The concept is simple, yet profound; you are an odd-looking boy with a rooster hat named Maxwell, and there are a series of minor tasks for you to complete. The reward for solving these tasks is a starite. However, instead of taking the usual video game route where you have very few items to work with and must rely on your skill, in this game, you can summon into existence ANY OBJECT YOU CAN THINK OF to help you on your way. (There are restrictions to the “anything you can think of” rule, like not including vulgar terms, shapes, Latin names, or copyrighted things, but those restrictions do make a lot of sense, and don’t ruin the overall game.)

For example; on the far side of a lake, there is a flower that you have to pick, but between you and the flower is an angry bee that won’t let you go past it. How do you get rid of it? That is entirely up to you. Flyswatter? Sure, it works. Bug spray? That works too. Boomerang? Yep. Sword? Absolutely. Venus’ flytrap? Um… actually, I’m not sure about that one, let me check…

*a few seconds later*

OK, Venus flytrap doesn’t actually try to eat the bee. However, dropping the plant on the bee’s head seems to kill it. This illustrates one of the downsides about Scribblenauts. Just because you can summon nearly anything doesn’t mean that it will always act the way you may expect. An ostrich will not bury its head in sand. Playing the flute will not make rats follow you. A ceiling fan will not automatically attach to most ceilings.

In making this game, 5th Cell – the creators of the game – were doomed to at least some level of failure, because everyone who picks up the game will eventually find something that the game will not do. It has no hope of living up to anyone’s wildest expectation. However, it does do at least half of the things that I could dream up for it, and that’s amazing in itself. Monkeys will eat bananas and swing on vines. Elephants will run from mice (and so will mammoths). Electrocuting a corpse will turn it into a zombie, who will in turn try to turn any living human around it into a zombie.

It is a game that amazes me, but I couldn’t have a proper review of the game without mentioning its biggest flaws. There are two big ones that have dominated game reviews for Scribblenauts since the game launched, and I have to mention them here as well: player control and camera control.

All player movement is done with the DS stylus, rather than most games where control is done with the pushing of buttons. The problem with this is that the manipulating of objects in the game is also done with the stylus, meaning that you frequently move Maxwell around when you mean to pick up an object (or vice versa). When I first started playing this game, this annoyed me, but I’ve quickly found the solution for this… move Maxwell as little as possible. If there’s an enemy between me and the starite I need to get, I don’t give Maxwell a machete and try to fight the enemy myself. Nope, I send a T-Rex after him, or bury him in quicksand. The less that Maxwell does, the better.

The camera control problem is a harder one to deal with. You see, you use the buttons on the DS to scroll the camera around to the part of the level that you want to put an object in. The unfortunate problem is that the camera will automatically recenter you on Maxwell after a few seconds, and while that’s sometimes good in large levels when you have forgotten where Maxwell is, it usually is a pain in the butt. It makes levels longer and more tedious than they need to be.

There is a wide variety of things to do in Scribblenauts. The game contains 220 levels, although the game shines most for me in levels where you have a very simple task to do and can choose from a hundred different ways to do it. I should also mention that this isn’t the type of game that you’re likely to play for five hours at a time. I find it best to pick it up for twenty minutes, do a level or two, and shut it off again, because then the whimsy of being able to make any object I please to solve a problem stays fresh in my mind, and I enjoy the experience even more.

Scribblenauts is definitely worth buying, despite its flaws, and if the creators of Scribblenauts were to create a sequel that had better controls and more types of item interactions, I’d be first in line to buy that too. 5th Cell, my inner 8-year-old thanks you.

Unexpectedly Useful Items:

