All Star Cheer Squad
Score: 71% ESRB: Everyone Publisher: THQ Developer: Gorilla Systems Media: Cartridge/1 Players: 1 - 3 Genre: Sports/ Rhythm
Graphics & Sound: You might have read my review of All Star Cheer Squad for the Wii. After playing it, I was really wondering how they were going to translate such an active game to the handheld market. Graphically, the cheerleaders don't look very different from each other. Granted, it didn't help that I managed to choose the exact same features Becka has so they looked like twins on the screen. Really though, they have different skin (four choices) and hair colors (including normal colors, plus pink, blue, and even one with bright red and green streaks) and a few different hair styles, but other than that they all look alike. They are all the same height, body size, and body shape. The backgrounds are pretty generic. They're pretty, but there is nothing really outstanding to them. The background music sounds very appropriate to me. It is very peppy and active with a cheer feel to it. There are some encouraging voices in the background music, but none of the characters speak out load themselves.
Gameplay: In All Star Cheer Squad, you are playing as a girl (sorry guys, there's no male version in this game) going to summer cheerleading camp. You think everything is going to just be easy and fun. Your cousin Becka will be there with you, so why wouldn't it be a fun time? Well, first thing when you get there, Becka tells you that you're going to have to earn your own merits and stay away from her. She wants to impress the others and doesn't need you holding her back. So I guess you're just going to have to buckle down, get serious, and learn how to cheer your best on your own, especially since due to your laid-back attitude, you get challenged within 2 minutes of entering the camp. After passing your challenge, you will need to go get yourself assigned to a squad. Every new location is marked by a yellow star. If you can go to that location at that time, the star will sparkle. If the star isn't sparkling, that location isn't available to you at that time. Anyway, go get added to a squad so you have a group to cheer with. All Star Cheer Squad on the DS is more like an adventure RPG than the version for the Wii is. You will be given tasks to do and specific times that you have to be places. On your free time, you'll need to wander around and talk to other cheerleaders. You can find everyone and everything from the map. Other cheerleaders with free time at that time will be shown on the map so you can find them easier. Most of your day will be taken up by things that you have to do. Some of them are scheduled for you. The others are given to you for you to schedule whenever you want them. Each morning, you tap on the schedule wheel to see your schedule for the day. An arrow points to the current time slice. If you tap on the slice, it will tell you what your task is and where to go. You can see which way you need to go on the map. From there, you just go around, complete tasks, work on your routines, make friends, and try to become the best cheerleader that you can.
Difficulty: All Star Cheer Squad really isn't that hard to play. The hard part is getting from place to place. It just seemed to me like it took too long to walk from place to place. You can warp around on the map to get places quicker, though. All you have to do is touch the place you want to go and then tap the big yellow star in the bottom right corner. When you get there, you'll be given different little mini-games to perform. At the beginning, they're really easy to pass. You just have to do it and you really can't fail. Actually you can't fail the game at all. The worst thing that happens is that you have to retry until you get it right. The "squad kit" does help make it easier to play the game. You can choose which item you want to see on the touch screen. This means that if you need the map, you've got it. On those occasions where you're trying to make the best of your free time and make friends with the other girls, you can keep your journal on the screen. It shows the other squads, their members, and your relationship to them. When you're trying to remember what task you need to do, you can keep your schedule on the touch screen so you don't forget where you're going.
Game Mechanics: In All Star Cheer Squad, you will be using both the touch screen and the stylus a lot. You use the D-pad to move from place to place. Most times this seems natural. When I was looking at the map though, I wanted to use the D-pad to move around the map and it just didn't work. You have to use the touch screen and tap on the arrows to move around the map. That took me a while to get accustomed to. The red arrow represents where you are on the map. You can run around the locations faster by pressing the (B) button. This is quite useful to cut down that movement time. The game definitely does not prompt you to save or give you the option to save when you want. You can choose Quit Game and lose everything without realizing it when you first start the game. Autosaving a lot more often or giving you the option to save whenever would really have been nice. As it is, the game autosaves "after certain events or tasks." This means that if you want to stop playing at any other time, you'll have to settle for just pausing it by closing the lid without turning it off. At least it does show you when it has saved so you don't have to just guess that you won't lose anything. On the whole, All Star Cheer Squad just isn't as much fun on the DS as it was on the Wii. It is a decent game, but there's nothing really spectacular about it. Unlike the Wii version, you don't get the feeling that you're actually doing any cheerleading since all you do is tap the screen in various areas to perform cheers. It isn't a bad game, but it just doesn't grab you and hook you in either.
-Cyn, GameVortex Communications AKA Sara Earl
Neopets Puzzle Adventure Zoo Vet: Endangered Animals