Wow, it's really been almost four years since I completed this. That doesn't mean I haven't played it since, just not finished it.

Played this in hype for Sponge on the Run but I haven't seen it yet because there's no good camrip yet and they thought releasing it in the US a year after it's Canadian release was a good idea. I'm getting off topic.

So is this game good? I think so, but it's not as good as its predecessor Battle for Bikini Bottom. There are a lot of similarities to it though. The basic gameplay is the same, except some of the moves are different, like Patrick now having a cartwheel move instead of his belly attack, and SpongeBob no longer has his ground pound (or the dolphin noise smash as this game would call it). Also Sandy is not a playable character but she didn't have a major part in the movie so she didn't need to be.

The game also doesn't have a hub world, instead you just go from one level to the next, probably because the movie was told in a linear way and there's really no way to make it open world.

There's also levels that exist for the sole purpose of padding the game out. Three of the last six levels are not scenes that are in the movie, which are Sundae Driving, Welcome to Planktopolis, Minions, and Drive of the Knucklehead McSpazatron, the last two are SpongeBob and Patrick getting back to the Krusty Krab 2 after riding David Hasselhoff, but in the movie, he just launches them to the Krusty Krab.

Another way they pad out the game is by making you go back and play challenges in the vehicle levels, a time trial, a ring challenge, and a macho time trial. If you want to 100% the game, you have to play them and they get really repetitive because you have to do them in one go and if you fail, you have to start over again.

The ring challenges are more tense than any horror game, but I flat out hate the macho time challenges.

There's also minigames in the regular levels where Patrick has to jump on floating blocks or SpongeBob has to go through an obstacle course in his Spongeball form. After this playthrough, I can say that I don't want to see another Spongeball level ever again. Both that and the macho time challenges are my least favorite parts of the game.

This isn't a major issue or anything but I'm not a big fan of the cutscenes. Some of them are fully 3D animated, but the others are screenshots of the movie with generic stock photos of the characters.

Also here's a fun fact I couldn't think of anywhere else to put: Scarlett Johansson voices Mindy in the game, but just the console version.

Overall, I do like it, I just find it frustrating at points. If I had to choose between this and BFBB, I'll pick BFBB any day. Although if they ever make a rehydrated version of this game, I know I'm going to buy it.

this is another one i'll have to go back to eventually, but i'm still confident in my gripes with it. it has all the level design chops of battle for bikini bottom, with the cool addition of ability upgrades. unfortunately, the transition from open-ended platformer to linear game was messy. it's ultimately bogged down by a combination of absurd goofy goober requirements to gain moves, and most of the means of getting extra goofy goober tokens being groan-worthy. there's an over-reliance on side mini-games to get your extra tokens, rather than exploration, which would be fine if the mini-games were less taxing. vehicle and slide time trials can take ages and have to be done in one go, combat arenas are just plain awful (the last one has enemies that game only ever teaches you to defeat using PATRICK), and spongeball/patrick cube levels can be fun but frustrating. also my xbox disc was scratched enough (sold to me that way) that loading back to the early part of the game proved impossible...whoops...