Like plenty of folks from my generation, I absolutely adore The Princess Bride. The combination of colorful characters, witty one-liners and an off-beat fairy tale ending have left a lasting effect on many that have enjoyed the film. Unfortunately, fans hoping for some kind of expansion to the universe will be a disappointed with The Princess Bride – The Official Game ($3.99). However, there’s just enough fan service in the collection of simplistic mini-games that it’s certainly worth buying for any fan of the film.
Currently, Princess Bride features four arcade mini-games, each based on a particular scene from the movie. ‘Shrieking Eels’ has you tapping the heads of eels before they get to Princess Buttercup stranded in the water. ‘Cliffs of Insanity’ is a tilt-based mini game that has you avoiding obstacles in a slow-moving vertical endless runner. Meanwhile, ‘Battle of Steel’ is essentially a fruit ninja clone with the battle between Westley and Inigo in the background while ‘Battle of Strength’ is a simple swipe-based battle against Fezzik. Each of the mini-games are endless in nature and include separate leaderboards and objectives that award stars. The stars serve three purposes: they are used as initial gates to unlocking each of the mini-games, serve as replayability drives as the challenges get harder with each star unlock and are used to unlock sound bites from the movie.
Being a collection of mini-games, sadly there’s not much more to say about Princess Bride in terms of actual gameplay. Each of the games are well-balanced and randomized enough that a play through doesn’t become boring. In addition, the availability of leaderboards adds that extra dimension of competition that adds to the replayability aspect. However, none of that changes the fact that the games are, by their nature, highly simplistic and repetitive. The fact that there’s only four games available at this point is a little disappointing as well (although free updates have been promised in the future). Obviously fans of simple arcade games won’t be troubled by this but folks looking for something deeper will need to look elsewhere.
With that said, where The Princess Bride shines is in its fan service. The sound bites that are unlocked are classic lines from the movie that can be played endlessly. Meanwhile, launching a mini-game treats the player to a small three-image montage from the film. The art style for each mini-game is highly stylized but does a decent job of preserving the classic scenes from the film. Even little touches such as including The Impressive Clergyman on the pause screen do a great job offering just a little more for those players that are true fans of the movie.
Whether the fan service is enough to warrant picking up the game may be a tough question. For me, it’s hardly a question to ask as I thoroughly enjoyed the movie and appreciate the fan service being offered in The Princess Bride – The Official Game. For other fans of the cult hit, I have a hunch they will share that feeling. Alas, if you don’t have a strong attachment to the film there probably isn’t enough here at this time to warrant a purchase.
