The Evil DoodleBob has returned to Bikini Bottom in order to wreak havoc in a way that only a ‘Badly Drawn’ doodle can.  However, this time around, SpongeBob Squarepants is asking you to help save the residents of Bikini Bottom and ‘rub’ out DoodleBob in the new THQ videogame for the Nintendo DS, Drawn to Life: SpongeBob Squarepants Edition. Given the task to help the residents of Bikini Bottom are my 7-year-old son, Nikolai, and myself.

Background

As the story goes, DoodleBob made his first appearance in Bikini Bottom in the SpongeBob Square Pants Cartoon Frankendoodle, when SpongeBob Squarepants and Patrick discovered a magical pencil dropped overboard by an artist.  This pencil had the ability to bring its user’s works of art to life.  So SpongeBob did a crude self-portrait, named it DoodleBob and used it to play a practical joke on Squidward.  Unfortunately, SpongeBob’s plans backfired and DoodleBob ended up beating up Squidward and trapping SpongeBob and Patrick in a hole.  After assorted cartoon tomfoolery, SpongeBob was able to finally defeat DoodleBob by trapping him in a piece of paper.  The lesson learned, “Never draw DoodleBob again with a magical pencil dropped overboard by an artist.”

In the video game Drawn to Life, SpongeBob Squarepants Edition, Patrick discovers two pencils dropped overboard by an artist. While trying to remember who he is not suppose to doodle, Patrick aimlessly doodles DoodleBob and because both pencils are magical, the forbidden DoodleBob springs to life, grabs the first pencil and sets out to scratch graffiti all over Bikini Bottom.  When SpongeBob discovers what Patrick has done, he and Patrick decide to give you the second pencil.  You are then charged with drawing a Hero Doodle to use together with the magical pencil to clean-up Bikini Bottom, fend off DoodleBob’s army and track down the Evil DoodleBob. 

Quirky Game Play

Now I should point out that in its basic form, Drawn to Life plays like a Mario video game with left to right screen movement, jumping over obstacles, collecting coins and using various weapons and instruments to attack and move past challenges.  However, the magical pencil makes this game interestingly quirky.  First off, you use the pencil to draw a Hero Doodle, which comes to life and is controlled by you.  The Hero Doodle runs, jumps, ducks and attacks.  Then as you move through the game, you use the magical pencil to draw objects that you need to surpass challenges such as Bouncing Shoes, a Slingshot, a Spring, Bubble Stairs, Floating Clouds, and Karate Chop Hands.  You even draw the icons to represent your Lives and Quick Saves.  You also use the magical pencil to erase DoodleBob’s graffiti along with erasing his Rogue Doodles and redrawing them into your friends.

The game consists of over 20 levels with various challenges and countless items to be drawn.  You can also call on SpongeBob, Patrick and Squidward who all have special attack and defense capabilities to assist you with particular challenges.  There is also a multiplayer game (1-4 players), but each player coming to the table has to have their own game cartridge.

Not So Much Rembrandt as Picasso

Now it should go without saying that you use the DS stylus and touch screen to wield your magic pencil and play the game.  For the Hero Doodle, the graffiti screen sets-up a multiple box diagram representing your Hero Doodle’s body so you can designate where the head goes in relation to the body, arms, legs, etc.  This is to ensure that when your Hero Doodle comes to life, he is properly animated.  When you are asked to draw other items, you are giving a graffiti box to help designate the size and orientation of the object you are drawing.  Now let’s be honest, the screen resolution is limited and very pixilated, and drawing with the stylus is not the easiest thing to do in the world, however I was pleased with most of the results.  Come on, it’s a doodle after all.  Nikolai, on the other hand, became a bit frustrated and just began using the paint bucket function to fill the graffiti box with a single color, the result of which was that his Spring was a blue square, his Rope Lift was a blue rectangle, and his Lives were represented by red squares.  I wouldn’t recommend following Nik’s example on this because when faced with these objects later on in the game, we had trouble figuring out what the green rectangle represented and how it was suppose to be used.

The game also comes with a lesson on how to draw SpongeBob Square Pants along with a digital coloring book which features more and more pictures to color as you complete challenges and levels in the game.

Overall Impression

Like I said the before, the game plays a lot like a Mario game, however the quirky drawing aspect keeps things light and entertaining.  The beginning of the game can drag a bit as you have to stop to draw some key elements, but once that is done things begin to move along.  So with that in mind, Nikolai has decided to give the game 100 Thumbs-up out of a possible 100, stating that the game is fun and he enjoyed drawing the items needed in the game despite the fact that some of them turned out to be various blue, red, or green squares or rectangles.  As for me, I also found the aspect of drawing needed items kind of fun as well as an entertaining distraction, so I’m giving the game 6 Dancing Elephants out of 8.

Parting Thoughts

Okay, I admit it, as I was playing this game I suddenly felt the need to be cheeky, so I redrew my Hero Doodle in pajamas, renamed him Harold, and drew everything in purple.