Publisher: Telltale Games
Developer: Telltale Games
System: PC
Minimum requirements: Windows XP/Vista; 1.5 GHz CPU; 256 MB RAM; 32 MB graphics card; Direct X 9 or better
Genre: Adventure
Release date: Available now
Review by: Michael Smith

Like the sands in the hourglass, so goes Telltale’s episodic series Strong Bad’s Cool Game for Attractive People. The first three stories starring Mike and Matt Chapman’s Homestar Runner web-comic characters have featured a bizarre track-and-field event, a civil war designed to overthrow the town’s doddering old ruler, and a battle of the bands judged by a cardboard cutout of a washed-up rock group. So it comes as no surprise that Episode 4: Dangeresque 3 The Criminal Projective would continue the series’ gleefully twisted storytelling style, this time taking a stab at an old cinematic staple: the movie within a movie (or in this case, a movie within a game).

After a production cycle that rivals that of renowned vaporware game Duke Nukem Forever, Strong Bad has finally completed his latest homemade spy epic, Dangeresque 3 (a poster for which can be seen on Strong Bad’s wall in Episode 3). All of the town’s inhabitants have a role in the movie, and most of them have gathered in the acid-witted luchador’s basement for the premiere screening.

In this ultra-low budget film, sly, hunky superspy Dangeresque (Strong Bad) and his close-to-retirement partner, Renaldo (Coach Z), embark upon a series of perilous adventures. Local environmentalist Cutesy Buttons (Marzipan) wants Dangeresque to find the ingredients for a formula that will make plants grow faster and larger, replenishing the Earth’s ozone layer. Scientist Dr. Experimento (Pom Pom) has had a vital computer disk stolen that would help guide a space ship he’s building in a secret lab, so the doc agrees to make Cutesy’s plant formula in exchange for Dangeresque’s help in recovering the disk. All of this has our hero jetting off to exotic locales (which all oddly look the same, right down to a river and the bridge that crosses it) and battling a variety of nasties.

Gameplay-wise, Episode 4 features the same tried-and-true point-and-click control scheme used in the other installments of the series. You control Strong Bad by clicking on the ground where you want him to move. The mouse pointer (or Wiimote pointer if you’re playing on the Wii) also identify objects with which you can interact. Collectible items, when found, are placed in a drop-down inventory; click on the one you want to use, and then click where you want to use it. The puzzles in this episode are perhaps the easiest found in the series so far; so easy, in fact, that the built-in hint system stops giving hints about halfway through the game’s approximately four-hour length (even when set to maximum hintage). The series’ trademark sense of humor returns as well, although perhaps not quite as savage as it has been in earlier episodes.

Unfortunately, Episode 4 looks like it was rushed out the virtual door before it was ready for prime time. Some of the graphics, simple as they are, look sloppy in spots. Strong Bad’s metal detector has trouble finding at least one item because it is buried behind another object, preventing you from clicking in the required spot to dig it up. There are also an embarrassing number of typos in the subtitles. Some dialog choices remain long after the threads they represent are finished, and the story covers so much varied ground that it’s sometimes tough to figure out what you’re supposed to be doing next, especially after the hint system goes AWOL.

I suppose it had to happen sooner or later. Telltale managed to produce three consecutive winners with the first episodes of the Strong Bad series. They were due for a clunker, and Dangeresque 3 is it. It’s not a bad game by any means; the difficulty level is just high enough to be challenging without being frustrating, the control scheme is simple and intuitive, and the snarky sense of humor loved by the fans of the series is back in full force. But the number of little errors here and there gives me the impression that Telltale took this particular confection out of the oven before it was done. Hopefully the season finale will put the series back in stride.

Our Score: