I’d be tempted to call Rugrats: Adventures in Gameland nostalgia bait if it didn’t go ahead and nail exactly what it set out to achieve. Developed and framed from the get go as a throwback to classic, licensed platformers from the nineties, Adventures in Gameland is unequivocally a “made for Gameboy” title through and through. And that right there carries with it a bit of good, and plenty of bad as the game’s beautiful presentation struggles to bear the burden of frustrating, clunky, and dated platforming—not that the game sticks around long enough for it to grate at you.
With just six levels, carefully crafted with an understanding of Tommy, Chuckie, and the twins’ creativity in mind, as well as a keen understanding of Rugrats deep cuts, Adventures in Gameland truly encapsulates a “classic” experience with its truncated runtime of just a couple of hours.
Although I do love how each stage is framed as an episode of the series, complete with the hallmark “ba-baaaa” title treatment, each level is rather formulaic in its construct as you, playing as any of the four babies on offer, carefully crawl and jump through imaginative twists on otherwise mundane settings around the Pickles residence, recover Tommy’s trusty screwdriver, and unlock the baby gate safeguarding the level’s boss.
There’s nothing that really sets each baby apart aside from their unique jump, and how much lift they get. Based on this, I feel like they do fit into the Super Mario Bros. roles to a degree with Tommy being reliably compact and sturdy as a squat plumber, while Chuckie and all of his trademark trepidation fits into the Luigi archetype. Phil and Lil feel similar, save for the fact that Lil has a floating glide at the tail end of her leap that makes her feel like Peach.
And it’s not that the babies control badly, although I do feel like the input gets confused if you’re trying to do too much, it’s everything else in Adventures in Gameland that is far more frustrating. The player hit box is the size of California, checkpointing can be pretty punishing in the game’s final stage, and I don’t recall the game explaining anything. For a game where you’re able to butt slam with the crushing force of a night’s full diapie, pick up and stack blocks to climb onto, and crawl, the game really does just let you work it out for yourself.
Fortunately, for as frustrating as the finicky platforming can be, the game does at least offer a few difficulty options, which is a nice modern addition for a game that tries so hard to recreate the Gameboy’s classic sensibilities. After a few cheap deaths, I was glad to be coddled by the simplest newborn mode.
From a presentation perspective, I don’t think Adventures in Gameland could be much better. As I’ve already touched on, the levels themselves dive deep into the enormity a child’s perspective can grant to pretty humdrum settings—for example, how a relaxing day at a backyard cookout can suddenly become an adventure throughout a tree hollow battling wind-up toys. It’s wildly imaginative and I think pays wonderful homage to some of the situations the babies found themselves in during the show’s run.
It might not include voiceover performance, and I admit I do miss E. G. Daily’s trademark Tommy Pickles voice cracks, but the game’s scripted dialogue is extremely on point nevertheless. The game’s soundtrack more than makes up for it, not only does it open with the expected, absolutely iconic Rugrats theme tune, we get so many great renditions of the same theme throughout including an aggressive metal one that does slap.
For those wanting an even more authentic Rugrats on Gameboy experience, you’re able to toggle between a pretty, almost true-to-animation high-definition setting and a classic 8-bit that’s more in line with how the game might have looked a few decades ago. You’re also able to switch between a full screen and bordered view, which restricts the action to a smaller share of the screen, more in keeping with the Gameboy’s original 10:9 aspect ratio.
As a nineties kid, who absorbed more cartoons than I’d care to admit, likely while white-knuckling a Gameboy, Adventures in Gameland is an extremely nostalgic regression to a simpler time for game design. It bears the warts of the era it’s attempting to emulate, by being a bit clunky and frustrating, however as a Rugrats property it’s as authentic as it gets. In fact, to borrow a bit of the gang’s babble talk, it’s been a worthwhile ‘speriment.
