Naughty Bear is a game that needs to be approached with a certain kind of perspective and preparation. Expectations for revolutionary gameplay, a brilliant story line, scripted scenes on par with prime time drama, or innovative game mechanics should be cast aside. Those things are not going to be found here.
Don’t know why, but where directors and producers are incredibly important to cinema buffs, for some reason most of us in the gaming community fail to notice the developer/publisher of the games we buy. In this case our developer (the people who designed the game) Artificial Mind and Movement is a very well established developer…in making a lot of those movie/cartoon to video game ports that all of us hate so very much. Prior to this their only silver lining IMHO was Wet, which was pretty awesome. Anyway, their publisher (the people who market, sell, and occasionally help pay for the game), in this case 505 Games, are responsible for the Discovery Kids games hitting shelves. Yeah, you know, those DS games with the animals on the cover, Puppy Playtime, and Kitten Corner…need I go on?
So right off the bat let’s get rid of the notion that Naughty Bear is a high quality, top of the line video game experience that so many of us have been spoiled by with publishers like 2K Games, Electronic Arts and Square-Enix giving us video games better than most of the drivel coming out of Hollywood…
*big deep breath*
With all that being said I think this game is awesome. If you’re a fan of dark humor and gratuitous violence – and let’s admit it, most gamers are – you’ll find yourself laughing out loud at all of the naughty shenanigans you can get up to in this game.
The premise of the game is the formula to its (marginal) success. You play as Naughty Bear. Naughty Bear lives on Perfection Island with a multitude of other bears with incredibly cute names like Chubby, Giggles, Daddles, Bubbles…you get the idea. Well Naughty Bear isn’t very much liked by the other bears and…well according to the in game load screens; “Naughty Bear doesn’t hear voices in his head, except for this one Englishman who is constantly urging him to kill.”
Said Englishman acts as your narrator throughout the course of the game, and humorously sounds like a kids cartoon host on Milkshake or CBeebies. This combined with the level and character design truly makes you feel like you’re walking around a kids cartoon set…with bear traps, knives, golf clubs, and baseball bats aplenty lying about to wreak havoc with.
In fact, according to Lead Designer Ashley Pannell in an interview she did with gaminglives.com, this connection isn’t accidental.
“Much of the inspiration for Naughty Bear came from Saturday morning cartoons,” said Pannell. “The idea of juxtaposing that innocence with dark humour and over-the-top violence. We think the blend of syrupy cuteness and cartoon violence works,” and I agree with her.
The gameplay takes place in six different episodes, each with different map layouts and objectives that ultimately lead to the slaughtering of a final target. In the first episode Daddles the bear is having a birthday party and everyone on Perfection Island is invited. Naughty Bear even made a present for Daddles! But when he goes and gives it to Daddles the other bears make fun of him and send him away. Poor Naughty Bear *sniffles*. Well the narrator then encourages Naughty Bear to “throw that present in the fire and go and do something about all of this!”. And the carnage begins.
You can play Naughty Bear with haste and speed or go for a more stealthy approach but either way the objective is the same. Terrorise the other residents of the island and gaining the most naughty points possible before completing the last objective of punishing the final target.
Naughty points can be gained in a variety of ways, smashing windows, breaking ‘beautiful’ things, sabotaging phones and power boxes all lead to naughty points, but that’s just the surface. One of the main game mechanics involve the “BOO!” button which causes Naughty Bear to let out a terrifying roar. You can do this at random or sneak up quietly behind a bear for extra points and a quick cinematic camera close up. Scare a bear enough and you’ll drive him insane. Scare an insane bear and he’ll go over the edge committing suicide with whatever weapon the beast is holding at the time. Get points for maiming a bear and leaving him alive for other bears to see. Bears will sometimes barricade themselves inside of a house and you can actually get points just for darting past a window.
Building combos are the best way to get points. Lay a few bear traps outside of a door next to a sabotaged power box…wait in the woods…and trap, maim, and killing a few bears in rapid succession in front of other bears will net you a nice fortune of points.
After initially completing an episode a number of different challenges open afterwards in the same level requiring you to go untouched, drive all bears insane instead of killing them, etc, etc. These are unlocked by earning bronze, silver, or gold trophies based on the amount of naughty points you accumulate in each stage.
Leaderboards are built right into the level select screen giving you an idea of what score to shoot for before entering a level. There are multiplayer modes but I’ve been too occupied with story mode to try it out yet. So far it’s been fun, and that’s the reason we play games, right?
Now there are plenty of bad things that have led to the multiple negative reviews like how the game feels low budget, really basic issues like getting stuck on corners or between objects, the camera angle/movement being pretty crap, and there is a lot of anti-aliasing roughness around the edges in the graphics. Sneaking up on other bears can get annoying since you need to be directly behind them for a stealth scare and exactly lined up with them if they’re trying to escape via a vehicle. There’s almost no storyline at all in the game, and the game play get’s repetitive pretty quick.
The game’s premise, dark humor, and silly self-awareness makes up for that in my opinion. I bought it for $50, although if I had a second chance I would probably rent it. It’s a game that should be played at least once simply for its initial entertainment value but will probably be shelved after a few plays. Although I can see it being one that you would pull down when friends are over; “You guys need to play this, it’s hilarious.”
VideogameUK verdict: 6/10
