Scribblenauts Unlimited is a 2D puzzler that has a rather unique game play mechanic: you can create nearly any object you can think of by simply typing it out. The simplistic art style combines well with their sound design which incorporates a lot of subtle background music, universal voice acting (ala The Sims) and hilarious sound effects. This seems to be purely coincidental however as whilst 5th Cell has a history of mobile/casual game development they haven’t made a single flash game although some of their recent titles were apparently inspired by them. When I first started up Scribblenauts Unlimited it’s art style reminded me heavily of the flash games of yesteryear as it has similar colour palettes and animation styles. Therefore its up to Maxwell to do good deeds in order to collect Starites, the only things capable of healing Lily. Strangely enough Maxwell seems unaffected by this curse but his sister starts turning to stone. That is until an old man curses both of them and tells them that it can only be lifted should they use their powers to help out others. Like any kid with unlimited power Maxwell, accompanied by his sister Lily, goes a bit crazy and starts creating all sorts of mischief. Scribblenauts Unlimited puts you in control of Maxwell, a rooster helmeted kid who’s been bestowed with the incredible power of being able to bring any object to life through the use of his magical notebook. That is until it became available on Steam late last year. The end result of this is that while I was aware of Scribblenauts I never really bothered to check it out. I even bought my wife a Nintendo DS as a present which is still loved to this day but more for its utility value than a gaming platform. I kind of skipped the next couple generations of handhelds though (unless you count playing the demo unit at work) but I did have a PSP for a long time, one that was modded to heck and back. I can remember my GameBoy fondly, it was a giant device in my little hands and I had but one game to play on it: Nigel Mansell’s World Championship Racing. Way back in the day, before I had a decent Internet connection and Steam, I was something of a handheld gaming fiend.

Scribblenauts demo