DS Review: Grey's Anatomy

Ever since a young age, I've been fascinated by anything and everything to do with the medical field. Some of that may stem from having a long history of medical ailments my whole life, some of it may stem from reading medical textbooks for fun. Whatever the reason, I've owned pretty much every single video title based on a medical premise since I was about 7 years old. (If it was for a system I didn't even own, I'd get it anyway and find someone who'd let me play it at their place. Yes. I am that much of a nerd for this stuff.) In addition, I also watch pretty much all the medical-based television shows that hit the airwaves too - E.R., Scrubs, House, Doc, Private Practice, etc. Last but not least, I can't forget the one that seems to be everybody's current favorite (okay, no hatemail from the House fans now), Grey's Anatomy. I just about jumped for joy when I found out a video game was being made of it.

But of all the companies out there to attempt such an undertaking..... it had to be Ubisoft. The company notorious for having fabulous game ideas, but bad execution. This, unfortunately, is no exception, I hate to say.

Don't get me wrong. There's a lot of nice things I can say about this game too. For instance, the graphics on this game are pretty superb; not only for a DS game, but for being based on real life actors and actresses. The likenesses are absolutely dead-on it to the point where it's almost creepy. In addition, the realism during certain surgical procedures (i.e. craniotomy) have officially been the first in a video game, ever, to nearly make me literally dry heave at how realistic they looked. (I got over it, but still. I was not anticipating such a reaction from myself.) The sound effects aren't too bad, either. The music could be improved, in my opinion, but then I'm not too hot on the music from the show either, and it's pretty darn similar to that. So I guess I really don't have a leg to stand on to complain about that. The dialogue and storylines seem like they easily could have been written by the actual screenwriters from the show.

But, as with anything, there's things to nitpick too.... In this case, they're very big somethings. As with all Ubisoft games I have played this far, the places you touch on the screen don't exactly seem to match up with where the touchscreen picks them up. (And before you start tossing accusations that my touchscreen may be messed up, it's not. I've heard this from countless other Ubisoft players, and I tried the game on 3 different DSes. Trust me. It's not the screen.) This causes huge problems in attempting to play a game in which precision is key. But even so? That's not my main issue with this game.

My big beef with the Grey's Anatomy game is that, while sure, a lot of the television series is based on the interpersonal relationship dramas between the characters of the show.... Who wants to play that out in a game? Maybe touch on a little bit, sure, that'd be fine. But a medical drama - ESPECIALLY one transferred into a game - should be focusing on the actual medical procedures primarily; NOT who's screwing who and whatnot. There's only a very small portion of the game spent on doing surgeries. Look, if I wanted a relationship simulator, I'd of played one of the MANY myriad of games out there that focus on just that. With so much quality in other areas, how could they have possibly screwed this up so badly? I just don't know. Needless to say, I'm very disappointed. Even if you're a die-hard Grey's fan, I can't imagine you'd care for this "game" much.

For those who didn't feel like reading the whole review, my final analysis is bleak. Great in theory, terrible in execution. I give this game a 3 out of 10 clipboards...and it's only that high because of the quality of the graphics.