Previous Next

Daffy Duck is easily one of the best Looney Tunes characters and he's starred in a variety of different games over the years. This latest outing on the Game Boy Color looks at first to be a fairly standard platform title but when you get into it, you'll find it's got quite a bit more depth!

Okay, let's not get too carried away... we're not talking a game as involving as say Wario Land 3, but we are nevertheless talking pretty darn good fun all the same. The plot is fairly simple, as you'd expect from a game based on a cartoon - Bugs Bunny has challenged Daffy to a treasure hunt and Daffy, with his love of all things cash, has readily agreed. Cue a madcap jaunt through six hazardous levels all packed with colourful characters who are out to make sure that Daffy doesn't get to that treasure!

The format of the game is a 2D platform set-up - at least to begin with - and the first level finds Daffy moving from left to right over a fairly flat landscape. As he wanders along, various 'toon chaps try to stop him, including unfriendly birds, egg-laying chickens, 'real' police dogs and, of course, Bugs Bunny himself. Some of the enemies that Daffy encounters simply whack him if he gets too close while others lob projectiles - it's up to you to figure out the best way of tackling each of them.

Daffy's biggest asset is his weapon (oo-er). Now the manual for the game refers to this as a 'smoke bomb' that apparently covers his opponents with soot. However, from the look of the device, it's actually a stick of dynamite, which makes much more sense - who tries to blow bad guys up with smoke bombs? The reason for this somewhat confusing labelling is probably that some rather nervous executive was worried about the impact in today's insanely politically correct society of having a duck running around lobbing dynamite, which is daft - this is cartoon violence, for goodness sake!

Er... anyway, Daffy must use these 'smoke bombs' to take care of the variety of enemies that he encounters on each level and must also avoid the range of cartoonesque hazards that Bugs has scattered around all over the place. These include classic comedy props like the discarded mousetrap and the rake left on the ground, just waiting for someone to step on it.

Daffy also has to contend with hazards such as naturally flaming geysers, which can seriously singe his feathers. If he gets caught, he promptly runs off like an Olympic sprinter until his burning butt finally cools off!

While Daffy Duck is a fairly linear game, it's extremely entertaining, not least because of the excellent Warner Brothers-style animations on Daffy and the various other characters in the game.

Hmmm, not a bad game. Each of the levels has its own quirks and variations on the platform formula and this is enough to keep things interesting.

The only real disappointment is the lack of a save option - it's got a password system instead that seems to work well, but who wants to have to remember them?

Graphics 100%
Detailed and hilarious!

Sound 60%
Not bad at all - nice tunes.

Playability 80%
Great fun if a little slow-paced.

Lastability 80%
The variety means more gameplay!

Overall 88%
A darned good platformer!