“The Fancy Pants Adventures” Allows for Both Fancy and Pants

After graduating from high school in 2007, I really got into flash games. My family had just bought a new Dell that ran wonderfully and could run then-current computer games. Of course, besides trying a few of those, I also really got into flash games. The one that stood out the most, however, was Brad Borne’s “Fancy Pants Adventures”, which, at the time I started playing, had just seen the release of its second world. As a flash game of the time, it was so impressive for its flowing animation and large amount of content. Imagine my surprise when, three years later, World 3 is finally being released and packaged with 1 and 2 for Xbox Live Arcade?

I will swiftly state that it was worth the admission price of 800 Microsoft Points ($10). The pants are still fancy, and the adventures are even grander.

World 3 follows the adventures of Fancy Pants Man, as he journeys to save his sister from a band of pirates who wish to make her their captain (a little backwards and odd, yes, but charming, nonetheless). Through the world’s 11 different levels, the player will make Fancy Pants Man run, jump, and flip through many colorful locales. As per previous installations to this series, the world itself is presented as “sketch-like,” with Fancy Pants Man who isa stick man with parachute pants. Regardless of its simplistic art style, the series continues its trend of downright fancy animations for its titular character, with new abilities such as swimming and light weapon-based combat thrown in. Fancy Pants Man has the ability to run up walls and other free running talents, and you’ll find yourself using his innate parkour skills to collect all of the squiggles in a single level.

Each level has one ultimate objective; find the end of the level. Getting there, however, has its challenges; from enemies like pirates and ninjas to spiders and rats, along with a specific number of collectible “squiggles” (much like Sonic’s rings) and challenge rooms to complete, each level is pretty packed with content, all of it sprawled throughout the stage. If you can find, collect and complete all of these objectives, then you 100% complete the level, which is the primary draw for replayability – making this a good game for people who like to complete something all the way through.

Speaking of replayability, a large draw for replaying the game comes from the rewards you win to customize your own Fancy Pants Man at the end of every level. While there are 140 different collectibles, you’ll hardly find 25% of them by the time you complete the game. It then becomes tedious to obtain the rest, as you’ll find yourself running through the same levels just to complete them and get a new reward. Not to mention, many of them even seem arbitrary, as the tiny graphics make some of the props indistinguishable and there are still a few that I can’t even figure out what they are. Not to mention that despite the character having many animations, there was very little care added to the collectible hats, as his default hair animations still leak through with some motions, which was something that was honestly rather disappointing.

The largest complaint I have for this game is its level design and lack of a difficulty curve. It was challenging is the strangest places, making it feel very inconsistent. On top of that, I have to admit that later levels feel a bit pointless and very tiresome. I found myself quitting when I started a new level because I was just not into the idea of scouring a new level for pointless collectibles. Unfortunately, the cutesy story and the way it plays out becomes rather grating, as the humor doesn’t really seem to at least reach a demographic I can understand. As a tripe complaint, there were also a few spelling errors and some of the text was just cheesy, resulting in a story that I was frankly tired of by the end.

Fortunately, this game really shines when you find a few friends to play 4-player co-op. The game’s controls have a pick-up-and-play feel to them, and playing with friends reminded me a lot of N+ (another flash game-turned XBLA game). There exists the silent competition to win the most squiggles yet while still working together to look fancy.

If you’ve got some points to spare, I highly recommend this game, especially if you’re a classic platformer fan. It’s a pretty good precursor to a summer that isn’t promising many big name releases. This game really feels fluid and is great in smaller pieces, with the innate attention to detail a great benefit. Looking past the small faults, this game is best played with friends. Always remember to run fast and run fancy!

Pros:

• Great classic-feeling platformer
• Large amount of content
• Fluid and entertaining controls and animations
• Awesome local and online co-op!

Cons:

• Level design feels uninspired
• Collectibles are ultimately pointless
• Difficulty is inconsistent
• Tasks for each World can feel overwhelming