Drawn to Strife would have been a more appropriate title.
Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter (DS)
[starreview]
Developer: 5th Cell
Release Date: October 27th, 2009
ESRB: E for Everyone (inexplicably)
It’s infrequent that you find a children’s game that deals with issues like self-sacrifice, loss, slavery, and not-so-subtle religious overtones. But for better or for worse, Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter explores these themes and more, all under the guise of a cutesy platformer featuring tiny, furry critters named Raposas.
But first, the facts. Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter, as you may have guessed, is a sequel to the entertaining yet flawed Drawn to Life, released for the DS in 2007. At that time, the DS still seemed wildly innovative, and the game’s promise to let you create your own protagonist from scratch was a major draw (no pun intended). Fast forward a few years, and the gimmick, while still fun from time to time, has lost most of its “wow” factor.The sequel certainly ups the amount of in-game items you can illustrate, but you’ll lose most of your enthusiasm after being asked to create yet another platform. And unfortunately, just like the first game, when you strip away the ability to draw your own hero, weapons, and objects, you’re left with a merely average platformer. A platformer that spends more time talking to you than it does letting you play the game.
And that’s where the story comes in. Between almost every level of gameplay you’ll be whisked back into the isometric hub world, where you’ll be forced to sit through anywhere between five and ten minutes of NPC dialogue. Even if the story was good, this would be frustrating. But unfortunately, it isn’t anywhere near as compelling as the first sentence of this review may have led you to believe. The story begins with the disappearance of one of the Raposa, and soon after, color begins to drain from the world. The Raposa are seemingly helpless on their own, so they they turn to you, “The Creator,” to solve all their problems. How topics like self-sacrifice and slavery factor into this initially innocent tale I’ll let you discover. But needless to say, it veers into some arguably adult subject matter that seems out of place and entirely inappropriate for a kid’s game. Sure, recent Pixar movies like Up dealt with themes of loss and despair, but they did so with a level of maturity and finesse that just isn’t found here. The ending is especially bleak, and may leave your kids with some depressing questions.
That being said, it’s not an entirely unenjoyable game. But unfortunately, most of my compliments can be met with an equally valid counter-point. The hero transformations are a good addition to the gameplay, though I wish there had been more than two. Most of the bosses are creative, but the final boss is underwhelming and anticlimactic. There are a few optional levels and collectables to find that lengthen the otherwise short adventure, but there is no real reward or in-game incentive to complete them; especially since money is so plentiful you will have bought out the entire Raposa shop in no time.
In the end, I can only really recommend The Next Chapter if you thoroughly enjoyed the original Drawn to Life and would like to discover the fate of the characters introduced in that game. There are better platformers for the DS than this, and if you’re only buying it for the creation aspect, the original game didn’t make you sit through quite as much babbling.
