Handheld
(DS) SHREK the THiRD
By James Rinehart
Jun 4, 2007, 7 :09 am

There’s the old saying, about how appearances can be deceiving, and nothing is truer for SHREK the THiRD. Developed by Vicarious Visions, the same people responsible for the recently released Spider-Man 3 for the DS, the game would seem to be an action brawler in the same vein, if you’re going by screenshots that is. In reality, Shrek the Third favors a more cerebral approach by putting the focus on puzzle solving over brawling.

The story acts as a sort of side plot to the movie. There is trouble in the land of Far Far Away. Shrek and friends have been shipwrecked and must bypass the minions of the evil Prince Charming to undo a spell so that Merlin can use his magic wand to save the kingdom and Fiona’s young cousin Artie can take the throne that is rightfully his. Shrek, Artie, and a cat brandishing a sword and a cute rogue’s hat with a feather in it named Puss in Boots set out with the help of Donkey who guides them from a distance via Merlin’s crystal ball. The storybooks sequences from the movies are present with Donkey’s narration; they usually crop up between stages.

The game is divided up into four stages with a total of four levels each, bringing the total up to sixteen stages that you can play through as many times as you want. The stages reflect a general location for the levels, a gully infested with goblins, a castle infested with sword-brandishing, knife-throwing knights, a haunted cave infested with bats and witches, and a harbor infested with pirates. Three levels to each stage with a boss level at the end is the simple math of it all, and it works well enough in pacing the game. It never takes too long to get through a stage and if you’re paying attention to things you’ll never get stuck in one spot.

The gameplay is comprised of guiding the three characters, Shrek, Artie, and Puss in Boots, through the levels and making use of each of their special abilities to progress. Shrek can smash through certain walls, Artie can use his shield to hit certain magical switches, take cover from airborne hazards like falling poisonous water, as well as use it to sail across portions of water, while Puss in Boots can jump. The goal of a given level is to hit all the right switches while keeping an eye out for either of the two main collectibles, the coin and the magic fairies that are required to unlock the boss levels as well as help undo the bad magic spell, and get all the characters to the portal at the end. There are a number of different kinds of switches you must hit with either one character or sometimes all three to unlock other portions of the level. The challenge comes from finding the switches and then figuring out how to hit them. It’s all simple lock-and-key stuff, really. You can take control of a single character by tapping on their portrait on the bottom of the screen and leave the others to sit and wait for you to come back to collect them, or you can team them all up as a single unit. Teaming them all up is required for a couple switches but you’ll spend most of the time switching between them as the levels call for. It’s an interesting mechanic, to be sure, and the entire game is built around it. Too bad that it wears thin after a while because while the idea of switching between characters with separate unique abilities sounds great on paper in practice it gets tiring if the levels aren’t built cleverly around it. You’ll switch back and forth throughout to perform the same special functions in the same situations in each level over and over again that you’ll really see how simply lock-and-key it all is.

Enemies are really like obstacles that just get in the way of your switch-hitting, and you have a few different ways of taking them out. Shrek has powerful punch attacks, as well as a body slam move that can stun enemies as well break weaker sections of floor. Artie can throw his shield or use it to block, and Puss in Boots has a cute little sword as well as a slide move type attack that also doubles as a way to reach areas inaccessible by the other two characters. All attack moves are made by either tapping the enemies with the stylus or in Artie’s case swiping it to throw his shield. It’s never fast paced and you’re thankfully never outnumbered. In fact, you only ever really encounter enemies one or two at a time and again, they only really act as a deterrent so you don’t just fly through the levels. Sometimes both screens are utilized at once as in during a boss battle. I’m thinking specifically of the fight with a certain wooden boy who wanted to become real and who is now blown up to giant size. Puss in Boots hops across the rafters of the building the fight takes place in, waiting for the boss to walk under a sand bag so that the rope can be cut and the bag fallen on the bosses head, then Shrek or Artie can come in on the bottom screen to do damage.

All the action takes place primarily on the bottom screen with the top screen used to show you more of the environment above. It works well for what it is, as you’ll often see a switch above and then have to find a way up to it. During the storybook narrative sequences you hold the DS on its side, like an open book, but the rest of the game takes place with the screens held vertically. When paused the top screen is a simple hand drawn map of the general area you’re in and the level select wheel on the bottom screen has information on how many coins or fairies you’ve found in a given level. The artwork is simple and cute, done in the same storybook fashion as you see in the films. There is repeating music that is almost catchy and the characters say little quips and such when you perform certain actions, but ultimately I found myself just turning the volume all the way down.

Visually the game is on par with Spider-Man 3. It’s good, decent 3D where the characters all look how they’re supposed to and not like blocky polygons. The backgrounds are modeled and show depth when the camera moves to follow the action. There is a good amount of detail in things and the animations are all smooth.

While the game is actually pretty fun at first it soon becomes derivative and tiresome. The levels become larger, more convoluted, and take longer to complete but you’re really still just doing the same things you did at the beginning to progress. Namely, hitting switches and getting all the characters to the end. Frustration sets in near the end of the game when you’re making your way through a maze-like level, not finding any coins or fairies, and fending off a constant stream of bad guys just to get to the end of the stage only to find out you need to replay it to collect those two fairies you missed or you can’t access the final boss to beat the game. Not that’s really that frustrating, in hindsight, since the entire game can be beaten during an idle afternoon. Add an hour or so onto that if you go back to collect everything you missed the first time around.

There is wireless co-op, where two friends can join you and each of you can control a single character. Everyone needs their own copy of the game, of course. You can also send a demo to someone else’s system if they want to check it out, and that’s about where the multiplayer options end.

Overall: 6.5/10