The first Madagascar movie was a fan favorite. King Julien and the very hilarious penguins, along with many other characters, made the movies great. Now after the recent release of Madagascar 2 in theaters, there has been a resurgence in Madagascar mania, and some of you may want to get your hands on Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa.

Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa seems to focus its plot a lot on the movie using platforming and mini-games to progress you through the game. The game really only takes place in an environment called The Watering Hole, which isn't that big of an area. Then there are sub-levels inside the Watering Hole that you must play and beat to get to the end of the game.

Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa is an interesting game to say the least. The game takes aspects from mini-games and platforming to make the experience somewhat original. In the game, your four main characters are Alex the lion, Melman the giraffe, Gloria the hippo, and Marty the zebra. In single-player mode or story mode, the game will begin teaching you the very simple controls for each player. So no worries - you and your kids will be able to play this without a problem. In single-player mode, you use each of the characters for different actions depending on what you are wanting to get accomplished in the game. For example, three of the four characters can't swim in water, and the Watering Hole consists of mostly water. So, knowing this, you must use the character who can swim, which would be Gloria the hippo. Each character had different actions and things they could do - like Alex can climb trees, Marty can run fast, and Melman can fly (sort of). You also get to use other characters randomly during the game. You will get to play as Mort and the penguins as well. The use of different characters was the best aspect of the game, hands down. Getting to play as all your favorite Madagascar characters was not only smart but really enjoyable.

You will have various levels where the game will set you up to do many different mini-games to progress you through the level. Most of the mini-games were fun and very creative. Some of the games Escape 2 Africa brings into the game you may remember from grade school. There is hot potato, musical chairs, and many others. But all in all, the developers made the mini games worthwhile.

But not everything is perfect within this Madagascar world. The graphics, even for the Ps2, struggle to be consistenly good. It seemed very buggy when trying to go from gameplay to cut-scene video. It would try and go to the cut scene, and then there would be a mirror image of the character creating quite a confusing image on the screen. Poor camera angles sometimes resulted in elements blocking the view of what your character was doing, and this was frustrating when you were trying to jump from platform to platform. The soundtrack wasn't that great either. It didn't have any variation. This game had a lot of downfalls, but one thing this game has going for it is it's absolutely hilarious. I found myself laughing on multiple occasions, and that's how I know a kid would really enjoy this game.

But wait, there's more...

Multiplayer mode consists of two players, and mini-games. You can play most of the mini-games from the story mode and a few extras they threw in such as my favorite - chess with the Madagascar characters. It doesn't get much better than that. Although Back 2 Africa's multiplayer is lacking in today's world of online multiplayer, there isn't anything like playing mini-games with a couple of buddies. I'll even go as far as to say, Back 2 Africa has a decent multiplayer that your kids will surely enjoy.

Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa isn't the most perfect game in the world, but overall the game is quite hilarious and enjoyable if you can get passed the bad aspects of the game.

Gameplay: 7.0
The gameplay of Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa was something I definitely wasn't expecting. I was expecting a decent platformer, and I got a mix of mini-games and a platformer game.  Although it was different, I still give it points for being original and somewhat fun.

Graphics: 5.5
The graphics weren't good at all, even for the PlayStation 2. It was also buggy at times when the game progressed from gameplay to cut scene.

Sound: 5.0
Nothing in the soundtrack really stuck out to me. I didn't even notice the songs or sound most of the time. Voice actors did a decent job, but it definitely hurt the game that it doesn't have the original voice actors from the movie.

Difficulty: Medium

Concept: 7.0
This had a decent concept with the combination of mini-games and platformer aspects, but failed to really bring it all together for an amazing experience.

Multiplayer: 7.5
Multiplayer is actually the best thing about this game. I think kids and adults would really enjoy playing some of the mini-games this title has to offer.

Overall: 6.5
This game was hilarious, and it was fun to get to control your favorite characters from the Madagascar movie, but bad graphics, sound, and decent gameplay really took away from the game, overall.