Looney Tunes: Acme Arsenal

"Looney Tunes: Acme Arsenal falls flat on its face and makes no effort to get back to its feet."

Acme Arsenal brings you into the explosive universe that is the home of the Looney Tunes. Your job is to assist them in stopping their ancestors from being erased. To do this you are required to solve various puzzles, collect items and smash your way through multiple chapters. As difficult as it may sound, this game's greatest difficulty is having the patience to finish it all.

The first levels will leave you with a familiar satisfaction that comes complete with any good form of entertainment, but as you progress through the course of the game, it becomes stale and frustrating.

The story is not something you will care about while playing this game. More often than not, any gamer will end up playing through the final chapters of this game just to smash a few more enemies and/or to gain a few more achievement points.

In your quest of gaining these achievements you will come across repetitive backgrounds, the same enemies dozens of times and the same annoying character catch phrases that never seem to end.

However, all of this combined is expected from a licensed game and can be successfully defeated by any dedicated gamer, but the major downfall that causes this game to be chucked into a bargain bin is the camera. It goes everywhere you don't need it to go. It will often cause you to die, not see oncoming enemies and/or important items. The camera is so bad at times that this game would be better off with a stationary, straight forward camera that is able to see what is front of your character and nothing more.

This game is just flat out frustrating for the wrong reasons, yet all is not lost in the world of Looney Tunes as there was plenty of good to go around. From great voiceovers to catchy music and humorous sound effects, this game manages to not be a complete failure.

The first thing that many will notice in the game is the quirky environments. This environment ranges from time machine plans to a to do list that includes “Being Evil; Calling Mother; Buying Milk and Eggs” to the ‘Evil Periodic Table.' The environment in which you suffer manages to add some much needed humor to the game. However, like everything else in this game, it soon becomes stale and for no reason at all, repetitive.

The combat system is fun and allows for you to use various combos to defeat your enemies. You can defeat them from close range using your character's weapon (of which can be upgraded by collecting items) or you can elect to use one of the many guns available for pickup throughout the course of the game.

Despite the presence of multiple characters and dozens of guns, nothing is different between them other than their appearance; they all do relatively the same things.

A second game mode is the battle mode in which you can go against up to three of your friends in a free for all tilt. In this mode you travel around a level collecting guns and other weapons to do away with your opponents. These options are limited are you are only able to play with either a time limit or with a set score. Nevertheless, the battle mode shows the most potential of providing any sort of entertainment value that lasts longer than a rental period. However, with its lack of depth, the battle mode is just as boring and repetitive as the rest of the game.

Acme Arsenal allows up to four players in the battle mode and up to a two player co-up team in the story mode. Though, you must be really itching for something to do if two people give into the monstrosity that is playing this game.

In short, Acme Arsenal is an easy game to get into that is great at the start, but is quickly turned stale through frustrating gameplay and a story mode in which there is no decent story to get pulled into. This game, like the majority of games under the Looney Tunes licenses falls flat on its face and makes no effort to get back to its feet.

Reviewer's Score: 4/10, Originally Posted: 11/05/07

Game Release: Looney Tunes: Acme Arsenal (US, 10/09/07)