Having saved the world from a shapeshifting snake, which could easily be mistaken for the male equivalent of vagina dentata, using little more than a Blackberry Storm, a porn-laden laptop and a ginger – all three otherwise useless objects – Matt Smith’s Eleventh Doctor has well and truly ingratiated himself into David Tennant’s vacant spot as the incumbent Doctor Who. The BBC has wasted no time in announcing a series of downloadable video games, Doctor Who: The Adventure Games, with voices provided by Smith and token ginger Karen Gillan as Amy Pond, materialising in June (possibly just as the current series ends).
From what the BBC has said, these are not video games as much as they are “interactive episodes” something which is not unheard of in Who-fandom since David Tennant presented the 2005 Red-Button game Attack of the Graske. The classic series also felt the lure of the polygon with their attempt to reignite interest in the show ahead of the TV Movie in the video game Destiny of the Doctors. By the sounds of it, however, the Beeb is keen to mention how this is to promote computer literacy among young children because, you know, once you’ve shot a Dalek with a Sonic Screwdriver using a keyboard, programming’s a snap.
Details of the game themselves, written by current Who-writers Phil Ford (co-writer of The Waters of Mars) and James Moran (The Fires of Pompeii and various work on Torchwood) and developed by Sumo Digital and Broken Sword creator Charles Cecil, are relatively lacking. The nature of the games remains a complete mystery save a few choice action-shots of the CGI Doctor and Amy peering around a war-torn city and missing the point of black cabs…
…Here’s hoping that they’ll be on the same video-game worthy level as modern console releases rather than tedious puzzle games, though the indication that they’ll be downloadable (and most likely free) suggests that these will be far from big-bugdet productions.
If they’re just piss-easy puzzle games with a few seconds of flashy CGI – I want my license fee back.
Just to clarify, I won’t be posting a review of every episode of the Doctor Who series currently airing, unless there’s a really awesome episode, though I will likely write a series review once it’s over and I will, of course, review these games.