When I sat down to write this review of Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie’s Revenge, I was convinced that I had run into a brick wall, with my thoughts about the game entrapped in some inescapable void. I sat down and thought about why I ran into this case of writer’s block and it soon became clear to me -- it’s difficult to write about game that you didn’t particularly enjoy a great deal. Now, does this mean that Oogie’s Revenge is a terrible game? Fortunately it does not, but what it tells me, and what it will in return tell you readers, is that Oogie’s Revenge is a game hindered by the taint of mediocrity and it’s a shame because the game has a lot of potential.

Oogie’s Revenge is the interactive sequel to Tim Burton’s cult favorite stop-motion film, The Nightmare Before Christmas. In Oogie’s Revenge, gamers become the film’s hero, Jack Skellington and embark on an adventure to defeat Jack’s arch-nemesis, Oogie Boogie. As you can imagine, since the game is geared towards a younger audience, its plot isn’t anything too complex, but it has its own fair share of surprises and mystery. To say the least, the game’s ability to tell a story isn’t its biggest draw.

Thanks to Burton’s vivid imagination, The Nightmare Before Christmas is a film that many will remember solely for its wacky and demented design, and surprisingly the game faithfully recreates the unique visual style represented in the film. The curved and angled design of the game’s world, and its Gothic aura, are simply a sight to behold and there’s an excellent amount of visual variety to keep things looking fresh from start to finish. Through and through, Oogie’s Revenge is faithful to the original source material even featuring much of the film’s original voice cast. Although, the truth is that videogames are not solely judged by their presentation values. What matters most is gameplay and this is the area in which things make a turn for the worse.

When first playing Oogie’s Revenge everything seems fine and dandy. The Devil May Cry-like gameplay proves to be easily accessible and enjoyable despite being heavily watered down (due to simple one button combos). However, the gameplay’s faults become apparent quickly due to the numerous amounts of battles you are continously thrown into over and over again. For one, the AI isn’t challenging in the slightest and the game’s auto lock-on mechanism is incredibly flawed. It seemingly locks onto the nearest enemy, which is indicated by an arrow highlighted above their heads, but there are times when it will not attack the enemy your locked onto and this can become a hassle when going up against a large number of baddies. Furthermore, you will quickly grow tired of the game since it throws you into far too many enemy encounters and the attack strategies that are most likely to be used by players are ones that will repeated hundreds of times over and over and with this repetition comes a feeling of boredom.

Boredom is mental state that videogames are meant to prevent and keep us away from, but due to the repetitive nature of Oogie’s Revenge, it’s best to play the game in short bursts in order to avoid any mind numbing experiences that will actually lead to boredom. Not only is repetitive gameplay an unfortunate aspect which results in this, but the game also has a good amount of tedious and unnecessary backtracking. At times, you won’t be able to perform certain actions simply due to the fact that you haven’t triggered the event to do so yet. This is extremely bothersome and forces players to progress in the game in a forced and linear fashion, even though the opportunity to give players greater freedom seems to be easily doable.

Now, you would think I’d have something good to say about Oogie’s Revenge at some point in this review, and if that’s what you were looking for, you’ve finally come across it, so congratulations!

I simply loved the boss battles in Oogie’s Revenge. These boss battles play out like something you would see in a musical. Each one has their own music and specific lyrics and for the most part these themes, while childish, are actually appealing and memorable to some extent. For instance, after collecting a large amount of musical notes that appear on-screen with each successful attack against the boss, players will enter this musical sequence that has players pressing various buttons and moving the control stick in various directions in order to pull of this super attack, which greatly damages bosses. Its very similar to how a DDR game would be played out and is very, very refreshing, especially when compared to the rest of the game’s repetitive design.

Technically speaking, Oogie’s Revenge isn’t something you’d want to show off to your friends. While the game is not a bad looking game, you won’t see it receiving any accolades for its visuals. In fact you’ll even come across a great deal of slow down when encountering a horde of enemies at once. Oh, and don’t even get me started the rough look of the PS2 version... Although, that is the fault of the hardware itself since many PS2 games share that characteristic "rough" look, due to the lack of anti-aliasing.

As a child I missed out on seeing Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas. Back when all the other kids were wild about the movie I just never bothered to see it since it didn’t appeal to me at the time. A decade later I introduced myself to the film’s world with Oogie’s Revenge and I must say that the vivid imagery of the game is indeed bizarre, so spooky and demented that I just can’t help but love it. However, the game’s faithful recreation of the film’s world is not enough to suggest Oogie’s Revenge for purchase. The gameplay itself is far too repetitive and tedious and prevents the game from being something great.