D3 does E3.

D3 was showing three games on the show floor, all of which were media-based but don’t hold that against them. The Secret Saturdays: Beasts of the 5^th Sun, Ben 10 Alien Force: Vigax Attacks, and Astro Boy: The Video Game are all on the display and looking pretty solid.

Leading off the tour was Secret Saturdays, a side-scrolling action platfomer based on a Cartoon Network series. It stars Zak Saturday, the teenage son of the crypto-zoologist adventurer family, but frequently switching characters to take advantage of their skills. He’s pretty handy without much help, however, as he runs, jumps, and uses a claw to swing through the levels. Zak can also use a scanner to identify various animals, with varying effects depending on what he finds. Some animals are just there to be cataloged, others can be influenced to flip switches to deactivate traps, and some can even be taken control of directly. The level I got to play was fun to explore, especially seeing as Zak controls exactly like I wanted with a useful, well-designed move set.

Not faring quite so well was Ben 10, a fully 3D action-platform adventure that felt a bit generic. Ben has all of his transformations available, with different abilities in both combat and movement for all of them, but the level on display looked bland and the combat didn’t feel quite right. It’s big advantage is the sheer number of tools available to the player at any time thanks to the variety of forms available at any given moment. Plus, like Secret Saturdays, it’s voiced by the original cast and meticulously designed to keep the look of the show intact. Fans of both shows should have a good time with each of them.

Finally there’s Astro Boy, which developer High Voltage knows has a lot to live up to after Treasure’s GBA game. I didn’t get hands-on time with this one, instead watching a developer play it, but he knew what he was doing and laid the firepower down fast. Astro Boy is another side-scroller, much like the aforementioned GBA version, with both run & gun and shooter levels. The run & gun sections actually combine punches and kicks with the finger laser and butt gun, so there’s a lot of ways to string enemy damage together. Certain moves like the butt gun can only be used a limited number of times, but destroyed enemies drop glowing purple pips that refill the special gauge. The side-scrolling shooter levels are roughly similar, except no melee attacks. What I got to saw moved at a decent clip with plenty of enemies to destroy, although it’s maybe a bit too easy to spam the special attacks in its current form.

While all three games are based on kids’ shows, it’s good to see some care being taken with the gameplay. I’ve seen enough lazy, half-hearted cash runs to be heartily sick of them, and all three games felt like effort was being taken to do more than just represent a license. Kids (and adults too) are always going to want games based on what they see on tv, and someone will always provide it in some form or other. It’s good to see some effort being made to provide them with something worth playing.