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The number of platformers released for the many consoles that
have come and gone are nearly countless. If any one genre is
synonymous with videogames, itd probably have to be the
platformer. As is the case with a large sampling of games from
any genre, said platformers have ranged from extremely poor to
masterful. Despite being sound in many respects, 40 Winks ends
up falling squarely in the former category. It fails to rise above
mediocrity due to its utter lack of challenge, its ultra-cute tone -
which severely limits its appeal - and its over-simplified
gameplay.
Seemingly out of nowhere, GT Interactive has quickly become a
preeminent developer. Titles such as Oddworld: Abes
Oddysee, Oddworld: Abes Exoddus, and most recently,
Driver, have not only been commercial successes but critically
acclaimed as well. Taking all of that into account, it would be
reasonable for one to expect 40 Winks to be a platformer of a
high caliber. The aforementioned ultra-cute tone, which is a
significant contributing factor to the games limited appeal, was
made glaringly apparent at the character select screen. The
games two protagonists are a little boy named Ruff and a little
girl named Tumble. Make of that what you will.
Its bedtime one evening for Ruff and Tumble, and they arent
pleased. They think bedtime is boring. Their mother proceeds to
tell them about the little creatures called Winks that sleep during
the day and come out at night when everyone is asleep and
dreaming. Theres a problem though. A grumpy old man named
NiteKap, whos so tired that he cant sleep, has decided to
kidnap the Winks and turn them into Hood-Winks. These Hood-
Winks are responsible for people everywhere having nightmares.
Only 40 Winks remain in the land of dreams, and its up to Ruff
and Tumble to make sure NiteKap doesnt get his hands on
them.
That premise alone is enough to keep a large segment of the
videogame-playing populace away from this title. The game
begins in Ruff and Tumbles room, from which you can access
every stage in the game. Different doors in their home lead to the
different stages. If you elect at any time to exit out of a game
without having reached a save point, the house is where youll
be taken to, so in that sense it serves as a sort of hub throughout
the game.
As far as the games graphics go, theyre definitely one of its
high-points. Its obvious that Eurocom spent a significant amount
of time making sure the visuals were top-notch. The various
characters animate quite nicely, and all the environments - which
range from a forest on a stormy night to a Pirates Cove to the
Moon - are all vibrant, lush, and full of detail. Theyre not as
beautiful, large, and intricate as the levels found in, say, Rayman
2, but very few games can match Rayman 2s visual splendor,
so that cant be held against 40 Winks. However, each stage
just isnt big and lengthy enough, so unless you intentionally slow
yourself down you wont really have much time to enjoy what is
nice about each area. Ruff and Tumble, as well as the multitude
of enemy creatures, animate quite nicely, and theres really no
clipping, draw in, or texture problems to speak of.
The sound, however, isnt quite as appealing. In keeping with
the games ultra-cute tone, both the music and the sound effects
are of the high pitched and super-sweet variety. Think back to
your Kindergarten and early elementary school days and
remember the songs you sung in class. Thats pretty close to
what you get in 40 Winks in terms of music and sound effects.
Perhaps the games most glaring shortcoming is its gameplay.
Even though its evident that this game is targeted at a very
young audience, it would be nice to think that Americas youth
can handle games with mildly complex gameplay. Both Ruff and
Tumble have approximately three moves - a general attack, a
butt stomp attack, and a scream attack. In addition to collecting
Winks youve got to gather Zs, Cogs, Moons, Dreamkeys, and
Tokens. Zs represent the life remaining in your life bar. Each
time you get hit youll lose a few Zs. Once you lose all your Zs
and youre out of lives you "wake up" and the game is over. The
Cogs allow you to open various locked doors throughout each
stage, and the number of Cogs required to open each locked
door varies. Moons are what allow you to perform your scream
attack - your only long-range weapon. Run out of Moons and
youre limited to close-quarter combat. Dreamkeys are what
youve got to collect in order to gain access to subsequent
levels. Lastly, there are two types of Tokens - R Tokens and T
Tokens. Ruff collects the R Tokens and Tumble collects the T
Tokens. If you manage to get ten tokens you earn an extra life.
The most interesting aspect of the gameplay by far is the ability
to temporarily transform into different forms. Throughout each
stage are little jack-in-the-boxes that, when jumped into,
transform your character into a different character for about a
minute. These different characters include a ninja and a muscular
caveman, both of which have slightly different attacks than Ruff
and Tumble.
Ultimately, as was stated in the first paragraph of this very
review, 40 Winks is simply too cute and saccharin. Playing this
game as an adult is akin to pouring a pound of sugar in your
mouth. Its that juvenile and cute. The tone hurts the game
enough and limits its possible appeal to a significant extent, but
when you couple that with the extremely basic gameplay, the
small stages, the average at best sound, and the generic
characters, what youre left with is a game thats really only a
good purchase for a very young child. 40 Winks might be a
good purchase for a parent with a 6-10 year old whos just
starting to play videogames, but other than that, anyone looking
for a quality platformer that excels where 40 Winks fails should
look to the likes of Rayman 2 or Spyro 2.
Graphics: 7
Sound: 5
Gameplay: 4
Value: 5
Reviewers Tilt: 2
Difficulty: Easy
Learning Curve: 30 Minutes
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