GameCube

Super Monkey Ball Adventure

Insgesamt gelingt der Monkey Ball-Serie der Sprung vom Geschicklichkeits- ins Adventure-Genre aufgrund der etwas trägen Spielbarkeit nicht besonders gut. Zum Glück bietet der Multiplayer-Modus mehr und kann länger unterhalten als das dröge Soloabenteuer.

Adventure is really only going to appeal to a certain segment of the audience of the originals. Younger gamers with a love of platformers and enough patience to cope with a some sometimes uneven challenge will find a satisfying game here, but many of the older set will simply grow bored of running errands and odd jobs. For the purists, I would recommend holding out for the truly impressive Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz coming this fall. But some of their younger brothers and sisters might find what they want here.

The Super Monkey Ball franchise just proves that adding monkeys to your Marble Madness-inspired puzzle game makes for good time because - let’s face it - what gamer doesn’t like great puzzles and controlling monkeys encased in a protective bubble? Yet the main reason the franchise is so addictive is the variety of race-to-the-finish-line-style puzzles that require some thought to complete successfully. Super Monkey Ball Adventure for the GameCube is the latest addition to the franchise but, sadly enough, this isn’t the best game in the series to grace our favorite cube.

Super Monkey Ball has proven itself to be a singularly bizarre, unique game series. You could draw some flimsy comparisons to Marble Madness, but even then you're not giving Sega credit for SMB's potent cocktail of three-dimensional puzzle-solving and harrowing platform action. Combined with its distinctly Japanese style, which was like equal parts Sonic the Hedgehog and Hello Kitty, Super Monkey Ball felt like it was developed with little concern for market forces or key demographics. It's kind of depressing, then, to watch the series degenerate into a frustrating, haphazard mush with Super Monkey Ball Adventure.

Taken as a whole, this isn't a terrible game, just a very disappointing one. If you want to get the most out of it, buy it for the new puzzles and not the story mode. Also, unless you've got a burning desire to play new SMB puzzles right now, just wait for a price drop. $40 is way too much for just 30 new puzzles, especially when SMB Deluxe can be had for less than that (and even bundled with Sonic Mega Collection Plus for Xbox owners). With so many top-shelf games coming out in the next month or two, I can't really recommend this right now.

Super Monkey Ball has made a pretty good name for itself. Previous games in the series featured devious 3D courses where the player would attempt to roll a monkey in a ball from start to finish by tilting the entire level, and separate crowd-pleasing party games like Monkey Fight (who doesn't enjoy a good monkey fight?), Monkey Target and Monkey Bowling. It was a great formula, but the simple premise couldn't continue sequel after sequel without change. And so, four monkeys with cute names -- AiAi, GonGon, MeeMee and Baby (awww) -- set out to do themselves some adventuring.

The Super Monkey Ball franchise was born of classics like Marble Madness and has always been an arcade-paced affair. At the heart of previous games was a series of puzzle mazes, each designed to challenge your brain and your reflexes. The goal was simply to reach the goal by any means necessary. If you were a pro, you found ways to bounce your glass-encased monkey off objects and around turns for spectacular shortcuts. If you were a novice, you probably jerked your way through the obstacles, all the while twisting your controller as though you might be wrestling it from a monkey's grip. But either way, you could pick up and play the titles from the start and whether you were a whiz or a joke, you found yourself having a lot of fun.

SMBA is a serious misstep for the series. The other games gave players exactly what they wanted, and somehow succeeded in being more charming and fun. There is really no reason to pick this one up. Save your money and get one of the older Monkey Ball games. At least your ears will thank you for it.

En adoptant un système de progression radicalement différent des précédents volets de la série sans se donner les moyens d'aboutir à un résultat correct, Super Monkey Ball Adventure risque de perdre en route un bon nombre de fans. Avec son gameplay inadapté et ses challenges insurmontables, ce titre ne procure aucun plaisir de jeu. Pire, vous en viendrez probablement à le haïr.

The basic idea is that you take your chosen monkey-in-a-ball from island to island to bring happiness and allow a couple to wed. It doesn't matter; your real mission is to go around the islands and play the various minigames, teleport into puzzles to unlock things, and gather bananas to unlock characters and minigames. But, except for a few corners you can whirl around in, none of the areas are designed for a character that's rolling and hard to control. Mess up and you restart at a seemingly randomly placed checkpoint.