Friday, November 06, 2009
Wallace and Gromit's Grand Adventures - Episode 2: The Last Resort
Video game review by Sombrero Grande
It's been a long wait for Xbox 360 players anxious for the second episode of Wallace and Gromit's Grand Adventures to arrive on Xbox Live Arcade, but Episode 2 is finally here. Perhaps to "apologize" for the substantial delay, Telltale Games has seen fit to release not just Episode 2 but 3 and 4 as well, completing the season all at once, so gamers will be able to immediately move on to the following episode after completing the one before.
In The Last Resort, Wallace and Gromit's Blackpool vacation plans are rained out when a freak storm hits West Wallaby Street. Not only that, but the unexpected downpour floods their basement to boot! Always the enterprising inventor, Wallace gets the idea to turn "lemons into lemonade" and transform their flooded basement into their own faux seaside resort and charge the locals to vacation there. But not all is sunny in the artificially sunny basement, when a bully threatens the other guests' enjoyment and someone decides to take care of him themselves.
My nit-picks and praises of the series still stand from my review of Episode 1: Fright of the Bumblebees, so if I were you I'd check out my review of that episode as well as this one. I'll add that the issues with awkward control are just as valid as they were in Bumblebees, and in Act 4 of The Last Resort become downright frustrating due to the nature of the puzzle presented, complete with a constantly rotating environment and the vitally important reliance on timing.
Aside from the way the Xbox 360 controls do nothing but cause aggravation in Act 4, I can say that I enjoyed The Last Resort more than Fright of the Bumblebees due to the generally more confined environments and more interesting storyline. There are only passing mentions of events that occurred in Bumblebees, so you don't have to have played through Episode 1 to fully enjoy Episode 2.
The Last Resort costs 800 Microsoft points ($10) on Xbox Live Arcade or $8.95 for PC on Telltale's web site.
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