''It's Mr. Pants'' is a
puzzle video game
Puzzle video games make up a broad genre of video games that emphasize puzzle solving. The types of puzzles can test problem-solving skills, including logic, pattern recognition, Sequence, sequence solving, Spatial ability, spatial recognition, ...
developed by
Rare and published by
THQ
THQ Inc. was an American video game company based in Agoura Hills, California. It was founded in April 1990 by Jack Friedman, originally in Calabasas, and became a public company the following year through a reverse merger takeover. Initial ...
for the
Game Boy Advance
The (GBA) is a 32-bit handheld game console, manufactured by Nintendo, which was released in Japan on March 21, 2001, and to international markets that June. It was later released in mainland China in 2004, under the name iQue Game Boy Advanc ...
. It was released in North America in 2004 and Europe in 2005. A port of the game for
mobile phone
A mobile phone or cell phone is a portable telephone that allows users to make and receive calls over a radio frequency link while moving within a designated telephone service area, unlike fixed-location phones ( landline phones). This rad ...
s was developed and published internationally by In-Fusio in 2005–2006. The game stars Mr. Pants, a crudely drawn mascot formerly featured on Rare's website who had made cameo appearances in several prior Rare games.
Gameplay
The basic idea of the game is to create rectangles which have to be two-by-three blocks or larger to clear them from the grid. Blocks cannot be placed on top of blocks of the same color that are already on the grid, but they can be placed on top of blocks of any other color which causes the different blocks on the grid to disappear.
The game incorporates three main game modes: Puzzle, in which players must clear a puzzle board using a limited selection of specific blocks; Wipeout, in which players have a two minute time limit to clear all blocks from the grid; and Marathon, in which the available grid space is slowly restricted while players attempt to achieve the highest score possible. Each mode has four difficulty levels, ranging from "Easy" to "Special", with each difficulty unlocked after clearing the previous one. Players are awarded a trophy for each successfully completed difficulty level. Upon completing all four difficulties in Puzzle mode, a fourth game type is unlocked called "Max the Mystical Mouse's Muddle", in which players must clear rectangles of specific sizes as provided by the eponymous Max.
Development and release
''It's Mr. Pants'' was developed by
Rare, which, during much of the game's production, was a
second-party developer for
Nintendo
is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company headquartered in Kyoto. It develops, publishes, and releases both video games and video game consoles.
The history of Nintendo began when craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi ...
. Rare was responsible for creating games in Nintendo's long-running ''
Donkey Kong
is a video game series and media franchise created by the Japanese game designer Shigeru Miyamoto for Nintendo. It follows the adventures of Donkey Kong (character), Donkey Kong, a large, powerful gorilla, and other members of the List of Don ...
'' franchise. Early in the course of development, the game went through several name changes including ''Splonge'', ''Nutcracker'', ''Animal Cracker'', and ''Sunflower''.
It was eventually presented by Rare at the
Electronic Entertainment Expo
E3 (short for Electronic Entertainment Expo) was an annual Trade fair, trade event for the video game industry organized and presented by the Entertainment Software Association (ESA). It was held principally in Los Angeles from 1995 to 2019, wit ...
2001 as ''Donkey Kong Coconut Crackers'', one of four titles for Nintendo's GBA
handheld game console
A handheld game console, or simply handheld console, is a small, portable self-contained video game console with a built-in screen, game controls and speakers. Handheld game consoles are smaller than home video game consoles and contain the con ...
.
Nintendo aimed to release ''Donkey Kong Coconut Crackers'' on 7 December 2001, but was likely postponed ahead of time due to the forthcoming acquisition from Microsoft in 2002. In September 2002, Nintendo announced it had sold off its 49 percent stake in Rare back to the latter company; Rare subsequently sold its entire company to
Microsoft Studios
Xbox Game Studios (previously known as Microsoft Studios, Microsoft Game Studios, and Microsoft Games) is an American video game publisher based in Redmond, Washington. It was established in March 2000, spun out from an internal Games Group, fo ...
. The ''Donkey Kong''
intellectual property
Intellectual property (IP) is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect. There are many types of intellectual property, and some countries recognize more than others. The best-known types are patents, co ...
for which Nintendo held Rare responsible, defaulted back to Nintendo, forcing Rare to abandon this theme for the then-upcoming puzzle game.
On August 11, 2003, Microsoft announced their partnership with publisher
THQ
THQ Inc. was an American video game company based in Agoura Hills, California. It was founded in April 1990 by Jack Friedman, originally in Calabasas, and became a public company the following year through a reverse merger takeover. Initial ...
for distributing Rare's GBA titles, including the newly revealed ''It's Mr. Pants'', set for an early 2004 release.
