The Spiderwick Chronicles
is a children's fantasy feature film being released in the UK in late March, just in time for the Easter holidays,
and centres around a magical wood full of bizarre creatures in the bottom of a back garden, documented by Arthur Spiderwick
who lives there (well, he owns the house - he doesn't camp out). Anyhoo, he gets bumped off by what he finds and 80 years
later his niece moves in with her three children, daughter Mallory and twin sons Jared and Simon.
If you like running around and messing about with brief, mediocre 'missions', and are not yet a teenager then you'll have a blast
with this. Unfortunately, for someone over 20 years older, like me, who'd never even heard of the title until the game dropped
on his doormat, it just looks like so many other games based on films - all of which seem to base themselves on a Tomb
Raider-style format with a game engine that was first used several years ago, so although the movement is fluid and if
the premise grabs you then you'll look forward to what's inside, for anyone who has been around the gaming block a time or
two, it's very lacking.
There's also too many items around the house and elsewhere that are just marked 'look at this', and you have to complete a
number of other very standard small tasks before you can move on and interact properly with these things.
Beyond that, there are some additional features to the game which are as follows:
Film trailer: It's very The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe and The Golden Compass, so that's the
kind of audience they're aiming at.
Simon and Schuster Video: This is a dialogue-free advert for the Spiderwick books and although you see the people
behind the book - Tony DiTerlizzi and Holly Black, there's no interview with them which is what I was expecting.
Game Cinematics: Unlockable clips from playing through the single player game.
Multiplayer: It's only a 2-player co-op, not on Xbox Live, but you can't even play this until you've completed the
single player game! That's not very sporting for a computer game.
As of April 2009, Blu-rays and DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TH-37PX80B
37" Plasma TV with a Sony BDP-1500 Blu-ray player and played through a Yamaha DSP-AX820 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Jan 2011: Intel Quad Core Dell XPS 8100, i7 CPU 860 @ 2.80Ghz, 8Gb RAM, nVidia GeForce GTS 240, Windows 7
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
If you like running around and messing about with brief, mediocre 'missions', and are not yet a teenager then you'll have a blast
with this. Unfortunately, for someone over 20 years older, like me, who'd never even heard of the title until the game dropped
on his doormat, it just looks like so many other games based on films - all of which seem to base themselves on a Tomb
Raider-style format with a game engine that was first used several years ago, so although the movement is fluid and if
the premise grabs you then you'll look forward to what's inside, for anyone who has been around the gaming block a time or
two, it's very lacking.
Beyond that, there are some additional features to the game which are as follows:
