Sitting Ducks

"...God I Hate Ducks..."

'What is Sitting Ducks?' you may ask. Basically, it was an 'animated in 3d' kids comedy series about Bill the duck and his friend Aldo the alligater mixed into some sub-standard story plots. Was it good? Hell no, it was boring. And about no-one has ever heard about it anyway. So why release a game about it? I don't really know, maybe to try and scrape up a few bucks after failing to recover from a horrid show that never had much succes airing or hype. I managed to see a few episodes, hated them, but noticed thier smooth, cartoony animation. I'm at least glad to see that the game managed to support a similar graphics engine to the show and some pleasing little jazzy tunes. The real downer of the game is that is is unbelivably frusturating. Whenever I was on a vehicle other than my own bare feet I'd smash into things left and right, not to mention the horrible abundance of traffic with stupid A.I. running strait into me. It took me hours just to get through the first episode, and I'd always end up broke since the main character would lose currency whenever he ran into something which, thanks to the clumsy controls, would happen a lot. The sad part is, this could of been a pretty good game if some objects were taken out of the streets and less traffic, with more predictable paths (an overhead map that shows buildings and takeable roads would also be appreciated) and a more direct control system.
Sitting Ducks is like GTA with kid-friendly training wheels and no combat. The game has a wide area of gameplay that Bill the duck can run through for no real reason. But it was awkward when trying to complete a mission and having to pass through so many load screens that I'd just get fed up and quit. There is also an insane difficulty inbalance in the missions. There are three awards for completing missions that depend on time completed, to abundance of items you were supposed to collect. But it is impossible to get anything but a bronze award(occasionally a silver award), seriously. I've tried missions over and over to get that all too illusive gold feather, but to no avail. I don't see a child being able to play this game without throwing multiple temper tantrums. But now on to other things...

Graphics: 8
The graphics are pretty smooth. Lip syncing isn't even attempted though, as mouths just flap randomly. The characters are cartoony and likable, and have great physical expressions. Yet the ocasional random slowdowns and framerate spasms will make you scratch your head and think 'Is my PS2 working right?''. It can take a while for the backgrounds to appear and irregular shapes will pop out of nowhere, and you have to get closer until it develops any detail. But overall, the graphics work, and that's alright for me.

Gameplay: 3
Welcome to the 'cry in your pants mode' of the game Sitting Ducks... the acual game itself. The city of Ducktown is lazily put together, and with a lack of a decent radar-map, you will find yourself constantly bumping into dead ends. Although some vehicles are fun to drive, the constant running into everything will discourage you to continue playing games. You'll find yourself broke many times due to the 'blind guy on ice skates' themed controls and the decency for Bill to lose money every time he bumps into anything. There are so many things to run into on the streets, not to mention the stoopid pedestrians and drivers on the road turning in random directions and making you have to swerve everywhere. You'll only get about 15 currency every mission(since you really can't get anything but a bronze medal) and you lose money more than you gain on some quests because of crashing or refueling. The game also expects you to time a perfect jump every time. There have been times where I've had to jump over things to complete tasks, and I have had to redo them countless amounts of times because i jumped too soon or too late. Gameplay is what really matters for a game to be considered 'passable', and this game is barely tolerable.

Sound: 7
Decent jazz tunes will wander around in your mind for a while. You will be hearing the crashing sound effect A LOT, mind you. The voices range from half-assed to pretty good, and the vehicles all sound like they should. No problems here.

Story: 5
The guys down at the creating booth for the series Sitting Ducks must not of managed to find a decent storyline, so they decided to make the plot of the T.V series the main story for the game, which was ultimatly a bad idea. The cartoon never really had any good story to follow, they were all mainly rip-offs of any other plot on T.V. The game expects you to have watched the series in order for you get get many of the jokes (which there aren't many). The story just pitches Bill and Aldo into an experiment of standard, predictable plots (forgetting a birthday, going to the dentest, crap like that).

Interest Span
About a few hours untill you realize what an idiot you were to try the game in the first place.

Rent or Buy?
Peh, niether if you ask me. Don't get this for your kids, because they will hate it, and you for handing them crap like that and saying "Go screw around with this for a while and get out of my hair." If you had some lazy bills to spare, maybe give it to some geeky friend as a joke (no, I'm just kidding, don't go near this game).

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 03/12/06