📚 Received: March 24th, 2012 📚 Written: October 15th-19th, 2023 📚
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On November 23rd, 1994, 20th Century Fox released the family movie The Pagemaster in theatres in North America (with international distribution handled by Turner Pictures), which was one of the first movies to combine live action, hand-drawn animation, and CGI animation all together. Produced by David Kirschner and Paul Gertz, written by David Casci based on Charles Pogue's six-page "Library Days" pitch, and directed by Joe Johnston in his third directing job after Honey, I Shrunk the Kids and The Rocketeer (but only the live action bits at the beginning and ending with cinematography by Alexander Gruszynski) and Maurice "Pixote" Hunt (who directed the Turner Feature Animation and Hanna-Barbera produced animated bulk of the film), The Pagemaster ended up doing poorly at the box office having only made back $13.7 million against a $34 million budget. It underperformed, but like a lot of theatrically-released movies that didn't do well financially it ended up developing a following once it came out for home viewing. There were also a couple different video games that were released based on it.
and especially original non-licensed fare like Argonaut Software's 3D Croc platformers. Not even a decade after they formed, Fox Interactive would become acquired by Vivendi Universal Games on March of 2003.
Images from GameFAQs
Designed by Gary Liddon (who was also programmer), Tony "Tiny" Beckwith (who was also producer), and Nick Baynes with Scott Marcus acting as liaison for Fox, The Pagemaster was released in North America by Fox Interactive on November 23rd, 1994, the same day the movie got released in theatres making it one of the first instances of a video game tie-in sharing a simultaneous release date as the movie it's based on. The European SNES version would follow suit in the PAL region by Virgin Interactive on May 23rd, 1995. This review will focus exclusively on the SNES version.
Left: Gazing at a book | Right: Jumping behind see-through draperies
In the sidescrolling action platformer The Pagemaster you take control of the bespectacled ten-year old Richard Tyler (played and voiced by Macaulay Culkin in one of his last child roles before briefly retiring from acting in 1995) whom you can move left and right, duck down, pick up an item by pressing down beside them like a spring or skull or the sleeping book Horror (voiced by Frank Welker) or Humpty Dumpty and gently place them back down by pressing down again or throw them across by pressing B so you can get on them later, climb ropes up and down, jump up in the air with the B button where your gained altitude is dependent on how hard you pressed it, and with the Y or A buttons you can use your weapon against your enemies after acquiring one.
Left: Beware of Mr. Hyde | Right: Moving across by rope
The Pagemaster is divided into three worlds and in each one you'll be collecting a specific set of items in your journey: gold keys in the horror world, gold coins in the adventure world, and golden eggs in the fantasy world, and collecting a hundred of them will earn you a life. There are three sets of items that will aid Richard should you find them in midair with wings or if you jump on certain enemies: blue shoes that will not only make you jump higher than normal but also allow you to jump kick off of walls, gooey slime that will allow you to stick underneath ceilings and move across them, and finally there are weapons to defend yourself with which vary with each world (a bag of long-ranged bouncy eyeballs in horror, a close-ranged sword in adventure, and a long-ranged bag of magic dust in fantasy).
Left: Running down the halls enshrouded in mist | Right: Riding up a magical book platform
The goal of each level in each world is to make your way towards the exit book at the end, that way you'll be granted access to the next level (and if need be, in the world map you can revisit a level should it have two different exit books which may lead to branching paths). There is no score in this game to keep track of, but there is a health system in the form of the three aforementioned items I mentioned earlier, and if you sustain damage you will have one of them taken away from you. Losing damage while only having the blue shoes will render you at your most vulnerable, but fortunately you can run after them on literal foot in the event that happens. When it comes to larger levels you may stumble across the hat of the Pagemaster (voiced by Christopher Lloyd), Guardian of the Written Word and Keeper of the Books, which acts as your checkpoint should you lose a life after the fact, in which case he will appear in a puff of smoke and thunder Richard into the scene.
Left: Tossing bouncy eyeballs across | Right: Flying books
Thorough searching may lead you to a rare knight's helmet that will help by momentarily rendering Richard invulnerable to enemy attack, and an item that leads to one of three different bonus segments: a book that will take you on a Mode 7 bonus level guided by Fantasy (voiced by Whoopi Goldberg) where you're accompanied by Horror in the horror world and Adventure (voiced by Sir Patrick Stewart) in the adventure world, a clock icon that will take you to a time-based bonus level, and by jumping up on a randomly inconspicuous spot you'll reveal a hidden book that you can dive into that will lead you to a bonus level where you can collect as many golden items that you can manage. You will also be taken on a Mode 7 bonus level once you reach the exit of the horror and adventure worlds in the map where you're granted a simple six-character password.
