A solid, if easy, platform/3PS dressed up in a deliciously creepy outfit makes for an experience to savor.
I was definitely glad I did!
A number of reviews have characterized Alice as being "style over substance," and to a certain extent that's true. The path through the game is basically linear, and there's limited interactivity--basically, you either stand on something, swing from it, shoot it, or don't get run over by it. What these reviews miss is, as with much in the Gothic genre, the style is the substance. The fun of the game is to immerse yourself in the twisted vision of Wonderland, full of macabre imagery from beginning to end. The theme of "corrupted innocence" is strong throughout, and seeing just what American McGee has made of one of the icons of children's literature is extraordinary. The story hangs together, the graphics (while a bit choppy by today's standards) are excellent, and the sound, including the positively unnerving Chris Vrenna soundtrack, makes the game immersive. You constantly find yourself wanting to move forward to see what twisted truth you uncover next.
Level design is wonderful. In an age when repetitive, boring levels are the Achilles' Heel of many an action game (*cough* Castlevania: Curse of Darkness *cough*), Alice offers constant variety in how it presents the various areas you explore. From twisted mockeries of a mining village and a school ("skool") to woodlands infested with evil bugs and attacking fungi, to underwater environments to chessboard cities to mechanical towers, it isn't necessarily that the levels are themselves insanely innovative (though many of the decorative touches are both innovative and genuinely disturbing...my personal favorite shudder-with-creepiness moment is when you discover what has become of the March Hare and Dormouse), but that you never find yourself doing the same thing over and over for more than one or two levels in a row--horizontal jumping, vertical jumping, moving platforms, low-friction-coefficient ice levels, "run" levels, swimming levels, levels that mix elements, floating-on-air levels, all-out-brawl levels--you won't find yourself having to do the same exact thing again and again. Likewise, combat is livened up considerably by the new weapons and new enemies that are introduced at a steady pace, though most of the bosses aren't particularly tough (honestly, the worst part of fighting the Red Queen at the end was the fact that it's on a series of miss-a-jump-and-fall-to-your-death platforms, not the Queen's attacks).
I suspect that hardcore gamers with mad platforming skills will find Alice somewhat easy, even on the hardest of the four offered difficulty levels, as I myself was able to adapt quickly to the easier settings. Being able to quicksave and quickload instantaneously at the touch of a button makes it possible to get past the especially tricky spots effortlessly. I suspect some may consider this "cheating," but believe me, when an all-thumbs klutz like myself takes six or seven times to make a particular jump without falling into the lava or to the floor of a steam-jet tower, this is a deeply appreciated feature...especially when it took three or four minutes just to get to that point in the first place. Control was the only weak spot...as someone more familiar with console gaming than PC gaming, I spent most of Alice aching desperately for a Bloodrayne-style control system and a PS2 controller. My left hand always seemed to have too much to do (move with WASD, reach down with the thumb to the space bar to jump, change weapons with the number keys, quicksave with F4), but again, the fact that I was able to start operating fairly smoothly.
All in all, Alice provides a fun, creepy experience, and if the gameplay isn't anything that you haven't seen before, it's at least done well, and in an environment that makes it a pleasure to move through.