Ty the Tasmanian Tiger 3: Night of the Quinkan.

In this third installment of the Ty series entitled, Ty the Tasmanian Tiger 3: Night of the Quinkan, we once again take on the role of Ty. If you’re unfamiliar with the series, then title explains most of the details of the main character that you really need to know. Naturally, since he’s from the outback Ty is pretty handy with his boomerang. This is your main weapon, along with a few others in defeating the dreaded Quinkan. The Quinkan have taken over the area of Buramudgee in Ty’s absence since the last installment. Along the way in your quest to regain the region from these terrible creatures, Ty runs into both new and old friends as well as enemies. The problem is, one can only guess why the Qinkan would want to overtake Bermudgee?

The story line is quite silly at times and more often than not, seems forced in an effort to give the player a variety of game play. The good news to this strategy is of course the fact that there is a good bit of variety in the game. Some levels involve various vehicles and types of racing as well as some good old shoot ‘em up action in the form of tossing your boomerang. There’s also a lot of close up action with all those Quinkan running around. 

The negative side to the game play is it’s overall simplicity. The ease of game play is appreciated, however I believe that even for an E rated game, it could have been more difficult. This would have played a strong hand in increasing the life of the game. With that said, the game is in fact fun. The options and upgrades, on the other hand, are generally unspectacular and really unnecessary. Perhaps if the game were more challenging then there would be more motivation to upgrade, sadly this is not the case.

The main character is quite fun and is easily maneuverable. His main weapon, his ‘rang, is somewhat enjoyable to use but it becomes quite bland after a very short time. As mentioned before the upgrades that are supposed to counter this staleness do a very poor job of doing so.

A sad fact about this game is that it has no multiplayer function in story mode. You can go head to head against each other in mini-games and what - not but you can’t team up with someone and defeat the levels. I believe that this is a huge drawback in this genre of game. It is my belief that games that are rated E, should by and large have game play that is conducive to parents playing with their children. Kids usually really enjoy playing with their parents particularly if they aren’t playing against them. I’ll get off my soapbox now.

As for the ambiance of the game, the environment is only so - so. The atmosphere and landscape are quite cartoon-ish. This style does appeal to some folks, in particular the E demographic that the game is shooting for. I can appreciate a colorful cartoon-ish backdrop as well as anyone, but I do expect the graphics to be better than is the case here. This is particularly true with the uninventive bosses and enemies. The main protaganist characters are somewhat better but not by much.

The long and short of this game is that it is an easy game for your kids to play and an adult might want to sneak a session in hear and there. The game misfires, however in doing anything even remotely unique or creative, even if you take into account that it is a title geared toward the E audience. The fact that the game is a little to easy and is not conducive to every age group in the house hold having a good time together, severely cuts down on its replay value.