As I see it, the folks
at Telltale were sitting around the office, slapping each other on
the back for the success they were having that July with their brand
spanking new Monkey Island series when one spoilsport way in the back
finally got up the courage to peep, “You know, it’s the
last week of July and we still have to finish that fourth installment
of Wallace and Gromit . . . don’t we?” “What?”
some company bigshot shouts, sloshing himself another glass of champagne.
“Wallace and Gromit? Is that that PR firm we hired for Tales
of Monkey Island?”

Anyway, the company at
last came to its senses and immediately sprang into action placing
a couple of college interns and a cleaning lady or two in charge of
getting out that last darn episode of that darn “Wallace and
Gromit” series that only so short a time ago had seemed so promising.
On July 29th (although I didn’t get my email notice until the
following day), a mere two days before the deadline, the fourth episode
of “Wallace & Gromit’s Grand Adventures: The Bogey
Man” was released to its subscribers, and, should they care,
the world. Whew!

Grand Adventures was the
first time I ever “subscribed” to a game series. I followed
the first couple of seasons of Sam and Max with interest and downloaded
a demo or two, but it wasn’t until W&G that I got excited
by the prospect of downloading a new installment every month. Frankly,
it turned out to be a drag. It felt more like waiting for the cable
repairman to turn up rather than Santa Claus. After all, big Nick
may not bring you what you want but at least he always shows up on
the appointed day. Telltale was quite prompt the first couple of months,
getting the games out in the first week. Then episode three slipped
to mid-month and finally, for the finale, the eleventh hour. My thinking
now is, next time I’ll just wait until the entire series is
available, then get it. If the game is any good, it’ll keep.

So
was episode four, “The Bogey Man” worth my wait and yours?
The short answer is that it is just as charming, just as well made,
just as inventive, and just as easy as the first three episodes. Actually,
it felt a little shorter than the others, and, if possible, a little
easier. But that may just be because I’ve grown familiar with
the game’s modus operandi. It also has pretty much all the pluses
and minuses of the previous three episodes, as catalogued in my three
earlier reviews, including controls designed for the Xbox. Just what
is Xbox Live Arcade, anyway? Does that mean there’s network
play of W&G? I checked the Xbox
W&G site and I still can’t quite figure that out.

The Bogey Man of “Bogey
Man” is – actually, I’m not sure. It’s either
Duncan McBisquit or Wallace himself. No matter. Unlike the previous
episode, this one is a light romp with no real villain. Wallace awakens
the day after the excitement with Monty Muzzle and realizes to his
horror that his neighbor Felicity Flitt thinks he’s proposed
to her. In fact, he was just politely returning a lug nut. It’s
up to Gromit once again to extricate his master from his foibles and
he does so by – getting Wallace invited to join the local country
club. Why? Because Felicity’s aunt Prudence will allow her niece
to wed anyone except one of those durn Prickly Thicketeers! Why? Because
six hundred years ago when the Prickly Thicket club was first founded,
there was a contretemps between the Flitts and the club and . . .
are you paying attention? All this matters, you know. Anyway, there’s
a scene where Wallace shows up at the club and ferrets out its long
lost secret, then there’s a big golf showdown between Wallace
and Duncan for leadership of the club (though it’s Gromit who
does the actual “golfing”), and finally there’s
the big Gromit action scene back at Prickly Thicket, where all is
blissfully resolved, including the hand of Ms. Flitt. Hooray. End
of series.

So was I sad when it was
all over? Yes, I was. But it was more the wistfulness one feels at
the end of a wonderful children’s story, like “Alice in
Wonderland.” It’s the characters you’re going to
miss, and the clever, marvelous situations. Telltale kept the actual
gameplay in the series down to its absolute minimum. Case in point:
The second “act” of “Bogey” takes place in
a brand new locale, the Prickly Thicket golf club. It’s a charming
medieval room that was “designed” by a great ancestor
of Wallace’s. All kinds of crazy contraptions and secret doors.
When I first walked in, I was thrilled. A half hour later, after the
game led me by the hand, step by step, through what I had to do, like
a preschooler, it was over. On to the next scene! Did you have fun?
There was one point when I tried to move Wallace across the room to
test one of those enticing contraptions – but no, Wallace was
doing this now. Wait until the game is over, then you can
explore. So I had to return and let Wallace go through his preordained
steps.

