Nintendo Okie

Howdy:

• It’s Alvin and the Chipmunks
• This time the Chipettes join them.
• A really decent soundtrack.

See Ya’:

• Game play is extremely repetitive.
• Motions don’t work that well.
• Mini games are boring.

Many people of my generation have a fond remembrance of watching Alvin and the Chipmunks on TV growing up. Then the thought of their revival a couple years ago ended up being less awesome than we had hoped, but introduced the trio to a new generation of children. They’re back again, this time in Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel and they’ve brought some new friends and a new game.

Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel is a rhythm game in the same vein as We Cheer or Hannah Montana World Tour. You’re moving in time to 25 different songs from the library of songs the Chipmunks have. Some of them are songs you’ll recognize and some are original to the series. The game consists of you performing these songs along with the Chipmunks on their tour around the world. There are 25 different locations in the game where you’ll perform one song at each stop.

The game play of Alvin and the Chipmunks centers on a wheel of dots in the middle of the screen. You’ll hold the Wii Remote and Nunchuk in your hands like maracas and each side of the circle has three dots for each arm; one where you’ll move the corresponding arm up, one out to the side and one where you move your arms down. There are other dots flowing in the from the edges of the screen. When they intersect a part of the circle you are supposed to move your arm in the appropriate direction. While it sounds simple enough I had to make short punching motions to get my movements registered. The controllers also needed to come back to your center position before going in another direction. This meant that quick movements between different directions are unwieldy and were harder to perform. There was no song that I ever scored a perfect on because the movements weren’t always registering. I also had a lot of trouble finding out just how the motion out to the side was supposed to be performed. I eventually found a motion that seemed to work by holding the Wii Remote horizontally to the ground and punching out to the side, but it took a lot of trial and error to find the correct motion.

Many of these games where you’re following a dance routine on the screen also are trying to get you to simulate the dance moves that you’re seeing. That’s not the case with Alvin and the Chipmunks. You’re simply moving your arms in one of three directions while the Chipmunks do their own thing on screen. Your movements have nothing to do with what their doing, which you might find okay, because the dance moves the characters perform seemed to repeat with every song. There were one or two different routines they did and it repeated over and over. I didn’t notice it until I was watching someone else play because I was concentrating on trying to follow the dots, but it would have really been nice to see some variety to what they were doing. It was also very obvious that they were not singing the songs that were playing as their mouths never once moved during a performance.

The main element to the songs is broken up randomly during play by one of three mini-games that you can perform for bonus points. I didn’t ever notice if this was triggered by anything or it just happened at predetermined points during the song. At first it is a welcome break from the extremely repetitive game play, but after a while even these mini-games get old. Each of the different chipmunks has a game that they “star” in. Alvin’s (or Brittany’s) mini-game has a speaker that bounces around the screen throwing out waves of music notes which you are asked to collect. At various times a circle with a skull will appear that you have to avoid while doing this. If you touch the skull you’re stunned temporarily and can’t move. Simon (or Jeannette) has a pong style game where music notes and skulls are flying in from the right side of the screen and you move your character up or down to collect the music notes while avoiding the skulls. Theodore (or Eleanor) wants you to avoid the bars of an equalizer to collect points. Get touched by one of the bars and you’re stunned. You rotate the Wii Remote AND Nunchuk left or right to move your character around. This is probably the worst of the mini-games because the movement of the character is a bit unwieldy. None of these breaks from the song are fun and you end up wanting them over quickly so you can get back to finishing the song.

There is some uniqueness to each of the locations that you’ll visit as the stage is generally themed around the place you are visiting. Though aside from a few different objects on the screen you’re always just on a stage with either the Chipmunks, the Chipettes, or both groups together. Both groups use the exact same dance moves for every song, their mouths don’t move and they repeat the same phrases over and over while they’re supposed to be singing. They are only so many times you can hear “Give yourself an A for AWESOME!” so many times before you want to turn the volume down only to realize your playing a music game so you have to have it up. The Chipmunks themselves feel like they were cut and paste into the different locations. The story itself is told through still cut scenes that are just there to give you some reason to go to the next location. The most fun I had, though, was during the cut scenes when I could use the mic to pretend I was a reporter holding the microphone up to each of them as they talked.

As a child hearing the Chipmunks perform some of my favorite songs was a treat that I remember really enjoying growing up. Now that I’m an adult I just find their voices grating and irritating. There’s nothing really cute about their voices in this game, though my kids really enjoyed listening to them sing. I will say that you’re final performance is the Macarena, which I was looking forward to, because secretly I really like the song, but they didn’t even do the dance, which was disappointing. Afterwards they say that maybe you should play again, but this time on expert mode. After the chore that normal was, I don’t think I’ll be going back and doing that.

The Chipmunks were a big part of my childhood. I loved the cartoon, but this recent revival has been nothing short of disappointing. The game is tedious, doesn’t respond well to my movements are there are glaring oversights, like the dancing and singing on stage, that should have been looked at. The game is fun for a couple of songs, but the game play is too repetitive to have any lasting enjoyment. There’s not a whole lot here with Alvin and the Chipmunks: the Squeakquel to recommend and that truly is a disappointing statement.

Final Score: 1/5 Terrible