• RAMP: In Scribblenauts, there are these annoying buttons that are on the side of a wall. The level can only be passed if the button is continually held down. Ramp solves that problem… just roll a ball down the ramp, it will press the button and stay there.
• AIR VENT: Blow things in any direction you want. Useful for avoiding certain enemies or blowing a starite towards you. Similar objects: LARGE AIR VENT, FAN
• BLACK HOLE: At first I expected that a black hole would destroy absolutely everything, making it useless, but instead, a black hole only works in a localized area, which can be very good for clearing out enemies. As an extra bonus, if you create a LHC – which stands for “large Hadron Collider”, the world’s largest particle accelerator – and interact with it, it creates a black hole. Synonyms: NOTHING, ANYTHING
• HAIR DRYER: This is really quite useful, but not for the obvious reason of being able to blow air (it’s actually not particularly good at that at all). No, hair dryer’s are great because they kill sea creatures. You know how you’re not supposed to drop a hair dryer in the bathtub because it will electrocute you? It works in Scribblenauts… you can get rid of sharks, pirahna, and barracudas quite easily this way. TOASTER also works for this, and as a bonus, if you use a toaster, you can kill sharks and get a loaf of bread at the same time! Other similar objects: BLENDER, WAFFLEMAKER
• WINGS: I went into this game fully expecting that I would make a lot of use out of the JETPACK. It is indeed useful, but I hadn’t considered that there are situations (such as falling into water) when a jetpack will break down. Giving your character wings to fly takes away that problem. Of course, if you don’t need to fly into a small space, it’s a lot cooler to ride a PTERODACTYL, SPACE SHUTTLE, or PEGASUS.
• ICEBERG: If you need a flat surface to reliably float on in an open expanse of water, I’ve found none better than putting in an iceberg.
• CHERRY PICKER: Got a place that’s too high to jump to, but you don’t feel like flying? This may be just the thing for you. It’s a little difficult to use sometimes, though, so you may want to try other things that will lift you, like ESCALATOR or ELEVATOR.
• FISHING ROD: Are you close to the starite, but can’t quite reach? Do you need to get a small object from far away? Fishing rod may just be your best friend. It’s quite useful for much more than just fish.
• CARROT: If an enemy is standing on the edge of a precipice, the easiest way to get him out of your way isn’t to shoot him… it’s luring him with food. I chose “carrot” to represent this, but really, most foods will work just fine.

Unexpectedly Disappointing Items:

• GENIE: He doesn’t give you three wishes. He doesn’t spawn random items to help you. He certainly doesn’t sound like Robin Williams. Nope, he just stands there, and if he dies, IVORY appears. Seriously? Ivory? Not that I’m a genie expert, but that’s kind of random.
• DUCT TAPE: In the real world, many problems can be fixed with duct tape. In Scribblenauts, not so much. It’s just a small strip of tape that works the same as GLUE, and while it’s still kind of useful, you’re not going to be fixing a broken space shuttle with it or anything.
• TORNADO: Not particularly destructive, just annoying. It only pushes things without destroying them (and yes, I’ve even tried putting it on a TRAILER PARK).
• STARITE: It makes perfect sense, but in case you thought you’d cheat on this one, making a starite only creates a toy, without finishing the level.
• BRIDGE: I was pretty disappointed the first time I tried the word “bridge”. Not only is it small, but it’s pretty unstable and almost unusable for crossing large gaps. (Fortunately, I found BRIDGE LADDER fairly early into the game, which was much better).
• LIQUID NITROGEN: Oh, I had such high hopes for this item. I was hoping for a big tank of it with which to freeze things. No such luck. It’s the exact same item as a fire extinguisher.
• ELECTRIC EEL: The electric eel is not a particularly bad item to use. The problem is the fact that it naturally moves so much it’s a real pain to try and pick up and place anywhere in the game. It takes at least 5 times before I can get it with the DS stylus.
• FOLDING CHAIR: Completely useless. If anything touches it, it tips over.

Unexpectedly Funny items:

• DOOHICKEY: It spawns a Swiss Army Knife, which is brilliant, because if anything embodies the spirit of “doohickey”, it’s a Swiss Army Knife.
• CAVE: There are many items that have other items inside them. AMBULANCE has a PATIENT inside, MOLEHILL has a MOLE inside, and CAVE, I was surprised to discover, has a BEAR inside, which promptly attacked and killed me after I found him. Oops!
• LAWYER + AMBULANCE: The lawyer will chase a moving ambulance. I kid you not.
• TRAMPOLINE: The trampoline, by itself, is not that funny. However, choosing pretty much any small animal and putting that on the trampoline? Priceless.
• MONORAIL CAT: If you’re at all familiar with the humor of “lolcats”, you’ll be happy to know that Monorail Cat is there, as well as CEILING CAT, LONGCAT, and PIANO CAT.
• LOL WUT: Found this by accident. Typing it in creates… well, we’ll just let you find out for yourself!

I’m devouring Scribblenauts at the moment, and while I intend to do a video game review of it later, my short review is that I definitely like it.