Alice in Wonderland – DS Review

Reviewed by Dexter Pearson on March 19, 2010

Alice in Wonderland - DS Review  | read this item

If everybody had an open mind, perhaps the world would be a little less full of hate and a little more like Wonderland. Unfortunately, political leaders, taxes, terrorist threats and the fact that you can’t turn on the TV without hearing some kind of bad news makes us all serial pessimists. Nothing will ever go right, I’ll never find a good job, I won’t be able to afford to go on holiday, I can’t get out of that rut – and as a consequence of this way of thinking, naturally, any pessimistic person would think that Alice in Wonderland for the Nintendo DS would be mediocre and aimed at children. But don’t be such a naysayer, because you’d be very wrong to assume anything other than the fact this could be the best DS game released in 2010 so far.

In a unique twist, players do not assume the control of Alice in this game, but instead control one of the four other characters who have to escort Alice through mazes of puzzles, battles and unique thought-provoking challenges ensuring that Alice comes to no harm. Controlling your character is nearly always done via the touch screen, walking by dragging the stylus in the desired direction, jumping by double tapping on the ledge you’d like to jump to, and helping Alice make the jumps by turning back around and tapping her to bring her across. Powers and attacks are all executed with a variety of gestures, for an example, an upwards attack would have you swiping upwards, while a defence move would have you charge up a defensive attack by holding the stylus on your character for a couple seconds before unleashing it with a diagonal swipe.

So who are the four characters you can control, I hear you ask? Well, of course, there’s McTwisp the white rabbit, MadHatter, Cheshire Cat and Absolem the wise old caterpillar. As you might expect, each character has some special ability to help you and Alice along the way, and I don’t mind saying that these four characters have some pretty cool abilities for a DS game. My favourite would have to be McTwisp as he can control time by pausing, rewind and fast-forwarding time to help in destroying enemies and solving the odd puzzle. MadHatter can flip the world upside down to uncover hidden objects, while Cheshire Cat can vanish objects the tap of a stylus, which is interestingly used later on in the game. Last but not least, Absolem can use his slug powers to crawl on the ceiling, which may sound a little dull in comparison to the others, but it comes in handy for getting past obstructions in addition to giving you a unique perspective on the level.

The top screen on the DS acts as a HUD and Map display, which shows you where you need to go and all of the possible routes you can take to get there. One of my favourite aspects of the game is that it’s not exactly linear, so you can use different routes to get where you want to be, which in turn will have you solving different puzzles and battling other enemies that you otherwise may have missed if you took another route. As you progress and gain access to dungeons, you’ll see that the map turns into a jigsaw – and in another unique twist, you can rearrange the pieces of the jigsaw to create even more possible routes, or even shortcuts to get around difficult areas of the map.

It’s the little things like the jigsaw aspect that really make Alice in Wonderland an instant DS classic. It’s true that the DS hasn’t really had any winning titles in the way of actual entertaining games just lately, sure, we’ve seen brain teasing games score highly, and crossword games prove popular with the pipe and slippers generation, but somewhere along the line, Nintendo’s beloved handheld sold its soul and threw caution to the wind, taking a risk to appeal to a wider audience. Of course, the risk paid off, but at what cost? No fun games for open minded people, that’s what cost. Eccentric and unique in every way, Alice in Wonderland wows with its real intuitive touch screen controls and a variety of characters and powers to keep things fresh, coupled with the super-idiosyncratic graphics that boast a style that I have never seen before in a game, dark but drawn in such a way that will appeal to everybody, it’s one of those games that has to be seen to be believed.

While there’s no real reason to go back and play it over once it’s done, Alice in Wonderland does last quite a while, it’s just a shame there’s no multiplayer modes for prolonged pleasure. Having said that, this game is still a corker, and those willing to have an open mind will be very much rewarded by the quirks and perks of Wonderland. A definite must play!

Tags: alice in wonderland, Disney, Disney Interactive Studios, DS, DS Review, Etranges Libellules, Nintendo, Platform Adventure, tim burton