After
writing the review for Bone:
Out From Boneville, I received feedback from
readers who felt that while the game was great, it
was just too short for the money. Now, I could see both sides of
the issue. On one hand, gamers quite rightly expect to get their
money’s worth for the change they plunk down—myself included.
On the other hand, I understand that Telltale is not some giganti-mondo-megalo-corporation
with an unlimited budget, and they really put a lot of quality into
the game.

Fortunately, Telltale
has removed the conflict that was brewing between my two hands
by announcing a lower price for this charming
series to $12.99 per episode. That’s good, because I would
have hated to see my hands come to blows.

That being said, I did
keep track of my playing time and found that I completed Bone
2: The Great Cow Race in a little over 6 hours.
That’s not taking into account my shameless use of the in-game
help system in order to get this review out in a timely manner. Overall,
I believe gamers will find this game to be a longer one than its
predecessor.

The business of time and
money aside, it’s time to get down
to the fun part. Bone 2: The Great Cow Race finds Fone Bone and his
cousins reunited and preparing for the Barrelhaven county fair. It’s
the eve of the annual cow race, and each one of them has a role to
play in upcoming events. As you might expect, Phoney is devising
a scheme to part the townsfolk with what passes for money, and Smiley
is going along for the ride. Fone Bone is busy mooning over Thorn,
looking for a way to wrench her attention from a shirtless honey
salesman, and all the while the rat creatures are still making their
dastardly plans.

In addition to returning
characters Gran’ma Ben, Thorn, and
the rascally possum kids, you’ll meet the good people of Barrelhaven.
This includes a rather large-armed, squinty-eyed fellow named Lucius
who looks to be Gran’ma’s male counterpart.

Throughout the game, you’ll
switch between playing Fone, Phoney, and Smiley to help each of
them complete their assigned tasks. The
upper right portion of the screen has icons to help you make the
switch as long as characters have unfulfilled missions. This works
especially well if you find yourself stuck with one puzzle. Just
switch characters for a while and come back later.

As far as I can tell,
the interface is the same as in Bone: Out From Boneville. A cursor
will give you the option to look or use/
take an object, and right-clicking will cycle between them if more
than one option is available. The inventory is represented by a small
knapsack at the bottom left of the screen, and clicking on it will
reveal the contents. In the bottom left of the screen, a scroll represents
the main menu for saving, loading, quitting, and game options. If
you’ve chosen the help option, a question mark icon will sit
next to it.

Once again, the graphics
are stunning, with beautifully detailed backgrounds rendered in
classic cartoon style. The characters look
great and move realistically, and the voice acting is superb. It’s
obvious that a lot of talent is behind the Bone series.

The puzzles in Bone
2: The Great Cow Race are also very well done, with each of them integrating
with the game and storyline. A couple
of them were truly original. I never thought menial cleaning chores
could be made into a game, but Telltale has managed to pull it off.
You’ll even get to try your hand at creating lovesick poetry.
While all the puzzles take a little ingenuity to solve, none of them
are extremely difficult, and the aforementioned in-game help system
can get you through any tough spots.

Most of this game flowed
flawlessly, but there was one sticking point I have to mention:
the load time between scenes was agonizingly
slow. I actually began to dread leaving one area for another because
of this, and it added an element of torture to an otherwise fun arcade-type
puzzles. This long load time, which occurred between different areas,
when waiting for dialog options with characters, and when opening
certain puzzles, sometimes lasted as long as 10 or more seconds.
It’s possible that this problem is unique to my computer, but
I doubt it.

In summation, I highly
recommend this game to anyone looking for a lighthearted adventure
whether they’re fans of the Bone books
or not. And while growing old between scene changes was a very real
possibility, I’m only docking the game half a grade, since
the rest of it was just so well done. That leaves me with a final
grade of: A-

Final Grade: A-
(find out more about our
grading system)

System Requirements:

• Windows 2000/XP
• DirectX 8.1
• 140MB Free Drive Space
• Newer 3D Accelerated
  Video Cards:
  800 MHz P3 processor
  (or better)
• Older 3D Accelerated
  Video Cards:
  1.5 GHz processor
  (or better)