Topic: Scribblenauts Showdown (Switch) Review

[Daan]

A party game that makes a muck out of an once fun franchise.

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/review/46856/scribblenauts-showdown-switch-review

5th Cell was a developer that made games that I loved. Between Drawn to Life and Lock's Quest, they could do no wrong in my eyes. At the height of their superstar status, they gave us the Scribblenauts series. These quirky games see you putting in words and making objects appear that can solve puzzles. It was all about using your imagination, and focusing on what truly matters. Five long years have passed since the company's last major release. Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, however, didn't sit still. They got a new developer and made a new Scribblenauts game...sort of. Instead of an imaginative puzzle game, they made a bland party game.

When I say bland, I truly mean underwhelming to the highest degree. The minigames included in this package range from bearable to out of touch. There is a flying, a battle arena, fishing and bringing items to holes on an alien planet. The variety is there, but none of them are fun or remind you of the old Scribblenauts games. The short games are random for the sake of being random, and don't really do anything that will surprise you. Except for maybe eating to the point of throwing up.

But where does the Scribblenauts tradition of word entry come in? Well, the items that you use during the minigames are chosen by you. That might sound exciting, particularly to younger players, but it goes back to the randomness argument. Without care, you decide to play as a farmer in the dancing minigame, because it fits the theme that the game asks of you beforehand. Another is how you are tasked with putting in a specific mystical creature to eat during the eating contest. It sounds hilarious on paper, but the dymanics of the experience really don't change.

Even at that, not every minigame uses the words. There are plenty of button mashers and waggle experiences that simply state the rules before you continue. It goes to show how phoned in that whole side of it is. This bring me to the following question: why does this even have the Scribblenauts name? The way you type in words feels clumsy as you can only use a single Joy-Con to play it docked. On the go, the button controls are smoother, but it is here you would expect touchscreen controls. Surprise surprise, the game doesn't offer those at all.

Next to playing the minigames on their own,  there are also Versus and Showdown modes. In Versus, you basically play through a bunch of minigames until one player becomes the winner. Showdown is, honestly, a lot more interesting in that regard. This virtual board game sees you every player having a stack of cards, which have specific minigames and a tile amount attached to them. By winning, you give yourself the option to speed ahead or slow others down to a halt. While it relies on the bland minigames, the strategy side of it is genuinely neat and deserved a lot more love.

The final option in the package is the Sandbox mode. While this will remind you the most of the old Scribblenauts games, this is where the controls are the most uncomfortable. The different areas see you completing tasks by bringing objects into the world, and see the response to them play out before your eyes. The animations and interactions are adorable, and it is sadly the biggest standout here. This is because the missions are actually quite bland, and the levels are tiny compared to their versions in previous entries. I think that the biggest insult is that the game offers barely any wiggle room to find unique solutions.

Scribblenauts Showdown is a cookiecutter attempt at bringing back a lost franchise. While the party aspect isn't absolutely terrible, its bland nature made me shrug every time. And sure, the game tries to tie it in to the Scribblenauts franchise, but it misfires to an almost comical degree. This would be more funny if it didn't involve games I used to really love. There is the potential to bring Scribblenauts back, but Warner Bros. aren't the people to do it.