Super Scribblenauts (Hands On) (Nintendo DS) Preview

The first level I played saw Maxwell trying to get to the front of a queue for an Exciting New Videogame™. Simply cutting won’t cut it (no pun intended) so it falls to the player to summon objects that can distract everyone else in the queue. An artist will happily wander off when presented with his brush, while a rockstar prefers his guitar, a barbarian his axe, and a witch her broom. Not a particularly good introduction to any of the game’s shiny new features, then, but a nice reintroduction to the world of Scribblenauts nonetheless.

The next level available level, a Super Mario Bros.-inspired platform affair complete with piranha plants and wandering turtles, served as a much better demonstration of Super Scribblenauts’s new movement controls. Players can now use the main menu to swap between using either the stylus or the D-pad to move. The D-pad is a lot less fiddly and frustrating than the stylus when it comes jumping between platforms and smashing blocks that house Starites (the collection of which is still the primary reward for solving puzzles and completing levels).

Typing in an adjective and following it with the word “potion” spawns, in theory, a potion that can imbue existing objects with those qualities. The idea is put to a test when Maxwell is challenged to transform a man in a laboratory into a dragon using only potions. A caged dragon is supplied as a reference point for creating the likes of “green potion “and “scaly potion” which gradually transform the unfortunate soul into a terrifying monster. While I was able to spawn most of the potions I wanted, the adjective system appears to be a lot more restrictive than standard object spawning.

To conclude, Warner Bros. Interactive have confirmed that 5TH Cell will be bringing along a whole host of new levels, with 120 freshly created stages for gamers to experience, including a wide variety of tasks to complete. Examples of what will be on offer in the final product are objectives like uncovering how to be totally rid of a terrible plague, filling up an empty office, or even identifying animals with shells. On top of this, there is a multi-layered hint system thrown in, so that players who are struggling to work their way through the adventure will be able to spend in-game currency (the 'Ollar') on the purchase of more explicit hints to guide them.

That is by no means all, however, with a 'Universal Feedback System' being incorporated, which lets the gamer clearly visualise their progress throughout each level to keep track of what has happened so far. Any relevant objects summoned up until that point will receive an on-screen 'thumbs-up', whilst those that prove to be irrelevant objects receive the opposite, a 'thumbs-down.' With a massively updated dictionary, though, it should not be too tricky to find alternative solutions to incorrect inputs. 5TH Cell was able to cram so much into the original Scribblenauts that people were sceptical right until the day of release, yet now you can summon more than 800 all-new, customisable objects to solve puzzles and earn Starites.

In terms of the all-new adjective system touched upon earlier, Warner has gone on record to state players will be able to make fanciful word combinations to create things like shy green polar bears or an angry zombie pears, all thanks to the 10,000+ adjectives added in that reflect real-life behaviours, personalities and characteristics when applied to objects. Finally, there is a Level Editor and Innovative UI. The former is where players can create both puzzle and action levels, with the
new unique template system allowing for all kinds of objectives to be added to level creations, whilst the latter gives owners of the game far more control over the gameplay in general, with more detail on how to navigate through new levels in the game. Super Scribblenauts is lined up for an Autumn release here in Europe and looks like it could be one of those games that helps the DS finish its lifespan off in true style.
Adam Riley, Senior Editor.