Introduction: And it comes around once more, the film tie-in game merry-go-round is simply taking too much mullah to be stopping any time soon. Meet the Robinsons is the game of Disney's most recent computer generated (CG) animated feature film. It is worth noting this is not a Pixar movie, something that is now harder to define since Disney's recent acquisition of the bright star of CG films.

More unusually, we don't get to relive the film's plot in full surround gesture control on the Wii. Rather we find ourselves playing in a tangent to the film's main story. Rather than Lewis, we control Wilbur Robinson the kid from the future with a chip on his shoulder, and the uncanny ability of getting himself into various scrapes. Whether this is a more interesting proposition than playing the geeky orphan kid around which the movie focuses, time will tell. Wilbur certainly lends himself to the action more readily.

GamePlay: The game opens with a Laura esque escape the tomb sequence that introduces the main controls, although a little more prompting would have been nice. That said, it was good to see a subtle rather than heavy handed introduction to the game. Once you have escape you are transported back to the future to the Robinsons house, where the game structure unfolds and you are introduced to your first few tasks.

Including home sweet home, there are eight different locations to work through. Each different setting has its own appearance, layout and puzzles. The puzzle element enables you to slowly unlock and explore more of each level, as well as perform tasks for the different characters you meet. Each puzzle usually required you to collect or find something. This often involves using Wilbur's various gadgets to interact with the various objects on the level. For instance you can use his dis-assembler ray to turn the objects back into their constituent parts that can then be used to create other gadgets.

As you work your way through the levels you encounter a variety of different robots. The key to defeating them is acquiring and using the right gadget. There is wide variety of gadgets to be collected, including the dis-assembler ray, the charge glove and scanner backpack. These are also used in the boss battles that function in a similar way to the robot encounters, although there are usually a combination of attacks that you need to figure out before you can defeat them.

Graphics: The game uses its movie franchise really well. Not only are the environments recreated from the film, but the characters have a real sense of fun about them. The game recreates the movie world's swagger both graphically and with the excellent voice work. Even with a lot happening on screen the game maintains a decent smooth frame rate. The worlds are mostly well lit and textured, although some to descend into a rather generic last generation look and feel. You get the feeling that the development team had their favourite sections and these received more attention. Where there was more connection to the movie world, the levels definitely benefited.

Sound & Music: The sound in the game is pretty good. It actually stands out more than the graphics, which is unusual for a computer game. The rock indie music that plays in the background provides good backing for the quirky on screen action. But where the sound really excels is in the excellent voice work. At times this gave me a similar experience to playing adventures like Day of the Tentacle. It is the self aware little comments, and sense of character that comes from the great writing and acting talent involved.

Control: The game is available for both the Gamecube and the Wii, with the Wii version requiring you to shell out a few more pounds. As we have become used to the only real difference between these versions are the Wii controls. These work pretty well, and are certainly fit for purpose. I did have some frustrations with controlling the camera, but I think that would be the same regardless of which system you were playing on.

Final Comments: Overall this is another confident movie licence. If you or your kids enjoyed the movie then you really can't go far wrong here. That said you should probably consider whether you really need the waggle controls. You can essentially get the same game for the Gamecube, and play it on your Wii, for a good ten pounds less.
There is certainly plenty to entertain here, although it's obviously not breaking any genres, or stretching the imagination.

Pro: Excellent voice work.
Con: Some levels look generic
Final Score: 7.0

Reviewed by: Douglas Andrews