I get the feeling of deja vu in wanting to make a point about how “one great feature doesn't make a game”. Portal would've been lame if the point of the game had been a room and the ability to teleport from one side to the other. Similarly Crysis would've been yet “another shooter” if you didn't have all the fun that went into tooling around with your suit.

You can perhaps understand this introduction to the review when talking about Scribblenauts, in that it's a game where you can think of just about anything and create it in the game. From this we then have to take a look at the game that surrounds this feature to see whether it holds up. While the ability to create any object is impressive enough – it simply boils down to a lot of money spent on a creative team and a dictionary. So...

In Scribblenauts the main aim of each puzzle-like level is to move a kid called Maxwell around a level collecting stars. If you're looking for more than that - perhaps the fundamentals of why Maxwell must collect these stars or what cruel and twisted fate placed him roaming these lands searching for them – who knows? Perhaps there's some form of mild narcotic inside them which Maxwell needs to fuel his habit. The game doesn't feel the need to delve into such a pointless thing as a storyline it would seem.

Each level can be completed in numerous ways. After completing them you'll earn 'ollars' which can be spent on extras or unlocking new areas with new levels to challenge you. Completing a level involves reading a hint and then either getting Maxwell to the star, or solving the puzzle in order to make the star appear. As an example you might have to rescue a beached whale, or make an omelette for a caveman. Each time you get a star you can move onto the next level or repeat it in advanced mode a couple of times, which requires you to solve the challenge in ways you haven't done before.

Creating items is simple enough, although you have a limited amount you can create each level. Bringing up a text editor you can enter the item you're thinking of and then create it. These items can range from “fridge” or “car” to “dragon” or “virus”. They say that if it's an object, excluding alcohol, names or profanity (shame) that you can create it in-game. Although they've included the likes of Satan, Santa, The Reaper and Cthulhu, amongst others I'm sure. Of course this brings up the issue of getting an unexpected item instead of what you need. One of the biggest examples of this is should you wish for a bridge, or a surface to span a gap. In almost all the cases whatever object I thought of was never quite right.

They teach you about glue and how you can stick items together. Unfortunately physics isn't the strong point of the game and after the untimely death of a giraffe I was trying to get across a ravine with 2 bits of road glued together and one very spazed out Maxwell trying to help with his arms flailing all over the place – I decided that helicopter + rope is indeed the answer to most of these puzzles. And yes, there is no walking with Maxwell; no finesse whatsoever. If you want him going places, he'll happily move there as if he were allergic to peanuts and eating a Snickers.

This is why it's all very well to include a new and exciting feature, but the wrapper you put it in should be shiny and strong and not have the consistency of a wet tissue. Scribblenauts wrapper comes in somewhere around blancmange with the odd pebble of solid ground work. So long as you're willing to delve into their world, with their rules, then you'll probably get on like a house on fire (use fireman with hose... or rain... or grenade and be done with it!).

OK... so that was a general gripe with the game that surrounds the feature. However, remembering that this game sits really well on a DS, with no loading times to worry about and a skippable intro to each level, you can really fly through the levels you don't like and have fun on the ones that you do. Although I would have to say that for the most part, what you're enjoying is the item creation and probably not the levels as much. Perhaps in a way to appease this grievance they've added a level editor so you can at least have a think about what style of levels you prefer and make a few yourself.

While this review might come across as more “grr” than “ooh” I would argue that this is about defining where the games frustrations lie and not necessarily the elements that make it a bad title. I enjoyed quite a lot of the levels and working out a variety of ways to solve a any one of them. It's also been entertaining to see what others come up with when I've handed the DS over to them. After a few drinks in a group there have been some bizarre solutions. Scribblenauts has at least been easy to pick up, perhaps more so by a generation older than expected when looking at a game's graphics drawn by kids with crayons. PEGI goes for a 12 on Scribblenauts due to violence thanks to being able to shoot, blow up or drop objects on any living thing in the game. That, and you have to be able to at least come close to spelling the word of the item you want to create. Although I suppose that's not inhibiting you sat by the youngster teaching them to spell now is it?

Scribblenauts is certainly a fun game, but one that's marred somewhat by more time being spent on a feature and less on core gameplay mechanics.