When Drawn to Life, 5th Cell's first handheld endeavor, was announced for the Nintendo DS I knew I must make it mine. The idea of importing my very own creations into a game seemed mystifying and absolutely engaging to me. Once it became available, I happily devoured it, as well as its SpongeBob SquarePants-themed spinoff. I moved on to Lock's Quest, a bird of an entirely different color, and enjoyed it thoroughly as well. One fateful day I caught wind of 5th Cell's latest and most ambitious project by far - Scribblenauts. The possibilities seemed limitless - how could they not be with an in-game dictionary featuring over 20,000 words?

As it turns out, quite easily. Though there are plenty of words at your disposal for use in merry puzzle-solving madness in Scribblenauts, the ways that you can utilize them are unfortunately too stilted to appreciate as much as we all wanted to. Sure, you can find just about anything within this quirky title - anything from dogs, dinosaurs, and unicycles to internet memes such as Longcat and even never-gonna-give-you-up Rick Astley. Many items are duplicates of each other such as the word "nerd" and "geek": you receive a studious old man in glasses. Because of this, the amount of items you can actually realize in-game are reduced slightly.  Thankfully multiple items can be used (i.e. chained) together to help solve the various scenarios, which can lead to some unexpected (and often hilarious) combinations.  Trying giving that "terrorist" you just created a "knife" and it won't be long before you wonder how such an innocent game could turn so wicked.  Hint - it's you.

Scribblenauts requires you to solve simple (and sometimes complex) puzzles using these many different items. There are several different ways to complete said puzzles, though most of the solutions involve some of the easiest possible paths. For instance, you might want to capture a butterfly using a ridiculously large-sized cage rather than a more sensible butterfly net, but you just aren't allowed to. For a game that offers such creative freedom, when it comes to solving actual in-game puzzles, you might find yourself actually using such creative license very little. In fact, the most creativity you'll expend is thinking up several different items and people to populate the title-screen itself, where you have no restrictions or puzzles to solve. Here you can test out all sorts of different scenarios such as a horde of cops and one donut on the other side of the screen, or one zombie and a screen full of regular people.

In all honesty, I had much more fun messing about aimlessly than with the game's several puzzles. While it was intriguing at first to complete several puzzles such as "Give the farmer some farm animals" simply by typing  in some letters, even later scenarios began to feel more like homework than the game we were led to believe Scribblenauts would be upon its long-awaited release. Granted, the puzzles available for solving can be an exercise in fun, but more often than not I found myself wondering why I was relegated to solving puzzles in such simple manners rather than being allowed to experiment much more often.

Visuals are, well, scribbly. They are most certainly not the most detailed or intricate images you've ever seen, but manage to fit the game's tone exactly. Humanoid characters are appropriately gangly and wobbly, ambulating with an undeniable cuteness that makes you want to grab them and hug them tight. The very same can be said for a variety of farm animals, dinosaurs, and other beings you decide to bring to life. The color palette is a bit muted, however, and I would have liked to have seen darker, richer colors rather than flat pastels. Music is appropriately whimsical and airy, though there were no particularly memorable sections that stood out to me.

With over 220 different levels spread across 10 different worlds, there's a lot of game to be had with Scribblenauts.  There's even a built-in level editor that allows you to make and your own creations via Nintendo's WiFi service, although like other games this is limited to those in your Friends listing.

Scribblenauts was a title with so much potential. Still, what's presented is an entirely fresh experience. You won't find this kind of gameplay in any other offering currently available, though it seems as though even revolutionary ideas end up needing a bit of housekeeping before they are unleashed upon the world. With a little more polish and some zanier puzzles along with the freedom to truly solve them literally any way you could think of, this could have easily become one of the greatest games of all time in terms of total immersion and out and out fun. I have nothing but praise for developer 5th Cell for having such brilliant ideas and remain ever-vigilant and hopeful for their next excursion - let's hope it's even half as innovative as Scribblenauts, and that it hits the mark.