One
more example may suffice to make my point: In the first scene of “Bogey
Man” the game designers don’t want you wandering too far
afield to solve the first series of obstacles, so the front gate that
takes you to town and elsewhere is not accessible, nor is the backyard,
nor the stairs, nor the door to the living room, nor the basement,
not even the kitchen. About the only things available to you are the
handful of items and areas you need to complete the first steps of
the game. I mean, come on. It’s not like the world of W&G
is so vast that one is going to get lost for long. Some of the subtle
manipulation that games now do routinely does make sense, like dispensing
with superfluous inventory items, but when the controlling hand gets
too strong the gameplay suffers and the sense of exploration evaporates.

The really sad thing is
that there are in “Bogey Man” as there are in the three
previous episodes, the makings of some great adventure puzzles. But
the whole thing is so tightly scripted and your actions and choices
so limited, that it’s like walking into a room with a great
big Lionel train setup, only to be allowed to send the train round
and round a simple oval. Telltale was so scared than non-adventure
game W&G fans would be so petrified of having to solve a puzzle
or two that they did what pretty much every other adventure game company
does now – give you a guided tour whether you want one or not.
What I don’t understand is why these companies don’t just
include a written walkthrough with the game. That way newbies or adventure-phobes
can just read their way through the obstacles.

The artwork of “Bogey
Man” is, as previously, gorgeous, the writing is top-notch,
the acting is superb, the small ensemble original score is toe-tappingly
wonderful. It’s Disney quality cartoon making, no mistake. But,
as I have noted before, it’s only just barely a “game.”
I suppose Telltale is trying to interest non-gamers in its games.
They’ve shelled out big bucks for these big name franchises
– Sam, Max, Guybrush, Wallace, Gromit – and they don’t
want to limit their sales to the feeble, dwindling numbers of adventure
gamers. Adventure games are dead, didn’t you hear? We’re
trying to transform the adventure game into something that everyone
can enjoy, which is to say, not an adventure game. Here, by the by,
is a direct quote from a recent press
release from Telltale: “Telltale’s Wallace & Gromit
games are designed for the same all-ages audience as the duo’s other
endeavors and will be enjoyed by gamers and non-gamers alike.”

There
is an abundance of talent at Telltale. The stuff they put out is swell.
I know they could make great traditional adventure games if they really
wanted to, which is what leads me to believe that they don’t
really want to. I have read in the forums that people are saying the
new Monkey Island games, while wonderfully faithful to the Monkey
Island ethos, are even easier than Telltale’s other games. Look,
Telltale is free to do whatever they like, and if this path is making
them money, then of course they’re going to follow it. I’m
only saying that as an adventure gamer, I’m bitterly disappointed
in the direction they’re going.

The one thing in these
games that does keep you on your toes is the ever changing prices
and platform availabilities. Here’s another bulletin from that
same press release: “Individual Wallace & Gromit episodes
can be purchased for $8.95. Telltale is also introducing an upgrade
offer today, which allows customers who own one of the individual
episodes to get the remainder of the series for only $19.95.”
And, of course, no waiting! As of this writing, only the first episode
of W&G is available on Xbox – the platform the game was
designed for! Telltale usually releases its games for Wii, too, but
so far no word on W&G on the Wii. Though I suppose that would
be Wii&G?

“The Bogey Man”
is fun, funny and again beautifully made. I can indeed easily see
how a W&G fan who has no discernible interest in adventure games
might love it. Episode four was of a piece with its three previous
installments, although a bit less surprising, a bit less engrossing.
One could almost hear the game designers yawning. I give it an overall
grade of B.

This would also be the
likely time to award a grade to the entirety of “Wallace &
Gromit’s Grand Adventures,” all four episodes together
– B plus. Almost everything about the game was A material, except,
alas, the most important part, the gameplay.

System Requirements:

• Operating system: Windows
  XP / Vista (Vista64 unsupported)
• Processor: 2.0 GHz or
  better (3 GHz Pentium 4 or equivalent recommended)
• Memory: 512MB (1GB recommended)
• Video: 64MB DirectX
  8.1-compliant video card (128MB recommended)
• Sound: DirectX 8.1 sound
  device
• DirectX: Version 9.0c
  or better