Looney Tunes

"A sample of seven Looney Tunes charcters to play on one carridge. Quite good too."

Looney Tunes for the Game Boy was released in 1992, based on the classic Looney Tunes cartoons created by the Warner Bros. The Looney Tunes cartoon serie started in 1930 and co-existed with another Warner Bros. cartoon, Merrie Melodies. Basically if you've never heard of the Looney Tunes then there's something seriously wrong with you.

The game consists of seven stages, each with an individual Looney Tunes character including Daffy Duck, Tweety Pie, Porky Pig, Taz, Speedy Gunzallis, Road Runner and Bugs Bunny himself. Throughout the game, you'll encounter various of the classic Looney Tune's characters arch-enemies, for example Marvin the Martian appears as a mini-boss in the Daffy Duck level, the Tweety pie level involves avoiding Silvester the cat, Roadrunner is based solely on beating Wile E. Coyote and Bugsn Bunny has to beat Elmer. There isn't so much a story line in the game at all, but it's almost about another cartoon episode of eavch of the individual game characters in game form in the sense that you're avoding and beating their relative arch enemies.

One of the strong points of Looney Tunes is that you get a variety of charcters, which means they all have different moves, different attacks and most of all, different level scenario's.For example the first level of Daffy Duck is typical platfroming action, walk around through then level ad shooting or jumping on enemies while collecting the odd power-up, while in the next level involve avoiding an evil cat or fly Porky Pig in a spaceship.

For many of the enemies, they're designed to be annoying, such as flying right into your charcters face or knocking you out of the way. In the later levels, most particularly Speedy Gonzalis, it's fully loaded with obstacles and narrow platofrming jumping, which is even more underlined with Speedy's inability to stop efficiently, or even in the Road Runner level you first have to avoid a bunch of rolling boulders while running at high speed.

Looney Tunes is loaded with challenge, but in some cases the game can be a little difficult at times, it wasn't until after 10 years of owning the game I actrually completed it for once.One of the problems is the fact that you have only three hit points which is clearly underlined when bosses have about 7 hit points, although it takes 2 hits to take one hit off, taking great difficulty to beat several of the bosses. Then again, I'm not the most skileld at games.

The games visuals are fantastic for the Game Boy can do. All the Looney Tunes characters look as authentic as they can, considering what can be fitted on a Game Boy screen, while the enemeis have all been animated well, while the backdrops are good enough, but not too detailed. The same can be said for the music, it sets the atmosphere with a fast moving beat for a fast level, or an Egyptian styled tune for Speedy Donzalis suits wonders for the type of level it is. The sound effects are nothing snazzy, there's no voice clips for the charcters but that doesn't matter, it's of course only the Game Boy.

The Seven stages of Looney Tunes is definitely adequate for the game, taking a couple of hours to complete, or more, depending on how stuck you get on the last boss. Unfortunately there's no save system, or password, which is a alight let down but given the game doesn't take ytoo long to complete, it isn't hugely essential.

Graphics Authentic looking charcters, great animations and backdrops. 9/10
Sound Great tempo sets the atmosphere for the game 9/10
Gamplay A little too tricky at times, but fun nonetheless and feels rewarding 8/10
Length Seven levels is adequate, but not massive. 7/10

Looney Tunes is a good Gam Boy title, which is worth buying if you find it in your loal Gamestation pre-owned for a few quid. A little short maybe, and a little tricky, but still a very respectable game. 8/10

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 08/30/06