Tom and Jerry in War of the Whiskers

Also known as: N/A

Developer: VIS Entertainment

As a former animation student who preferred to work in the classic, hand-drawn style, and liked to create the mayhem found in cartoons like Looney Tunes and Tom & Jerry, War of the Whiskers seems like it would be a game that I would absolutely love. I like the various environments and how interactive they all can be. I like the art direction of the game – it often looks like you’re playing a fight in a cartoon. I like more than I thought I would, honestly…this isn’t a horrible fighting game. Unfortunately, while I like it more than I thought I would, I also don’t like it as much as I hoped I would. The character selection increases as you play the game, but unless you’re a Tom & Jerry nut, many of the unlockable characters will be underwhelming. Maybe I’m just bitter because Droopy, one of my all-time favorite cartoon characters (and another MGM cartoon character like Tom & Jerry) isn’t in the game. Granted, there aren’t a ton of MGM cartoon characters that everyone would recognize, but it still would have been nice to see more of them featured here. As Droopy would calmly say, “That makes me mad.” Gripes aside, this is a so-so fighting game. It’s not bad by any means, but I can’t imagine that anyone would pass up Super Smash Bros. Melee to play this, either. If you’ve ever wanted to control some of the mayhem in a Tom & Jerry cartoon, however, then War of the Whiskers is worth checking out, even if the fun likely won’t last as long as you’d hope it would.

Review added: 03/04/2021

Tube Slider

Also known as: N/A

Developer: Nd Cube

I had never heard of Tube Slider (that I can remember, anyway) before playing it for this site…and I have to say that I am mostly pleasantly surprised by what I experienced. Honestly, the name "Tube Slider" and the generic-looking box art make it pretty easy to overlook this game and assume it's nothing special. Once you pop it in the Gamecube and play a few races, though, you'll find a solid futuristic racer. The first thing that you'll likely notice is that this game is actually quite gorgeous. The tracks lack roads, but instead you race in tubes and these tubes often have windows in them allowing you to see the world outside of the track, and they're usually a treat to look at…well, when you’ve got enough of a lead to sit back and enjoy the view, that is. The next thing that you'll find out rather quickly is that, since tracks are just giant tubes that you're racing in, instead of being stuck on a flat road, you can actually race along every angle of the tube. While it's fun to do that, it can also be a bit disorienting at times. Likewise, it does take a little while to get used to how everything controls, so that, mixed with the tube aspect, may run some people off when they try this game for the first time. Likewise, I see a few people claim that this game is very difficult and that the computer opponents are brutal to race against…I honestly did not have any problems with difficulty. In fact. in several races, I not only won, but by the time the checkered flag waved, I had a very convincing lead over the rest of the pack. I actually wanted a little MORE difficulty out of the game in those instances, honestly. I don’t consider myself a top-tier racing game player, so the only thing I can chalk that up to is maybe I adapted to the controls and using every inch of the race tubes a little faster than the average person? Anyway, Tube Slider isn't perfect - the controls in particular take a bit to get used to - but it's a good racing game that you may not have heard of before. If you like futuristic racers and happen to stumble across a copy, definitely pick it up. I bet you'll be glad you did.

Review added: 08/31/2022