When Wallace and Gromit’s seaside holiday plans get rained out, they make the best of the situation by turning their flooded basement into an indoor beach resort and invite their neighborhood guests for a rainy day holiday. Little do they know that their resort is about to become the scene of a murder! Well, OK, it’s a family game, there is no murder! But someone does get bonked on the noggin for a bit of temporary amnesia, and it’s up to inventor Wallace to use his Detect-O-Matic (with a little help from his clue-sniffing pup Gromit), to solve the case and find out whodunit!

Academy Award-winning clay animated duo, Wallace and Gromit, are starring in a series of episodic point and click adventures from TellTale Games, makers of the Sam & Max and Strong Bad titles. The second of four of the 3-6 hour long episodes, The Last Resort, can be downloaded on your PC (visit TellTale’s Web site), and it’ll also be available on Xbox Live.

For those not in the know, Wallace is an inventor of crazy Rube Goldberg machines that don’t always work the way he intended, and Gromit is his silent but devoted dog, who is the more intelligent of the two. In the second episode, Wallace and Gromit must procure items for their indoor beach resort, then make sure their neighbor guests are happy, and finally you’ll use point and click skills to gather clues and solve the crime.

In the game you control both Wallace and Gromit separately in typical point and click adventure fashion. Use the mouse to point on objects and use items in your inventory to solve puzzles. The animation and ‘feel’ of the game is top notch. If this weren’t a video game, it would probably be up for an Academy Award for best animated short film.

There are really only two nitpicky problems that I can pinpoint with this game. First of all, TellTale didn’t get the original voice actor (Peter Sallis) for Wallace in this adventure. But the new voice actor did a pretty bang-up job imitating Peter Sallis’ tone. It’s only a shame since the other Wallace and Gromit video games in the past were able to get Peter Sallis.

Another problem is that in most point and click adventures, you use the mouse to move and click on objects. But in Wallace and Gromit, you move with the WASD or arrow keys. You still view and pick up objects with the mouse, though. It would’ve been nice if you could have controlled the whole game with the mouse, but they had to do it this way since the game will also be on the Xbox 360 console and played with a controller. Really, moving around with the arrow keys didn’t bother me at all, personally, but it might bug others.

But again, these problems are fairly minor. Wallace and Gromit’s Grand Adventures is looking to be another great point and click adventure from TellTale, with fun yet not too frustrating puzzles that’ll make you feel like part of the story. If you’ve got a PC or an Xbox 360, you’ll definitely want to download these games, especially if you’re a fan of point and click adventures and/or Wallace and Gromit.

Kid Factor:
The Last Resort is rated E for Everyone. Nothing objectionable here, aside from some cartoon violence references, like getting bonked on the head or poked on the foot. It’s definitely the most family friendly game TellTale has made to date. Some very young players might get slightly stumped at some of the puzzles, and may need a little help. But this is one game that’s great to play WITH your kids and family, as an extra set of eyes to help spot items and clues is always helpful for these kinds of games. Highly recommended.

Tags: Game Reviews