In the game, Poseidon, the Greek god of the sea, tries to destroy the SeaWorld theme park and replace it with Atlantis. The player controls Shamu, the titular protagonist, who attempts to defeat Poseidon and the Kraken.[2] Shamu collects power ups and performs various feats over 20 levels and 8 environments.
The PlayStation 2 and Xbox versions received "mixed" reviews, while the GameCube and DS versions received "unfavorable" reviews, according to the review aggregation website Metacritic.[7][8][9][10]
Xbox Advanced said, "Shamu’s Deep Sea Adventures is just flat out a bad game. Being a budget title does not save this game or excuse any of its shortcomings, as so many of today’s budget titles for kids are actually very good".[11] The video game columnist for CiN Weekly said the game is "a cute marketing vehicle that is too difficult and underdeveloped for its target audience".[6]