Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie's Revenge Review

By Martin Coxall Published 6 October, 2005

Look how frightfully Gothic I am.

Version tested: PlayStation 2

SOUL RUBBER! SOUL RUBBER! SOUL RUBBER! SOUL-

Look, can you stop please?

SOUL RUBBER! SOUL RUBBER! HALLOWEEN! HALLOWEEN!

Please shut up.

SOUL RUBBER! SOUL...

And so on. It's astoundingly irritating, is it not? Especially when you hear it once every second, shouted in gregarious actorial American drawl. But that's just one of the many surprises The Nightmare Before Christmas has to offer you. Every time you use the soul rubber - the primary fight mechanism - that imbecilic ejaculation will screech its way into your brain and make you wish to go on a killing rampage, were it not for the fact that you are Soul Rubbering your way around a world full of the already dead.

It's not clear why anybody bothers with cinematic tie-ins; studios, distributors, gamers alike. It is, after all, consummately well-received wisdom that to within an order of magnitude, every film-derived game has been a steaming, species-shaming nematode of awfulness, the kind of game that makes you want to scratch your eyes out with the controller. Atari started the hallowed tradition with ET, Acclaim perfected the fine art of making unbelievably wretched film licenses, and adherents of the bad-movie-tie-in-game practice their dark arts to this day.

'Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie's Revenge' Screenshot hanky

Jack's cold was getting worse, and he was out of hankies.

Naturally, one of the reasons why such tie-ins tend to be so unspeakably abhorrent is because the rights to use the name in a heavily-neutered and badly-scripted approximation to the story takes up most of the budget, leaving little money to pay the artists, programmers, testers et al.; thus the game gets left to the tea ladies and their 14-year-old nephews.

The obvious way around this problem would be to adapt a film nearly 15 years old. You'd get the rights to that pretty cheaply, yet if that film has a sequel approaching, you can still hope to capitalise on the publicity you hope that will generate.

Well, that's what Capcom has done, and it's a pretty smart move. The Nightmare Before Christmas might have been made thirteen years ago, but has a number of unique selling points: it had a unique aesthetic; it was stop-motion animation that hasn't aged; it possesses a quasi-dark-and-brooding air that self-absorbed teenagers and goths love; there is a haunting Danny Elfman soundtrack. These factors all seek to make a film that is highly memorable, and doesn't seem that long ago. And, since they got the rights relatively cheaply, Capcom would be able to afford to do something really spectacular with it, right?

Well, theoretically, yes. Of course, this being the games industry Circa 2005, what it actually has done is take Devil May Cry, make it look a bit more Tim Burton, and then sell it off as a new game.

Well, we're not fooled.

'Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie's Revenge' Screenshot xfactor

Sharon? Louis? ... It's a no, I'm afraid.

It certainly doesn't offer anything above what Devil May Cry did. In some respects it offers quite a bit less. And, given that in the cool light of revisionism, Devil May Cry isn't nearly as great as everyone thought it was at the time, it doesn't add up to an especially compelling purchase.

Fixed cameras may have been acceptable in the time of Devil May Cry, but in 2005? Tsk. The dramaticam is in full effect here, using its advanced psychic knowledge to position itself to maximize both the beauty of the unfolding scene, and your irritation at being unable to see where you want to go.

The baddies, the way they look, move and the way you dispatch them all feel alarmingly familiar to anyone who has played through any of a number of other Capcom games. In fairness, you do have a rather unusual and briefly fun weapon, the aforeshouted SOUL RUBBER, which is a kind of luminous, semi-sentient bungee that grabs the generic-Gothic-baddy, which you can smash around a few times in a rather satisfying death-combo.

'Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie's Revenge' Screenshot lighting

This season's lighting fashions in Halloween Town? Radically traditional.

Initially, it seems rather unusual and different. But it's not. You quickly realise that these are basically all the moves you'll ever get in the game bar the fairly useless Pumpkin King Jack and Santa Claus Jack modes. These other modes are fun but worthless, except for one boss that's carefully constrained to require the use of all three fighting styles. The fighting gets dull quickly.

In accordance with other Capcom titles, the puzzling elements hover in an intellectual space between easy and brain-dead, which is a real wasted opportunity for this environment, which could have played host to some great and memorable puzzles. Not this-bit-of-Capcom's forte, I guess.

Neither, clearly, is platforming. The one thing you need if you want to have platforming is accurate control. What you get in Jack Skellington is frustrating, loose, twitchy control that raises an ire alarmingly quickly. When you press the jump button, Jack jumps forward. When Jack stops running, he takes an additional step forward. As a result of these two foolish control gotchas, you will fall to a hateful and unnecessary death. Frequently. To compound the insult, the game will then put you back right at the start of the chapter, and ignore your last save-point. Gah.

'Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie's Revenge' Screenshot bbq

Jack's barbecues were always the talk of the townsfolk.

There is, perhaps, only one thing this game really does well, and it is the thing that you would hope they got right, lest the game would be entirely pointless, which is to say the appearance of Tim Burton's beautiful world of Nightmare Before Christmas.

The game offers a wonderful and entirely accurate recreation of the non-Euclidean Gothic paradise of Halloween Town and environs. It's breathtaking, and wonderfully true to the equally Tim Burton original. A great deal of pleasure can be taken wandering around and just staring at things, interrupted only by occasional bouts of the slapping of soul rubber on

skellington.

Taking everything into consideration, it doesn't strike me that Capcom was the right developer to be doing this franchise any sort of gaming justice. A team that specialises in interactive fiction could work wonders in a world such as this. Capcom, in trying to shoehorn one of their hack-and-slashers into this world, have produced something which is beautiful, but incoherent and ultimately rather average.

5 / 10

Read the Eurogamer.net scoring policy
Picture of Martin.

About Martin Coxall

Read more articles from Martin by visiting the Martin Coxall archive page.

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Comments (33) Latest comment 6 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Razz #1 6 years ago

    Bah! Looked nice as well... :/

  • Blerk #2 6 years ago

    Bugger. Nightmare Before Christmas is one of my favourite films. :-(

  • RabidMonkey #3 6 years ago

    I was really looking forward to this one....

    Oh well, might pick it up when it's cheap.

  • kebab #4 6 years ago

    indeed...lots of pc reviews, reviewed by "strangers" o_O
    Edited by 1 at 06/10/05 @ 16:17

  • Furbs #5 6 years ago

    I only see 2 PC reviews on the front page?

  • kangarootoo #6 6 years ago

    " I only see 2 PC reviews on the front page?"

    Stop clouding the issue with facts. That isn't what we are interested in. I'm buying two XB360s and hiding one, for when "they" come and take our consoles.

  • Darkedge #7 6 years ago

    "indeed...lots of pc reviews, reviewed by "strangers" o_O"

    err it's a PS2 game but Martin does seem to be new.. Initiation time any one?

  • Teeth #8 6 years ago

    /racks brain for examples of good licences so he can start criticising the review to look cool

    /draws blank

  • caligari #9 6 years ago

    Everyone knows that Beetlejuice would have made a MUCH better game!

  • mr rick #10 6 years ago

    I read all of this thinking it was a typo when they said this film was 13 years old.

    I remember this like it was, well a hell of a lot less than 13 years ago.

    must be getting seriously old :(

  • kebab #11 6 years ago

    "I only see 2 PC reviews on the front page? "

    9 pc games have been reviewed in the last 28 days, quite a lot, these new comers must really like PC games
    Edited by 1 at 06/10/05 @ 16:39

  • bootsy_NL_30 #12 6 years ago

    did lionhead make this game?

  • RabidMonkey #13 6 years ago

    "/racks brain for examples of good licences so he can start criticising the review to look cool

    /draws blank"

    I can only think of two, one a film license, the other a manga - Chronicles of Riddick:Escape from Butcher Bay and Astro Boy:omega Factor
    Edited by 1 at 06/10/05 @ 16:50

  • Hicksy #14 6 years ago

    A real shame :(

    A license as excellent as this one deserves more... :(

  • Furbs #15 6 years ago

    Its about the same number as have been reviewed for Xbox and PS2 (10 each). Surely you're not saying EG is PC-biased? Everyone knows they are only Anti-Xbox ;)

  • rauper Verified Managing Director, Eurogamer Network #16 6 years ago

    The same number of PS2 and Xbox reviews? OMG BIAS ;)

  • Furbs #17 6 years ago

    LOL, its deliberate isnt it? You're only allowed to put up one PS2 review if theres an Xbox review too! You've caved to arnie and the Highcaliber squad!!

  • posh_geordie #18 6 years ago

    Post deleted at 18:45:04 02-01-2012

  • mr rick #19 6 years ago

    cheers for putting my mind to rest Posh Geordie.

    Oh and decent games based on films you all ask?

    I give you ... Bladerunner.

  • Heds #20 6 years ago

    "Fixed cameras may have been acceptable in the time of Devil May Cry, but in 2005? Tsk."

    Whooooa! Hold on a second. To remove the static camera in, for example, the Fatal Frame series would be to throw a lot of the suspense and drama they have to offer.

