Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs

A curious mix, says Jen

There can't be a single adult gamer that doesn't approach a game based on a kid's film with a certain amount of trepidation. Is this game going to be a Lego Star Wars or is it going to be a Hannah Montana, you ask yourself. Some games aimed at kids are pretty good fun regardless of your age, all the Lego games for example are, for the most part, decent fun even if you're not part of the core audience. Then there are the Hannah Montanas of the world, the cynical cash in attempts by a distributor, where the game is shockingly badly made and really should be condemned to the fiery pits of gaming hell. In between are a multitude of mediocre games that manage to suitably entertain a child but miss the mark for those entrusted with caring for them. So you're probably wondering where Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs sits in this array of games aimed at the younger player. It's not as easy to define as you would expect, as proceedings entirely depends on what level of the game you're playing.

Dawn of the Dinosaurs opens up perfectly pitched at children with a simple tutorial explaining the basics of how to play. You start out playing as Sid the Sloth, an ever popular character in the Ice Age films. Throughout the rest of the game you play many of the film series characters besides Sid, such as Manny, Diego, Scrat, and new additions Scratte and Buck, all of which are voiced by their film alter egos - meaning children and fans of the films will instantly feel at home with the game. As well as this, the graphical style of the game perfectly matches the style of the films.

Playing as Sid in the early stages is a very simple affair. It's a platformer aimed at younger children at this point, so you may find as an adult that you get bored quickly, but young children will no doubt be enchanted by the action. The gameplay is just what you would expect from an average game aimed at kids, however as the title unfolds, more level-types appear on the scene, and these aren't anywhere near as simple as the Sid stages. Of course, they are no real challenge for an experienced adult gamer, with predictable weak points available for boss fights and fairly basic hand to eye co-ordination required to pass many stages. However for the younger gamer, it does feel a little unfair at times.

In the initial few opening levels, there is a sequence where you, as Diego the tiger, must chase a wildebeest around a linear course. I was surprised to find that it took me a few attempts to traverse this successfully mostly due to rather poor handling making it difficult to control the direction of Diego at times, and I suspect that a young child would certainly need a fair bit of help to get them past the level. Throughout the game there were a few sections such as this where I can't help but think the difficulty level was pitched wrong, and would frustrate children in places.

There are some surprisingly fun homages to other games too, such as a Monkey Ball-esque level featuring Sid the Sloth having to roll a dinosaur egg to safety around various dangers, and the side-scrolling levels starring Scrat, which featured plants you could jump in and be fired from, a la the Barrels used in Donkey Kong Country. Finally, there were even levels where you controlled a pterodactyl and had to shoot your way across the screen, very much like a dinosaur-themed and simplified version of R-Type. All of these varied levels made events much more interesting but I did find Dawn of the Dinosaurs somewhat confusing, as to its intentions. Some levels just seemed too difficult for a child to traverse alone without some tantrums occurring. For example, the Monkey Ball-type levels often required quite precise movements with the controller, something that Im not convinced a young child would be able to manage very well. The Scrat levels suffered from insta-death moments as you would expect from a side scrolling platformer, again rather frustrating for young ones.

Then again, as an adult, I quite enjoyed the title. The levels featuring Sid and Buck became a little tedious at times because they were excessively simple but others such as the Scrat and Pterodactyl levels reminded me of the games I played in my youth. It was also refreshing to play a title with seemingly no noticeable bugs or glitches that wrecked the game in any way. The problem stands that the most appealing levels for the adult gamer would instantly infuriate and aggravate a child gamer which makes Dawn of the Dinosaurs a curious mix, a confused game that doesn't quite hit the mark for either young nor old.

I struggle to recommend it to a childless adult as really, why would you in your right mind buy a full price game aimed at children? However, if you are a parent who is looking for a game to play with their child that both of you can enjoy: this succeeds quite admirably. It even offers a multiplayer mode if you want to compete together, although this consists solely of mini-games rather than any co-operative sections within the game. Just make sure you keep an eye on things so you can take over when the action gets too taxing, you don't want your child to learn that throwing a controller at the TV is terrific stress relief.

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By Jennifer Allen