Polly Pocket has won a vacation to Super Splash Island, a water park filled with fun rides and games. Each of the activities offers special tickets which can be redeemed to ride the Giant Water Slide. Polly can also collect special flowers at the rides, which will unlock her dressing room, where players can choose different outfits for Polly to wear.
There are six rides, which are all arcade activities. These are: River Crossing, a Frogger-type game; River Rapids, a game where Polly floats down the river on a tube collecting balloons and powerups while avoiding hazards; Tube Trouble, a game that involves using tubes to move back and forth across three levels while popping balloons; Bumper Boats, a bumper car game with boats; Water Blaster, a water pistol game where Polly aims at her friends by matching the colors of the water balloons to their float rings; and Jet Boats, a jet ski race on race tracks.
There is also a special Giant Water Slide ride, which can only be accessed after earning a certain number of tickets on the other rides. At first, only one of five sections is available to ride, the other four sections of the ride require additional tickets to unlock. Polly can collect flowers and powerups while riding the slide.
Kids can play either a single-player or two-player game on all the rides. There is a password save, but it doesn’t seem to save any points under increments of 1000 for some reason, and this may present a problem for very young players. The interface is simple; after choosing whether to play a single- or two-player game, kids will walk Polly from one ride to another across the main thoroughfare of the water park. The points earned at each ride are displayed across the top marquee of the rides. There are three levels of difficulty, but even the hardest level is pretty easy.
The animation is really cute, and Polly moves smoothly across the screen. As this is a so-called “girl game”, everything is in pastels, but it is pleasingly done. The music is of average quality, cheerful but nothing memorable.
This is a cute collection of arcade games that all kids can enjoy, boys and girls, despite the Polly Pocket logo. Digital Illusions Canada designed this game, along with the same publishing team of Vivendi and Mattel, the same companies that produced the excellent Barbie Groovy Games. This collection of mini-games isn’t quite as good as Barbie Groovy Games, but is still one of the better GBA games for the young crowd. There is a sameness about many of the levels in the activities that becomes repetitive in nature, which will probably bore older children after awhile, but the younger players won’t mind. One of the activities, Jet Boats, only offers a few tracks to race on, which soon become memorized. The best game is Water Blaster, which requires quick thinking and reflexes on the upper levels, with lots of colors and floats to match in a short time. Adding the two-player mode really extends the life of this game, and makes for a good “road trip” take-along.
Polly Pocket Super Splash Island is a good choice for girls and boys ages five-eight, and parents will be pleased with the quality. The only slight problem is the save game feature, which doesn’t save any points earned under 1000, this may be difficult for young kids to accomplish in one sitting.
Gameplay: 7.8
The gameplay is straightforward and easy to begin. The games are simple arcade games that are targeted toward young players, and are designed not to frustrate. The activities are fun enough, but suffer a trifle from a repetiveness across the levels.
Graphics: 8
The graphics are very nice, and the characters are smoothly animated.
Sound: 7
The music is ultimately forgettable, but not annoying.
Difficulty: Easy
All the activities are easy to play, and are obviously designed for young children. This is great, it’s been wonderful to see several programs lately that demonstrate the time and care taken to design a real children’s game for kids. Too often kids’ games suffer from being stretched across broad age groups, but that’s not the case here.
Concept: 7
The concept is nothing really new, but the execution is well-done. It would have been nice to have seen some more innovation within the activities, but what is solid for the most part, although more race tracks are needed for the Jet Boats game.
Multiplayer: 7.5
The multi-player mode allows two kids to take turns in each game and compete for the highest score. This adds to the game’s longevity, and is especially good for car trips.
Overall: 7.8
It’s nice to see a company that takes the time and care for a children’s product that Digital Illusions Canada has obviously taken. Young children will enjoy these games and will gain a feeling of success, as every child will be able to earn points in every game, even if they don’t win enough to get into the Water Slide. The only quibble I really have with this game is the strange save game feature that doesn’t save points under 1000, this may be a problem with the youngest players. However, mom and dad can probably help out with getting in more points. Parents, this is one of the few GBA games that is actually worth the money. If you have young children ages five-eight, this is a good choice.
