Alice In Wonderland (DS) Review

I’m fairly certain that I’ve said this before, but it’s very rare to find a game based on a movie that’s quite enjoyable to play and rather well put together, both in terms of presentation and gameplay mechanics. Usually, it’s simply because the game itself has to be rushed out to coincide with the film’s release, but for some reason, rather unknown French developer Étranges Libellules have crafted a rather enjoyable experience that is sure to surprise anyone who’s played it. That game is Alice in Wonderland, and while it has been made to coincide with Tim Burton’s recently released feature film, it doesn’t really feature much in common with the movie.

Alice in Wonderland is actually a sequel to the original stories that we all know and love, though any fan of the original Lewis Carroll novels will tell you how butchered the series has been. Regardless, this iteration of Alice in Wonderland brings Alice back to Wonderland, except that a lot of the inhabitants don’t believe her to be the “original” Alice they ran into all those years ago. Unfortunately, the inhabitants of Wonderland must be convinced that she is so that she can slay the Red Queen’s Jabberwocky, a mythical creature threatening the world of Wonderland. Similarly, the Red Queen has “dismantled” most of Wonderland and it’s up to Alice to reconstruct it along her quest to find the mythical weapon with which she can slay the Jabberwocky. Yes, it’s rather simplistic, but this game is technically for all audiences, and it does suffice.

The most intriguing and without a doubt most charming aspect of the Alice In Wonderland game is its artistic direction, which takes a rather large divergence from the styles featured in the film, and is exclusive to the DS platform. It’s first of all a nice step away from typical conventions, creating an art style that works with the system rather than trying to fit a realistic/misfit style onto the system and creating a rather ugly game instead. The whole game feels like a story board come to life, boasting a rather stark black and white base for most of the graphics, with some bright and bold colours highlighting and accentuating details in the world, such as Alice’s hair, the Red Queen’s portals and the environments themselves. It’s a very nice meld of typical Tim Burton artistic design with the phantasmagorical visions of Lewis Carroll that we all would’ve had when reading the novels. The animations are well done, too; Alice is adorable as she skips along and looks genuinely scared when something bad happens. The other characters are also great, with their animations and facial expressions lending them so much personality despite them never actually speaking. Some of the characters have some, well, let’s just say interesting introductions. To put things into perspective, this game is definitely up there with Okami and Wind Waker as being one of the most stylistically advantaged games available on a Nintendo system.

Alice in Wonderland is essentially a puzzle game dressed up as an adventure. Players don’t actually control Alice herself, but rather one of the four companion characters that assist her throughout her journey. Players begin with the White Rabbit, and later go on to recruit the Caterpillar, the Mad Hatter and the Cheshire Cat, each with their own specific power that will lend Alice a hand throughout the game. It could even be said, in fact, that the game takes a few pages from Metroid’s book in that there is some light backtracking once obtaining new abilities in order to open up new areas. Each character’s special power will have to be utilised to solve the puzzles that are presented, and as the game gets more and more further in, multiple powers have to be used in order to progress. It’s a rather simple sounding system, and the powers themselves are things you would expect in a game like this, but they are implemented in such a clever way making use of all the DS control schemes that it just all comes together to feel oh-so-right.

Naturally, having Alice follow you and being rather defenceless leaves her open to all kinds of danger. The major enemies are the minions of the Red Queen herself, who will commonly try to steal Alice and put her in a portal to take her back to the Queen. This is very similar to the Yoshi’s Island gameplay mechanic, where Alice makes it evident that she’s in trouble and must be rescued within a certain amount of time. These little combat scenarios help to break up the puzzle solving and never really pose a challenge, although they’re are still a welcome addition. Similarly, players will also come across the many creatures of Wonderland and will often have to solve puzzles to defeat them, too.

The game’s menu system is rather well done, too, having a rather “organic” feel as the vines of the game’s virtual world take over each of the options. With a touch of the stylus, players can switch between the four playable companions in order to help out Alice. Slashing the screen is a basic attack, and holding the stylus to the left or right of the screen moves your character. Hardly any face buttons are used, except for companion’s special powers. In addition to the basic attack that utilises the stylus, players can occasionally blow on the screen upon smashing an enemy’s armour in order to send them tumbling away. These are quite small touches but still do an excellent job at utilising the hardware without really feeling shoe-horned into the mechanics. I previously mentioned very light Metroid-style backtracking mechanics, and thankfully the game allows players to mark on their maps when they reach an area they will have to revisit later, which is a nice way to keep things running smoothly rather than running around aimlessly trying to remember where to go next.

As a short aside, the developers of the game also implemented an optional feature available to DSi users, in which the camera is utilised to open certain treasure chests in the game. Should Alice and her companion find a red chest in the game, in order to open it the player must locate an object in their real, physical environment that is the same colour (or at least similar) to the chest. It’s a rather nice diversion that works well with the camera, and despite being my first DSi-enhanced game, I quite like the way it’s been implemented. It’s nothing too complex, but really nothing too simple either. It’s a bit of a cliché to say, but it’s just right.

The sound effects in Alice in Wonderland are fairly bare bones, with the typical bips and bops you would expect in a 2D platformer. Similarly, for a game without any real voice acting, each character has a little sound byte that is used to punctuate certain parts of dialogue, kind of like a very lax version of Banjo Kazooie’s dialogue system. Finally, the music is very simple yet whimsical, with the opening scenes in particular featuring some really well done pieces that make you feel like you’re out in foreign territory. Music will loop on occasion, particularly during those parts where you can’t quite find where to go, but it never really gets too annoying.

Alice in Wonderland is an amazing adventure game with some excellent design choices, but surely it must go wrong somewhere? Well, unfortunately, it does. It’s rather short adventure and once it’s over, there’s hardly any reason for Alice to return to Wonderland once again. I managed to take about six hours, though it’s a bit hard to tell since the game doesn’t really provide an accurate way to time a playthrough. Still, it’s a rather enjoyable experience from beginning to end, regardless of the length.

Alice in Wonderland is one of those games that I think everyone should play. It’s also one of those movie games that doesn’t completely fall flat despite having potential. The developers have not only managed to craft an interesting and engaging gameplay experience from the source material, but also created a title that takes full advantage of the Nintendo DS system’s functionality and to a further extent, the DSi’s camera, too. It’s definitely a title that you shouldn’t shun for it’s childish appearance, for it is a rather enjoyable game I can safely recommend to all ages. It’s length and simplicity can really bring it down in parts, though.

Graphics 9.9

A charming artistic direction really shines on the DS hardware. Animations and facial expressions are brilliantly done, adding life to the games characters.

Gameplay 7.5

An interesting blend of puzzle elements with some character swapping gameplay creates a rather unique 2D platformer experience. Thankfully, babysitting Alice doesnt ever get too annoying. Combat and puzzles can be a bit simplistic at times, though.

Sound 7.5

Nice blend of sound effects and some well conducted pieces fill the games soundtrack to create the perfect fantastical world.

Tilt 7.0

A great blast through, though there isnt much to do once its done.

Value 9.0

I had a lot of fun playing Alice in Wonderland, so much so that I finished it in almost three sittings. Everything combines to create a rather cute and interesting little adventure/puzzle game.