Legends of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole (Nintendo DS) - Review by Andrew

Introduction

We seem to get as many CGI movies now as there are 'normal' ones so you could be forgiven if you haven't heard of this latest offering from Warner Brothers. From a personal point of view the movie will be forever etched in my mind, as it was the first trailer I saw on the 3DS and pretty impressive it was too. That, though, is for future discussion and right now we need to get the bottom of just what's happening with the owls of Ga'Hoole.

Gameplay

Legend of Guardians has you taking the role of Shard, a member of the elite Military Squad who is charged with protecting the lands of Ga'Hoole from the Pure Ones. These are a group of evil birds that wish to kidnap (or birdnap) the residents of Ga'Hoole in order to make them slaves. The whole plot of the game rests on this single factor. This involves you in a variety of missions, which generally involve racing, escorting or gathering thing, although most of them are so similar it's difficult to tell the difference between them. To make matters worse the objectives themselves are repetitive and once you've battled it out with one group of birds you'll be seeking a different challenge. Sadly, as the Pure Ones all attack in exactly the same manner, that's not available. There are some RPG elements where you can beef up your skills, but if you are playing this long enough for it to make any real difference we'll be amazed.

Controls

All the owl combat is controlled with the touch-screen so there's no point hanging around here although you can do a handy 180-degree turn with the shoulder button.

Graphics

While the cut screens are very impressive, this is yet another DS game that stretches itself a little too thinly and while the 3D engine moves at a steady speed it is at the expense of the visual quality. The game is much more like a first generation effort as opposed to the type of stuff we are seeing from developers such as n-Space. To make matters worse there's a problem with some of the collision detection so, not only can you travel through some walls, but invisible objects also spring up from time to time making some of the simpler missions very frustrating.

Sound

The soundtrack is here is wonderful and the orchestral score will have you believing that you are about to play the most impressive DS title ever. Sadly this is short lived and the horribly repetitive sound effects will have you turning your sound off altogether.

Dual screen

On the plus side the control system is very intuitive and whether you are simply flying around or racing with another characters the stylus makes navigation incredibly easy. Unfortunately the same can't be said of the various courses where, on more than one occasion, we came to a dead stop thanks to an invisible wall or obstacle. This isn't always the collision detection either as things aren't really helped by the bland visuals. The other major part of the gameplay is combat, which you'll trigger by tapping groups of birds. The action then moves to a 2D plane but rather than being frustrating this is, instead, so incredibly easy that even younger gamers will dispose of the enemy in a matter of strokes.

Final comments

After a handful of better than average movie tie-ins The Owls of Ga'Hoole perfectly demonstrates just why we're so wary of games based on big screen outings. This really is a mess from the start and the lack of challenge, poor visuals and awful combat system means that it is unlikely to appeal to even the younger gamers who enjoyed the film at the cinema. In fact, the only real redeeming feature of the whole package is the soundtrack but if you really do want to hum along to the film's score, why not simply invest in the CD.

Pro: Great Soundtrack
Con: Poor Visuals, Bland Gameplay, No Real Challenge.
Final score: 3.7

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