Movie games are similar to popcorn; all have the potential to be great. But when it comes down to it, some pop and some don’t. Goldeneye is a great example of a game that popped, Fight Club however is an example of one that didn’t. Within today’s current Wii trends of shovel ware and less-than-perfect games, it’s even harder to find a movie game that pops. Unfortunately I’m not going to say this is where Wall-E is the exception to the rule.

Wall-e, Based off the pretty good Disney Pixar movie, is a game about a small robot named Wall-E (/shock), given the task of cleaning up the planet. After 700 years of doing his job he started to develop a personality and begins to feel lonely until another robot named EVE arrives on earth. This is standard Disney story really and the game doesn’t try to change it at all, just try and add to it and extend the story.

I have to say when I first started the game uip; I was greeted by an amazing in-game cut scene of Wall-E starting his daily buisness. My heart then sank when the game loaded to a laggy grey and brown landscape and I realised it was an in-game cut scene from the 360/PS3 version of the game, not the Wii version. Graphically the game is pretty ugly, but in a city full of rubbish and garbage shouldn’t it look that way you ask? Yes it should, but this goes far beyond that with big drops in frame rate leading to massive amounts of lag.

Wall-E controls adequately using the Wiimote and Nunchuck, with certain flicks making Wall-E turn into a cube and roll around and others allowing him to pick up rubbish off the ground in certain designated areas, a bad design choice as rubbish is everywhere but you can’t use it. You also get to control EVE later on who can fly around and shoot her gun using a reticule on the screen. The reticule is also used to control the direction she’s flying in and I’m happy to say it works nicely apart from a slightly slow turning circle and the first few times I played the game decided it would of been a good idea to not give me a target reticule so I couldn’t see where I was shooting or flying. Not so much fun.

You also get to use both Wall-E and EVE at the same time in parts of the game which, while a good idea, is cumbersome as their controls overlap each other making both of them do movements when you only wanted one to do something. While the controls work good enough when working alone, it’s a whole other game when trying to control both.

Something Wall-E does boast are varied gameplay styles including Racing, Fighting, Platforming/Puzzle Solving and Fetch Quests. The most fun to be had is in the racing levels but unfortunately these do feel tiresome after the first few turns as they get very repetitive, which is what this whole game is based around. Repetitive gameplay

Closing Comments
This game hasn’t popped, not on this reviewer anyway. It’s a shame because Wall-E has some great ideas, great inclusions like Wii Zapper compatibility, 4 player multiplayer, plenty of gameplay styles and nice controls but all these things don’t work to the level they should. Multiplayer is laggy, gameplay is boring, controls let you down and I have no idea how you could play this with the Wii Zapper. I have no doubt kids will beg for the game come Christmas but they wont enjoy this after the novelty wears off and that will last around 5 minutes.

Score 4.9

+ Variety a ‘plenty
+ 4 player Multiplayer
+ Nice controls….

- Until they glitch
- Bad amounts of lag
- Bland