Herbie: Fully Loaded (Game Boy Advance) - Review by Andrew

Introduction

It was interesting to see the Herbie franchise resurrected this summer as in my younger days this was a personal and family favorite. That and the wonderful Pink Panther films although I'm not entirely sure that the bumbling of Inspector Clouseau would make for a great GBA game. During Herbie's initial outings computer games were a pipe dream and it would be some years before even Nintendo's Game and Watch made an appearance. That was then though and this is now and in the 21st Century it would be unthinkable for the likes of Disney to miss out on a franchising avenue of any description. So was this one worth the effort? Read on and see...

Gameplay

As you'd expect Herbie is all about racing, the object being to enter a series of events to eventually prove that Herbie has a little more under the hood than you'd first expect. These are simple affairs with the last race being no more difficult that the first. The only thing hampering your almost guaranteed pole position is another car, oil on the track and the rather irritating yellow star. Outside of that it's generally plain sailing with only a major lack of concentration on your part losing you the race. Once you've completed the main competition you can race each track at your leisure but that's it so you do get the feeling that the whole package is lacking in the longevity department. This could easily have been fixed with the inclusion of more varied challenges. Maybe a driving license section, which would need to be earned or even some garage-based mini games. As I'm playing the game now though this is clearly a case of wishful thinking and we can only assume Climax had little or no time to produce the title.

Controls

Deadly simple and if cars were this easy to drive you'd pass your driving test in around four minutes. Accelerate, brake and use special item! Got that? Good!

Graphics

Probably one of the best aspects of the game is the actual graphics engine and while in some areas you can definitely say you've seen it all before there are some nice touches, which manage to separate Fully Loaded from the rest of the pack. The first of these is the actual model of Herbie himself and while other racers use the minimum amount of frames to animate their main features, your car moves incredibly smoothly regardless of how much you twist and turn. The rest of the game is pretty much as you'd expect with flat 'mode-7' tracks filling in for the courses and the odd building to remind you where you are. The movie link is strengthened thanks to a handful of images featuring the stars with simple text pushing the story along which is something we've all come to expect nowadays.

Sound

Adding fuel to the argument that this was indeed a rushed project is the soundtrack which in no way enhances, or even manages to accompany, the on-screen action. I haven't seen the movie yet but I'm almost certain every race features something more sophisticated than a hard rock theme and even this appears to of been lying around the development studio for some time.

Final comments

While Herbie himself (assuming he's a he) certainly looks the part this game is definitely aimed at your first time drivers and anyone who's ever even switched on a similar title is likely to fly through Fully Loaded in less than an hour. For everyone else there a bit of a challenge here mostly due to the yellow star which forces you to drive backwards but you will find that even the humble Herbie can outrun every car on the circuit. Fans of the movie will also no doubt enjoy the series of cut screens, which accompany the Story Mode, but this really is a very average movie tie-in and a definite try before you buy.

Pro: Herbie Looks Fantastic
Con: Not Very Challenging
Final score: 5.3

Share on Twitter or Facebook

Comments