The Fantastic Adventures of Dizzy

The Good
When you fire this game up, the first thing that strikes you is the clean, almost stick figure character rendering. The backgrounds are more lush than the characters, throwing them in contrast. It is strangely refreshing. While most game makers were trying to outdo each other in graphics, this game is almost elegant in it's minimalist character and item rendering.
The game play is straight forward. Save your kidnapped sister from the evil nogoodnik through exploration, item recovery and puzzle solving. The game itself is a two dimensional side to side/up & down scrolling game. Dizzy's world is surprisingly large, and you have a lot to do. Some area's are locked until you get items to help you gain entry.
The puzzles offered are simple (picture puzzles) to fairly difficult logic puzzles. They are somewhat diabolical in that you don't know how to solve some of them until you come across an item later.
You meet other friends who give you tips and other "monsters" that range from simple fire, spiders, rynos, spitting mini volcano's, and many more.
The fun is getting clues, finding items and figuring out how and where to use them!

The Bad
At the most you can only carry 3 items, you can drop them anywhere so you can make an area your "staging" area, storing items for future use, food, etc. The problem is sometimes you don't have enough room to carry all your booty you've found or need. The problem is compounded when you travel far and through dangerous areas only to find "I shoulda taken that rope/ladder/poison etc. instead!” You now have to go all the way back and restock. That gets a bit boring, especially when you loose lives doing boring things!
Dizzy is a bit wonky to work with. His movements are basic walking and jumping. It takes a lot of practice to get a feel on his jumping. Being an egg, basketball ain't his sport! He don't jump high and when he lands, he tends to roll, just like an egg! This is annoying when he rolls off a ledge or rolls into something dangerous!
One other thing, the music while charming at first gets repetitive fast and will grate on you early. It is oddly electronic and makes you itch.

The Bottom Line
In the world of games this one is unusual. The game and characters are fun and cute. Halo it ain't of course, but if you like to solve puzzles this is a fine game to have in your collection.