Review:

Toonstruck is a comical cartoon adventure featuring Christopher Lloyd as a cartoonist caught in the world of his own creation. Christopher Lloyd plays Drew Blanc, the creator of the sickeningly sweet Fluffy Fluffy Bun-Bun Show. Drew's boss wants more of the cute bunnies for the show, but Drew would rather turn his attentions to his first and favourite creation, Flux Wildly, a zanier type of cartoon character. During a long night of work on the new show, Drew is sucked into the television and into the world of Cutopia, where things are not all sweetness and light. It turns out that Count Nefarious, the evil ruler of the Malevolands, has created a malevolator, a machine that takes cuteness and turns it evil. Drew and Flux are enlisted by the king of Cutopia to help create a cutifier, an anti-malevolator to make things right again. Your first task as Drew is to find the 11 missing parts of the cutifier, and make things cute again. This first part of the game is a huge treasure quest, with the usual hunt-for-the-inventory theme. Exploring this world is a tremendous amount of fun. While the game begins with sickeningly sweet cuteness, the game slowly takes a twisted turn. The cute parts are so sweet they'll make your teeth hurt, but hold out, the rest of the game is worth it. The treasure hunt is only the beginning of the game, as the plot take a left turn at that point and you will find yourself in the middle of a big mess. I won't give any more away, but the story is well worth the suspense. The interface is a hunt-for-the-hot-spot type, with the cursor changing shape as you can interact with objects and toons alike. The SVGA graphics are very well done, with wonderful backgrounds and animations. Almost unnoticable, but I feel that it bears mentioning here, is that the transitions between scenes are almost instantaneous. I never had to wait for something to load, even a saved game. This is transparent to the user generally, but if you have ever played a game that takes too long to load scenes, you will find this refreshing. The game comes on two CDs, with the switch needing to take place only once, you will NOT find yourself switching CDs throughout the game. A lot of thought went into ease of use here. Much in the manner of Sam 'n Max, you can use Flux as an inventory item, to do things where you need another hand, or just to do things only a toon could do. You cannot die in the game, always a plus for me. The puzzles range from the moderate to somewhat difficult, but nothing too illogical. One point I must make here, is that logic here is based in the cartoon world. You must think like a toon if you are to succeed. If, like me, you have watched too many cartoons, you'll do just fine. The sounds are very well done, but I did have a problem with the stereo separation which I never did resolve. Gameplay is lots of fun, this is a huge world to explore, and the inhabitants (and in some cases, their evil counterparts) are just a joy to interact with. If you are a die-hard adventurer, get this game. You will enjoy yourself immensely. One warning, this game, while cute and sweet at times, is not for children. There are some semi-mature themes here that are OK for mature teens and adults, but not for the younger gamers out there.

Bottom Line: Lots of fun for mature teens and adults. Humour is probably suited to a certain taste. Think like a toon or fail. Adventure fans will like this.