(singing) I got them happy feet! I got them happy feet!

I still remember fondly the very first computer game I ever played. It was a little ZX Spectrum title called Manic Miner. I was three years old at the time and that game had me hooked for weeks. It was nearly impossible for me to finish but, boy, did I try!

When Happy Feet Two: The Videogame landed on my lap for review I had very little background on the game, the animated movie, or the previous game and movie releases. My closest link to imparting a fair review of the game was to relate this title (suitable for three year-olds and older) to my own experiences as a child of three years of age and see how it measured up.

Happy Feet Two is without argument aimed at the younger market (and in this particular case, the very younger market). It’s a musical adventure game for the whole family to play and is inspired by the eponymous animated film.

The gameplay in Happy Feet Two is simple - it’s really just a basic platforming adventure where players control one of either Mumble or Ramon (two talking penguins who are the protagonists of the movie) as they groove their way across the Antarctic landscape in search of Mumble’s son, Erik, who has run away from home as most kids his age are prone to do when they are embarassed (the poor kid was trying to dance and ended up looking like a Jack-Ass… penguin, ahem).

The purpose of the game is to collect bouncing musical notes as you traverse the landscape in search of penguins to recruit in order to enable you to exit the level (still not quite sure why you need these penguins, but that’s not for us to question). Recruiting penguins is a simple matter of standing close to them and ‘dancing’ to the beat by pressing the X button until they join you. Through the process of navigating the level you can also dance, stomp, or clap your way along and hope to score a well-timed Dance Combo to gravitate nearby musical notes towards you.

Navigating the levels incorporates swinging on stalagmites, hopping over ledges, pushing ice blocks into position, stomp-smashing obstacles, or doing the penguin slide. On the odd occasion you may also be faced with a ‘boss battle’ which usually incorporates having a dance-off, which is really nothing more than hitting the appropriate button at the right time as a bouncing-ball guides you through the process. To break the monotony of the levels’ general emphasis on the penguin shuffle, there are also some opportunities to test your high-speed racing mettle against your co-op partner in some bonus toboggan levels.

The game attempts to slant the focus of the gameplay into something a little more meaningful by incorporating rhythm as a form of bonus power - whenever a player presses buttons in time to the beat they will be able to unlock combo’s which either speed up certain tasks or release bonus music notes which can be collected and saved up to unlock more beats to play in the following levels. To this end, the unlocked songs can be chosen prior to the start of each level and used to adjust the beat. Not that I’ve ever heard of this band prior to the game but the music included in the game is composed and performed by Ozomatli, with a little help from Grammy-nominated Robert Carranza, and the music certainly is upbeat and, er, happy.

Interestingly, as you level-up each song in the game a new vocal track or instrument is added to the mix. What first starts off as a simple drum beat soon develops into a fully developed musical piece. This is meant to provide an adjustment to the tempo of the game and no doubt will be very rewarding for the younger audience as they can receive a tangible reward for their efforts.

As a discerning and critical adult gamer, I wasn’t all too flattered by Happy Feet Two’s style of gameplay. It is essentially a very simplified gaming model and at times I had to remind myself that this is geared for children of all ages and, to its credit, it is placing its focus on good aspects of our children’s education - music and rhythm - rather than violence and gore. The game offers two player co-op on the same console which also enhances this emphasis on rhythm building by requiring the players to work together in sync to achieve certain objectives.

There’s support for 3D and the 3D is actually pulled off really well. With the already impressive graphics (and not to mention the very picturesque Antarctic levels), the 3D adds a very effective sense of depth to the visuals and it’s hard not to catch your breath at some of the visual spectaculars that have been achieved.

Happy Feet Two is also not without its shortcomings, however. As a kid’s game (especially for age three) it can’t really be too complicated and even though there is emphasis on rhythm the game is incredibly forgiving for players that just tend to hammer the buttons erratically. To this end, if you choose to just mash your buttons repeatedly, you’ll eventually complete the same tasks that otherwise require rhythmic beats.

Going back to my original perspective on how this game measures up to my own experience as a three year old (granted that was almost thirty years ago), I would say that three year old kids of today - if they can master the Xbox controller - will find Happy Feet Two to be many fair hours of fun. I am concerned that some points of the game may be overly complex for them and there is a difficulty curve with the races which may prove insurmountable for some of the youngsters, however, all-in-all, Happy Feet Two is an entertaining game (at least, my wife seemed to think so!) with enough variety and picturesque montages to break the otherwise monotonous snow-filled romp through a barren landscape. I can’t help but feel this game is very limited in its target audience which means its all-encompassing ‘family’ focus is a bit of an exaggeration, but for what it aims to be, it pulls off reasonably well and is certainly one of the better movie-inspired games of 2011 for the kids.

The Good: It’s good for the kids; the music is upbeat and happy.
The Bad: It’s a bit simplistic.

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