Official Website

Platform: PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii, Nintendo DS

Genre: Action

Number of Players: 1 - 2

Supported HD:  720p

Children’s movies have taken marketing to a different level. It’s not just toys, candy or clothing that get the likeness of characters slapped on them but most savvy studios are looking to push their creations into digital marketing with video game tie-ins. Rarely do you see an animated feature these days that doesn’t have some kind of video game released, I think that actually The Princess and the Frog was one of the very few this year that didn’t when it comes to major studio releases.

To see that Planet 51 has a video game adapted from the movie isn’t a surprise at all. The game is loosely based on the plot, throwing in plenty of other things to give young fans more of an opportunity to follow the exploits of the characters. Primarily players will be in control of Lem, the teenage alien hero of the movie though a few stages allow them to also play as Earth astronaut Chuck Baker and even his probe Rover. The premise behind the movie and the game stay overall identical; Captain Baker has landed on what he believes to be an uninhabited world to find that there is life on Planet 51. The aliens however aren’t what he expected and not only is their society something of a throwback to 1950’s Earth, they also have that same level of paranoia and are convinced that the alien that has landed, Chuck, is going to enslave them all by turning them into mindless zombies. Baker manages to meet and befriend Lem who agrees to help him get to his spaceship but now that it’s fallen into the hands of the military, it’s not exactly going to be easy.

Planet 51 is a mission based style of gameplay putting into a category where you could simply think of it as being Grand Theft Auto, Jr. minus all of the prostitute beatings and leaving piles of bodies in your path thanks to some alien weaponry. The game starts out simply enough by having you take control of a bicycle and learning how to control it until Lem finally manages to get his license and get his first car which opens up much more of the world to access. While you can get out of the car and explore on foot, most of the primary missions in the game often require the use of a vehicle of some kind in order to accomplish them. These can be time based, some are delivery good where you must keep damage to a minimum or perhaps not upset an alien creature, and then there are you basic race style missions.

The game provides plenty of tutorials on how to accomplish the various missions that become available. The driving portions are fairly straight-forward and like most games though there are some differences. Since the cars hover, players have the option to strafe as well as jump and use turbo. Instead of dealing with garages at set locations, the game provides vehicle dispensers that are scattered throughout each area making it extremely easy to change from a bike to a car, to a truck, or a fancy sports car if you want. The vehicles do take damage, but this is easily remedied by floating over one of the repair pods that are also conveniently found everywhere. If you’re playing as Lem, doing outrageous things on the streets will start to gain the attention of the authorities and just like with GTA and many other titles, this will continue to increase until the military is called in with some heavy firepower. When you’re Chuck however, your mere presence will instill fear in the residents and the easiest way to take care of being captured is to hide in a garbage can until the police leave; the player however doesn’t have many missions to play as Chuck and concern themselves with this.

While players can play straight through the story portion of the game if they desire, just about every mission that you undertake will unlock a series of bonus missions that can be played. These range from mundane things like paper delivery and mowing the lawn for extra money to participating in street races, parking cars, taxi missions, and even destruction derby. Each of these has ten different levels of difficulty though you can’t select what degree you want to participate in; the player must gradually work their way up and should you chose to quit and try something else, you’ll need to start over from the first level. One nice touch with all of the missions that are available is that instead of having to travel back to the location of them is that you can simply select them from the game menu and instantly be transported back to their location. Finishing these will reward the player with a variety of collectibles, new vehicles, and new stages for the multiplayer mode. Scattered throughout the game players also might uncover comic book pages to recreate one of the Humaniacs comics which can then be access via the games submenu.

Planet 51 does a fairly good job at recreating the look of the movie. While it might not be quite as sharp and vivid, it makes up for this by really expanding what was seen in the movie tremendously and not only allowing players to explore some areas that were only briefly seen but they can also go inside some locations like Lem’s house or the comic book store, among others. The cut scenes in the game tend to be done a little better than the rest of the game, but they aren’t heavily used and instead the in-game look is what is really relied upon. There aren’t many issues with the controls either and for the most part, they tend to be extremely easy to work with save for some of those quick time events with Chuck that seem to come up and want a response within a split second.

Young fans of the movie will be thrilled with the opportunity to be a part of the adventure though any that are too good for games at their young age might find that Planet 51 is a little too easy. This is true of you adults as well; Planet 51 is yet another title that is set up with young players in mind not those who are spending every moment playing Modern Warfare 2. Planet 51 might not be the most outstanding children’s game released, but it’s a step up from the exceptionally easy Up and has enough variety that it should keep most youngsters entertained for quite some time.

-mike-