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In Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian, players assume the role of Ben Stiller’s character, Larry Daley, former night guard of New York’s Museum of Natural History. Larry must rescue Jedediah and his other friends from Akhmenrah’s brother who captured them while stealing a powerful Magic Tablet that can raise the Army of Horus to take over the world. Daley is well aware of the havoc that history’s most notorious figures can wreak when the sun goes down and the museum exhibits come alive. He races to DC to help his friends in the Smithsonian.

Using Larry’s trusty key chain and flashlight, players must solve puzzles and adventure through 14 levels including the Federal Archives, the National Air and Space Museum and the Lincoln Memorial. Gamers can travel in style on the back of a T-Rex skeleton, within the Lunar Lander and in the cockpit of Amelia Earhart’s Pitcairn Autogyro. Along the way, players must find pieces of the Magic Tablet and collect other items to unlock mini-games, new areas and bonus content from the Smithsonian including trivia questions, in-game audio tours and factoids.

Genre: Adventure

Publisher: Majesco

Developer: Pipeworks Software

Online Play:

Local Play:

May 13, 2009 –
I’m not going to start this review with the typical “wah wah, licensed kids games are laaaame” BS. We know they’re bad, you certainly know they’re bad and the poor folks making these games often know they’re bad. One of the few upsides to the sorry state of affairs is that for reviewers like us, it’s not hard to actually end up bucking our expectations going in. Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian, amazingly, has done just that. It’s not an amazing experience by any stretch, but what’s here is not only inoffensive, at times it’s just… fun. Surprising? Yep.

It’s also a rather short experience, but then I’ve long argued for keeping a game slim and trim while maximizing whatever fun the developer (in this case, Pipeworks) could come up with based on the source material. At no point does the basic concept of using a powered flashlight in conjunction with special ingots in a sacred tablet get old. There’s just enough platforming mixed with some light puzzles mixed with a daisy-chained series of objectives to keep it all entertaining throughout the three or four hours that it’ll take to get through things.

He’s fixing it, man.Achievement whores, take note: without even trying to tackle them, I managed to stop just eight Achievements short of banking a full 1000. Even on the Wii, accomplishing the same tasks will net you token points, which in turn unlock dozens of bits of concept, character and level art, plus audio tours, factoids with pictures and even evolution videos that track the game’s copious pre-rendered sequences from storyboards through animatics to facial animation steps all the way up to the final rendered scene.

But I’m getting a little ahead of myself here. Ben Stiller’s Larry Daley (who is arguably the only real discernible likeness in the game beyond the main villain, but then he was the only movie star to lend his voice to things) quickly gets caught up in reprising his role as the guardian of a mystical tablet that imbues his keychain and flashlight with a bevy of abilities. When the tablet is ganked and transported to the Smithsonian, Larry ditches his New York digs, heads to the Capitol to reclaim the tablet, magical ingots ‘n all.

He’s quickly thwarted by Kahmunrah (get it, common law? Har har har), the evil brother of Egyptain dude Ahkmenrah from the first flick, and quickly recruits the reanimated likenesses of Al Capone, Ivan the Terrible and Napoleon to help open a portal to take over the world. Fun. Larry, with pint-sized pals Octavius and Jebediah Smith, hops ‘n bops his way around the museum scooping up all the ingots to place back in the tablet to (wait for it) eventually save the day.

Gotta catch ‘em all…The latter part of that hop ‘n bop descriptor probably isn’t all that accurate. At no point does Larry actually fight enemies himself, rather he uses the tablet’s many gifts to do the dirty work for him. He’ll tame beasts to solve puzzles, turn his keychain into a whip or grappling hook, call down lightning from the sky, repair things like doors and paintings, “activate” paintings so he can dive into them, uncover hidden objects, and so on. What’s nice is that all of these powers can be funneled through a single power that will auto-switch to whatever’s needed in that case, eliminating some trial and error.

• 1
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• Next
  

May 13, 2009 –
I’m not going to start this review with the typical “wah wah, licensed kids games are laaaame” BS. We know they’re bad, you certainly know they’re bad and the poor folks making these games often know they’re bad. One of the few upsides to the sorry state of affairs is that for reviewers like us, it’s not hard to actually end up bucking our expectations going in. Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian, amazingly, has done just that. It’s not an amazing experience by any stretch, but what’s here is not only inoffensive, at times it’s just… fun. Surprising? Yep.