    Apart from that, bummer, I was looking forward to this. :-(

  • Aysir #21 6 years ago

    I think the review is awfully harsh on the game. Yes the Soul Rubber chant does annoy but the game is rather well done. It captures the look of the film quite specatularly, it's got all the voice actors from the film and some catchy new tunes for the boss battles.
    And why does everyone compare this to Devil May Cry? Where's the guns? Onimusha or even Rygar are are far better aproximates and in fact Jaques' weapon in Onimusha3 is kinda similar to the soul rubber, making it an infinitely more appropriate comparison.
    The game does have some neat ideas and allows you to use the Soul rubber to pick up objects and hurl them at enemies and the is quite generous when it comes to save points and replenishing your health and health restoriartive infinitely.
    It really does grind my gears when reveiwers don't so much review a game as bash it or praise it without really giving the other side of the story...

  • tengu #22 6 years ago

    Better.

    Than.

    Conker!

  • caligari #23 6 years ago

    The Cliffhanger game was rather awesome.

    Oh...and Last Action Hero.

  • Xerx3s #24 6 years ago

    How can they screw up like this whle the film was quite good? Screens look nice btw.

  • mastertigurius #25 6 years ago

    Aysir: You seem to have missed one crucial point - Devil May Cry, Onimusha and all the other Capcom action games are the exact same game. First, they developed Resident Evil. Good game, with focus on adventuring, but with slightly quirky control (therefore not very good on the action part).

    They refined the control, made a fully 3D-rendered engine, got to a good concept, and released Devil May Cry.
    Huge success.

    This worked so well, that they decided to make a new game. They took the system that had proven itself on the market, and hurled it back to feudal Japan.
    Huge success.

    Wow...this really works! So in the DMC-engine's wake followed a great number of sequels, and they even hurled the engine into cel-shaded animé Tokyo (Crimson Tears). What they've done now, is simply take the engine AGAIN, and hurl it into a psycho Tim Burton, crazy carnival, gothic Halloween-world.
    Nothing new.
    Huge success?

  • Daryoon #26 6 years ago

    Ah well, there's always Kingdom Hearts!

  • Aysir #27 6 years ago

    Saying that DMC, Onimusha and Resident Evil are the same because they share some engine similarties would be demeaning to all three of those games. Does anyone really feel anyone of those was a clone of the other? Each game had a particular focus that made it unique. It's like saying all FPS games are exactly the same cause they all use guns and use the same camera controls - Halo, Battlefield, Doom3 are all very different. Yes Nightmare before christmas is similar to Onimusha and DMC and Resident Evil in only that it is a third person action adventure. It hasn't got any elements similar to DMC at all other than that. It has similar elements to Onimusha3 and Rygar, namely the whip style weapon. The only thing that people see and think DMC is the Chapter style gameplay, fixed camera angles and the name Capcom.
    Regardless of that I think if you like the Onimusha style games and like Nightmare before Christmas this game is well worth a look. It's not groundbreaking but it's not shite either.

    BTW Crmison Tears was Dream Factory developed...though where they went wrong with the graphics after Bouncer i'll never know ;)

  • Buggerboo #28 6 years ago

    Um, did anyone actually proof read this review? It's horribly written.

    Fr' instance.

    'There is, perhaps, only one thing this game does really well, and it is the thing you would hope they got right, lest the game would be entirely pointless, which is to say the appearance of Tim Burton's beautiful world of Nightmare Before Chirstmas.'

    Ugh. Grammar just got murdered.
    Edited by 1 at 06/10/05 @ 19:33

  • Furbs #29 6 years ago

    Robocop 3 on the Amiga for teh w1n \o/
    Oh and you call yourselves gamers? Noone remember a movie tie in called Goldeneye? ;)
    Edited by 1 at 06/10/05 @ 19:29

  • Roamer #30 6 years ago

    A bit burtonesque(yes, that's a word although I'm not sure about the spelling) then, beautiful but shallow. Oh, except for 'Big Fish' where you can swap 'shallow' with 'wonderfully deep'.

  • botherer #31 6 years ago

    Goldeneye, you thickos.

    Martin's not a stranger. He's all familiar and lovely.

  • American_Badass #32 6 years ago

    what a bunch of european fat asses

    "He's all familiar and lovely."
    "Bugger."
    " did lionhead make this game?"
    "/racks brain for examples of good licences so he can start criticising the review to look cool "

    http://85.be /vkweekend/fat-man-flyer.jpg

  • byron_hinson #33 6 years ago

    Oh by the way, I agree with the whole review apart from the fact the weapon is called "Soul Robber" not "Rubber", reviewed the game last week and its called that in the manual, possibly the most annoying bit of speech ever in a game.

  • #34 6 years ago

    an american should never insult other nationalities by calling them 'fatasses'.

    you come from the fattest nation on earth my friend. still, you're not exactly famous for your intellect either, and it shows ;)

  • Donglebomb #35 6 years ago

    > Everyone knows that Beetlejuice would have made a MUCH better game!

    The NES version suggests otherwise.