Box Shot

Pinky & The Brain have come up with their DUMBEST plan to take over the world yet! They plan to steal a new movie script from Warner Studios, produce the movie, and then earn enough money to take over the world. (What a dumb idea, what if the movie is a downright bomb?) Well, anyways, the CEO sends Yakko, Wakko, and Dot (The Warner Brothers and their sister) a message to find all 24 pieces of the script, which are scattered around the studio. In this area I must agree with Dot: Brain MUST be pretty goofy to leave it lying around (wow, a game character actually THINKS for once!)! So you take control of the Warner siblings and set off to find the peices of the script.

Now to gameplay: You start the game in the introductory stage, which is pretty simple, but gets you used to the game. All three Animanics are on the screen at the same time, but you only control one (who leads...the others follow.) It's a side-scroller, but there is depth movement toward and backwards on the screen. Here you can get used to the Short Stack manuever. When you press X, the other Warners (the ones you're not controlling) hop on each other's shoulder, in which you can get on top of them and jump to reach a higher platform that you couldn't otherwise reach. However, if you lose a character, you have less of a chance of getting to that platform, and if you only have one character left, you can't freakin USE the Short Stack (DOI!!!) therefore making some platforms (and some pieces of the script) unreachable!

After getting used to this (you'll use it a lot) you'll follow Dr. Scratchnsniff as he jumps out the window (??) Then you have to run away from Ralph the Security Guard while he tries to catch you and put you back in the Water Tower. (What the Hell? The CEO himself sends the Warners on a mission and Ralph is STILL trying to catch them? Huh?) This should really be no problem, in fact its nay on impossible for Ralph to catch you, still bugs me that he IS trying to catch you...

After the Intro, you go to this map screen, where then you pick what Studio you want to start at. Also on the map are Ralph (if you run into him, you go to an "outrun Ralph" stage) a pointless little red guy who just bounces when you run into him (??) and the Water Tower, in which you can play a "Rescue" stage if a Warner was captured by Ralph or otherwise put out of commision by a bad guy. There are 4 studios: Fantasy (You know, dragons and stuff), Sci-Fi (aliens) Aquatic (water and pirates) and Adventure (large range here, mostly a forest and a castle though.) After you defeat the sosses of these places, you can go to the editing room (the one with a Big X on it) for a showdown with Pinky & The Brain.

You go to a Studio and Press A, then you go to a side-scrolling stage, where you procede to your mission: Find the peices of the script! Some are in plain sight if you know where to look, while some are hidden, sometimes in VERY good places (to this day, I still haven't found all the pieces of the script). The main task is to basically look for the script, but there are enemies. Problem is, unless you have a weapon, there's really no way to attack! Dashing works sometimes, but not often. This is Ok, because most enemies can be avoided rather than defeated (Ralph, for example). How do you defeat the bosses, then? Trust me, when you get to them, you'll find out (except for the final boss, which may take awhile).

The levels, while not always hard, can certainly give you problems, and the only thing you got going for you is the slot machine at the bottom of the screen. How does this work, you ask? Simple, whenever you get 5 coins or one gold coin (both of which are Scattered around the level) it rolls, and what it lands on determines a bonus (enless it lands on Pinky, Brain, or Ralph, which takes away Coins). Rolling Yakko, Wakko, and Dot (in that order) brings back any Animaniacs you lost, rolling 3 Nurses makes you invincible for a useless amount of time, eolling 3 CEOs gives you a Continue, as does getting 100 Coins. Whenever a Warner sibling gets hit, he/she gets put in the Water Tower. If all 3 get put in the Tower, you must use a Continue. If you run out of Continues, then you can use a Password, and you can't run out of Passwords. You shouldn't run out of Continues anyways, because thanks to the slot machine, you will get LOTS of them. Hell, I one time had 20 Continues and I only beat the Fantasy stage! The problem here is that, when you continue, you only have one Warner, but usually there are coins nearby so you can recuperate easily.

The characters, however, have really nothing unique. They all can do the exact same things, and the fact that Yakko is the biggest don't really affect anything. Where's Yakko's intelliegence? Wheres Wakko's inexplicable ability to pull just about anything out of his bag? Wheres Dot's..errr... whatever the hell Dot has going for her (beatnik poetry reading)?

The graphics are pretty, all colorful, with cool background effects (dig those scrolling clouds in the Fantasy Stage!) The characters are pretty well animated, they even do this weird dance when they stand still. The music rocks. I never really hummed any of the tunes, but I can remember all of them for a few days. I love the Adventure stage music when you get to the castle, which at first sounds like a spiced-up Indiana Jones but then goes to a more action-oriented Animaniacs theme. The game controls pretty well too, as the Animaniacs are nice and fast.

However, this is still a pretty damn fun game! Using lightning-fast reflexes to jump on fast moving platforms (the majority of activity in this game) never really gets old, and there are different endings, depending on how many pieces of the script you found when you beat the game. This gives a hint of replay value here. And fans of the show will probably like some of the show's humor (like when Yakko goes nuts over the Nurse), even though I don't care for it much. I just wish this game had more levels, that's it! I can live without attacking, and who needs unique characters anyway? But come on, only 6 Stages total (counting Pinky & Brain)? Also, this game could of been a bit more challenging, but still, I recommend this one to everyone, even those who HATE the show. Please remember this is coming from someone who dislikes the show himself, does that tell you how good it is? Get this one!