Family Guy: Back to the Multiverse

This is an episode of the show merged with an average third-person shooter. There's a lot to enjoy, but none of it will knock your socks off.

On one hand the game makes me laugh a couple of times, on the other hand it feels like an ancient beast from the 90's - it even lacks online multiplayer. If you already enjoy Family Guy, you will probably have a good time with this game; if you don't you most likely won't.

Two worlds collide: On one side you get loads of bizarre enemies and hair-raising ideas. On the other you get frustrated by old-fashioned mission design, poor AI and boring gunfights. Like Stewie says: "Again! Again! I love repetition!"

Funny but mediocre shooter that a mother (or a hardcore fan) couldn't love. [Feb 2013, p.78]

While it's not broken, Back to the Multiverse, is very limited and uninspired.

A solid comedic core cannot save what becomes tedious gameplay as you move through the 10 different dimensions of the Multiverse. Throw in the mind-boggling lack of online multiplayer for a suite that clearly could have benefited from it, and Family Guy: Back to the Multiverse should only appeal to fanatics of the FOX animated sitcom.

Archaic third person shooter based on MacFarlane characters. Aiming is weak, pale graphics and wounding vulgarity make for an average-at-best package. Result is for show hardcore fans only.

Repetitive, boring and quickly tiring: a lazy tie-in with almost no value even to the animated series lovers.

The only adjective to describe Family Guy: Back to the Multiverse is absolutely mediocre.

When Multiverse is at its best, you'll enjoy its clever quips and competent shooting. Unfortunately, these highlights are all too rare.

Half of Back to the Multiverse is done exceptionally well. The other half is the polar opposite. The gameplay could fuel any generic shooter, and doesn't feel like it belongs with this property. Stewie and Brian deliver some good laughs that fans of the show will want to see, but working through gameplay this bad isn't worth the effort to others.

Only for fans of the TV series, and we're not even sure if they'll be able to like this poor game.

It successfully adopts the humor of the TV show and the original voices give it some extra authenticity, but at the end of the day, Back to the Multiverse is just another bad third person shooter.

Macfarlane is a man of many talents. Understanding what makes a videogame great is not one of them, unfortunately.

While licensed games seem to grow in popularity and quality, there are still titles that didn't even try to improve themselves. Family Guy: Back to the Multiverse is one of these games. Despite the fact that the game uses the fame of the cartoon series, it is just a collage of levels, most of which are just colorless copies of the situations we used to see in the TV series. Too bad for the Griffin family, they deserved a better game than this one.

None of the key features really hold up compared to other shooters, save for the appearance of Seth McFarlane and his crew of writers and actors. Even then, this would have made for a weakly written episode of the show. If it were down to a night with your buddies in front of the TV with a few drinks, then it would make for an alright rental.

The game isn't funny, and that's inexcusable.

Back to the Multiverse is complete nonsense. Small-minded and archaic shooting gameplay with little comedy and a boring story.

Family Guy: Back to the Multiverse is by far the worst game I've played this year, and I've played Kinect Star Wars! It's a title that's utterly marred by its own identity crisis, with gameplay more suited for kids but with subject matter aimed at adults, and too many recycled jokes to warrant a purchase for diehard Family Guy fans.

Appalling levels, terrible writing, repetitive gags and weak shooting mechanics make for one of the least enjoyable experiences of 2012. Be smart and avoid at all costs. [Issue#93, p.82]

Not good. Not funny. Which is a sin for a Family Guy game.

A functional, ordinary third-person shooter hobbled by simplistic AI and vulgar gags.

Family Guy: Back to the Multiverse is terrible, a bad idea that is malformed. Brian and Stewie deserve a better game. Not this unplayable, short and ugly TPS.

If you're the sort of person who doesn't inherently find the concepts of greased-up deaf people, Amish people commenting on their sex lives, older women grotesquely demanding group sex from frat boys, people in wheelchairs falling over, or "the gays" completely hilarious, do not get angry at Family Guy: Back to the Multiverse.

There is surely scope to make a decent Family Guy game - just imagine an adventure or puzzle title littered with acerbic humor and smart observations. But as a shooter, Back to the Multiverse is a hopelessly moronic, completely pointless experience that will please neither Family Guy fans nor people who enjoy games. In this case, the joke is most definitely on us.

A return to the very worst standards of video game tie-ins, with terrible gameplay and an equally incompetent attempt to mimic the show's humour.