Goosebumps: Escape from Horrorland

"Ooh, scary, not really..."

When I was 10, my most favorite books were Goose bumps. They weren't scary, but hey they were exciting back then. They were so popular that the creator, R.L Stine, released more merchandise than the Spice Girls did in 1998. Exercise books, erasers, pencils, board games, tons of things.
5 years after the author started the long running Goose bumps series, Dreamworks and Microsoft released a Goose bumps video game. Let's see how it turns out.

GAME PLAY: Well it is the digital sequel to one of the Goose bumps book's called One Day At Horrorland. It is set in a horror theme park where bad things start to happen. Scary. It is a point and click adventure, and you walk around clicking on stuff and collecting clues and playing mini games, that sort of stuff. There is even a Doom-style first person scrolling game. This is quite good, but there is something missing in all this. Maybe because you don't have a ton of freedom to explore. 7/10.

STORY: The story is all right, if a little stupid. Lizzy (the book's main character) finds you and wants you to come with her. Her brother Luke and his friend Clay (played by The Santa Clause's Eric Lloyd) have disappeared. Then, you and Lizzy get sucked in to this house and are transported to Horrorland, and Luke are Clay and locked in stocks. You have to find a way to release them. There is more in the story, but I'll let you find that out in the story. 7/10.

AUDIO: Good music, authentic sound effects. The characters actually talk rather than have a thousand text boxes come across the screen. There is also this big fortune teller thingy and the voice it makes is very deep and very cool. 8/10.

GRAPHICS: Very impressive graphics. The graphics are the exact quality of movies and some of the monsters look very, very good. There are even two movie stars in this game, Jeff Goldblum (who was in the two Jurassic Park movies) as Count Dracula, and Isabella Rosselini (in the 1989 movie Cousins), who plays this crazed lunatic woman.
One thing is for sure, this game is NOT for children under the age of 8! The monsters can be VERY VERY SCARY for young children. The monster in the maze levels scared the heck out of me! Not for the faint hearted (children that is) 10/10.

RE PLAYABILITY: Lots to do, but sadly a little short. This can be completed in about 12 hours and that is definitely not a long time, it is short, considering that Final Fantasy VII lasted for over 100 hours! 5/10.

PROS
*AWESOME graphics
*Fun game play
*Nice sound
*Lot's to do.

CONS
*Too short
*Not enough freedom
*May be frightening for little kids

OVERALL: 7/10. A good game, but it could have been a lot better. Goose bumps fans will want to try it though.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 08/08/01, Updated 09/29/01