Monster House (PS2)

• Platform:   PlayStation2
• BBFC Rating:
• Media: Video Game

In a nutshell:
You’ve seen the movie (or at least your kids have) now play the game as yet another computer animated film gets turned into a third person action game, this time with relatively pleasing consequences.

The lowdown:
There’s hardly any action or kids film nowadays that would dare to strut the word stage without an attendant video game, no matter whether the movie is suited to the treatment or not. Luckily Monster House is as you control CGI youngsters DJ, Chowder, and Jenny in their attempts to escape the titular Monster House with naught but their wits and a squirt gun. The game both looks and sounds just like the movie as you battle rooms full of possessed furniture. The only problem with this is that it means you end up fighting the same bad guys again and again, with only the end of level bosses offering any real variety. Still, the game’s short enough for this to be a relatively minor problem and fans of the film are unlikely to be too disappointed.

Most exciting moment:
Each of the three different children gets to use a different kind of squirt gun: DJ can use his like a house, Chowder’s works like a shotgun and Jenny’s is quick fire and good over long distances.

Since you ask:
The movie is the second film, after The Polar Express, to use a new motion capture process called performance capture. The video game uses some of the same data for the animation of the characters as the movie does.

The bottom line:
Not the greatest game ever but one of the better movie tie-ins.
HARRISON DENT