Carmen Sandiego: The Secret of the Stolen Drums

ACME agent-in-training, Cole Gannon, cracks a code and now he’s ot on the trail of Carmen Sandiego, the world’s greatest thief.

EU release: 5th March 2004
NA release: 13th September 2004
JP release: N/A
Developer: Artificial Mind and Movement
Publisher: BAM! Entertainment
NGC Magazine: 70%
Mods Used: Widescreen Hack

Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? is a franchise that I’m only vaguely familiar with, and that’s only the cartoon. I was surprised to find out that Carmen Sandiego is actually the main villain, part of the Villains International League of Evil (or VILE). Another surprise was that the series started out as an edutainment video game. I was aware that the show had educational elements to it, so I guess it makes sense. Carmen Sandiego is also quite well regarded as far as edutainment games go.

The Secret of the Stolen Drums is a departure from this formula, though, turning it into a stealth action game. There are still some educational parts, such as the generic character you play as spouting some facts at the beginning of a level or some terrible puzzles like jigsaws, but these are only a very minor thing.

Instead, you wander around levels, do some basic platforming and a bit of basic combat. In the first level, your opponents can only be attacked from behind, so you need to take part in some easily broken stealth mechanics (if you roll around, they can’t hear you, and it’s quite speedy) to whack them in the back. Layer on, you’ll be mashing a button to take on bigger robots and some monsters. It’s all very dull.

There are some collectables to find, but none of them engaging. Some are needed to progress while getting so many amulets will make your staff slightly stronger. There’s supposed to be an alternative ending for collecting most items, but it only actually works with the language set to French. This is so unbelievably dull that it makes you wish that they had stuck with edutainment.

Poor

Although there’s nothing particularly amazing or original here, it’s the sort of game a ten-year-old would get a lot of value from. Make of that what you will, or cut out this review and pass it to your mum…
NGC Magazine #92

Remake or remaster?

A collection of all the games would be neat.

Official Ways to get the game

There is no official way to get Carmen Sandiego: The Secret of the Stolen Drums