Once more through the looking glass, Aaron revisits a twisted Wonderland in Alice: Madness Returns… And it was a damn fine platformer too, packed with excellent artistic design and enjoyable gameplay.

It even ran well on my ageing 3DFX Voodoo 2, which was nice.

Its far more than that.

What we have here is a real upping of the ante, and a largely revamped and redesigned experience.

Here you might explore the world, examine various objects and delve into Alices dark and foreboding existence.

Its simply challenging in all the right ways.

Even the camera plays nice, only very rarely getting caught up in the world.

Thankfully, the aforementionedZelda-style lock-on combat system has been implemented very well.

Some enemies require a mixture of ranged and melee attacks, whilst some need carefully timed dodges or blocks.

But, for the most part, its decent enough, and isnt a game breaker by any means.

But again, its a minor glitch and isnt too much of a problem.

As good as the design is, though, there are some blemishes too.

Chief amongst these is some of the worstUnrealengine texture pop-in Ive seen so far.

This glitching is far more noticeable in the London sections of the game, but is present throughout.

I also noticed more than a little slowdown at times, which also needs to be remedied.

This style, which may appear a little dated to some, works perfectly here, in my opinion.

Its all crazy and off the wall, and is all the better for it.

Fall off a platform to your doom?

Dont fret, theres usually a checkpoint not too far back to return to.

However, it also tends to make the game far less challenging, even on the harder difficulties.

Youre rarely worried too much about failure, as youre never put too far back.

Thats not to say the game is a pushover.

Old school

So,Madness Returnsis a pretty good game ,then?

Well, yes, but thats not all.

Alice Madness Returnsis a triumphant return to form for American McGee.

Above all, its a platformer that gets it right.

Alice: Madness Returnsis out now andavailable from the Den Of Geek Store.

Rating:

4 out of 5