SpongeBob SquarePants: Employee of the Month
Score: 80% ESRB: Everyone Publisher: THQ Developer: THQ Media: CD/1 Players: 1 Genre: Adventure
Graphics & Sound: SpongeBob SquarePants, the popular Nickelodeon cartoon enjoyed by youngsters, students and old fogies alike, vibrantly comes to life in Employee of the Month. Using a visual style reminiscent of Grim Fandango or the Kings Quest/Space Quest series, SpongeBob and his companions appear lifelike, and perhaps better than what we see on the TV series. Rendered in full three-dimensional shapes and animations, characters such as 'SpongeBob', 'Marlin the Weather Wizard' and 'Mr. Krabs' move fluidly and interact seamlessly throughout the two-dimensional backdrops. It is hard to distinguish between the 3D elements and the 2D elements of this game. They are matched perfectly and create a definite realistic atmosphere to SpongeBob's world. Sound also contributes to the great atmosphere. Dialogs presented throughout SpongeBob emulate the feeling of a SpongeBob television episode with top class performances and scripting. I was especially impressed with the realism and quality that SpongeBob seems to produce, putting it possibly one notch above its own TV series.
Gameplay: This is not SpongeBob's first adventure in the video game world. Although SpongeBob has been popular for less than three years on Nickelodeon, he is already featured prominently on various titled for consoles, handhelds, and the PC. Employee of the Month, the latest addition to SpongeBob's fleet, sets off with SpongeBob having just been awarded with the 'Krusty Krab's Employee of the Year' award after having been 'Employee of the Month' for the past twelve months. As an award for such an achievement, SpongeBob was given two free passes to 'Neptune's Paradise', an amusement park located outside of 'Bikini Bottom', SpongeBob's hometown. On the path to Neptune's Paradise, SpongeBob encounters numerous obstacles and catastrophes, which delay him from his destination. As the main character, you control SpongeBob's actions and orientation. Getting SpongeBob from the Krusty Krab to Neptune's Paradise requires intuition and attention. There are 4 chapters total in Employee of the Year with each chapter occurring in an entirely unique location in SpongeBob's world. The key here is to look for anything that may be usable or interactive. Talking to certain people, or finding and making use of certain objects propel the story making available new map locations or forwarding the chapter. As which is usual for this style of game, it is possible to complete Employee of the Month without seeing every object, or performing every possible task in the game. For those who are compelled to find every trick, SpongeBob is full of neat, humorous gags and tricks that do nothing to propel the game except to make it witty. Examples include interactions between inanimate objects such as beach balls and soccer goals. Other humorous twists are built right into the storyline, such as the 'familiar guy' who seems to be everywhere SpongeBob goes, yet has no recollection of ever meeting SpongeBob. Though the storyline is witty and definitely full of spunk, SpongeBob's shortcomings come in its unreasonably small length. I was able to play the game from start to finish in one sitting of under 4 hours (that's 1 hour per chapter). After completing the game, there isn't really any reason to backtrack except to find some of those 'hidden' features.
Difficulty: Since SpongeBob is ultimately geared towards the younger audiences, the level of difficulty doesn't go to far past basic intuition. As long as you listen to what people have to say and be sure to notice anything of interest it should not be remarkably difficult to figure out what needs to be done to get ahead in the game. Some tasks seem a little obscure, and their solutions do appear in extremely unlikely ways, however we are talking about a walking and talking sponge that wears pants and works at a burger joint.
Game Mechanics: The control layout is based on a point and click scheme. Point in the direction of desired travel, and SpongeBob heads off in that direction. Point over an object or a character and SpongeBob will interact with it in whichever way he is supposed to. Other interactive features of Employee of the Month include Inventory items, which are kept safe in a treasure chest, and always available at the touch of a button, and a map, which shows locations within a chapter that SpongeBob can travel between. An easy and intuitive design along with fun and creative visuals puts Employee of the Month right up there with SpongeBob and his TV series. Though it is geared for younger children, older fans of SpongeBob should enjoy playing as their favorite sponge as he perils toward Neptune's Paradise. If it were longer, however, Employee of the Month would be a perfect game in every right. Considering that some games in this genre take people months to complete without ever finding every possible objective, SpongeBob's lack of grandeur pulls a lot away from its value. Enjoyable while it lasts, this sponge loses out on one specific aspect, which shamefully affects its overall effectiveness.
-==Boy, GameVortex Communications AKA Kyle Prestenback
Minimum System Requirements: Win 98/ME/XP, 266MHz CPU, 32MB RAM, 4MB video card, 8X cd-rom, 500MB HD space   Test System: Windows 2000, AMD Athlon XP 1800+, 128MB RAM, 75GB HD, nVidia Vanta TNT2 video card, on-board sound, 40x CD-ROM
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