As a new father, and someone who spends quite a lot of time looking after toddlers into the bargain. I can’t help but look through my rose-tinted glasses from time to time, and shake my head disapprovingly as I mutter: “I remember when kids’ cartoons were actually good.”
If you enjoy the irritating ramblings of Peppa Pig, or the brainrot that is CocoMelon, then more power to you. But I lament a time when Rugrats was on my television. One of the breakout Nickelodeon cartoons that helped shape the network as the home of kids’ TV.
Back in that era, a successful franchise almost always led to a slew of money-grabbing video games, and Rugrats was no different. So much so, that we have been treated in the year of our lord, 2026, to an entire collection of Rugrats games, each evoking a diaper full of nostalgia.
But the question remains. Are these games as good as I remember them, as I peer through these rose-tinted glasses? Or are they simply a time capsule full of games as raggedy as Chuckie Finster’s ginger mop? Well, to put it succinctly. It’s a little bit of both.
Core Memories Unlocked
As much as I would love to give every game equal billing in this collection. That would simply be doing a disservice to the game that I would wager everyone eyeing this collection is eager to replay.
Rugrats: Search for Reptar was a surprisingly great licensed PS1 game, placing you in the role of the usual gang of dumb babies, to complete a series of fun levels and mini-games. All in a bid to collect all the pieces of Tommy’s lost Reptar puzzle. A simple premise that opens the door to a world of fun.
Each level was a welcome blast from the past, reminding me just how much this game offered with so little technical polish or design chops. Ranging from a frankly excellent mini-golf game for the era. A slew of collect-a-thons. Various races and platforming challenges. Not to mention a few light horror and combat elements that I remember giving me the willies as a child.
You have to remember that this game was aimed at children, and it really did hit that sweet spot. Offering varied gameplay, short but sweet levels, appropriate levels of challenge, and a sandbox world to explore in the form of the Pickles home.
Whether it comes from the unbridled joy of smashing up numerous Mr. Friend robots. The satisfaction of beating Angelica in a race for cookies, or ignoring the game’s desired outcome and whacking Chuckie with a shuffleboard puck. There’s moment-to-moment fun to be had here. Which I say as a thirty-year-old man.
Combine this with the incredible soundtrack that has no business going this hard, and you have a few hours of unadulterated fun right at your fingertips. But, I suppose we should address the elephant in the room.
Shattering Rose Tinted Glasses
As I returned to this game, with decades in the rear-view mirror, I knew that this game wasn’t a polished and pristine one. Frankly, even as a small child, I knew this game was very much a mixed bag. But, even with that in mind, the technical issues were a lot to contend with.
The PS1 was jam-packed with games boasting some of the worst cameras around. I would say that Search for Reptar has them all beat, quite easily to be honest.
The camera is about as rudimentary as it gets. Struggling to keep up with your character, messing up your direction of travel, especially in tight spaces. Not to mention, when it did glitch out, it genuinely felt quite nauseating.
Alongside this, the visuals are jaggy, even within the era of PS1 Lara Croft boobies. The animations and actions are temperamental and clunky at best. Not to mention the platforming, which, in some levels, is mandatory, is even more of a nightmare to contend with than Deep Jungle in Kingdom Hearts 1.
In short, this game is as whimsical and fun as you remember. But, you may have tucked away in the deepest recesses of your mind just how technically flawed this game was, even by PS1 standards.
In my humble opinion, provided you can wrestle with the camera, the good far outweighs the bad. But it’s just a fair warning to all you nineties kids out there. Not everything in the nineties was better. But the vibes were immaculate, and still are.
The Best of the Rest
If this were a port of just Search for Reptar, the price of admission simply wouldn’t be reasonable at all. But thankfully, the Rugrats franchise wasn’t shy about lending its likeness for studios to produce a litany of games and movie tie-ins.
That said, I imagine you still remain skeptical about getting value out of this collection nonetheless. So to help you gauge that I’ll take a two-pronged approach.
Essentially, you have, alongside your marquee game, Search for Reptar, two sets of filler titles. One batch is the Game Boy titles, whereas the other is the 3D model titles built using the same design principles as the aforementioned Search for Reptar, in all their jagged polygonal glory.
I’ll be painfully honest about the Game Boy titles. They are about as basic as it gets. When it comes to the most basic of the bunch, such as the tie-in for the original movie. You can expect brain-dead run and jump mechanics and little else. I say this with no hyperbole: I have played McDonald’s Happy Meal toys that were on par with this.
Then, at their best, you have the Rugrats In Paris portable game, which at least has some gameplay variety through mini-games. Not to mention a map/hub that makes progression feel structured and rewarding. However, as a whole, the GBA collection is the definition of filler, and unless you’re a completionist, can be ignored.
The 3D titles, such as Studio Tour and the 3D Rugrats in Paris outing, on the other hand, do have something to offer that adds value to the set. Studio Tour feels like a more over-the-top extrapolation of Search for Reptar, albeit far removed from the true-to-source levels of its predecessor. It lacks the heart, but still has the core components of what made it’s predecessor excellent.
Whereas Rugrats in Paris is more of a mixed bag clearly made from a different team. Offering a similar nonsensical mini-game vibe to Studio Tour, with generic themes repurposed to fit the mold rather than actually playing into the themes or beats of the movie.
But, nonetheless, providing some decent mini-games to partake in. Even if the tank controls are even worse than before, which takes some doing.
All in all, as a collection, I feel like there is just enough value to justify the price of admission, but it’s a pretty close call if we’re being honest. Mileage may vary in line with the nostalgia you feel. But, I can say for sure, they don’t make ’em like this anymore. Whether that’s a good thing or not is yours to decide.
Review code provided by the publisher
Despite some filler Game Boy titles bulking up the collection, it's fair to say that this Nickelodeon time capsule is a joy to behold. Search for Reptar is a cult classic for a reason and carries the collection. But there are also little nuggets of excellence to be found within the other baby-fueled titles. Fair warning, the controls are clunky, the camera is cumbersome, and the gameplay is often shallow. But despite it all, these games are a lot of fun, and it's a collection I feel blessed to have access to on modern systems
The Good
- Lots of content in one collection
- Search for Reptar steals the show
- Rewind feature is a blessing
The Bad
- Game Boy titles feel like filler
- No autosave features
- Controls are actually worse than I remember