Left: Bats are about to swoop down upon you getting closer | Right: Running across a bookcase
The artwork by Phil Williams, Mark Knowles, and Blizzard's Mark Frazer really bring out the diverse flavors of the horror, adventure, and fantasy worlds and levels and the colorists Terry Ford, Jason Green, and Lloyd Baker did a solid job at capturing the movie's animated aesthetic. The horror levels are the most atmospheric of the bunch with the deliberately dreary appearance and detailed walls and chains, haunted bookshelves, occasional bouts of mist and fog, dithered draperies, piercing lights from barred windows that occasionally reveal the exit sign, and in a couple levels very dark vignettes to augment the dark areas even further. Things get more colorful once you reach the adventures levels as you're greeted to clear blue skies (if not dark and rainy ones) while aboard the pirate-infested ship,
Left: Aboard a pirate ship | Right: Save Adventure
the vibrantly magenta sky upon reaching Treasure Island, and there are a couple outdoor levels where there's a faintly silhouetted ship looming in the distance partially covered by clouds which gives it an atmospheric look and feel. And finally there's the fantasy levels where there's a burst of color with the golden bricked road levels with some nice subtle parallax scrolling, a couple of beanstalk levels where one transpires below the clouds in a darkly red sky while another one takes place above them with the brightest sky color imaginable, and there's a group of levels where you journey through the dragon's insides with the occasional bone remnants of the unfortunate last victims (where the backdrop is sometimes green and sometimes red).
Left: Trying to subdue George Merry | Right: Climbing the rope
The animations by Darren Goodacre, Jason McDonald, Dimitri Bakalov, and Emil Sergiev are very smooth and fluid to watch. Richard's running, jumping, hanging, climbing, and falling (with his flailing and wavy hair) animations are very lively when seen in motion, and I like his different idle animations when remaining still like wiping his glasses and pulling out a book to look at its contents. The animations for when he throws his long-ranged weapons and when using a sword are solid, and he's got an expressive face for when he loses his last bit of health, and I do find it amusing when you chase after your power-ups that are running on their own two feet after defeating certain enemies by jumping on them.
Left: Luring the sword-carrying parrot | Right: "Whoa!"
During the course of The Pagemaster you will face a slew of enemies to contend with and they animate nicely as well. Some have been lifted from the movie like the monstrous-looking Mr. Hyde (voiced by the late Leonard Nimoy, RIP), Long John Silver (voiced by James Jonah Cummings*), Captain Ahab (voiced by George Hearn), and Hispaniola's pirates the slender Tom Morgan and obese George Merry (voiced by the late Phil Hartman and late Ed Gilbert respectively, RIP), and as for the game-exclusive enemies there's swooping bats, sentient book enemies that sometimes sweep across or jump up and down or float in midair or will attempt to fall off their shelf-space should you be moving below them, Frankenstein's monster's hand, a small scythe-wielding reaper creature, a candelabra-holding specter with a mischievous grin, the Big Bad Wolf, baby dragons that immediately aim to attack upon hatching from eggs, and sword-wielding Templar knights (I think).* Thanks, filmmaker who just happened to be named Jim Cummings, we can't refer to the iconic voice actor as "Jim Cummings" anymore like he used to be known once upon a time because of your existence? I'm so annoyed! 😞 Never mind that sometimes there are sets of first and last names to match which sadly is not that uncommon, but of all people, Jim Cummings has to fall under that category of names you have to be specific about to avoid confusion?
The Pagemaster's music was composed by the late James Horner in his third of four collaborations with Joe Johnston as director, the last one being Jumanji the following year, and he managed to bring the movie to life with his sound. Horner, who described himself as having Asperger syndrome, began his music career in 1978 and throughout his remaining 37 years of life composed and conducted some of the most memorable and iconic music in the history of movies
Left: Being carried upward by Fantasy | Right: Steer clear of Captain Ahab's harpoons
The title theme does a sufficient job at setting the tone for the game with its mysteriously enticing melody, the torture chamber theme is atmospheric and bouncily catchy in its menacing-sounding composition, the ghost theme is appropriately creepy and builds up to quite a finish at the end, the cemetery theme is bustling with lightheartedly intimidating sound quality, the marine malarkey theme is a fun and silly sea-faring number, the Treasure Island theme is a pleasant adventure melody, the stormy sea theme is a hauntingly effective atmospheric theme with its impending melody, the golden brick road theme is endearingly jaunty and catchy to listen to, the pools of goo theme is intimidating given that you're inside a dragon's innards, the beanstalk theme is sprightly and lighthearted as you're venturing in the heights, and the credits theme is a pleasant one to listen once you've finished the game.
