Monkey Business With Serious Space Chimps

By Jay Williams

Alright - let's get the puns right out of the way now, that way we won't all be tempted to waste time on it later...

So...

Stop monkeying around. Quit with all that monkey business. Monkey see monkey do..

Introducing Space Chimps the new action adventure game adapted from the movie of the same name which hits Aussie cinemas September 18th, 2008 (and took in about $40 Million worldwide).

The game starts out with you as Ham The 3rd. His life wasn't always this complicated, especially when you consider the fact that only a few days ago he was a circus chimp getting shot out of a cannon.

But it's Hams heritage (it seems he is the grandson of a legendary chimp astronaut) that soon sees him being called to duty by NASA.

Yep - just like Armageddon, except without Ben Affleck... and animals that can actually act on screen!

Setting the scene, Ham and his fellow Space Chimp Luna have been given the mission of exploring a wormhole that has sucked in one of NASA's space probes.

The challenge along the way is helping and freeing imprisoned aliens from the planet Malgor.

From the get-go, you've got yourself a pretty strong story, but the big question is - how does the game play?

Ham and Luna have quite different playing styles - Ham being the fearless ex-circus chimp, he runs, jumps, punches and spin kicks pretty much any enemy in his way.

Luna, on the other hand, is more of a bookworm (you just know those bookish Monkey's are the hottest too). Her intellect helps her along the way (as does her trusty friend named Squirt).

The brilliance of Squirt is that it is a little lizard type alien that straps around Luna's wrist, it gives her the ability to shoot foes from a distance in first person or whip them up in a button mashing frenzy. It actually gives her an advantage throughout the game which Ham just doesn't seem able to provide.

Throughout the game you can take turns playing either Ham or Luna. Now while this aspect of the game might seem good, it's actually quite deceptive. There seems to be a lack of choice, with the game automatically starting you off with Ham, before randomly rotating between the two heroes throughout the rest of the game.

But back to the game itself...

The first level dumps you out onto a Red Desert-Canyon like Planet (perhaps Mars) where you are attacked by some seriously crazy frog aliens (and not the type of Crazy Frogs that release ring tones either... these are much worse) and spear wielding monsters.

It seems from here on in that pretty much every alien you're going to encounter wants to kill you (ranging from small woosie critters up to Thor hammer swinging Aliens).

There are two ways in which to fight enemies, the first being the classic "crazy-thumb-smashing" of buttons - the other being a rather handy stun move.

It's actually pretty cool, with Ham jumping into the air then crashing down onto the ground causing a yellow force wave that knocks foes off their feet. Kind of like a Monkey A-Bomb.

Luna isn't as abrupt, using her little friend Squirt to shoot and daze enemies (it's good to see the return of the classic cartoon "stars-around-the-head" animation as well).

Now while all of this may sound like fun, before you know it, Space Chimps heads into the same repetitive cycle with the combat system having no real depth to secure interest for anyone over the age of twelve.

That said, the majority of the game time is a lot of fun having to maneuver through various obstacles, jumping from ledges and swinging from one place to next. The free use of camera angles turns out to be quite useful, allowing users to see a full 360 degrees, which makes it mighty handy when jumping around corners or making a difficult leap to a vine.

Space Chimps also offers up a good deal of game time having to solve a bunch of puzzles, which can often be a lot of fun. From having to activate monkey statues that deliver you either a Glowing monkey head or a Giant Boulder monkey head (so many monkey heads to choose from - it's like Christmas... for monkeys), to placing objects in their designated areas to allow gates and doors to open.

There are also a bunch of collectibles throughout including Globhoppers and Dole Bananas (which seem to be based along the same lines as Mario's Gold Coins and Donkey Kong's Bananas), but instead of extra lives players are able to unlock bonus game content. Globhoppers (friendly little aliens that are scattered across Malgor) unlock a bunch of movie clips and concept art, while Dole Bananas are single items featuring only once in per level - collecting them unlocks new costumes for either Ham or Luna.

The game really excels with it's fantastic use of colours and rendering, I'm not to sure if it reads just as well on other platforms (as it does on the Xbox 360 and PC versions) but it has to be said that on the right systems, the designs make for a truly vibrant and dynamic playing environment.

Once again, it's the sort of stuff you see in a lot of youth-orientated games, so there isn't a great deal of depth -  but having said that (and keeping in mind the targeted demographic of which this game was intended) Space Chimps is sure to be a whole lot of fun for the youngsters.

Game: Space Chimps
System: Xbox 360
Players: 1-2
Online: Yes
Developer: Red Tribe
Distributor: Brash Entertainment

Rating: 75%

(Ratings Key/Explanation)