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The Movies...

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 2 / 3
Date: May 19, 2006
Author: Amazon User

This is my review of The Movies; a game that had huge potential, and didn't show it all.

Graphics: 9/10. The graphics are really nice and move nice and slick on a 1 GB RAM computer. The animations are nice, and it all just adds more to the experience.

Sound: 9/10. Music playing in the background and even a radio station guy talks time and time again. The character voices are decent, and the sound effects are cool.

Control: 8/10. It's not so much that it's hard to control, it's just that there are so many different things in this game that you have to do it's hard to remember them all.

Fun: 7.5/10. The Movies is a game that is so much in depth, it's not that much fun of a game to play. It's not bad, but it could easily suck hours and hours of your life away depending on how well you expect to make a movie. Making a movie in this game is a very hard task because there are so many options. The fact that this game is somewhat like The Sims also makes this game hard, because you have to take care of all your players other wise they will just get mad. The Movies is a great game, but it requires a lot of commitment, a lot of time, and a lot of patience.

7.8/10

ONE OF THE BEST GAMES!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 7
Date: March 22, 2006
Author: Amazon User

THIS IS ONE OF THE BEST GAMES!! iT IS ONE OF THE BEST GAMES!
THOUGH, THE SIMS STILL HIGHLY BEATS THE GAME!! I WOULD RECCOMEND THIS GAME TO EVERYONE!! THANKZ

Not Sim-like enough; a little disappointing for the Sim fan

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 2 / 4
Date: January 18, 2006
Author: Amazon User

I was under the impression that this game would have more Sim-like functions; there is little interaction between stars, no ability to personalize sets, and unimaginative costumes. The tutorial is absolutely terrible. As a fan of the Sims, the Sims 2 and SimCity, this game is not what I expected. If you prefer the character and building options with these other games, don't waste your money on this one. I wouldn't buy it knowing what I know now.

Repetitive Gameplay

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 2 / 4
Date: April 17, 2006
Author: Amazon User

After downloading and playing through a demo, I was left wanting to continue playing. Later that week, I shelled out 50 dollars to buy this game. I expected some additions and variety from the demo, but I could not have been more dissappointed. A bunch of extra sets and actors, but not much else. The one part that I actually was pleased with was the music and radio announcements. The sound truly reflected on the time periods that you would play. Other than that, I honestly would say you should just play the demo over and over again until you are bored. Then you have experienced the equivalent of buying the full game for no price and less space taken up on your computer.

This game comes totally under the radar!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 2 / 5
Date: April 24, 2006
Author: Amazon User

Do you like movies? Have you ever wanted to create your own movie but realize how expensive it is? Then, this is totally the game for you and worth every dime. Not only is it a movie studio simulation game, you can actually make your own flicks and upload them to the net, or show your friends. I don't often buy new games at full retail, but this game was totally worth it. The only problem, the expansion "Stunts and Effects" won't be out till June! I can't believe every budding movie maker isn't beating down lionhead studios door! Brilliant!

I'm Addicted!!

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: February 21, 2006
Author: Amazon User

I love this game! I was a little skeptical at first because I didn't think the graphics would live up to The Sims and Roller Coaster Tycoon games. I think the graphics are pretty good and this game is so much fun, and addictive! The only caveat I have with this game is that they could have done much better with the wardrobe, hair, jewelry choices. If you love tycoon games, I would highly recommend this one.

Totally Addicting but Infuriatingly Frustrating

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: July 18, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I was talking with a friend about another game before when he said, "How can you like it? I'm addicted to it, but I don't like it!" I didn't understand what he was saying until I played "The Movies."

Where to begin? This game is one of the most insanely frustrating games I have ever played. It's meant to work as both an RPG simulator game and a movie making tool. I haven't played many RPG sims, but this is a lot of aggravation to go through to make a movie. Let's start with the bugs. Sometimes the actors show up as black blobs instead of actors. Sometimes, when costuming the actors for a scene in the movie, the actors torso will appear as a formless white shape so that you can't see what their costume looks like. Actors will sometime play roles or wear costumes that you didn't assign to them. In the movies, the actors will make annoying mumbling noises unless you insert a microphone and dub over them. The microphone leads to a whole different set of bugs all together.

When the game starts, you have to build a studio from scratch. You also need to hire employees to write scripts, act in the movies, direct the movies, be extras for the movies, build and maintain buildings, clean the lot, and research movie technology. Directors and actors fall under the same category in the game, but you'll probably use them interchangeably. In fact, you'll probably use all of your employees interchangeably, because only a handful of applicants apply for the jobs on your lot. Making movies stars out as a lengthy process of putting screenwriters to work on a script, casting the script, making sure the script has enough employees attached to it, and then filming on the sets you pay the studios budget to put up. Once the movie is finished, it's reviewed. And then the reviews torment you for using a maintenance man as a star and a screenwriter as a director because you didn't have enough actors and directors to commit to making multiple movies at a time, something you'll need to do if you want to make any money at all in the game.

You also need to let your employees have fun without getting drunk, and letting them have fun will stretch out the amount of time it takes to make your movies. You also have to build trailers and nurse relationships between the actors to keep them from quitting. Plus, running the studio is often interrupted by an awards ceremony. It's fun at first, but after a while I ended up fast forwarding through the ceremonies to see if my studio won anything. The game starts in the 20's and continues to move through time until it goes into the future and doesn't stop. Also, moviemaking processes evolve faster than they did in real life, and there's no way to choose which technology you want to incorporate into which movie, so don't count of producing a film noir in glorious black and white in the 1940's.

It's possible to attempt making movies without stressing over the strategy element in the game's "sandbox" mode. Unfortunately, options in the sandbox mode must be unlocked by earning certain amounts of money, winning certain awards, garnering good reviews, and babying movie stars in the main game mode. You even have to unlock the ability to write your own "scripts." This process consists of stringing together different animated sequences, ranging from a secretary seducing her boss to a zombie getting stabbed in the head. There are thousands of combinations of animations possible. Still, there aren't enough possibilities. While you get to control certain elements, such as violence level during fight scenes and the raciness of love scenes, it's impossible to control basic elements such as whether an actor is exiting stage left or stage right. Also, each script can be based only around three main actors, and each actor only gets one primary costume. If you want an actor to wear a different costume in certain sequences in the movie, you must change their clothes in each of those individual scenes. The same goes where choosing a custom backdrop for the scenes. And the options for dressing the sets with props are almost impossible to use.

I've restarted the game twice already. The first time I restarted it was because I did so miserably in the strategy portion of the game that my studio spent a century being multi-millions in debt and I only had three tiny sets to film on. The second time I restarted because my brother accidentally saved over my game in the confusing save screen. After that, I was forced to start earning items I had unlocked all over again.

There are several other frustrating elements of the game, such as being unable to change simple mistakes, like an actor being in the wrong costume, during filming or post production but only during the screenwriting process. Also, in the main game, custom scripts will take more time and money to produce, meaning that making movies the way you want to make them will actually hurt you in the RPG strategy element. And the non-custom, auto-written scripts you will have to produce to keep your studios above water are highly repetitive and hardly ever make sense.

The game certainly has its moments. And it definitely is addicting. The first week I owned it I lost sleep trying to come up with strategies to save my studio from financial ruin. But it really isn't worth losing sleep over. And while I'm addicted to it, I can't recommend it to others.

So far, so good

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: February 14, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I just got this game a few days ago, but so far I have to say I enjoy it. I played a bit on the regular mode, and I agree with other reviewers that taking care of the stars could be a bit tedious. However, my primary interest in the game was making movies myself.

I started another game on the sandbox mode, made it so the stars don't misbehave and the movies are made instantly. If you start with the game in the later years you can get the custom script office and post-production office and customize you movies. If your interest in the game is mostly making movies and not as much in running the studio, this is great. It is a fun movie-making tool.

The reason I don't give this 5 stars is that I wish you could do a bit more customization in the custom movie making. I have made movies in The Sims 2 before, and sometimes it is frustrating sometimes not being able to do certain things. However, it is fun and making movies is the big feature of the game (obviously) so there are many things that make it easier than in The Sims 2. Also one thing that is annoying is that some of their movements, like walking, look clunky and awkward, especially compared to TS2, and I haven't managed to get my custom stars from the Star Maker into the game, but that might just be because I need to play more.

Overall, 4/5 stars, mainly as a tool for making movies. For the game as a whole, 3.5/5. Also, I found it at Sam's Club for about $16.99. I almost bought this back when it was new and somewhere around $.., but I'm glad I waited.

Great, Awesome, Exellent, Fun, (any more good adjectives about this game?)

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: February 19, 2007
Author: Amazon User

"The Movies" is a great game. You can hire people to write your scripts, or (if you win the certificate) you can make your own movies. Their is only 1 problem about making your own movies. If you want the movie to turn out good, the actors need to wear the same thing in every scene! The game makes the actors wear something random, but then you need to change it, so don't make your actors outfits too confusing. If you make a long movie, it will take a long time to shoot. Trust me when I say long. If you have 3 scenes it takes 6 months!! (in the game of course) After you are done filming the movie, you can put it in Post Production. In Post Production, you can add subtitles, maybe cut out some of the scenes, you can move the scenes to different places. But in Post Production, you cannot change the outfits on the actors. That should be done while you are writing the script. Your movie gets rated by critics, your script (for some reason) can only be rated 2 stars. No matter how much stars the movie is you are definetly going to get over [...]. After a while, the movie stops selling, and you need to put in in the archive. Enough about the movie itself. Now lets talk about what happenes behind the scenes. Stars might be concerned about their image. If they are, drag them into the makeover department. You can give them a custom makeover or an auto makeover. I suggest auto because the stars pick what they want to wear. Now it's time to talk about stress. If stars are in too many movies for too long they get stressed. The way to fix this is, put the star in a restraunt or a bar and don't take them out until they come out themselves. Next is aging. Your stars auctually age! They need to retire at about age 70. Next is time, you start your movie empire in 1920. That is about all the important stuff i can tell you about "The Movies". I'm sure that the other reviews will tell you about some of the stuff that I missed.

Addicting!!! But....

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 3 / 11
Date: November 29, 2005
Author: Amazon User

...the novelty wears off. The fact that the movie making experience is very limited, redundant, and totally lacking. The stratagy part of it together with the "fun" and creative parts of the game is completely off-putting. But it's a fun game for the first 5-10 hours of play.

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