You see, Voodoo Vince lives in a quiet little voodoo shop with his owner Madame Charmaine. This is of course until, surprise surprise, someone comes along who is hell bent on taking over the world - Kosmo the Inscrutable. Kosmo manages to kidnap Madame Charmaine and her batch of potent zombie dust. It is this dust that gives Madame Charmaine her powers for safeguarding her community that is now in danger. The whole future depends on Vince who magically springs to life thanks to the zombie dust.

As you start to control Vince you step out of the quiet surroundings of the voodoo shop and into the outside world to try and find Madame Charmaine. The first level, as with most, introduces you to the basic controls such as jumping and attacking. Attacking the critters that pollute the levels can be done in either of four ways. There is the traditional moves such as punch, spin attack or the head-drop that is a combination of the jump and punch button. Then there is his fourth attack which is his voodoo powers, achieved by pressing both the shoulder triggers at once. These attacks vary as the game progresses by picking up a voodoo power icon, which is dropped when all enemies are dispatched in certain areas. Each time a voodoo attack is used your voodoo meter is emptied and can only be refilled by picking up the colored beads which the enemies drop when you either attack them or destroy them. Voodoo attacks can come in a variety of deaths such as stabbing yourself (Vince) with pins, cutting yourself with a chainsaw or even the foot of god stomping on you. There are over 25 different attacks to be seen so you wont get bored of them in a hurry. The voodoo meter can be expanded to give you multiple voodoo attacks by collecting cards in certain levels. When all the cards are collected a skull is dropped and must be caught to add another voodoo attack. Sound confusing? Well it is in theory, but easy to follow in game.

Each level has a various amount of stages which are all linked to the level in question. These levels span different parts of the city such as 'The Quarter', which is the main center of town, 'Crypt City', the 'dead' center of town and even 'Roachfort', which is an underground kingdom. There are quite a few more but we can't ruin all the surprises. The levels are very well designed and some have fantastic mini games as well which can put you in control of a swamp rat, a plane and a ride on a ghost car at the local circus to name a few. All of the levels can be revisited any time to try and find any remaining hidden items by traveling on the local train. This is a good idea, but one that is not quite pulled off as well as we would've hoped but more on this later.

As with all games in this genre, you cannot have a level without an end of level boss. The bosses are quite original in some aspects, and the only way to defeat them is to try and find a way to harm yourself. Bosses range from a dinosaur in a museum, a giant hurricane in a swamp, and a giant doll.

Voodoo Vince comes across as a believable character who is animated superbly and has a certain wit about him. The game is full of some magical moments especially between Vince and Kosmo, which result in a few laughs. The graphics work very well with a nice variety in the textures. In the whole game there is only one glitch we have found and that is that Vince's shadow sometimes is not reflected quite right, but other than that there is absolutely nothing to complain about. The collision detection is spot on which is crucial in the jumping aspects of games such as this. The draw distance is excellent and very noticeable on the later stages, of course with today's consoles it is expected so no surprises there.

The sound department has received some quality work, especially in the voice-acting, which is important when trying to achieve the humour that Voodoo Vince sets out for. The sound effects range from average to believable. Some of the attacking moves sound mediocre, but the effects from the transport used and the ambience effects are excellent. Then there is the amazing song from the closing credits in the game; this is just absolutely superb, and can be selected from the main menu.

All platform games require responsive controls, and if these were any more responsive they would have to be telepathic. The buttons are not confusing at all thanks to the moves slowly being introduced and by the end of the game you will be double jumping and gliding with ease or swinging from hooks thanks to his trusty swingpin.

The autosave feature logs progress throughout the game but also harms the game-play somewhat. Each time a section loads such as a mini game or sub-level the game autosaves, but should you quit the game with seven lives remaining, when you return to play again and reload you are only given three lives. There are no save slots to choose from to load, only the one progress per new game started. As mentioned before, the train can be used to travel between levels to try and pursue those items you couldn't find, however once the game is completed you cannot select another level to return to, so if there are any rewards for finding every item you will have to do so before completion.

One other minor problem we had with the game is with the mini games. Not that they aren't great, it is just that the lack of a multi-player option is a bummer because they lend themselves so well to that type of experience. Whether racing around a swamp on a swamp rat, or submarine races to dog fighting in the planes, it is great fun and would have been even better with mates.