Disney's Aladdin

A decade after the theatrical release of the animated film and several 16-bit console versions, Aladdin gets the official GBA treatment from Capcom, but should anyone care?

As far as licensed properties go, Aladdin was smoking hot about 10 years ago?and unsurprisingly, this untimely GBA Aladdin game is an unremarkable action/platformer. As an ?enhanced? port of the 16-bit SNES title of the same name (Capcom has added a new level to each stage), Aladdin is a mind-numbingly simplistic, straightforward action game based on the mid-1990s animated blockbuster. The 1990s saw a flood of subpar platform/jumping games starring forgettable mascots (remember Bubsy?) and uninspired movie adaptations that nearly sunk the genre forever. Sadly, Disney?s Aladdin serves as a reminder of those dark days in gaming as yet another example of the unsightly marriage of mediocre game design and big-name movie licenses (albeit an ancient one).

Boringly basic though it may be, Aladdin isn?t all bad. The welcome inclusion of a handy save feature always makes portable gaming easier. And with the ability to toss apples at his attackers and float down from heights via a homemade parachute, Aladdin does have a few cool moves that help break the monotony of the run-right-jump-over-pit gameplay. The floaty control scheme, however, often leads to frustrating accidental deaths as Aladdin annoyingly vaults off enemy heads high atop precarious platforms. Also, the easy difficulty level combined with the ability to save anywhere will have experienced gamers breezing through this title in as little as two hours (which translates to roughly $15 per hour of ?fun?), making Aladdin a poor choice for anyone outside the kindergarten crowd.

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