Sound:  
The music in the game is appropriately island-themed, but repetitive. People who do fire dances know how to keep the drum beats interesting. This game sounds like someone threw the music together the day before it came out and didn't have time to write more than a few seconds. The worst part about being repetitive is that it gets stuck in your head after playing, and there's nothing worse than having bland music stuck in your head. Turn it down and save your batteries for your CD player— better yet, clank the batteries together and come up with your own rythym.

Control:  
The control in this game leaves you frustrated, and not in a "Super Monkey Ball" kind of way. Not in a way where you blame yourself for messing up and know that you can do better. This game makes rudamentary Mario jumping a chore. Say you have two small islands and you have to jump from one to the other. You make the jump, you fall in the water, and your idiot robot walks all the way to the starting point of the jump so you can try again. Why wouldn't he just walk to the next island when he was closer to it? And if he can go that long underwater, why is he jumping in the first place?

More examples? You jump to a rock in the water and land on it, but the robot falls over and tumbles in the water, taking you back to the starting point. Sometimes there's a robot-eating plant at the starting point and when it takes you back it grabs you. So you press the buttons to get out and fall back in the water! So it takes you back to the plant who grabs you again!

Besides jumping, throwing stuff is also a guessing game. You can press the A button to throw an object, or hold it down to get a meter of how far to throw it. Too bad the meter appears above your head and really doesn't help you determine where the object will land. There should have been a meter along the ground to help you guage your throw.

The L and R buttons are used to assign whatever items you want to use like a "Zelda" game.

Gameplay:
This game tries to BE like a "Zelda" game, but fails. "Zelda's" greatest strength is its intuitive design and the gratification you feel when you do well. Hmm, so in "Lego Bionicle" you don't build with Legos and you play as a robot on an island who throws rocks at enemies instead of shooting lasers and rockets. Oh, and the natural enemies of robots seem to be bugs. VERY intuitive. As for the gratification part, you find the Toa stones and move to another town, that may as well be the same town, to find some more Toa stones.

Even finding rare items to help your quest seems forced. The Volo Lutu Launcher lets you jump further, but you never need it until you get it, so why take an extra trip to the inventory screen to equip it? This is not like "Zelda" where you see an obstacle in your path early on and later figure out how to overcome it and reach a new area— THAT'S rewarding. The Whenua Drill lets you burrow underground like Bugs Bunny, but every enemy can still harm you while you're underground. It's really only useful to get past rock formations that are only there so you remember you can burrow under them.

Multiplayer:
There are several multiplayer mini games in "Lego Bionicle," but it may be hard to find any one else who owns this game and wants to play it.

You earn new mini-games before getting to a new village. Once you've found them in the single-player game you can access them in multiplayer mode. These games include racing games and fighting games and even a dig-for-powerups game.

OVERALL:
Holy crap did I hate playing this thing. Maybe I could have looked past the uselessness of key items if I got through an area quickly, but the poor controls mean you die frequently and spend a long time in the same place.

I think I'll end this review before I go off on another rant.

 

The Lowdown on  Lego Bionicle Aesthetics: Average Control: Terrible Gameplay: Below Average Multiplayer: Sound: Below Average Innovation: 2/6 Lasting Appeal: 1/6 Rating Explanation Overall: Below Average! "Has Some Detrimental Problems"