Wonderland Adventures: Mysteries of Fire Island

If I'm weird for saying this, I don't care: playing this game for the first time was much like being smacked upside the head with a rainbow. Wonderland Adventures: Mysteries of Fire Island is so cheerful and family friendly that it was a tad shocking. Behind its ultra-happy face, there's quite the head-scratcher of a game here.

Casual gamers will enjoy the game's jolly nature and cutesy atmosphere (mostly aimed at young people), but others will be off-put by the squeaky voices and the smiley-face characters. The dialogue is simple, and the plot isn't a brilliant narrative by any means: fire is falling from the sky, so you set out to stop the catastrophe. It goes in a fairly predictable pattern from there, you end up on Fire Island via a shipwreck, exploring ensues.

The motivation to progress through the game obviously doesn't come from the plot, but the puzzles. The game is all about traveling through each environment and completing various objectives. The puzzles are challenging, which is great. They're creative, and they're pretty unique in terms of each other, so you don't always feel like you've done the same puzzle multiple times before.

However, I have a bone to pick with the gameplay. While you can save in the middle of something, you'll still find that your mistakes will often require restarting the whole segment over. This gets old really fast. Not only that, but you have little way of viewing your surroundings (no zoom in/out feature, no movable camera), which makes anticipating what's coming up next difficult. One final beef I have is probably just me being picky, but still needs to be addressed: the character is aggravatingly slow. It would have made the game just that more convenient if the player-controlled character would just move his stubbly little legs a fraction faster (power walk or something!).

All in all, Wonderland Adventures: MoFI was fine for its desired audience. But, if you can't stomach this level of casual game, then set your sights on a different puzzle game. The hardcore gamer will find too many inconveniences in the game to appreciate it.

Graphics:
The game has typical 3D graphics, nothing special. It tries for unique environments (or it seems that way), but they still look like they're re-used.

Sound/Music:
Much of the music is orchestrated, which is nice. However, it doesn't really add anything to the experience, like good game music should. It does its job: make everything sound cheerful.

Gameplay:
The puzzles are fine; the annoying part is actually doing them. There are enough flaws in the execution of the gameplay that it's more of a chore to play than an enjoyable experience.

Concept:
As I played, I felt that I had seen this kind of game many times before, which is probably a safe assumption. There have been plenty of isometric puzzle games in the past, so this isn't exactly a unique concept.

Value:
The game is long, and it will keep those in its target audience enthralled. Those not in the young casual gamer demographic will be much less willing to fork out $19.95.

Fun:
I typically play videogames for entertainment. When a game is frustrating enough that it becomes work, it's no longer entertaining. That puts a damper on things.

Overall:
As I've stated before, this is a game for casual gamers. They'll like the cuteness, and they'll be willing to overlook the flaws in terms of gameplay. Anyone outside of the casual circle will look elsewhere for their puzzle gaming fix.