Of course there are downloads, tons of games, plot descriptions and bios to get the target kiddie audience to relate to a colorful cast of cartoon characters. But every film site these days has that, and there is a lot of penguin-based animated competition out there right now. So Sony put in some extra effort to let users invest themselves in the plot and themes explored in the film. Users can create and print personalized storybooks where the film's characters discuss the user's own interests and dreams. Most notable, though, is The Big Z Memorial Surf Competition page, where "Mikey" takes film fans on a snarky tour of surfing hotspots like…New Jersey… and …the Grand Canyon?
Moreover, the site does a great job of creating the look and feel of a social community for surfing fans, starting off with a beach-friendly soundtrack that plays throughout the site. Users can create their own surfboards and learn surf lingo. There's a photo memorial of 1950's-era penguin surf competitions and the Sport-Penguin Entertainment Network (SPEN), where users can create their own surfing highlights reel using clips from the film. And more importantly, the site raises awareness for real-life environmental issues by connecting users with local and national surf charities like the Reef Check Foundation and Heal the Bay.
-- Jodi Harris, managing editor, Entertainment Spot
I was fortunate to see "Surf's Up" with my son this past weekend before I reviewed the site. The landing page threw me off a little as I never noticed an environmental message in the movie, but it was front and center on the landing page. Now this was an area that could help to expose children to doing some good while enjoying the myriad of well designed games on the site.
I loved the idea behind the Surf Cam. I remember calling the surf line back in the day for wave reports. Oh how far the web has brought us. What I was waiting for, though, was the characters to make cameos in the web cams, as was my son. Chicken Joe's Lingo provides great surfer speak examples with translations that kept my attention. I would have commented that they were easy and the right answer was obvious, but then I remembered who the site was built for: kids like my son who are just learning to read and understand. (I scored a perfect round with takes a point off my Barney status and places me back as a Grom.)
Interesting that they added a mobile campaign system to get media for your mobile phone. Now I don't know too many kids that have a mobile phone in what I would assume to be this target audience, but Sony must know better than I do here. Just one of the first in this genre I have seen mobile.
Overall the amount of games, activities, character bios and soundboard kept us entertained together for about 45 minutes. I feel very comfortable turning him loose on this site and am confident that he could navigate the areas all on his own. But since I was having so much fun as well it was a good parent/child "surfing" experience.
The flash was so well designed and loaded flawlessly. This is a childrens movie site that I would benchmark for great content, amazing movie tie in execution to support the story line, and a perfect Hang 10 in my book.
-- Dylan T. Boyd, VP of sales and strategy, eROI, Inc.
Animated movies rely heavily on their characters to draw people into their story, and this site does a nice job of highlighting the cast. They are everywhere, and impossible to ignore.
Another thing is for certain on this site: there's no lack of activities. Kudos to the team for creating so many small, quick and (to a 10-year-old kid, anyway) fun experiences. My favorite sections include the "Wave-cam" and the history of the "Big Z" surf contest.
There is so much content, in fact, that I kept discovering more things even after I thought I'd gone through the entire site. I'm not a UI guy, and sites like this make me glad of that. The design and layout is relatively clean: there's just so much to see and do, as a user I found it a little difficult to navigate around in some sort of structured manner.
I discovered some small UE glitches here and there. The interface on the "Surfboard Designer" page seemed counterintuitive. Clicking on a color box automatically painted the board. One would assume clicking on a sticker square would do the same thing, but you actually have to drag and drop the sticker onto the board. Why not just make it a click?
Overall, however, there are lots of things to keep kids busy on the site, and it does a good job of enabling visitors to know the cast of characters better.
-- Chris Gatewood, creative director, Freestyle Interactive