Left: Winged shoes | Right: You don't have to, but let's play a game of Toss the Bomb at Long John Silver
Just like the sentient books Horror, Adventure, and Fantasy, I do like how they have their own discernable identity not just with their world themes but also their book bonus level themes as well as it makes them stand out. The horror world theme is spooky, the adventure world theme sounds inspiring, and the fantasy world theme is soothing and lighthearted (there are even sped up variations of all three, stick with the normal tempo versions). The bonus level themes when you fly with Fantasy sound like carousel tunes with the horror bonus theme sounding eerie, the adventure bonus theme sounding fittingly adventurous and lighthearted, and the fantasy bonus theme is nice and relaxing. The sound effects are decently chosen like the bouncing sounds of the eyeball weapons, the swish of the sword, the jingling sound for when Richard jumps up in the air after acquiring his jumping shoes, Richard's "Wow!" and "Hey!" audio bytes, and even when he drops down an inch or two he makes an audible boom sound when he touches the ground which I found very interesting.
The 3D bonus levels by Carl Muller have got a smooth sense of Mode 7 scaling and rotating effects that flash by with a keenly felt sense of flight and speed as you must collect magic dust and whatever golden items you can manage before the gauge becomes completely depleted, for the only way to make it through is by collecting a reasonable amount of items without being bumped back by pillars lest you lose time from it.
With the B button you can have the book Richard rides on briefly close itself with him on top of it to clear past narrowly spaced pillars to get through with ease, and with the Y or A buttons you can have Horror and Adventure leap up from their spot. The left and right controls operate as they should, but the up and down controls feel a bit reversed which is a bit confusing but is easily playable once you've got it down pat.
Screengrabbed and cropped while on The Pagemaster's SNES prototype's page on The Cutting Room Floor, censored by me
Prior to the finalized release there was a prototype version of The Pagemaster which had a random level select feature, a version of the stormy seas theme but composed with cymbals that have been removed in the released version, and a hefty list of error messages (including a hilariously colorful one considering this game's family demographic).
Screengrabbed while watching Andrea Pannocchia's PC Longplay video on YouTube
Like I said earlier there was another video game license based on The Pagemaster in 1994 exclusively made for the personal computer format in the form of a point-and-click graphic adventure developed by Mammoth Micro Productions in what was their only video game they worked on published by Turner Interactive. Instead of being a direct adaptation it acts as a semi-sequel to the film as Richard Tyler is already acquainted with Adventure, Fantasy, and Horror as he must save the Pagemaster from Mr. Hyde who has stolen his book and it is up to Richard to venture in all three book worlds to claim it back and save his friends. The voice cast is entirely new as it doesn't reprise any of the voices from the film, there are awkward pauses between dialogue due to the slow speed from the technological limitations of the time period, most of the animation cels have obviously been traced from the film but with the most basic color palette and appear noticeably jagged as a result, and on rare instances there are clip captures from the film. At least it used James Horner's title motif on occasion.
Screengrabbed while watching retro VHS trailers' video on YouTube
One of the fond memories I had of watching The Pagemaster on VHS was before the movie started as it showed an advertisement for the video game which was exciting to watch when I was younger, but I never got to play it as a child and none of my cousins who owned a Game Boy, Genesis, and SNES whenever I visited them owned it.
I liked playing The Great Circus Mystery so much and had a lot of fun with it that with my 21st birthday coming up in less than two weeks I asked for its precursor The Magical Quest starring Mickey Mouse as one of my birthday games, which I also consider a fun Nintendo 16-bit platformer but with a superior soundtrack by Mari Yamaguchi.
Left: Just disposed of a hopping book enemy | Right: Leaping up to the golden coins and winged life
So, what were my thoughts on Probe Software's The Pagemaster video game now that I finally got to experience it after having known about it for so long? It's not what I would call a masterpiece, I am fully aware of its faults and am willing to acknowledge them, but at the end of the day I found the game to be decently enjoyable for what it was. I did manage to finish it the night that I got it, but it wasn't without a few struggles, though after a few replays I've discovered that it's not really that hard of a platformer so much as one where you have to be mindful of your actions from time to time.
