SpongeBob SquarePants Operation Krabby Patty
Ages Everyone

It is weird, irreverent, funny and it's Nickelodeon - need I say more? Well a little more - fast frenzied action with totally irrelevant pursuits. Assembling hamburgers won't save the world - but it just might take your mind off more depressing things.

Basically it's arcade fun, as you collect hamburger ingredients, speed race to qualify for a boating license, steal cheese from fishing hooks, and fire bubble cannons. Game controllers make it easier to play. Two sides - right and wrong allow two to play. All this with the voice-over of Ernest Borgnine and Tim Conway make it an easy time-out for the adults.

Editor Review 11/01

"I'm ready! I'm ready! I'm ready!" That's SpongeBob SquarePants, and he's the first thing you'll see and hear when you put the SpongeBob SquarePants: Operation Krabby Patty CD in your computer. Later in the game, you'll see and hear Sandy, Mr. Krabbs, Mrs. Puff, SquidWord, and the star of the show, SpongeBob SquarePants. You'll see and hear all of the characters on this game that you see and hear in the SpongeBob episodes on Nickelodeon. So if you like SpongeBob, you'll love the game.

SpongeBob SquarePants: Operation Krabby Patty is a one-player game for girls or boys. The game doesn't say what age group it's for, but I think it's good for 7, 8, and 9-year olds. If you were younger, the game would be very complicated. The game might be all right if you're older than 9, but I think it might be too easy for you.

The first stop on the game is SpongeBob's bedroom, and you have to choose which side of the bed you want SpongeBob to wake up on. If you have him wake up on the right side of the bed, you first get to play Invasion of the Patty Snatchers. Guide the robot Mr. Krabs to collect all of the Krabby Patty ingredients from the little red creatures.

If you have SpongeBob wake up on the wrong side of the bed, Plankton has captured Gary, and he makes SpongeBob do all of his commands. The first command for SpongeBob is to get his learner's permit from Mrs. Puff's Boating School. In Boating School 101, SpongeBob has to pass all of the checkpoints before the timer runs out. But be careful: Some of the checkpoints are time penalties, and you don't want to get those.

Whether you have SpongeBob wake up on the right side or the wrong side of the bed, you get to play the same games, but the games are in a different order and sometimes have different characters. In addition to Invasion of the Patty Snatchers and Boating School 101, you get to play Who Cut the Cheese?, Hide N' Go JellyFishin', and Save Me Money.

My favorite game is Hide N' Go JellyFishin'. In this game, you'll be Sandy first, and you'll use a net gun to try to catch the colored jellyfish that the game tells you to catch. Once you run out of nets, you go to Hideout Rock, and then you'll be SpongeBob. (If you can't find Hideout Rock, go look by a clam. You'll see the big rock that says Hideout Rock.) I like catching the jellyfish because when you catch them, you get lots of jelly (like the kind you put on toast). But be careful when you go jellyfishing because the jellyfish can sting you. You really have to watch out for the big jellyfish. You can catch him, but you don't get any jelly for catching him, and he'll sting you every time.

Save Me Money is my least favorite game. I think it's hard to understand, but now I get it. In this game, you're supposed to fire on the pirates, but I didn't know at first which pirates I could hit: The ones with the treasure or the ones without the treasure. I figured out that you have to hit the ones with the treasure. If you point the arrow at a pirate that has treasure and the arrow is blue, then you can shoot the pirate with the bubble cannon. If the arrow is red, then you can't shoot the bubble cannon at the pirate with the treasure. If you see an all-green ghost with no treasure, you can shoot it three times to get rid of it.

Overall, I liked the game. It's fun. I like to have SpongeBob wake up on the right side of the bed better than having him wake up on the wrong side of the bed. But it's kind of cool that you can have him wake up on either side to make the game different.

If I made the game, I think I'd add some races at Mrs. Puffs Boating School. I'd make it so you could race a friend or race the computer.

I wasn't crazy about SpongeBob SquarePants: Operation Krabby Patty to begin with. I didn't like that I had to play the games in order because I was getting bored with the Invasion of the Patty Snatchers. When I finally got past Invasion of the Patty Snatchers, it was quite fun. If you get this game, you might think it's pretty fun too.

Reviewed By Callie K.