TAG: City Of The Daleks (2010) Review

Gah! Too close!!

City Of The Daleks is the first part of the Doctor Who Adventure Games series, which was intended to run alongside and supplement the offical show as sort of "extra episodes", a great idea in theory, but let down by poor reception, which meant the whole thing was scrapped after only five episodes(four from Series 5 and one from Series 6).

Being the fan that I am, however, I cannot resist taking a look at these and seeing how they hold up and whether or not they were right to be cancelled.

PLOT

The Doctor and Amy take a vacation trip to 1963 London, only to find it overrun with Daleks, who have discovered a mythical anomaly called "the Eye Of Time", with which they can bend the whole of the time continuum to their will.

As Amy starts to fade away from history, the Doctor is forced to take the TARDIS directly to Skaro to prevent the Daleks from ever having access to the Eye Of Time.

ANALYSIS OF WRITING

This is a rare case where the plot makes sense(the Daleks have completely neutered the laws of time, therefore the Doctor doesn't have any qualms about breaking them either in a way we haven't seen on the show), but I just don't care for it.

It's like this story wants to be a big thing(the Daleks have conquered 1963! The Dalek Emperor is back! It's the original city on Skaro!), but at the same time, there's a casualness about the whole affair that makes you feel like it hasn't deserved to include those elements in the story.

The Doctor breaks all the laws of time, the Daleks are about to conquer the universe, we return to the original city on Skaro, now rebuilt and yet the Doctor's only worry seems to be stopping Amy from disappearing.

Is this why both of Phil Ford's stories on Doctor Who are co-written with the head writer?

ANALYSIS OF GAME MECHANICS

There are two playable characters: the Eleventh Doctor and Amy and you can move around in a 3D environment. However, the control is sluggish and you can't even jump. It's kind of like "Alone In The Dark" or "Resident Evil", which really works against the fast pace of modern Doctor Who and is part of why the whole experience is a glorified puzzle game.

You have an inventory, but it's not optional: you can only use it when the game dictates you can. You have a sonic screwdriver, but it's not optional: you can only use it when the game dictates you can. Both are huge mistakes and take away from the fun of being the Doctor(or Amy). You don't feel like you're driving a car, you feel like you're driving a tram. You're on rails, so to speak.

You have three different types of gameplay: 1) Searching around for stuff, 2) Doing a minigame to complete an objective and 3) Avoiding the enemies.

As you may have surmised, this is incredibly repetitive and boring. The developers tried to spice things up a bit by giving you collectible cards to find, but when your whole reason for playing a Doctor Who game is cards, you know something is wrong.

The environments are authentic to the TV show, but chances for exploration are limited(this was particularly irritating in the 1963 sections, since I wanted to see more of the destroyed London) to the point where the game is literally pushing me away and saying in Matt Smith's voice "You don't need to go there."

What's the point of a Doctor Who game when you can't be the Doctor in it? What Doctor Who needed was something that required thinking AND had free will be a huge component. Being the Doctor means being clever, figuring things out. The perfect game would've been a point-and-click adventure, where you can choose your own way of handling things. That's the kind of game that makes you feel like YOU are part of the story.

CHARACTERS

I hate to say it, but Matt Smith is awful here. He's obviously inexperienced with voice acting and they didn't seem to give him any direction, since he only has two modes here: mumbling and shouting.

Karen Gillan fortunately fares better and seems pretty normal, although maybe a little on edge(I doubt she's done that much voice acting either). Still, her part was believable and enough to get me somewhat invested.

As I mentioned earlier, the Dalek Emperor has returned... somehow and apparently on the Doctor's side since he just lets him and Amy enter the Eye Of Time and undo everything he worked for. Weird.

NOTES

*All of the Daleks in this story are of the New Paradigm design introduced in Victory Of The Daleks, making this the only NuWho Dalek story where the Time War Daleks do not make an appereance.

*For some reason, the soundtrack from Series 3 and 4 is used in this game prominently, most notably the "epic Dalek invasion" theme from when they attacked Earth in The Stolen Earth and the quiet, sad theme from when the Master and the Doctor had a phone call in The Sound Of Drums.

*The Doctor likes James Bond? His complete and total antithesis? What do you think his favourite film is?

*The collecting jelly baby cards is pretty fun(once you get past the disappointment of not getting a character card), although some of the flavours are just weird. Vanilla? Chocolate? Are these jelly babies real? 

CONCLUSION

There are some good ideas in here, but the gameplay is really awkward and not fun at all. The pacing and story are all over the place and the acting is faulty as well. Avoid this one.