It’s also a rather short experience, but then I’ve long argued for keeping a game slim and trim while maximizing whatever fun the developer (in this case, Pipeworks) could come up with based on the source material. At no point does the basic concept of using a powered flashlight in conjunction with special ingots in a sacred tablet get old. There’s just enough platforming mixed with some light puzzles mixed with a daisy-chained series of objectives to keep it all entertaining throughout the three or four hours that it’ll take to get through things.

He’s fixing it, man.Achievement whores, take note: without even trying to tackle them, I managed to stop just eight Achievements short of banking a full 1000. Even on the Wii, accomplishing the same tasks will net you token points, which in turn unlock dozens of bits of concept, character and level art, plus audio tours, factoids with pictures and even evolution videos that track the game’s copious pre-rendered sequences from storyboards through animatics to facial animation steps all the way up to the final rendered scene.

But I’m getting a little ahead of myself here. Ben Stiller’s Larry Daley (who is arguably the only real discernible likeness in the game beyond the main villain, but then he was the only movie star to lend his voice to things) quickly gets caught up in reprising his role as the guardian of a mystical tablet that imbues his keychain and flashlight with a bevy of abilities. When the tablet is ganked and transported to the Smithsonian, Larry ditches his New York digs, heads to the Capitol to reclaim the tablet, magical ingots ‘n all.

He’s quickly thwarted by Kahmunrah (get it, common law? Har har har), the evil brother of Egyptain dude Ahkmenrah from the first flick, and quickly recruits the reanimated likenesses of Al Capone, Ivan the Terrible and Napoleon to help open a portal to take over the world. Fun. Larry, with pint-sized pals Octavius and Jebediah Smith, hops ‘n bops his way around the museum scooping up all the ingots to place back in the tablet to (wait for it) eventually save the day.

Gotta catch ‘em all…The latter part of that hop ‘n bop descriptor probably isn’t all that accurate. At no point does Larry actually fight enemies himself, rather he uses the tablet’s many gifts to do the dirty work for him. He’ll tame beasts to solve puzzles, turn his keychain into a whip or grappling hook, call down lightning from the sky, repair things like doors and paintings, “activate” paintings so he can dive into them, uncover hidden objects, and so on. What’s nice is that all of these powers can be funneled through a single power that will auto-switch to whatever’s needed in that case, eliminating some trial and error.

• 1
• 2
• Next
  

May 13, 2009 –
I’m not going to start this review with the typical “wah wah, licensed kids games are laaaame” BS. We know they’re bad, you certainly know they’re bad and the poor folks making these games often know they’re bad. One of the few upsides to the sorry state of affairs is that for reviewers like us, it’s not hard to actually end up bucking our expectations going in. Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian, amazingly, has done just that. It’s not an amazing experience by any stretch, but what’s here is not only inoffensive, at times it’s just… fun. Surprising? Yep.

It’s also a rather short experience, but then I’ve long argued for keeping a game slim and trim while maximizing whatever fun the developer (in this case, Pipeworks) could come up with based on the source material. At no point does the basic concept of using a powered flashlight in conjunction with special ingots in a sacred tablet get old. There’s just enough platforming mixed with some light puzzles mixed with a daisy-chained series of objectives to keep it all entertaining throughout the three or four hours that it’ll take to get through things.

He’s fixing it, man.Achievement whores, take note: without even trying to tackle them, I managed to stop just eight Achievements short of banking a full 1000. Even on the Wii, accomplishing the same tasks will net you token points, which in turn unlock dozens of bits of concept, character and level art, plus audio tours, factoids with pictures and even evolution videos that track the game’s copious pre-rendered sequences from storyboards through animatics to facial animation steps all the way up to the final rendered scene.

