Activision's roll just ended. The company that spun gold thread with Spider-Man and made magnificent mutant melees with X-Men couldn't achieve the comic/movie license trifecta. Fantastic Four is amazingly mediocre and has the bare minimum of innovation and polish to be a passable action game. When you think of the possibilities of what a foursome of this magnitude could've done, that's anything but fantastic.

Wherefore Art Thou, Four?

Fantastic Four follows the movie pretty closely. Of course, you have to embellish a bit to make a 15-hour interactive experience out of a two-hour film, so Activision and 7 Studios reach into the comic archives and dusts off guys like Diablo and Moleman (not Hans Moleman of The Simpsons fame). No matter what baddie is thrown in front of our heroes, the formula is always the same--button-mashing combat with a little teamwork.

Each character fulfills their traditional roles. Mr. Fantastic is a stretchy chap, while Invisible Woman can execute stealth kills. Ben Grimm is the wrecking machine, and Human Torch does welding without a union membership. The one huge drawback here is that you cannot fly freely with Human Torch. Instead, you're forced to hover a couple of feet above the ground. Even so, their unique powers add to puzzle elements and quirky little minigames that are a little too easy but inject a dose of adventure to the action.

The game is undoubtedly at its best when the crew is destroying thugs with double team moves that would make any WWE wrestler jealous. The AI is good at taking cues from you, and unlike X-Men Legends, you don't have to worry about them croaking in the middle of a fight. Switching to a different member is as easy as a press of the D-pad. Other functions aren't as easy, as the mapping of controls is really odd. How many games can you think of that ask you to jump with the Y button on the Xbox controller?

Fantastic Four features a clever way of leveling-up the characters. You earn points for just about everything you do, and can then cash them in to upgrade powers. These same points can also buy unlockables like cast interviews. Each level is filled with bonus opportunities, so you may find yourself replaying to make bank.

 Fights, Camera, Action!

An isometric camera would've drawn even more unflattering comparisons to X-Men Legends, but it should've been the way to go. As is, the view is way too low for you to catch all the action--especially when all four of the Four are bringing da ruckus. Even solo missions will often fashion the camera firmly onto someone's butt cheek. The sloppy collision--enemies get stuck in walls and Jessica Alba evidently loves diving into dumpsters--combines with the camera problems to give Fantastic Four a sloppy, unpolished feel.

Speaking of Jessica Alba, one would think adding the likenesses of her and the other actors would be an asset to the game. Not quite. These are some of the least inspired voiceovers in recent memory. It seems the cast had a good whiff of chloroform before that red light came on in the studio. As for the visual representations of Chiklis, Gruffudd, and the rest, it would be appropriate to say that the in-game graphics are "loosely based" on their motion-picture counterparts. Human Torch is one of the most generically-modeled main characters of this console generation. Compare this to what EA does with The Lord of the Rings cast, and it's a big let down.

The rest of Fantastic Four's graphics are sagging like your grandma in a bikini. Take a jungle level where it's obvious that tree textures have been painted on flat walls, or the fact that you get attacked by a gang of identical bikers. The real-time cutscenes just show how lame the enemy models are, and the animation isn't much better. The developers haven't even bothered trying to lip-synch the dialogue in real-time cutscenes. Again, this contributes to thoughts that Fantastic Four was hastily and/or lazily crafted.

Flying the Co-Op

Since the Fantastic Four live and die as a team, you'd hope the multiplayer component would be finely tuned. Judges? Buzz. Wrong answer. It feels more like a haphazard throw-in than anything, as many levels were really designed for single-player and the other character sticks out like a sore thumb. Co-op also makes the bad camera even worse. It's better included than not, but if you want great multiplayer, play the deeper and more fulfilling X-Men Legends or one of the Baldur's Gate games. 

If this didn't have the Fantastic Four license--instead starring some generic frat-boys on the town or something--it wouldn't have half the appeal it does. It's on par with most of the movie and comic license games out there. That is to say, it's not that great, but fans of the property will buy it and like it anyway.