You’ll be pleased to hear that I won’t once be mentioning the tagline to a frankly overrated, poorly paced hit US super-hero drama, in this review. Start The Party: Save The World is Supermassive Games’ second furore into the Start the Party franchise, the first of which was one of the flagship Playstation Move titles and was on the receiving end of some very average reviews. If you’re unfamiliar with the franchise, in a nutshell its this generation’s answer to the EyeToy: Play games, only with notably less influence from Gorillaz. The Start the Party games are undeniably aimed at a young audience, what with the charmingly LittleBigPlanet-inspired visuals and the over-all tone of the game.

Start the Party: Save the World premise is that a cartoonish super-villain -aptly named Dr. Terrible, not to be confused with Neil Patrick Harris- who is intent on causing mayhem and destruction through a series of mini-games. As the name heavily implies, the primary focus of this game is local multiplayer and more specifically with the help of your friends. The first issue is that mini-games of this nature are always going to deliver a short-lived gaming experience, especially when STP!STW! has such limited options in terms of gameplay. You can either play the minigames with in a party mode or alone and that’s it,  no difficulty settings and nothing to be said for a competitive online mode.

That said, a neat little feature which has survived the retail transition is the use of faces. In party mode, each player chooses a character -with up to four players-, has their photo-taken and voice recorded, heliumed up for extra child-points. It’s a shame there are only four stock characters, resembling a misjudged Village People tribute act and a trick for even the slightest bit of character customisation was well and truly missed here.

The 20 mini-games themselves are at least enjoyable and utilise the move controller in a relatively successful manner but as ever with the mini-game format, it delivers some fairly mixed results. The shooting games are quite a treat and whilst being short in duration, they’ll draw increasingly bad Tony Montana impressions as the night wears on. Conversely, Astro Bounce is a horrible, illogical game in which you guide astronauts from one space-ship, to another, drawing lines in space in order to prevent your astro-friends becoming space-dust.

It’s incredibly difficult to even think about this game without constantly referring back to the obvious EyeToy: Play! comparisons and the crux of the issue is that since 2003 we really haven’t come a long way at all. Whilst enjoyable, none of the games are even playing the same sport as Wishy Washy, let alone the same ball-park.

For all the bizarre glowing orbs and augmented reality, this game is a prime-example at both showcasing motion controls but more crucially highlighting just how constraining they really are. The amount of time one spends wildly flailing about, and ending up with both carpal tunnel and tennis elbow, is remarkable. Is it fun? Well, yes but for the lay-gamer it’ll soon lose its appeal and will find itself relegated to the level of ‘boardgames-only-played-when-drunk’.

This game was reviewed on the Playstation 3.

To get everyone up to speed, Start the Party is a compilation of mini-games that uses Sony’s new Playstation Move motion controller. As far as being a tech demo for the hardware is concerned, Start the Party is fantastic. The calibration is instantaneous and simple and, regardless of what game you’re playing through, the controller always responds well and feels natural. The games too are reasonably fun, seeing you using the Move controller for a variety of different functions. Whether you’re popping fish underwater, using a fan to waft parachuting animals onto safety rafts or shining a torch on ghosts and other undead abominations, the controls always feel appropriate and well though out.

The move wand shows up on screen as different implements based on which game you’re playing. Though a real paint brush would have been fun…

Fun is clearly at the heart of Start the Party, and the presentation also goes a long way in demonstrating this. The graphics are bright and vivid and fairly accomplished across the board. I usually find that a cartoon aesthetic is the result of an unambitious attempt at visual presentation but, in the case of start the party, the vivid visuals are appropriate and well realised. The Sound is of a similar vein with some fun melodies and old-school cartoon style sound effects. The only major audio failing is the narrator who I just found plain irritating. An option to turn his voice off would have been nice, as small a complaint as it is.

It’s both creepy and humorous how the game captures real time videos of you and your friends in the background

For all the enjoyment you may find in Start the Party as a glorified tech demo, the actual game part of it falls short in comparison to other mini-game compilations I have sampled over the years. For a start, the amount of games on offer is rather lacklustre. The sheer abundance of content on offer in games like Mario Party and Bishi Bashi Special back in the day was outrageous and, it must be said that, the handful of games offered up by Start the Party pale in comparison. The main aspect of Start the Party that enraged me was the fact that there were no games that allowed for simultaneous multiplayer. The party games in my youth all allowed everyone to get involved together, whereas Start the Party would rather see you taking turns. Admittedly the turn based party mode in Start the Party was still highly enjoyable and saves you having to fork out for multiple PS Move controllers, but a true two player game or three would’ve been a brilliant alternative.

Sony’s marketing would have you believe you need to look like a gormless half wit to play. Don’t worry, it isn’t a prerequisite

Start the Party is a fun little romp into the, somewhat momentarily, shallow world of motion Controllers. It is tempting to smooth over the rough edges of the game on account of its budget price but, no matter how we try to justify it, the nine games supplied by Start the Party just don’t hold enough water. Were Start the Party a free demo supplied with the move it would be a shining example of how to use the technology, but as a retail game I just don’t feel any kind of price tag can justify the lack of content on the disc. I would only recommend Start the Party for those with a bunch of friends who need an excuse to use the new PS Move hardware, otherwise you’d be better served by other titles in the Move’s launch line-up.

This game was reviewed on the PlayStation 3.