But I’m getting a little ahead of myself here. Ben Stiller’s Larry Daley (who is arguably the only real discernible likeness in the game beyond the main villain, but then he was the only movie star to lend his voice to things) quickly gets caught up in reprising his role as the guardian of a mystical tablet that imbues his keychain and flashlight with a bevy of abilities. When the tablet is ganked and transported to the Smithsonian, Larry ditches his New York digs, heads to the Capitol to reclaim the tablet, magical ingots ‘n all.

He’s quickly thwarted by Kahmunrah (get it, common law? Har har har), the evil brother of Egyptain dude Ahkmenrah from the first flick, and quickly recruits the reanimated likenesses of Al Capone, Ivan the Terrible and Napoleon to help open a portal to take over the world. Fun. Larry, with pint-sized pals Octavius and Jebediah Smith, hops ‘n bops his way around the museum scooping up all the ingots to place back in the tablet to (wait for it) eventually save the day.

Gotta catch ‘em all…The latter part of that hop ‘n bop descriptor probably isn’t all that accurate. At no point does Larry actually fight enemies himself, rather he uses the tablet’s many gifts to do the dirty work for him. He’ll tame beasts to solve puzzles, turn his keychain into a whip or grappling hook, call down lightning from the sky, repair things like doors and paintings, “activate” paintings so he can dive into them, uncover hidden objects, and so on. What’s nice is that all of these powers can be funneled through a single power that will auto-switch to whatever’s needed in that case, eliminating some trial and error.

• 1
• 2
• Next
  

May 13, 2009 –
I’m not going to start this review with the typical “wah wah, licensed kids games are laaaame” BS. We know they’re bad, you certainly know they’re bad and the poor folks making these games often know they’re bad. One of the few upsides to the sorry state of affairs is that for reviewers like us, it’s not hard to actually end up bucking our expectations going in. Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian, amazingly, has done just that. It’s not an amazing experience by any stretch, but what’s here is not only inoffensive, at times it’s just… fun. Surprising? Yep.

It’s also a rather short experience, but then I’ve long argued for keeping a game slim and trim while maximizing whatever fun the developer (in this case, Pipeworks) could come up with based on the source material. At no point does the basic concept of using a powered flashlight in conjunction with special ingots in a sacred tablet get old. There’s just enough platforming mixed with some light puzzles mixed with a daisy-chained series of objectives to keep it all entertaining throughout the three or four hours that it’ll take to get through things.

He’s fixing it, man.Achievement whores, take note: without even trying to tackle them, I managed to stop just eight Achievements short of banking a full 1000. Even on the Wii, accomplishing the same tasks will net you token points, which in turn unlock dozens of bits of concept, character and level art, plus audio tours, factoids with pictures and even evolution videos that track the game’s copious pre-rendered sequences from storyboards through animatics to facial animation steps all the way up to the final rendered scene.

But I’m getting a little ahead of myself here. Ben Stiller’s Larry Daley (who is arguably the only real discernible likeness in the game beyond the main villain, but then he was the only movie star to lend his voice to things) quickly gets caught up in reprising his role as the guardian of a mystical tablet that imbues his keychain and flashlight with a bevy of abilities. When the tablet is ganked and transported to the Smithsonian, Larry ditches his New York digs, heads to the Capitol to reclaim the tablet, magical ingots ‘n all.

He’s quickly thwarted by Kahmunrah (get it, common law? Har har har), the evil brother of Egyptain dude Ahkmenrah from the first flick, and quickly recruits the reanimated likenesses of Al Capone, Ivan the Terrible and Napoleon to help open a portal to take over the world. Fun. Larry, with pint-sized pals Octavius and Jebediah Smith, hops ‘n bops his way around the museum scooping up all the ingots to place back in the tablet to (wait for it) eventually save the day.

Gotta catch ‘em all…The latter part of that hop ‘n bop descriptor probably isn’t all that accurate. At no point does Larry actually fight enemies himself, rather he uses the tablet’s many gifts to do the dirty work for him. He’ll tame beasts to solve puzzles, turn his keychain into a whip or grappling hook, call down lightning from the sky, repair things like doors and paintings, “activate” paintings so he can dive into them, uncover hidden objects, and so on. What’s nice is that all of these powers can be funneled through a single power that will auto-switch to whatever’s needed in that case, eliminating some trial and error.

• 1
• 2
• Next