Space Chimps for Nintendo DS is a 2.5D platformer, developed by Wayforward Technologies. I wrote down a few of their licensed games after playing a surprisingly good Despicable Me: The Game: Minion Mayhem. Hotel Transilvania was a slightly worse, but still decent offering. Unfortunately, it was only going downhill, as Space Chimps demonstrates that the company is still capable of developing some typical licensed garbage.
The gameplay is a pretty standard 2D platforming, mostly. You can jump, you can barrel-roll in air which acts as an attack against all lifeforms, making the character spin as if it were a Sonic The Hedgehog game. You automatically enter this spinning state if you jump on top of an enemy, but it's always safer to enable it preemptively. You can wall-jump, but it only works on some surfaces, for some reason. Like, the game is not always consistent about which surfaces you can jump off of. You can also slide, which is only really useful in cave levels where you're told this move to slip into tight areas. It takes a second to initiate, so as a combat tool it's worthless. And it's not required in any other level, so its inclusion is questionable. There's also a dodge maneuver by pressing X. Haven't used it much either, but at least it sounds more useful than the slide. Unfortunately, the level design is pretty bland. The game is very similar to Garfield's Nightmare, in that it can have some good ideas and interesting gimmicks, but the level design leaves a lot to be desired. I'm not asking for Donkey Kong Country levels of execution, but at least something interesting. Actually, missed opportunity to turn this into a DKC-like, seeing as it stars primates. The only notable level is towards the end, after escaping the prison thing to the outside areas, which seem to have some festivies on-going. One of the sections has spikes everywhere, as if it were a Rayman game, where you have to carefully navigate on rolling things. And in the last portion, one of the gimmicks from an earlier level returns, the mantis creatures that swoop in certain areas, kinda similar to Donkey Kong Country 3 's Fire Ball Frenzy. Actually decent level design? Even the boss battle is decent, up to this point they weren't much of a challenge. This one has pattern recognition and stuff Unfortunately, you have to trudge through a lot of it's dull gameplay to get there.
There's actually another type of gameplay in this game - flying. And I dislike these. You just avoid upcoming hazards and try not to hit surfaces too much, but the collision can be occasionally janky, and the controls don't feel consistent, as they can feel... slippery. Like if you hold the d-pad for long and let go, you carry momentum. It could very well be the fact that the action takes place on both of the game's screens, and the game keeps you from being in-between of the screens. In any case, these don't feel good.
The game does offer some extras. You can collect coins, with each level having exactly 100, you can also collect 5 butterflies in each level, and depending on your performace, you can get up to 3 golden bananas. There's an in-game shop that allow you to buy extra outfits, like the "Dole®" shirt, or even abilities like a double jump (as you can imagine, it's very useful). At least there's some replay value to revisit all the levels to get some stuff. I don't know why you would want to replay its levels, but the option is there.
The graphics are pretty decent. Once again, similar to Garfield's Nightmare, it's a 3D game, with platforming levels taking place in a 2D plane, although I think that game's graphics are smoother. I did notice stutter when the enemies load. Speaking of enemy loading, some of them can appear right before my face, which feels unpolished. Speaking of unpolished, I did notice one area with cutoff, thanks to the camera panning while holding L button. The cutscenes are pre-rendered and feel a bit cheap. I get it, they definitely aren't going to be the same quality as the movie, and it's a common practice, but... these feel inconsistent, you can clearly feel the framerate dipping in said cinematics. The music is also pretty mediocre. Unfortunately, Jake Kaufman didn't lend his talent, and it kind of shows. Not that it's "bad", but its just so generic. There's probably one track that I can call decent. Another disappointment. Yet again, Garfield's Nightmare beats this game in that department. Can you already tell this is basically a worse Garfield's Nightmare? That game wasn't very good to begin with. One of the few things this game does better over that game is offer more replay value.
Overall, not a very good game, with mostly basic level design, occasionally janky mechanics and those frustrating flying levels, these monkeys are not worth your money (or time. or even space).
The gameplay is a pretty standard 2D platforming, mostly. You can jump, you can barrel-roll in air which acts as an attack against all lifeforms, making the character spin as if it were a Sonic The Hedgehog game. You automatically enter this spinning state if you jump on top of an enemy, but it's always safer to enable it preemptively. You can wall-jump, but it only works on some surfaces, for some reason. Like, the game is not always consistent about which surfaces you can jump off of. You can also slide, which is only really useful in cave levels where you're told this move to slip into tight areas. It takes a second to initiate, so as a combat tool it's worthless. And it's not required in any other level, so its inclusion is questionable. There's also a dodge maneuver by pressing X. Haven't used it much either, but at least it sounds more useful than the slide. Unfortunately, the level design is pretty bland. The game is very similar to Garfield's Nightmare, in that it can have some good ideas and interesting gimmicks, but the level design leaves a lot to be desired. I'm not asking for Donkey Kong Country levels of execution, but at least something interesting. Actually, missed opportunity to turn this into a DKC-like, seeing as it stars primates. The only notable level is towards the end, after escaping the prison thing to the outside areas, which seem to have some festivies on-going. One of the sections has spikes everywhere, as if it were a Rayman game, where you have to carefully navigate on rolling things. And in the last portion, one of the gimmicks from an earlier level returns, the mantis creatures that swoop in certain areas, kinda similar to Donkey Kong Country 3 's Fire Ball Frenzy. Actually decent level design? Even the boss battle is decent, up to this point they weren't much of a challenge. This one has pattern recognition and stuff Unfortunately, you have to trudge through a lot of it's dull gameplay to get there.
There's actually another type of gameplay in this game - flying. And I dislike these. You just avoid upcoming hazards and try not to hit surfaces too much, but the collision can be occasionally janky, and the controls don't feel consistent, as they can feel... slippery. Like if you hold the d-pad for long and let go, you carry momentum. It could very well be the fact that the action takes place on both of the game's screens, and the game keeps you from being in-between of the screens. In any case, these don't feel good.
The game does offer some extras. You can collect coins, with each level having exactly 100, you can also collect 5 butterflies in each level, and depending on your performace, you can get up to 3 golden bananas. There's an in-game shop that allow you to buy extra outfits, like the "Dole®" shirt, or even abilities like a double jump (as you can imagine, it's very useful). At least there's some replay value to revisit all the levels to get some stuff. I don't know why you would want to replay its levels, but the option is there.
The graphics are pretty decent. Once again, similar to Garfield's Nightmare, it's a 3D game, with platforming levels taking place in a 2D plane, although I think that game's graphics are smoother. I did notice stutter when the enemies load. Speaking of enemy loading, some of them can appear right before my face, which feels unpolished. Speaking of unpolished, I did notice one area with cutoff, thanks to the camera panning while holding L button. The cutscenes are pre-rendered and feel a bit cheap. I get it, they definitely aren't going to be the same quality as the movie, and it's a common practice, but... these feel inconsistent, you can clearly feel the framerate dipping in said cinematics. The music is also pretty mediocre. Unfortunately, Jake Kaufman didn't lend his talent, and it kind of shows. Not that it's "bad", but its just so generic. There's probably one track that I can call decent. Another disappointment. Yet again, Garfield's Nightmare beats this game in that department. Can you already tell this is basically a worse Garfield's Nightmare? That game wasn't very good to begin with. One of the few things this game does better over that game is offer more replay value.
Overall, not a very good game, with mostly basic level design, occasionally janky mechanics and those frustrating flying levels, these monkeys are not worth your money (or time. or even space).