SpongeBob Drawn To Life Like Drawn To Life, But With SpongeBob
I confess to not having played the original Drawn to Life back when it came out, but I've a pal who's a SpongeBob Squarepants fan, so when I was at THQ's spring preview event in New York City, I had to take a peek.
A rep demoed the DS title for me, and explained the gameplay is similar to the original Drawn to Life - this time, obviously, with a big SpongeBob cartoon theme. It's actually based, she said, on an episode of the TV series where Spongebob accidentally scribbles himself an enemy, "DoodleBob," a drawing come to life.
Like I said, I never played Drawn to Life, but I heard at length from lots of friends and readers that the platforming was nothing to get excited about, so I asked whether they'd taken that feedback and cleaned it up this time.
Apparently not so much - the rep explained that Drawn to Life is actually targeted at kids, not older gamers, so we'd be mistaken to expect particularly complex, high-level gameplay. The appeal, she said, lies in how customisable the world is, giving the player the opportunity to draw and customise not only the player character, but gameplay elements like buildings, background elements and platforms in an MSPaint-like pixel-based stylus interface.
In the SpongeBob edition of Drawn to Life, players can pick either the titular sponge, his friend Patrick the starfish, or surly Squidward as a companion for gameplay, and each one lends a certain ability - SpongeBob provides a shield, and Patrick and Squidward have different special attacks.
The game looks rich with trademark Nickelodeon style, and one thing I'd think would make it really appealing to kids is that there are modes that teach them how to draw the key characters, so if they want to draw themselves a SpongeBob character and play as him, they can, but maybe not so much there for an audience our age unless you really love SpongeBob and don't mind simplicity.
View: AU Comments (2) | US Comments (18 comments)
Should've called it "Pants To Life"
when will it be out in australia?
@LittleBigPlaneteer: Me too. I will probably get this one.
LittleBigPlaneteer, have you seen the recent episode where SpongeBob got a splinter? I laughed for like 10 minutes. The most hilarious episode...ever...
Shyguy
I rented Drawn to Life. It was simple but fun. I think I'll buy the SpongeBob edition and play it until I get bored (probably won't take more than a week) then give it to my niece and nephew. They love drawing, DS, and SpongeBob so this'll will be their favorite thing ever for a least a little while.
LeChuck
Chalk Zone: Drawn to life would make alot of sense.
KEITH1437
Drawn to Life was fun if you committed yourself to the drawing aspects. If you didn't care about drawing, it would be a pretty awful platformer. The drawing was not as free form as it should have been, either, but at least you could do some decent things. My main character had Pac-Man head, hands, and feet.
kingofallcosmos
Hmm... I really like Spongebob, but I don't like his games. :/
I wonder if this game will do justice to his name?
Tigerfog
Drawn To Life didn't last long with me really, after the novelty of the spooge vicar with his penis shaped snow gun jumping on obscenity ridden platform wore off, the game itself was pretty dull.
cheeseboybeans
another thing, it would be cool if they added a feature where you could choose the type of hero you wanted to be and have customizable weapons based on that. for instance, you can choose to draw a gun toting maniac with different guns and ammunition, or you could choose to be a medieval knight with swords and maces, or even a ninja with shurikens, kunais, and different disguise/stealth tactics.
bigman88zz
Well, I liked Drawn to Life (a fun kids game) and I like Spongebob (the only kids cartoon I've ever seen that has gotten away with a puppet master reference) so this should be a day one purchase for me.
Thorax
Doodlebob FTW.
Bluejuan85
I love me some Spongebob. I'll be picking this up
LittleBigPlaneteer
Drawn to pants?
Kanik
gah, i wish they would add more complexity to the game, like customizable weapons(and i dont mean customization by drawing them in any shape). i really hated in the first drawn to life how the only weapons i could use were an acorn gun and a snowball gun. id really like to be able to draw my own weapons, and choose their abilities, such as explosive rounds, heat seeking rounds, armor piercing, etc. even if the game has a cutesy theme, its possible to implement these ammunition types without it turning into cod4. kinda like oddworld:strangers wrath, although that wasnt what i would call cutesy.
and dont get me started on the easy to beat enemies. maybe they should add a design your own baddies/boss feature too, with a customizable level of difficulty. then again, all this probably wouldnt fit on a ds cart anyway, since what im describing seems to be turning into a video game maker.
bigman88zz
Ah, Drawn to life...The game where you make your hero a penis guy with balls for feet who uses poop clouds to navigate across levels.
CCCombobreaker
@karasu is my homeboy:
The appeal to spongebob is
a) Cute, for girls
b) Its hilariously random if you're under the influence of pot, thus, a seller with college students
That said, I rather like spongebob, so Im kind of looking forward to this.
And Im uh, not a girl.
Komrade_Kayce
@Palladium: VP is not a kid game!
I don't see the appeal with Spongebob. But this is the best headline I've read all day. Confusion ftw.
karasu is my homeboy
a intresting liscended game but basically more of the same right? i hate spongebob...never liked it...but i did want to play drawn to life was it good?
bobdisgea
Hmm, if it gets a good review I may pick it up when it comes out, but only because I can get steep discounts on THQ games. DS games for $10 and ps3 games for $12. How much better can you get? I only wish they had a better selection of games.
spyguy99
Interesting story, and I respect your decision to put it up, but I'm wondering why.
Is there some sort of DS event going on right now, and I just didn't notice? Or is Kotaku just in a DS "kid-game" mood.
Either way, I'm never touching Nickelodeon games again. I played that one where you play as Jimmy Neutron, Danny Phantom, Timmy, and Spongebob, only to discover that it's impossible to beat the second or third level.
Palladium