MovieChat Forums > Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle (2017) Discussion > Easy to play, had it been a real compute...

Easy to play, had it been a real computer game


The Jumani that Alan Parrish explained in the first movie, was like a nightmarish place, almost impossible to survive in.

This Jumani game did not seem so hard to play, had it been an actual computer game. As an avatar, Dwayne Johnson was pretty much unbeatable, so with that avatar I think I could finish the game in a jif... the challenges not that big. Seemed like an easy game (do I hear drums?) Anyway, In Alan”s time it seemed like a way way bigger challenge.

Almost all the characters deaths was by their own choice or banter or carelessness and that says a lot about how hard a game really is.

They should have made it much more challenging, like in the original movie.... something like all the characters dying one by one because it is so hard and to only return if it is finished in the end by one of them. If they would have designed the gameplay like this instead of insisting that everyone needs to survive together to finish .. then the game’s difficulty could have been set to hard or very hard, instead of what looks to me like easy.

Many of you seem to like it. I was disappointed. I loved the idea but the movie itself was too focused on character banter. The game itself was reduced to a setting, unlike what made the original so great.

It was a fail, imo. I enjoyed it still, but will forget it soon.

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the game is just a plot device. the real comedy value comes from the character's interactions. so obviously the game difficulty is not really looked into and not important. most people don't give a damn and even most gamers wouldn't care. I agree the game is "easy" but its irrelevant to earning money which is what movies are set out to do

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Yes you are right. But when we saw the first one, Allan Parrish described Jumani to be such a hellish place that his description seem not at all like what we experienced here. Also the game in the orginal was near impossible and a real challenge ... now not so much. In fact, were the kids a bit more coordinated and cool, it would have been like ride in Disneyland. So the two movies are not that connected to each others narrative. Imo, I would have liked it more if Jumani has been closer to how is was advertised in the first one.

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I like to think the game adjusts itself to the players

Alan Parrish needed to face horrors worse than the local bullies and overbearing father. They helped him overcome his fears and get along better with his dad. It's no accident that the game modeled Van Pelt after Alan's father (both being played by Jonathan Hyde).

Kids who were more "coordinated and cool" might not even be allowed into the game (they might not "need" it), or if they did enter the game, it'd be a lot tougher for them.

The web series, "The Vault" toyed with this theme - it portrayed a fictional reality show where numerous players had to figure out how to cooperate. For dramatic reasons, the producers purposely placed a bunch of misfits in one vault and set them against a hyper-competent group of team players in the other vault.

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That is an excellent explanation.

They made a “Zathura: A Space Adventure (2005)” as a sort of sequel to Jumanji. I remember liking it, but cannot now remember much. I wonder if this “game” too followed your excellent description above. Do you remember?

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Only to a limited extent: the brothers were fighting all the time, and Zathura taught them to get along.

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I just now saw it again. What a marvelous forgotten movie this is. The theme is pretty much brother rivalry, and end in mutual respect, love and appreciation because of their tryouts during the game. This game is also here near impossible and so much more exciting for a story frame imo than what the “Jumanji Back to the Jungle” game is.... Anyway, your explanation on the true nature of the game though stands perfectly. I hereby decree it canon :)

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