Buzz: The Hollywood Quiz Review
Game shows are one of those things that no matter what the show uses as a gimmick, you always find yourself sitting down to answer the questions. So having trivia games migrate to the consoles only seems natural, and the Buzz series has found a great home on the PS2. This time around the Buzz franchise uses Holly wood as its backdrop, asking us to test our knowledge of the movies with our friends or by our lonesome in Buzz: The Hollywood Quiz.
The first thing you notice about Buzz: The Hollywood Quiz, is that it comes in a huge package, just like its competitors, including the game and the controllers, which allow up to four people to play right out of the box. The game also supports another set of controllers if you have some from the previous games in the series, for a total of eight players. Buzz also starts up with several modes of play, ranging from a simple one player game to a cavalcade of rounds for multiple players.
Starting up a game is easy enough and the interface is rather intuitive. Each round will present you with a different way to play. One round will have you entering whether a statement is true or false. Another has you playing a game similar to “The Weakest Link” where you answer questions, building up the pot of points. At certain points, you can bank the points, or let it ride, but if you get a question wrong, you lose the points that are not banked yet.
The game has a great visual style, and while not high resolution graphics, its cartoonish style always seems to charm as you are playing. One thing I noticed was the little touches that the game shows you visually. If you skip over the instructions that the Vanna White look-a-like is giving you, she crosses her arms and pouts at the fact you don’t want to listen to her. Buzz will also make gestures and so forth as you make mistakes with your answers. Nothing fancy, but it is the visual attention to detail that helps you get immersed in the game show feel. The game also has a slew of characters you can select as your avatar in the game, all based on movie icons. They add a lot of humor, like the Arnold Schwarzenegger wannabe, that hugs a teddy and pulls out a hair dryer that looks like a gun when he loses or wins. About the only visual item that looks bad are the backgrounds, because they are a bit plain and stale when compared to all the character visuals that are going on in the game.
One of the things that hurt trivia games is question repetition, and Buzz: The Hollywood Quiz uses the memory card to make sure that the repetition is kept to a minimum. With 5000 questions, Buzz will give you a lot of playback without starting to feel the same, but without the ability to add new questions, at some point you will find yourself fighting burnout with the game.
The audio in Buzz: The Hollywood Quiz is top notch, feeling fresh and full of enthusiasm. The main host, Buzz always delivers lines that are funny, but never over the top. The same goes for the characters that never speak words, but more like cryptic noises that sound rather funny when spoken. The music in the background jumps out as a bit obnoxious at times, blaring out quite a bit louder than the rest of the game. It is a bit of a shock to have the volume up for the game, only to have some interlude music knock you out of your chair due to the high volume.
The controllers that come with the game are rather simple with a red buzzer button and color coded buttons that match the answers on the screen. They are contoured nicely for the hand, and are light to hold. The buttons are nice and responsive, never having issues when selecting answers. The spaghetti of chords that connect the whole thing is a bit messy, but nothing that keeps you from enjoying the game. And to be honest, it is the only way the game would have worked without requiring a passive USB hub to split the USB ports for all the controllers.
The game really starts to shine when you get several players in the room to get a multiplayer game going. The game really offers a ton of different modes that really change up the way the game plays. With so many different modes of gameplay, every player will find a section that they can perform well. It also mixes in some funny moments from movies like the pie fight round, which reminded me of the scene in Blazing Saddles, when they have the great pie fight in the kitchen. Having a couple of friends over, I loaded up the game, and in no time, we were laughing and having a blast. If you entertain, this is a great game to add to your library.
There are no real glaring faults in the game, which shows that the developers put a lot of work into the game to make sure it came to market, ready to play out of the box. About the only bug I came across was that in the middle of a multiplayer game, it talked about the enthusiasm in the room, and then my PS2 camera turned on. But nothing came on the screen. I am not sure if it was trying to use the camera, but it did not seem to work correctly. My camera seems to work after several checks, but maybe it was just a fluke.
For the price, Buzz: The Hollywood Quiz offers a lot of play for a small price. You get controllers and a very witty and competent game show title, which becomes a great party game once you get a few friends in the room. Buzz: The Hollywood Quiz gets 4 out of 5 Aeropausonauts.
Recent Comments