Shark Tale is an easy kid's game, right?

Formulaic, chapter-by-chapter progression, repetitive game play, simple rules, nonoffensive content straight from the PG rated Dreamworks movie. Sure sounds easy.

And it is, through the first few chapters. Then you're asked to show patience as you sneak through piranha-infested sewers, and then you're challenged with a frantic race through the underwater streets of Reef City.

And then you're asked to dance. Several times. Fast.

Shark Tale quickly turns into a difficult, and often trying video game, both on your mind and your fingers. You may find yourself close to frustration, ready to throw in the towel. Easy kid's game? Yeah, right.

Not easy for any age group, Shark Tale is a 25-chapter break-up of the movie, complete with animated cut-scenes, both new and from the film. You are Oscar, a jive-talking little fish who's working his way up the food chain. When he gets credit for taking out a shark in the wastelands, he finds himself rocketing upwards in fame. Your job is to get him to the top of fish stardom.

Meant for your 12-year-old son, but not a totally unwelcome way to unwind from a hard day's work, Shark Tale manages to appeal to a wide XBox audience. That said, if I never, ever have to dance in a video game again, I'll be a very happy gameplayer.

Gameplay:

You start off as a Nobody, and your goal is to reach Oscar fame (that's bigger than Megastar, baby). To do this, you must collect clams, and finish each chapter mission. Besides each regular mission, there are bonus and elite missions, which earn you even more points if you're able to complete them. Some are more achievable than others.

There are four key types of gameplay in the chapters, each with their own challenges:

Adventure: This is the most common, and arguably the most enjoyable part of Shark Tale. You wander the streets of Reef City, the old shipwreck where the sharks hang out, the sewers where the scary fish live. You can wander in doors and be fed by strangers to regain your health. You can use your power moves to take out eels, crabs and puffer fish .... or pedestrians. That was my favorite part. Not only are the bad guys in your sights, but if you want to pick up an extra clam or three, take out the fish wandering by. One of the bonus missions actually encourages you to do so.

Sometimes Oscar is required to hide behind plants and fire hydrants (which is funny because, well, you're underwater) to avoid dolphin police and guard fish who want to eat you. Those chapters will really raise your anxiety levels, as you have to swim fast, and hide even faster. You may find yourself taking three or four tries at passing some of these chapters.

The only problem with adventure levels is that the boards are very small and confined, usually to a half dozen sewer sections, or three or four square city blocks. There's no free-range wandering around the entire city, and only once or twice are you allowed to move Oscar up and down in an environment, as you would expect underwater.

Race: From beating your boss to work to stealing all the newspapers before they hit the streets, racing is a hectic portion of Shark Tale. The controls are hard to get a handle on at the beginning, and more than once I found myself running into walls and rocks most of the time. You're best bet is to follow the bubbles that show the path, and worry about the clock more than the clams that are sitting along the path.

Racing is fun once you've got the controls down, though it's hard to use the powerslide feature correctly (which moves you along faster) and it's very hard to catch the short-cuts that are offered (they go by very quickly).

Fight: Fighting is the easiest part of Shark Tale and also the best looking part, other than the cut scenes and mini movies. You'll take on several different sharks, from a hammerhead to the dreaded great white. Fighting here is pretty simple, just stick and move. Avoid the shark's bite, and counter with combinations of lefts, rights and uppercuts. If you get a chance, hit your shark opponent by powering up first, for a devastating blow. You can even taunt the shark, by pressing and holding the A button. If there's one part of this game where you shouldn't have any trouble, this is it.

Dance: Where fighting is the easiest part, dancing is by far the most difficult and upsetting. Consider yourself warned: If you don't own a Dancepad, you're in for a few tries on several chapters.

The five dance chapters of the gameplay require you to push buttons and combinations of buttons in sequence with dance steps, to tunes like MC Hammer's "Can't Touch This" and Outkast's "The Way You Move." A circle screen with each move rotates around the dance, and you must hit the correct button once it hits the bottom of the screen. Activision did a good job synching the moves to the music, but they made it as hard as humanly possible to pass these levels. Give them this, though: They won't let you cheat, because smashing the buttons randomly will only make you fail and start over. You're graded not on how many moves you clear off the screen, but on how many button hits it took you to do it.

Trying to hit the right buttons, in the right order, is maddeningly difficult the first go around, and you need to score at least 75 percent to pass. I never finished one of these levels the first time around, and never scored the 90 percent needed for the bonus mission, or the 100 percent needed for the elite mission. If you can hit 100 percent of the moves on the fifth and final dance level (without a Dancepad), e-mail me a picture of the end points screen: I'll post it here, with your name. It's the least you deserve for doing such awful things to your fingers.

The worst part about these chapters, other than listening to "Carwash" five times in a row, is that you can't see the dance. You're so busy pounding away on the controller, there's no way you can watch Oscar bust a move. A replay feature would have been very handy here, because for all I know, Oscar was doing The Robot during each dance.

The variety of levels and the increasing difficulty made this game a surprisingly good time. But only once, and here's where this game's replay value takes a hit.

Shark Tale is a fun game, but only the first time around. It's a tad too formulaic, keeping the player completely stuck with playing the chapters in order, with no ability to go back and play favorite areas again, at least not without muddling through everything before it. If I could go back to some of the levels without starting over, I'd be happy.

After you've increased your fame and earned some clams, you'll be happy to find out there's something to buy with them. Purchase stills of characters and settings from the game and movie, buy songs and compositions, get the closing and ending animation for each chapter. Lots of cool items to purchase, though it would have been even better if they had allowed these newly acquired items to be used in the gameplay.

Still, while not quite as fun as pimpin your Crib in ESPN NFL 2K5, it was nice to shop for Shark Tale items between defeats on the dance levels.

Graphics:

Lots of detail in Shark Tale, especially during the race and fight scenes. In the races, there's movement everywhere, with other fish going about their daily business while you're racing along. It would have been nice to stop and interact with all the environment around Oscar, because it's bustling.

In the fights, the shark's snapping jaws are very realistic, and avoiding those teeth will give you a little adrenalin boost. Great backgrounds throughout most all of the levels. A little too good at points, because you'll see open water and another street, but will bounce back against the invisible wall. Guess the designers didn't want us going that way.

And we can't forget the movie parts. I really want to see this movie after playing the game, because it's a sharp looking animation. The fish movements, in gameplay, visual detail, and in the movie snips, are spot on. Good character movement, from the lithe Oscar to the lumbering hammerhead.

In all, very sharp 3D work in this game.

Audio:

While the star voice talent for the movie didn't come on board for the game, the music in Shark Tale is fantastic. Will Smith, MC Hammer, Fat Boys, Inner Circle, Wild Cherry, and more have songs licensed for this game. Menus and dance stages get the best treatment, but even in the other areas, the music and noises sound great. Ambient background ditties reminiscent of Jaws and bubbling noises are used well, and the punching and ramming sounds Oscar makes in fights and attacks also come through very well.

Conclusion:

I dislike repetitiveness in video games, and once you've finished Shark Tale, there's no point in going back for another 25 chapters.

If the players could access whatever chapters they wanted, after conquering the game once, the replay value for this game would be much higher.

But having to sit through another 20 minutes of "Can't Touch This," over, and over, and over again, is too much. "Don't Hurt 'Em Hammer" was a lie; it was physically painful trying to do the dance moves with the controller. Still, Shark Tale earns a borderline Recommended for the unexpected challenges and great music and sound.

For the Shark Tale and Dancepad enthusiasts, as well as the younger gamers, this game is a very good buy, especially after the price dropped to the $40 range. Give it a few months, and maybe it'll find it's way to the $19.99 section.

For the casual gameplayer, Rent it.

However, if you really, really liked any of the Grand Theft Auto or 007 games, you won't miss anything Shark Tale has to offer.