Interesting how those are still much, much too big to match the heads. The rusty pipes and wheels all over its back are a lot bigger, too, it now has a cluster of three doll faces, and it also gains a pair of giant dollbaby arms as well. When upgraded to "Menacing," a Ruin loses its left sludgy arm, but the right becomes relatively huge. While this nearly humanoid mode is kind of their "main" form, it isn't technically their most basic the weaker "slithering ruin" is nothing but a simple lump of the same black slime. Now we're into the enemy monster characters, the REAL good stuff! Madness Returns sees Alice back in an even more deteriorated Wonderland, and the "ruin" are pretty much everywhere, masses of dripping black sludge and random junk with signature baby doll heads lodged in the middle of their bulbous, oozing torsos. He's now a lot more stylized, a lot more like old caricature artwork, and just a lot more aesthetically appropriate to the setting, if you ask me. The Mock Turtle's design is totally revamped here, and I think for the better. He is such a better character than Johnny Depp's Hatter, isn't he? I've heard that Burton's brainfart killed any chance of this Alice getting a feature film, at least back in the day. Hatter, like the Rabbit, doesn't change his design much at all, but I thought you'd like to see him in 3-d. This was apparently because the team found the original boss battle to be difficult and not very fun, but the mecha was still an important plot point and it was easier to just cut the fight than cut the robot entirely. Same for the March Hare's little pal, looking even more like a Taxidermied corpse than before! Sadly, this duo represents some content that was at least sort of cut, since they actually commandeer a giant, clockwork robot in their thirst for vengeance against the Mad Hatter (or something like that), but it abruptly breaks down on its own. Such a ludicrous concept in such an entertaining way. Unlike, of course, the March Hare, who returns from the first game with a very different but still gruesomely cybernetic design. It's basically no different, anatomically, from countless Easter Bunnies you see every spring, but the realistic texturing and the eyes staring out to the sides - like the real thing should - make this animal look fairly deranged without any additional fangs or bloodstains or stitches. I didn't get around to reviewing the white rabbit when we looked at the first game, and his design didn't change much, but what an absolutely WRETCHED Lagomorph, isn't he?! I kind of adore how well this design makes a rabbit look scuzzier, creepier and more unsettling without technically giving it any features more monstrous than a real rabbit at all. Just how much madness DOES Alice return? Was she kind enough to rewind it first? You be the judge! We're not only going to be reviewing the creatures that appear in the final game, but many of those that, unfortunately, had to be scrapped! Whether these really were concepts for game sequences or just accompanying paintings, I'm not completely sure, but a great deal of content did have to be cut for time and budget by the final release of Madness Returns. And neither does this! I can barely begin to guess what's going on here, but what an even dreamier, even more fantastical scene! I don't even know!Īnd we'll never know, because this never happens in the final product.
Or maybe those are albatrosses, which are already that huge. I remember this visual getting me pretty pumped for this game! Can you think of anything in the world more epic than Alice facing off against a giant, monstrous, steam-powered snail on the roof of a lighthouse? Topping it off are the smaller snails slithering their way up the structure, but apparently getting picked off here and there by a flock of massive gulls. Reviewing Alice: Madness Returns CreaturesĮleven whole years after American McGee's Alice a high definition sequel game was announced seemingly out of the blue, promising a bigger, bolder, weirder and even darker adventure than ever before.and I'd say it certainly succeeded, but one of the first images ever released as a teaser was the following: