By The Jackal

Alex is a rare breed of lion who prefers to walk on his hind legs, like a bipedal human

Marty the zebra trying to escape the N.Y. zoo

Ever wondered what animals want (apart from food and territory)? What language they speak, or where they want to go?

Well, the answer to these questions is that they speak our language, they want to go to and hang out in the wild and most of all they want to have fun, whatever that may entail.

For those that haven't seen the movie, Madagascar is about four animals in the New York Zoo who escape and manage to find themselves in the wild. Their names are Alex, Marty, Gloria and Melman.

Alex (the lion) is the big New York Zoo attraction and brings in thousands of customers, young and old, too see him. His big roar yet friendly lion instincts make him a really nice guy.

Marty the Zebra isn't really a main attraction but is really cool and has a cool accent too - the only problem is that he doesn't know if he's black with white stripes or white with black stripes.

He's been acting a little strange since his 10th birthday and is wondering what he's been doing in a Zoo for half his life. He has come up with this crazy plan to go to the wild with all his friends.

Gloria the Hippo is a fun loving character who's really nice, really fat and really caring. She likes all of her friends and respects them alot. Melman the Giraffe is your typical comic relief character, completely paranoid about germs, dirty food and viruses, and has to have a cleaning crew come to his sanctuary at least every half an hour! He's really tall too.

In the fictional world of this PS2 game, the penguins are said to be psychotic creatures who have had military training -- and it's true! The penguins want to go to Antarctica and you want to go to the wild. Who knows, you might cross paths on the way...

The actual game begins as you're in the Zoo and you have to go around collecting cards, talking to people, doing quests and gathering coins. It's actually much fun collecting everything and doing quests, running races etc., because the developers have managed to inject the comedic characters with plenty of life.

Like any good platforming romp that involves the random collection of useless stuff, at the end of each level you can do it again just in case you miss a few cards or coins. The game also requires players to acclimatise themselves with the four animal characters, each of whom have special moves and abilities. Though Melman is tall and ungainly, he has a helicopter move that allows him access to areas others cannot.

Once you've played the first parts of the game, it's time to plan your big escape. Long story short, and the decision is made to travel by train, which means going into New York City. The big city is bristling with life; there's heaps of people, cars, police and even dogs. This task involves controlling each character across, in, over and through the city of New York, hopefully without copping too many bruises.

At the end of each level you pass you can choose to go to the 'Zoovenier' shop where you can purchase totally wacky hats, awesome bonuses, or cool mini games that add a bit of variety to the game. During the game (if you're lucky) you might even find yourself a secret door which leads to even more cool mini games, like tank games, aeroplane games and much, much more.

The graphics of the game are not state of the art, but are good enough and full of vibrancy and colour to make playing this game quite a treat for the eyes. Younger gamers will really enjoy the cartoon style, but most people should be able to take something away from Madagascar.

This game is aimed at a younger audience than, say, Mortal Kombat, but there's enough good-old-fashioned exploration gameplay in here to entice other players, and the variety of gameplay via minigames and various quests makes it more engaging that you'd first think.

If you've got a good sense of imagination and love adventure (not to mention the Madagascar movie) you should find something to keep you playing here. And even though this game is perhaps aimed at the younger gamers out there, and even if you haven't seen the movie, it's still a pretty good game to play. If you loved the humour in Shrek, you'll love this too.

Game: Madagascar
System: PS2
Players: 1-2
Online: No
Developer: Toys for Bob
Distributor: Activision

Rating: 70%

(Ratings Key/Explanation)

Madagascar is on the shelves now.