Genesis and PC classic which, along with the likes of Aladdin, many believed was Disney's finest hour, with regards to console games at least. Since then it's all been a little... well... dull to be honest and with the exception of Lilo and Stitch most of Disney's releases have been simple platform affairs. With that in mind it will be interesting to see if this new version will win over as many fans as the previous effort.

Gameplay

The Lion King challenges you to control both Timon and Pumbaa through jungles and over deserts whilst collecting as many bugs as possible. Well, as many as you can anyway. Each level requires you to acquire 40 of these tiny critters to open up the bonus levels. It doesn't matter if you don't find all of them on the first attempt though as the front-end menu system allows you to revisit any level at any time. If you do manage to locate all of them you'll be rewarded with a piece of a jigsaw puzzle and once you have all the pieces you can enter the bonus level. This is usually timed and you must reach the end before the clock reaches zero although handy bonus items are scattered around which can give some you all-important bonus seconds.

The levels themselves have you playing solo, as a team and in a co-operative mode and although The Lion King is strictly a platformer there are some rather ingenious puzzle elements, which become more challenging as the game progresses. This becomes apparent when you fully grasp the characters? various strengths and weaknesses so whilst some levels might have a very open ended feel others can have you deciphering the correct and safest path for each character. Most difficult of all are the chase levels where you find that trying to collect all the bugs while being pursued by raging beasts is almost impossible until you memorise their locations. That's not to say that these sections aren't fun, they're just incredibly challenging. Finally, in keeping with the title?s overall simplicity. the developers have added an automatic battery backup, which kicks in whenever a level is completed. It is simple and effective so why can?t all games do this...

Controls

Control is both straightforward and responsive which is always a plus in game of this nature and, while there's no tutorial level as such, every new movement is explained to the gamer. This is done via a rather large graphical scroll, which appears directly behind you whenever a new control combination is required, detailing how to do it and what will happen. Clearly this makes the whole thing much simpler and more rewarding, especially for younger gamers, whilst rendering the manual somewhat redundant.

Graphics

The very least you'd expect from Disney is a game with a superior level of visuals and The Lion King does not disappoint. It starts with some wonderful locations over varied terrains, which are both colourful and well designed and the character animation is super smooth regardless of how many characters are on screen with both Timon and Pumbaa occasionally displaying the level of humour that made them so popular in the first place. Finally there's the bonus of some FMV clips, which have been added onto the cart via a sophisticated compression technique making the footage smoother and clearer than usual. There's no sampled sound, instead the game?s soundtrack plays, but they will no doubt delight fans of the movie.

Sound

No sooner have you switched on your GBA than its tiny sound chip bursts into a very pleasing rendition of The Lion King anthem Hakuna Matata. This is continued throughout the game with similar themed incidental music which complements the on-screen action nicely. In addition there are a whole host of sound effects which have no doubt been collected from Disney's audio archive as you'll swear you've heard them all before in previous animated movies and games.

Final comments

This latest outing for The Lion King is clearly aimed towards the younger GBA owner with the gameplay being both simplistic and very forgiving. You're granted endless continues meaning that you can never really lose and by the time it gets more challenging you've gained such a good grasp of the game mechanics that you never feel overwhelmed by its complexity. It's a reasonably lengthy game too so, although there's little in the way of replay value, in order to completely finish the game with top marks you will have to collect all the bugs, which in turn unlocks the bonus levels. Overall I can't recommend this game enough for pre-teens although anyone even slightly older than this is likely to have seen it all before.

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