Ice Age: Scrat’s Nutty Adventure might seem like fun on its surface, but it’s a dull adventure that travels through an equally mediocre landscape.
On the surface, Ice Age: Scrat’s Nutty Adventure has potential as a fun 3D platforming adventure. Unfortunately, the game doesn’t deliver on that promise and instead is more of a dull journey through uninspired landscapes. Granted, this probably isn’t a title targeted at adults, but even children might find themselves a little bored after an hour or two of gameplay.
Ice Age: Scrat’s Nutty Adventure stars Scrat, the dim-witted saber-toothed squirrel from the Ice Age movies. Here, Scrat is still chasing his most prized possession, a nut, and finds himself tumbling down another proverbial rabbit hole into Scratazon Temple. To get his nut back, he must go in search of the four legendary Crystal Nuts scattered across the land. Scrat’s adventure takes him across the world of Ice Age, with gameplay involving navigating a variety of landscapes, including forests, icy tundras and volcanic mountain ranges. Some familiar Ice Age faces appear along the way, but ultimately, Scrat is the star of the show.
That sounds promising on its surface, and Scrat is a fan-favorite character from the Ice Age movies. Players might expect hilarity, but most of the “funny” bits are retreads from the films. The gameplay is simple, to the point that even a toddler could probably pick up a controller and quickly figure out what button makes Scrat jump, run and fight. This is a game designed for kids, but it’s almost too simple, and provides minimal challenge, regardless of the age group. The goal of Ice Age: Scrat’s Nutty Adventure is to guide Scrat through each level to find its Crystal Nut by jumping over obstacles, finding hearts (for life) and fighting any enemies that pop up along the way. There are also a few “hidden” areas, which never really feel that hidden. Completing a level gives Scrat new abilities, some of which he can take back to previous levels (via the game’s map) to get to new areas.
Combat is also too simple, with standard enemies and bosses being entirely too easy to defeat. Scrat has just a few moves, including throwing nuts at targets until they die. Although each level has plenty of checkpoints for Scrat to return to if he perishes in his task, he probably won’t die much, even when controlled by younger gamers. But this game isn’t just simple with its gameplay: its design also seems dumbed down. Although Scrat is moving through landscapes from the Ice Age movies, most levels feel a lot alike, with very little imagination put into them. The graphics are okay at the best of times, although they’re not up to par with what players might expect in 2019. The camera is a big problem too, often struggling to keep up with Scrat, which is sometimes bad enough to make the player dizzy.
Ice Age: Scrat’s Nutty Adventure could have been a lot of fun, but instead, it feels like a poor imitation of Crash Bandicoot that was phoned in by the movie studio as an excuse to have a tie-in game to a film franchise. Although younger fans might appreciate the game’s simplicity, Ice Age: Scrat’s Nutty Adventure will probably not hold their attention for very long. Perhaps that is the point: it’s likely that Ice Age: Scrat’s Nutty Adventure exists to keep the franchise present in moviegoers’ minds, not to create a great video game experience.
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Ice Age: Scrat’s Nutty Adventure is available now for PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch. Screen Rant was provided a PS4 code for the purposes of this review.
