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The best thing that can be said about Ubi Soft’s adaptation of Planet of the Apes is that it’s based on the classic 1968 movie and not this year’s ridiculous Tim Burton remake. (The next person who dares use the word “re-imagining” in my presence gets a slap.) Aside from that one reprieve, it’s exactly the kind of cookie-cutter movie spin-off we could easily survive without.
Planet of the Apes kicks off with an opening sequence almost identical to the movie’s, before handing control over to you — a human who is definitely not Charlton Heston, or anyone remotely resembling him, but is stuck inside a prison cell. The problems begin here. The puzzle itself is simple — the key to the cell is hidden inside the bowl of food an ape minion brings you — and I’d guessed the solution almost immediately, but then I gave up on that theory after several failed attempts to interact with the bowl. Eventually, after several more minutes of banging my head against the cell wall, I realized that the key was inside the bowl after all — I just wasn’t standing in the exact pixel-perfect position for the program to realize what I was trying to do.
Once outside the cell, the game progresses as a purely standard mix of 3D exploration, puzzle-solving, and rudimentary combat. There’s a slap-dash feel to the whole experience — the graphics are thoroughly mediocre throughout — though there are enough puzzles to please genre purists who feel the urge to persevere nonetheless.
As I wandered from cave to cave, occasionally trading loosely controlled blows with an ape guard or trying to interact with objects only to be told “This is of no interest,” I realized that I couldn’t have put it better myself.