The Movies: Stunts & Effects

The Stunts & Effects expansion pack adds more sets, costumes, props, vehicles and backdrops for your virtual productions, along with a new employee type: the stuntman.

For the few dozens that purchased one of the most creative and unique titles of 2005, Stunts & Effects is an absolutely essential expansion that dwarves other packs in comparison; for the thousands of PC gamers who looked past it, perhaps this is an opportunity to go back and discover a game that should be in everybody's collection.

If you were hooked on the original then purchasing The Stunts & Effects pack is a good buy!

The Movies: Stunts and Effects is a great addition to an already stellar title. The new features only add to the immense fun-factor and “sandbox” feel you reap from this game.

A truly solid expansion that adds to the overall experience of the game, whether playing out in the game’s goal-driven ‘campaign’ or in the sandbox mode. The ability to really customize your own movie becomes a deeper experience with Stunts & Effects.

Stunts & Effects adds a lot to the game, but does so without changing it in any fundamental ways. It is certainly recommendable to all fans of the original game, and is a virtual “must-have” for you The Movies filmmakers out there.

A bridge too far for managers, but a wonderland of opportunity for film makers. [Aug 2006, p.96]

The Movies: Stunts & Effects Expansion Pack gives you the tools to turn your Hollywood hits into blockbuster industry-shaping events.

Makes "The Movies" even bigger and better. Great stuff. [Aug 2006, p.82]

A welcome addition to the original, and is a must for lovers of Machinima.

With new scenes and sets, such as blue-screens and miniature cities (for your highly original 'Nodzilla' and 'Codependence Day' movies), as well as the ability to control the camera's positioning within a scene (which greatly increases freedom of creativity), along with new costumes, effects and a bunch of fancy camera overlays like night vision and raindrops, The Movies: Stunts & Effects is an essential addition and should not be missed by fans of the original.

Stunts and Effects is more than a minor expansion pack; it adds enough new wrinkles to renew your interest in the year-old, but still fun, original game, The Movies.

All of the additional creative sets, scenes, and the rest are certainly going to appeal to any movie maker. The same goes for the addition of the free-camera system and nifty new special effects.

Admittedly, many of the other problems haven't been fixed - staff, for example, are still in too short supply - but at least the effects add a touch of pazazz and the moviemaker mode finally works. The name may be misleading, but it was just the medicine The Movies needed.

If you're someone who spends hours making movies with the game though the add-on is well worth you taking a look at. A bit more variety in the next expansion is warranted though as are some tweaks to the core gameplay.

And the expansion pack is a step in the right direction. It's a good upgrade if you're willing to shell out for it.

The movie creation tools are undoubtedly improved by the additions.

In other words, if you're not the gotta catch 'em all type, this expansion pack feels like it actually expands an already great game.

Could The Movies live without Stunts & Effects? Probably, but it's more entertaining thanks to the additions found in the expansion.

The choice on this one is simple: buy it if you liked the original, but don't bother if you were only lukewarm to it.

It seamlessly adds another dimension to the gameplay while piling even more ingredients into the blender. The addition of explosions and helicopter stunts give yet more hours of enjoyment too, for anyone who's daredevil enough to pick it up.

New scenes, sets, vehicles and costumes expand the boundaries of what creative minds can accomplish, and the breadth of this new content is very generous.

No singleplayer game I know offers more scope for creativity, more surrealism, or a more original commercial model. [Aug 2006, p.82]

Budding directors will find a great deal to get their teeth into here, and shouldn’t hesitate to pick this expansion up.

By seamlessly integrating into The Movies, the Stunts & Effects expansion offers a lot of cool new toys for would-be studio bosses and virtual moviemakers to play with.

The big draw is for those that used The Movies to create customized movies. With the new sets, free-moving cameras, and stunts, these players will have plenty to help them get their creative juices flowing.

Overall the expansion adds to the original game by offering the user a tantalizing selection of new effects and stunts to use in the creation of their movies.

All in all, if you enjoyed The Movies, your experience is only a fraction of what it could have been without the Stunts and Effects expansion.

Is it worth 30 bucks? If you're heavily invested in its movie-making tech, or didn't struggle with the late game busywork, the answer is probably, though a 10-dollar shave seems more appropriate since stunt antics add relatively little to the sim game.

If you're into The Movies for the strategy sim, there's nothing noteworthy added in Stunts & Effects. But if you enjoyed building your own films, the freecam and the improved prop placement options alone are worth the price, while the props, sets, costumes, and effects merely add to the moviemaking experience.

Unfortunately, the introduction of stuntmen adds even more micromanagement to the already-laborious game.

Unfortunately, the biggest problem from the core title still hasn't been addressed, and that's the extremely limited number of available workers.

The Movies: Stunts & Effects adds some top quality content, but fails to address the major issues that held the initial game back.

So, while The Movies: Stunts & Effects Expansion Pack offers plenty for the hardcore moviemakers who compose the original release's main fanbase, more casual players will gain little from the expansion pack.

The Movies is still a dangerously addictive game, and the options added through the expansion pack make this even more so true; it’s just a sad fact players who couldn’t get over the interface and management issues of the original title won’t find a major reason to return for The Movies: Stunts & Effects.