Barnyard

The open-ended design is a breath of fresh air, while the overall presentation lives up to the movie's skewed style and humor.

It's no modern-day classic, but Barnyard is still a good choice for young gamers, with a nice unhurried design somewhat reminiscent of "Animal Crossing."

What a shocker. A licensed movie tie-in – based on a relatively unknown property no less – that actually ended up being fun and entertaining for the whole family.

The open ended gameplay, the mini games and a mobile phone to call my own all contribute to a good time, especially if you've seen me in the film beforehand.

With a ton of mini-games (half of which are available out of the box. Nice), a huge free-roaming environment, tons of mini-quests and open-ended gameplay, Barnyard manages to pull off its design quite nicely. Having said that, the game still suffers from the normal symptoms of licensed products, lacking a little polish here, and a gameplay tweak there.

While Barnyard has a few shining points such as the bike and Sharp Squirter, it just isn't entertaining enough to account for a purchase, unless you have children who are really, really into the movie.

An easy, mildly entertaining grab bag of minigames and missions. Young kids will still undoubtedly enjoy the game, and their parents will find themselves sucked into numerous minigames as well.

This may be one of the few games with nearly identical gameplay as its GBA cousin. It won't knock your socks off, but kids who are nuts about the movie might get a kick out of it.

Rather than craft a generic beat-em-up that follows the plot of the film, THQ has created sort of a kiddie version of "The Sims". [Oct. 2006, p.88]

It's just about good enough to entertain kids who must see more of the characters from the movie, but everyone else should stay well clear.

Quaint graphics, recognizable characters, easy gameplay, and many mini-games give Barnyard some staying power with its target audience. For older gamers, the game is entirely standard and boring.