Left: "Hey!" 📖 | Right: Dangling from a hook
There is an admittedly slippery nature to Richard's controls and his jumps could tend to be very loose on occasion which seems to be the general complaint among some who have played it, though I found the trick to mitigate those instances effectively was to have a measured sense of control, to not hold down the direction button the entire time (especially since you don't want to lose an item/health supplement to an enemy waiting for you offscreen), there's no timer to worry about so it's okay for you to take your time. Once you've got the main controls handled, the world becomes your oyster pretty much.
Left: "Squawk!" | Right: Found a library card, can you locate and find all eight of them?
The level layouts vary with each one you visit, sometimes they can be very straightforward and to the point while others have an open-ended feel to them which naturally lead to secrets, and due to the latter's design there might be one of two exit books to make your way to. There is convenient enemy-respawning (one time you have to lure the green parrot while it's sharing the same screen as you all the way to the left so you can jump on it to make your way up a high platform), and sometimes it's easy to reset them by running backwards a bit and then returning to the spot (like with the baby dragons who will not fly and attack so long as you don't stay in the same vicinity as them longer than you need to) which does admittedly cheapen the game a bit but by the same token I wouldn't really have it any other way, plus you can revisit the levels any time you'd like which I do feel helps.
Left: 🎵 Follow the yellow bricked road 🎵 | Right: Teetering
I like a good number of the inventive game scenarios, like having to save Adventure who's being hung upside down by a loathsome pirate by jumping on his so you're rewarded with a sword, on a handful of instances you might come across Fantasy who will fly you up in any portion of the area after jumping on her (provided you hold the upper direction buttons to keep afloat for once Richard touches the ground she'll fly back to her spot), jumping on books that glide you across and around, climbing up and across ropes, hanging on chains and vines, climbing up the beanstalk, picking up Long John Silver's bombs so you can throw them back at him, riding on magical leaf stems, collecting all fifty golden eggs so that you can open up the exit book, and tossing Humpty Dumpty who'll bounce along so you can ride on him across the hazardously prolonged obstacle at the end, et al.
Left: "I'll huff, and I'll puff, and I'll blow this house down" | Right: Beanstalk climbing
One edge this licensed game has over many others at the time is the fact that it's got two different endings (if you could refer to it as that) for scattered in eight of the levels are one library card each which are so well-hidden and concealed that your only way to claim them is by thoroughly searching. There are three in horror, two in adventure, and three in fantasy, and so long as you stay on the present world you can revisit the levels if you feel you may have overlooked them because once you take the exit to adventure world and later to fantasy world, you can never go back to the previous world. It doesn't really make much of a difference outside of a different end message in the credits screen, but the reward for collecting all eight library cards is a set of three lives. Wow! Well, it does add a bit of replay value. In fact, some of the levels are completely optional that you don't even have to play them, but they're there if you'd like to make the exploration.
Left: Using the gooey slime to stick underneath surfaces and move across them | Right: Firing magic dust
I do feel bad for director Joe Johnston, who I do consider a talented and visionary film director after catching up with his other works over the years, having learned later in life that The Pagemaster had a deeply troubled production and was essentially changed and rewritten without his consent to the point that he became dissatisfied with it and would rather not discuss it in his portfolio (the mismanagement of animation crew and narrative changes is also uncomfortable to learn about, which is one of the reasons it went overbudget). The box office failure for both it and Mark Dindal's underrated directorial debut Cats Don't Dance less than three years later ended up setting back Turner Feature Animation's other projects.
There is an irony over the fact that Chris Columbus' first two Home Alone movies are the generally better received of the films starring Macaulay Culkin in his child starring days over The Pagemaster, and yet I ultimately enjoyed playing Probe Software's video game interpretation of the latter more than Imagineering's SNES adaptations of the former.
Left: Sliding | Right: Stumbling across a winged book that will take you to a Mode 7 bonus level
On the subject of Macaulay Culkin, one of the most famous child stars in the early half of the '90s, I also feel a bit bad about him having learned that he had a very jealous father who's been likened to a Jack Torrance-like figure in his childhood. As a teenager Macaulay learned that he had a net worth of between $15-20 million which caused him to block his parents from controlling his trust fund, in the custody of his mother and estranging his father forevermore breaking free from his unhealthy lifestyle. He briefly retired from acting, met and married Rachel Miner in 1998 while filming the music video for Sonic Youth's "Sunday" and divorced four years later. In 2017 he married Brenda Song (London Tipton from Disney's The Suite Life sitcom franchise and Anne Boonchuy from Matt Braly's Amphibia) and is currently in a healthy relationship with her, and I have a feeling that he's a lot happier nowadays than he was back when he had a cruel father in his life. If he is, good for him! 👍
Left: Riding a magical leaf stem | Right: That dragon hatchling won't find me so long as I stay behind the foreground of that beanstalk (though that might just be wishful thinking)
I do not consider The Pagemaster to be either the best or the worst of the licensed video games I've played, on the SNES console or otherwise. It doesn't reinvent the wheel when it comes to the genre nor does it try to do more than it sets out to do, I think it's a fairly playable and decently crafted game while it lasts in the fifty or so minutes it takes to play through it, and that's perfectly fine. The mapwork by Nick Baynes, Mark Hill, Mark Viccary, Andrew McCarthy, and Tony Beckwith is decent, and it is a very pretty and colorful game to look at (especially when it comes to the horror and fantasy levels).
