Pen Pen Tri Icelon
- January 01, 2000 00:00 AM PST
The world has seen some odd, odd games over the years, but none hold a candle to Infogrames' PenPen TriIcelon, a body-surfing, ice-walking, fast-swimming penguin racer that'll have kids cheering and adults saying, "What the � ?"
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The PenPen is Mighter Than the Sword
Welcome to Iced Planet, where a race of creatures known as PenPen dance, sing, swim and play. Recently, creatures from other planets landed on the Iced Planet and founded the PenPen TriIcelon, a swimming, body-surfing, ice-walking marathon that brings the best PenPen racers together in a show of pure athletic ability. Choose your favorite athlete from the eight comical PenPens (seven are available from the start, and one must be unlocked), choose one of the four tracks (each with five different races) and find out if you've got what it takes!
Okay, okay, so it's cheesy, but while adults may scoff at PenPen's cartoony look and simple feel, young children will delight at the antics of the roly-poly characters and their easy-to-learn controls. PenPen TriIcelon isn't history's deepest and most challenging game, but it's one you can sit your kids in front of without fear.
Ice To Meet You
PenPen swims with the pack, with graphics that sport the "Three C's" of childrens' graphics: Crisp, Colorful and Cartoony. The bright colors and simple character models keep the action firmly in the playpen where it belongs. TriIcelon really slides on a smooth frame rate, interesting track designs, and a toybox feeling that somehow excuses the fact that the characters are all penguins. Older players might feel nauseous at the game's sugar-sweet characters and designs, but kids will eat it up.
The sounds in this game mostly consist of sliding, splashing and a cartoony "waddling" noise, with annoying little utterances thrown in by the PenPens. You'll be racing along, and suddenly you'll hear this disturbing grunting from behind you, just before you're passed by a strange penguin/walrus hybrid. The music is actually rather good, though, with a tinkly jingle on the Sweets track and a Danny Elfman-esque score on the Horror track. The announcer's voice is sickeningly sweet, but again, children won't care, as they'll be attracted by the candyland visuals.
Each race contains three events (the aforementioned belly-surfing, ice-walking and swimming), and each one requires different controls. In ice-walking, you waddle forward, jumping over obstacles and slamming into opponents to slow them down. In belly-surfing, you must time your wing-flaps perfectly to keep moving along at a steady pace. In swimming, you must paddle properly and dodge floating obstacles. The swimming is actually quite fun, but the other events really don't compete. The simple controls are fairly smooth and responsive; they aren't precise enough for the jaded gamer, but children can easily pick up the controller and play.
Rug Rat TriIcelon
PenPen TriIcelon was obviously made with children in mind with plump, "adorable" characters and sappy-sweet design, which may turn off older gamers. If you have children and want a safe, cute, and simple game, then PenPen takes the trophy.
