The Layton Movie is just the way I would’ve liked it—a believably unbelievable story (although this one leans much more towards unbelievable), and a heartwarming if not slightly cheesy ending.
If you’ve played the last few Layton games, you should be able to predict almost every plot-related element except for the puzzles’ solutions. So as long as you’re cool with repetitive narrative patterns, then you can enjoy the movie’s wait-now-its-a-this-no-its-a-that-no-its-THIS moments, bionic animals, gigantic machinery, excellent villain meltdowns, fencing and a catastrophically crashtastic ending. Oh, and lots of opera. Gotta kick up that English Gentleman quotient a notch every now and then.
The plot is far-fetched, but fun (I technically could’ve hoped for a realistic ending from the glimpse of plausibility in the Curious Village’s conclusion, but plausibility/realism has been on a delightful, screaming downfall in successive games. No complaints, though). Remi, who is the most recent addition to Layton’s team, totally kicks butt as the super-strong female character, and balances out the general helplessness of Jenice, the resident opera diva in distress, nicely.
The movie has a total of four puzzles, complete with the 00X formatting and in-game puzzle music. The answers are only slightly satisfying in movie form though because you’re not the one solving them. They have more of the Phoenix Wright satisfaction attached—you might solve the bigger picture in the ongoing mystery, but Phoenix’s following explanations flush out the rest of the gaps in logic. You solve the wars, but not the battles, I guess; I think that’s just how it goes with interactive fiction. Layton’s logic is pretty quick, so if you actually want a crack at solving the puzzle yourself then I suggest pausing the movie.
If you like the Layton series, then I definitely recommend giving this movie a go. I would go as far to say that it's definitely one of the better, maybe best, games-related movies I have seen. I wish I could say it was a solid animated film all the way around, but I’m afraid my bias would be showing. And that's just not becoming of an American gentlewoman.
I’ll wrap up this first-glance review by rating characters by their usefulness factor in the movie's plot. In Picarats. What else. Grab a cup of tea and see how they stack up:
Professor Layton – The man is a suave blend of James Bond and MacGyver. If he tried, I’m pretty sure he could be an English gentleman version of the Old Spice guy. He can think his way out of anything and doesn’t miss a beat in the movie.
200/100 Picarats.
Luke – Those hardly-animated game sprites in the Layton games really mask his clumsiness, which is ratcheted up to full force for this movie. He’s a clutz with a heart of gold that also happens to be made of sheer determination.
He was the only character I noticed to have a double line (he says, “Professor! The ceiling!” twice throughout the movie). He solves one, maybe two puzzles. His special ability, conversing with animals, proves useless. I was going to give him a 10/100 Picarats, until he redeemed himself in an over-the-top, ridiculous scene for a final 60/100 Picarats.
Remi – This girl kicks as much butt as The Bride/Uma Thurman from Kill Bill (just with less blood and katana; but, yes, she does wear just as much banana yellow clothing). Despite being absent from most of the movie, she comes in where it counts and can fight for the whole group when she has to (aka, 90% of the time). She doesn’t solve major puzzles, but supports with helpful sleuthing. 80/100 Picarats.
Jenice – Emotionally tough and surprisingly capable at times, despite weighing all of 40 pounds (with her head probably weighing 20) and looking like she could snap in half any moment. Not bad for the character who summoned Layton for help.
70/100 Picarats.
Meghan Ventura is senior editor/social media coordinator at MyGamer.com, and writes about Japanese video games and culture at her blog, KanjiGames. Send her your Hint Coins on Twitter: @meghanventura. She apologizes for the Family Guy reference in this article. It won't happen again. Probably. Unless it's early Family Guy. She prefers Futurama.