The Grinch: Christmas Adventures Review (Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5 & PC)

Tis’ the season to be mean—a mischievous grout of gluttony and green. With matted fur of sour apple and brown, he appears not with a smile, but the smut of a frown. Sacks aplenty of tinsel and lice — a mere speck of a human, not pleasant, not nice. But for when Christmas does comes a-knocking, you can rest assured that The Grinch will be there to fill your stocking. — Dr. Seuss, probably.

If you’re easily swayed by festive pulp and frequent rhymes, then you’re in luck. To commemorate the beginning of the Christmas season, we thought that it would be a fitting occasion to slip into our red socks and boil the mulled wine to celebrate The Grinch and all things Dr. Seuss-y. Because let’s face it, if we don’t feast on The Grinch: Christmas Adventures now, then we probably never will. No offense, Casual Brothers. After all, it’s not like you would go trick or treating on Easter.

To set the record straight, The Grinch: Christmas Adventures isn’t a good game; it’s a passable game that leans into its weaknesses to deliver a broken gift that accepts its identity as a somewhat mediocre platformer. It isn’t grand, and it certainly lacks the frills and flamboyance of a picture-perfect seasonal centerpiece. Yet, beneath its crusty layers and crinkled wrapping paper looms a weirdly enjoyable experience that, while a far cry from being perfect, taps into all of the pulpy PSX goodness that we adored twenty years ago. Is that a gift in itself? Maybe, maybe not.

Essentially, what you have here is a relatively short entry-level side-scrolling platforming game that pays homage to Dr. Seuss’ cult favorite storybook. It isn’t with the gift of longevity, and it doesn’t come suited and booted with the ribbons and confetti of a jam-packed co-op topper. Having said that, it does present an easygoing episodic tale that feels oddly charming in its own flawed sort of way, with a generous selection of collectibles, “special” abilities, hidden areas, and puzzles there for you to unlock. Oh, and rhymes. Don’t even get me started on the rhymes.

Where There’s a Rhyme, There’s Another Rhyme, Probably

While The Grinch: Christmas Adventures doesn’t bend the narrative to accommodate additional pages for its binder, it does spread out its stage-based book with a carousel of chapters for you to chomp through. From the opening caves to the festive parades of Who-ville, the game sees you traveling through a selection of boroughs, alternating between two characters—The Grinch and Max, naturally—and collecting gifts and golden puzzle pieces, the latter of which is used to complete side puzzles between levels to obtain more passive abilities, which includes the timeless Double Jump, Candy Cane Swinging, and so on and so forth. In other words, it’s a collect-a-thon with all of the traditional pulp and gameplay mechanics of a cliche-riddled romper stomper. This one just happens to be about Christmas. But other than that, it’s the same blueprint — just wrapped with a green ribbon.

While the levels here aren’t drastically different from one another, each chapter in the game does, in all fairness, feature a new challenge for you to overcome. For example, in several chapters, you may just find yourself tiptoeing around lovable gingerbread folks who, for some reason, have the natural-born ability to kill you with their cuddles. Don’t ask. And then there are the side jobs, which stretches out to jigsaw puzzles—a task that requires you to manually move one of six pieces at a snail-like speed to unlock a new power. It’s slow, and truth be told, it is boring. But hey — at least it’s in tune with the theme.

Aside from the occasional “stealth” mission that you frequently encounter over the course of the seasonal exploit, there isn’t a huge amount for you to achieve. Simply put, you rummage around and collect gifts, and then use whatever tools or abilities you have at your disposal to either conquer a relatively small gap, evade a dangling spider, or bounce over a spiky tile. Again, basic platforming bits and pieces that, frankly, you would have encountered hundreds of times before in alternate worlds. The only thing that gives this escapade an edge over its competitors is its frequent use of rhymes and irritatingly bashful spiel from one incredibly overbearing narrator.

Mean, Green & Lean

Don’t get me wrong, The Grinch: Christmas Adventures is, at least at its core, a brilliant entry-level platforming game that can help aspiring gamers with nimble fingers learn the fundamentals in a way that’s both informative and entertaining at the same time. The challenges are, well, they’re easy enough to tackle if you’re a die-hard player. Yet there is an area here that requires you to collaborate and complete various multi-layer environmental puzzles. There’s also a little stealth involved in the game, too, which is both comical and weirdly disturbing, truth be told,

When it comes to the rest of the world and its festive quarters, The Grinch: Christmas Adventures isn’t in receipt of anything particularly enchanting. Granted, it has its brief spells, as does it have its subtle jokes and appropriate references that harken back to the source material. But to put it bluntly, it just doesn’t have a lot else going for it. With forgettable stages and sluggish controls, clunky jumps and snail-like jigsaw progression, Christmas Adventures does, sadly, fall short of an ideal festive treat. For younger players, though, I’d say that it does just enough to keep the thumbs twiddling and the gifts flowing.

Verdict

The Grinch: Christmas Adventures isn’t better than its heyday classic on PSX, though it does bring a fresh lick of paint to an otherwise dull and bah humbug-ish seasonal experience to help modernize the format. With a lofty selection of levels, as well as a trove of abilities, collectibles, and jigsaw pieces for you to unearth, the game does foster enough depth to keep you and a younger companion entertained for an hour or two between festive commitments.

The main gripe here is the general sluggishness of it all. Aside from the movements being painfully slow, there’s also the sloth-like grappling of the puzzles and the turtle-based progression that forces you to pause and wait for the opportune moment to continue your journey every four or five seconds. This isn’t a bad thing for inexperienced gamers, but for the average player, it is a pain in the neck, and it does sully an otherwise seamless experience.

Having said all of the above, I will say this: The Grinch isn’t a bad game; it’s just a half-hearted follow-up to an otherwise formidable prequel. There’s heart here, for sure, but without the ribbons and packaging of a full-fledged gift, it just falls short of a truly unique experience that befits the spirit of its source material.