Curious George is a monkey that has stood against the sands of time, and has continued to grow. In 1941 Curious George got his first shot of stardom, being released as a children’s book by H. A. Rey. It appeared to be quite popular, and as such six other books followed it to the rise of fame. The books are so popular today that they have never been out of print. Curious George has been a staple of childhood reading, and even while H. A. Rey has passed away, new books continue to come out. As a child growing up, I also loved the books. While that was many... many moons ago, they still have a place in my heart.

Many adventures have been made of Curious George, and the man in the yellow hat. From visits to the hospital, to getting a job, Curious George has done a lot in his life, and each of the books allows for a new chapter for children to read and adore. The long life of this monkey has made it a household name even today. On the longevity of its life, and the overwhelming popularity, a movie had been cast to try and capture it. This movie has been on the back burner for fourteen years, and while the movie has been planned for that long, this game certainly was not. Since this is a giant cartoon movie, of course there was a videogame tie in, but I had hoped they put more effort into it.

Knowing that I would review this game would be different from how a child would, I decided to sit down with my niece and play a bit, each taking turns. I wanted to make sure that I could properly give this game a rating, and with her help, I was able to, and I can tell you right now before going too far into it, it was not an enjoyable experience for either of us. The story is based upon when the man in the yellow hat travels to Africa in search of a lost artifact, he returns with some unexpected cargo, a little curious chimp named George.

Will Farrell plays the voice of the man in the yellow hat, in the movie, parts of which are placed in the game. There are other scenes though where the voice acting does not seem to come from him. Quite a few people talk in this game, and while it does have a childlike undertone, it simply does come together well. This is quite sad, considering it is for children, and the one I was playing with, a ten year old, found that it was more fun to chew on the controller, than watch them. There is one saving grace though, as in the game it is revealed that the man in the yellow hat’s name is... Ted.

Graphically the game looks decent. It is very childish, and cell shaded, but the game is far from detailed. What makes issues worse are the camera controls. You do not have full control of the camera, but you do have limited access to rotate the view. This makes it quite difficult to make jumps from one location to another, without dying several times. I could stand the graphics -- even though the constantly advertise Dole bananas -- but the cameras needed major correction.

I also noticed the shadow of your character was not on all surfaces, such as walking on the top of a wall, but leaping to another rooftop would have it return. Also if you angle the camera correctly, or jump up into an area that the programmers did not block off with an invisible wall, you can see out into nothing. If this game does anything will at all, it is definitely the visual graphics of the game, just not the aspects surrounding it like the camera.

I had a similar major issue when it came to the controls. First there were issues with the double jump feature. The only way you could activate it was by hitting the button immediately after the original jump. This meant you really could not maximize on the full extent of it, and as such will miss landing a lot of jumps, causing you to die constantly. You will respawn immediately, but after you die the camera fades to black, and takes five seconds to fade back in on the game, but you can continue to move around while it is doing that. I did find amusement in killing my monkey several times, like having them run over the front of a moving car, only to be terminated a second later. Since it is a children’s game as well, you were not able to see the death of the monkey, but it -- may -- have made the experience a bit more bearable.

Also when you jump, you slide backwards when you land, ever so slightly. So even if you do reach the ledge, Lilly pad, et cetera, you may find yourself falling off the ledge and dying. This was very frustrating for myself, and my niece, which really lowered the fun value of the game, because even though you hit the target, it was snatched away from you like stealing candy from a baby. This is honestly the most annoying part of the game, which was slightly coupled by the bad camera controls. I also found that you could jump against objects and rather than slide down, you would hover against them for a moment before dropping.

During the game you will also run into little mini games. The earliest one allows you to dance for some sailors, by pressing buttons while they scroll across the screen. It is far from challenging, and watching the buttons takes the attention away from the amusing monkey dancing. All and all the mini games come up as a bust, but the niece did take some amusement from them.

Now the game does allow George to be curious with certain items. You can gain Curious points by poking beehives, opening luggage, and whatnot. Furthermore you can gain points by gathering bananas, and if you get enough of them in a level, you can even unlock a special item in the store. The curious and banana points you get in the level are totalled at the end, where you can then use them to buy items in the store, like a large yellow hat, scenes, and mini-games.