Left: Follow the occasional arrow trail | Right: Jumping across a hazardous emerald gap
There's also something nice about playing a literary-themed game amidst the backdrops of the likes of Robert Louis Stevenson (Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and Treasure Island), Herman Melville (Moby-Dick; or, The Whale), L. Frank Baum (the golden bricked road levels being references to his Land of Oz works), and "Jack and the Beanstalk", et al, and the exploration aspect is occasionally thrilling when it comes to the more open-ended levels.
Left: Picking up Humpty Dumpty 🥚 | Right: And using him to ride along the hazardous spike pit
If you're looking for a fairly decent platformer to play that it isn't too long and only initially appears daunting at first but turns out to be actually reasonably playable and fun, I think The Pagemaster fits the bill just fine should you maintain a measured sense of Richard's movement and jumping controls through and through. There's a keenly felt sense of atmosphere, and while it might not be the best game in the platforming genre, it is a commendable effort by Probe Software for what they attempted to do, and I'm glad I finally got to quench a childhood curiosity when I got to play it at last.
My Personal Score: 6.0/10
● I originally reviewed this game on my blog back in October 2015 and gave it a 6.5 if I recall correctly before I deleted it years later out of feeling that I wasn't satisfied with it (many of my old reviews don't hold up all that well). I'm much more pleased with this review, I feel I was fair and articulate in my thoughts, and for the sake of context it was back at a point in time when I was learning to get used to the camera option when the video camera option wasn't working anymore with the uploads (with the correct screenshot dimensions this time and not stretched because I kept my TV setting to "Wide", that was a mistake and it wasn't the only time I regret to say). Truthfully, I wish I stuck with the normal camera option from the beginning as I find the image to be clearer.
● It can be so easy to make Star Trek jokes and references due to most of the talent involved having been involved in the franchise in one form or another, especially the late composer James Horner. It wasn't something that clicked with me when I was younger due to not having grown up with Star Trek until I saw a video review of The Pagemaster on YouTube when I was younger (the kind I retroactively wish I never stumbled upon because it was the kind of video that I may have found amusing at the time but thinking back wasn't as funny or as well-made as I thought), but it is a bit hard to shake off once the pieces fit together.
● It brings me no joy to say this, and it does pain me as such to have to say, but I've lost complete respect for Whoopi Goldberg during this decade, I really have. 😞 I used to really like her when I was younger, I thought she was funny and witty. Nowadays, I've become so alienated by her and have progressively grown annoyed by her latest antics (I can't really bring myself to watch anything with her in it because I know my present-day feelings on her will get in the way of recognizing the quality of her acting). When you say something along the lines of "The Holocaust was not about race", ... that's the point of no return, really. Do not invoke the Holocaust for any reason, it's not a good look, be sensitive to people of the Jewish community, have respect for people in nursing professions. I know it wasn't Whoopi that made a dig at the last one, but it's still The View which is already a red flag. The way I see it, this was a show made by farceurs hosted by farceurs in their desperate attempt to remain relevant at the expense of coming across as disingenuous.
● But, as annoyed as I've become by Whoopi... I'm far more annoyed by what I've learned of The Pagemaster's producer David Kirschner (who produced the Child's Play franchise) and what he did as he tried to take sole screenwriting credit for David Casci's written contributions even though it was largely animated at that point landing it in a legal case (even though Kirschner made no such contributions). Kirschner seriously tried to be the Bob Kane to Casci's Bill Finger, did he? 😠 The only difference is that both ended up being credited (unlike with Batman where only Kane was given credit despite Finger's contributions), but at what cost? It was the most extensive and expensive investigation undertaken by the Writer's Guild of America, and when Fox threatened to pull out of legal arbitration and without WGA-approved credits, the guild filed an injunction blocking the movie's heavily promoted Christmas release. Kirschner, what an arsehole move!
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