''It's Mr. Pants'' was originally conceived by Rare veterans
Tim Stamper and
Gregg Mayles
Gregg Mayles (born 29 April 1971) is a British video game designer currently working for video game company Rare as creative director. He is one of the longest-serving members of the company, having worked there since 1989.
Career
Mayles be ...
.
The game was chiefly designed by Justin Cook and Paul Machacek.
Cook, who credits himself for creating two-thirds of the game's levels, described ''It's Mr. Pants'' as "just a solid puzzle game", stating, "We knew that it wasn't a big 'wow' game, but the playability was there." After the breakdown of its relationship with Nintendo, Rare chose to rebrand the game using one of their other characters. The team initially considered using characters from the ''
Banjo-Kazooie
''Banjo-Kazooie'' is a platform game series developed by Rare, a British company. The games feature a male bear named Banjo and his friend, a large female red bird named Kazooie, both of whom are controlled by the player. Banjo originally mad ...
'' or ''
Sabreman
''Sabreman'' is a series of action-adventure games developed and published by Ultimate Play the Game for the ZX Spectrum in the 1980s. Some of the instalments were also released on other popular home microcomputers, namely the Amstrad CPC, BBC ...
'' franchises before settling on Rare's online mascot Mr. Pants, which the company used in its website surveys collectively called "The Pantsboard".
The character Mr. Pants was originally illustrated by artist
Leigh Loveday, but the design was implemented into the game by Ryan Stevenson.
Mayles recounted that the "childish" visual style used in ''It's Mr. Pants'' was accomplished by having the
right-handed
In human biology, handedness is an individual's preferential use of one hand, known as the dominant hand, due to and causing it to be stronger, faster or more Fine motor skill, dextrous. The other hand, comparatively often the weaker, less dext ...
artists draw with their left hands to intentionally make the illustrations appear "genuinely bad".
The ''Donkey Kong Coconut Crackers'' incarnation of the game featured the ability to switch between top-down
2D graphics
2D computer graphics is the computer-generated imagery, computer-based generation of digital images—mostly from two-dimensional models (such as 2D geometric models, text, and digital images) and by techniques specific to them. It may refer t ...
and a
3D isometric layout. According to the developer, the isometric perspective was scrapped due to "consistency issues" when swapping between the two views, due to it being awkward seeing where puzzle pieces near the back of the board were, and finally because it "just didn't look as nice" as they had hoped.
When ''It's Mr. Pants'' was first revealed as ''Donkey Kong Coconut Crackers'', the game was intended to be
multiplayer
A multiplayer video game is a video game in which more than one person can play in the same game environment at the same time, either locally on the same computing system (couch co-op), on different computing systems via a local area network, or ...
for up to four individuals using the GBA
Game Link Cable
The also known as ''Video Link'' in early versions, is an accessory for the Game Boy line of handheld consoles. Introduced in 1989 alongside the original Game Boy, it was revised over four generations with varying degrees of backward compatibil ...
.
Rare had experimented with various multiplayer modes during the game's development, but ultimately released the game as
single-player
A single-player video game is a video game where input from only one player is expected throughout the gameplay. Video games in general can feature several game modes, including single-player modes designed to be played by a single player in add ...
only.
Once the game was submitted to THQ, the publisher requested a few slight changes be made. For instance, the "Crayon Snake" that circles around the board in Marathon Mode was originally called the "trouser snake".
''It's Mr. Pants'' was also in development for the
Gizmondo
The Gizmondo is a handheld gaming console developed by Gizmondo Europe. Its development was led by Swedish entrepreneur Carl Freer, who served as chairman of its parent company, Tiger Telematics. The device was originally launched on 19 Marc ...
handheld, but was cancelled due to the console's failure.
Reception
The original game received "mixed or average" reviews according to the
review aggregation
A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews and ratings of products and services, such as films, books, video games, music, software, hardware, or cars. This system then stores the reviews to be used for supporting a website where user ...
website
Metacritic
Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...
, receiving an average score of 73 out of 100.
References
External links
*
{{Donkey Kong
2004 video games
Cancelled Gizmondo games
Game Boy Advance games
Mobile games
Puzzle video games
THQ games
Rare (company) games
Video games scored by David Wise
Video games scored by Robin Beanland
Video games scored by Eveline Fischer Novakovic
Single-player video games
Video games developed in the United Kingdom
In-Fusio games
Microsoft games