Shaun the Sheep (Nintendo DS) - Review by jofra01

Introduction

Shaun the Sheep first made his appearance within a Wallace & Gromit short some years ago and only a while ago received his own television series. Shaun the Sheep, for Nintendo DS, is based on that television show and surprisingly the title is nearly as good as the series and does provide some quality, while it lasts.

Gameplay

Consisting mainly of minigames this title sees you have to track down a fair few sheep that escaped before the farmer gets back. The game contains an open world, that is quite basic in terms of quality and provides you with very linear gameplay meaning you can't do one thing or collect an item until you do a certain something before hand.

Having to find sheep as your main objective you will come across characters that will try and stop you and sometimes even help but they prove to be an actual distraction within the game and actual the game out quite a bit. Such characters you will come across will be the pigs who attempt to attack you starting a minigame in which you must avoid the pig for at least 5 seconds and then call the dog for help, that's it and you will be doing that several times within the game. All minigames require use of the stylus and some are quite simple indeed that see you making a ball of string by just drawing a continous circle while some minigames, such as Shaun playing a guitar, offer a minor challenge from their objective.

Other then minigames sometimes you will be required to create things to reach certain sheep and although it doesn't really offer real gameplay it does have you searching for things in obvious locations. Overall with the gameplay although it may be simple altogether, with some minor challenges, one will soon realise that if you do mistakes within the game it doesn't actual make a difference at all.

Controls

'Shaun the Sheep' has a very basic control system which sees you moving Shaun around in the open world with either the stylus or d-pad. The stylus is used mainly for minigames, with some minor use of the microphone, and if there was no use of the stylus at all one would end up with a very dull and boring game with average minigames.

Graphics

Surprisingly developers actually attempted to make the in game environments similar to what you would see within the television series, and sometimes it is pretty and sometimes it isn't. However graphics don't always maintain at the same level as there a couple of minigames which actually take a couple of direct shots from the series itself and are placed in the game with no movement, which is disappoiniting.

The characters themselves are well animated but the sheep themselves are very basic in design while characters like the dog are better looking.

Sound

Not really much within this department of the game with a few minor songs playing in the background nothing much does overally standout. Characters also make some sounds, with sheeps making baa sounds and pigs oinking which does add a form of humor into the game.

Dual screen

Dual screen use is nothing to be overally excited about within this game as the top screen contains only a map of the area, which does provide confusion in some places. The bottom screen is where all the real action takes place, if only the game did have action, with all minigames taking place in the bottom screen with only a few making use of top for extra valuse.

Final comments

Exactly 1 hour is how long it took me to complete this game 100% and I played through a title that isn't terrible but isn't that great either. It does contain alot of similarities to the show itself which is good to see but a whole lot more could have been added to make the experience of the game a whole lot enjoyable. This game will keep children occupied though, who are probably the target audience, as some minigames and challenges will actual prove more challenging to them.

Pro: Easy To Pick Up, Some Minigames Enjoyable
Con: Easy To Complete, Some Minigames Boring, Alot More Could Have Been Added.
Final score: 5.7

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