[h1][b]The Smurfs: Mission Vileaf[/b][/h1]
[h3][b]Time Played:[/b][/h3]
2.3 Hours
[h3][b]Last Played:[/b][/h3]
22nd of April, 2026
[hr][/hr]
Seeing as how the date was Earth Day, and I slept through over half of it, I wanted to delve into something as soon as possible. No Place Like Home, and Fresh Start seemed to not be entirely-spring-like, and Before We Leave, only tangentially-related.
Thus, given I doubt my foggy, groggy [s]Christmas[/s] state was even slightly capable of grasping Equilinox, I instead opted to go into the less complex of the two remaining options, with the hope it would be another unexpected, smash hit like the previous mostly-unknown Belgian-Comic-based game I played.
Unfortunately, that was not the case, and I suggest those incensed at my dismissing a “family” game to read all of it before rating/commenting (As everyone should for literally everything, as later information included in the same document may invalidate/alter any comments, or sentiments had.).
[h3][b]Yay:[/b][/h3]
+ Very colourful, and looking fantastic on my OLED Monitor.
+ Once you get the ability to do so, clearing out patches of infection was a very-satisfying-to-me occurrence.
+ This aspect also embodied the “clean the planet” effect I wanted for this year's relevant holiday.
+ The bouncy mushroom sounds reminded me of Super Magnetic Neo (Anybody remember that?), which I personally-enjoyed.
+ Semi-hidden collectible thingers that you can grab to (allegely; I didn't play long enough to do this) upgrade the Smurfizer.
+ Unlike some games, I found that the ones you can, and cannot get with your current ability set are clearly-defined, which saved me from many a minute bashing my head against a metaphorical wall, only to give up.
[h3][b]Meh:[/b][/h3]
~ I felt the “0 to pitch black with no gradient blending” shadows to detract from the visual style a bit, and make the non-shaded areas seem incredibly harsh by compare.
[h3][b]Nay:[/b][/h3]
- The tendency of the characters to replace non-rhyming words with “Smurf” was immediately-grating to me, and seemingly happens an agonising “over 30” times per-level.
- This made it come off as forced, stilted, and unnatural, where my opinion is concerned, and did not charm in a single instance.
- Absolutely “Let Me Play!” syndrome. I don't think a single instance existed where I got to play for more than 2 minutes without a completely-unnecessary cutscene grinding gameplay to a screeching halt.
- After about 19 of these in less than 1.5 hours of gameplay, I started to skip them.
- Alas, that was no escape, as the characters are near-constantly either narrating the objective you were told to do 20 seconds ago, or communicating over “Smurfie-Talkie”.
- Adding onto the disdain is the fact they seemingly only have 3 voice actors who barely-disguise their voices...
- ...I did not think the acting to be high-quality...
- ...and both of the protagonists I played as before bailing were arrogant, self-absorbed egotists.
- “Stop with the sound-effects” No, please, those actually varied, and fit the situation, rather than shoe-horning the name of the franchise in, regardless of how little sense is made by it, at seemingly every opportunity.
- On switching protagonists to Brainy Smurf, they had the outright gall to say “You should be proud of me” in one off-cutscene dialogue bit.
Given the family-friendly nature of the franchise means children may be playing this, I don't think surrounding them with characters who self-righteously tell others what to think is conducive to the growth of a functional person.
- I did not enjoy the combat, which boiled down to “hold Smurfizer button, and walk away from the enemy” over 90% of the time. Credit where it's due, the developers tried to vary it, but the other enemies were very sparingly-used, leading to the Vileballs being the most-common encounter, and present in all of them.
- Lastly, difficulty. I get that I probably only played a quarter of what the game had to offer, but I chose the hardest difficulty, and only died once as a result of my attempting to purify some grass/speed through the combat
[hr][/hr]
[h3][b]Verdict:[/b][/h3]
I fully-realise this game is based on a franchise enjoyed by all ages, but when Marsupilami: Hoobadventure was in much the same boat, yet managed to actually let you play, and provide some noteworthily-tricky challenges to those that wanted to 100% it, I'm of the mind this could have been the same thing.
Instead, I found it to be a grating, patronising mess with little faith in its players, ability granted to them to actually play the game, and a rather large disappointment overall.
[h3][b]Placed in:[/b][/h3]
4: Dourly-Dismissed.
