Refine search for Video Games

Xbox 360 Party Game Roundup

Author	Stuart Andrews
Published	21st Dec 2008
Manufacturer	Microsoft Game Studio
Supplier	hmv.co.uk
Price	£29.79 (Exc VAT)
as reviewed	£35.00 (Inc VAT)
Latest Price	Click here

Overall

5 comments Email

TrustedReviews Newsletters

Scene It? Box Office Smash is a good example of how you can improve practically every area of an already decent game, then comprehensively blow the whole thing through one basic failing. It's in clutching distance of being my favourite quiz game ever, but its biggest shortcoming is so fundamental and irritating that it spoils everything else about the game.

The good stuff is very, very good. Scene It? Lights, Camera, Action was a lot of fun providing you were a movie fan and you had a family of movie fans to share it with, and the wireless Big Button Controllers were - and still are - more elegant and refined than the ones supplied for Buzz. Its biggest failing was the framework that tied the various quiz show rounds together - a sort of Hollywood studio tour with an irritating (though mercifully unseen) presenter and a fair amount of repetitive, linking cut-scenes that soon wore thin.

Box Office Smash junks this in, and it's all the better for it. The action now takes place on a battered old sofa in a cinema, and you can now choose between pre-built characters and your brand-spanking-new NXE Avatars to represent you on the screen, adding a little Wii-style personality to the game. There are cut-scenes and explanations to get through before each round, but these have been kept mercifully short, making the average game of Box Office Smash a quick, slick, annoyance-free experience.

Lights, Camera, Action already had a more innovative approach to quiz rounds than Buzz and Box Office Smash carries on the good work. There seem to be more clips (and more HD clips) than last time around, and much-cherished old rounds, like the one where you have to guess a movie title from a doodle or the one where you have to arrange movies by release date, are joined by some interesting new ones, my favourite being the one where you guess the film from a scene recreated as an animation from an old, 8-bit video game. One notable exploit employed by Lights, Camera, Action! cheats - buzz in early on a question then use the long pause to guesstimate the answer - has been dealt with by a more draconian time limit, and generally the rounds work pretty well.

Latest 4 of 5 Comments

Have your say: Leave a comment below about this article.

StuAndrews said on 22nd December 2008

It's not so much that they're mediocre, more that they're all promising but have at least one disastrous flaw. I quite like all three products, but I just can't... more

Wilfried said on 22nd December 2008

I'll have to disagree with ilovethemonkeyhead, sorry. Most families cannot afford either a PS3 or a 360, let alone a PS3 and a Wii or a 360 and a Wii. The reason they head str... more

mr dog said on 23rd December 2008

my experience is that i bought the wii first on the strength of excellent release titles like mario galaxy and zelda, but found too few must-have single player games to make it wor... more

Wilfried said on 24th December 2008

I'm the same as you mr dog. My colleagues, most of whom have kids, have pretty much all gone for a Wii. One of my regular game supplier also mentioned that the Wii was his big... more

See all 5 comments on this article.

Add your comment

You must be logged in to comment. Login or register here.