X-men 3: The Official Game (Game Boy Advance) - Review by Andrew

Introduction

It's hard to believe that until a few years ago (with the release of Toby Maguire Spiderman) anything associated with Super Heroes was considered a risky business. Superman had long since gone, Batman had bitten the dust with the disastrous Batman & Robin and even Spiderman had been shelved for some two decades. There had been some success in TV animation of course and the comics still sold well but the journey to the big screen (and the general public) was not always a smooth one. It's all very different now though. The last couple of years alone have boasted successful movie outings for Spiderman, Batman and X-Men. However initial trailers for the third X-Men movie were greeted with questions as to characters whereabouts and plot progression. In short it made little sense. That was until 'The Last Stand' was announced which claims to be a bridging story between parts two and tree of the franchise. An X-Men 2.5 if you like, but even if this satisfies the comic book purists will it be the same for gamers?

Gameplay

Although there are four characters to play here (Wolverine, Colossus, Iceman and Nightcrawler) this GBA version of X-Men is a simple left to right affair with the odd end of level boss thrown in to break up the levels. Like the Ds version you can switch between characters (when available) in order to utilise their different abilities although the enemy AI is so poor you won't be doing much of this initially. I wish I could say that there was more to it but that really is it and as is often the case with movie tie-in's this has 'rush job' written all over it.

Controls

Very basic indeed and given that there's a tutorial available for the menu system it's incredibly difficult to get lost at all. If you do, it's simple really with the standard controls in charge of movement, attacking and jumping. The only other action at your disposal is a charge attack which can only be pulled off once you've filled the on-screen meter. As basic as they are though, they're still not nearly as responsive as they should be in a game of this nature.

Graphics

Visually the game is what we'd come to expect in the early days of the GBA which was simply updated GameBoy Color graphics and as a result the game looks rather dated with it's bold outlined sprites and generic backgrounds. The comic book style cut screens are slightly more impressive but given that this was the same developer that brought us the outstanding Shatae (on the GBC) this is all very disappointing.

Sound

The sound is not bad but it's nothing really special either with the GBA's sound chip under considerable strain trying to knock out something which resembles the X-Men score. The sound effects are of a similar quality featuring the expected swings, punches and moans with little in the way of actual voice samples.

Final comments

Given that everything you read at present tells you how great 'retro' gaming is you'd think that releasing a standard, no-frills platformer would be a good thing. It's not and this GBA version of the X-Men game demonstrates just about everything that's wrong with your average movie tie-in. For starters it's a generic platformer and you do get the impression that the developers simply had the gaming engine 'lying around' waiting to alter the visuals to reflect the title. To make matters worse, it's just not that entertaining and you'll no doubt lose interest after only a few levels. It you do want to immerse yourself in the X-Men's world why not try the superior DS version. On the other hand if you only have a GBA this is a definite 'try before you buy'.

Pro: End of Level Bosses.
Con: Flawed and Repetitive Gameplay.
Final score: 5.5

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