Disney Fairies: Tinker Bell Review

Disney used to have just one mascot, Mickey Mouse, but things changed somewhere along the animation mogul's timeline and other characters began to be included in some sort of exclusive mascot club. The perk to being one of these Disney mascots is being slapped on almost every kind of merchandise known to man. I'm sure it can be agreed that one of the most popular characters used to represent Disney nowadays is Tinker Bell, the temperamental little pixie from the Peter Pan film. She's so popular now that she spurred an entire line of books, movies and video games devoted to her life in Pixie Hollow, the home of Never-Fae. There's even a massive multiplayer online game called Pixie Hollow available at the Disney website where pixie enthusiasts can create their own pixie, or Sparrow Man if they want to play as a male, and fly around Pixie Hollow. That's a review for another time, however; today's review is over the first of Tink's Nintendo DS titles.

3+ years my foot, Disney.

Disney Fairies: Tinker Bell debuted in 2008, created by Disney Interactive Studios and Genius Sonority, made solely for the Nintendo DS system. The player controls the new Tinker of Pixie Hollow, Tinker Bell herself. The entire plot of the game revolves around Tink's role as a Tinker fairy, a fairy whose job encapsulates fixing, inventing and polishing items for the rest of the Hollow. There's little else to this game, actually. The player will spend most of his or her time picking up lists of things to fetch for the four Ministers of the seasons, invariably always involving something or things to repair. Yeah, sometimes you'll have to find ingredients like fruit, flowers, string or gemstones, but the constant is having to fix or polish something. Even the repair jobs are limited; generally the only items to fix are cups and teapots, occasionally interspersed with ladles. I'm sure there's a sexist kitchen joke in there somewhere.

Rubbing stains off is not repairing anything, Disney. It just makes this cup not dirty. Remember, if it's not Baroque, don't fix it.

Besides tinkering, Tinker Bell can perform fetch quests for other fairies other than the Ministers. Other major players from the films make cameos in the game, though are unplayable: Rosetta, Fawn, Iridessa, Silvermist, Terence, Clank and Bobble as well as Fairy Mary. Actually, the only reason any of them are there is so Tink can play mini games, such as collecting silk from worms with Fawn, water droplets from dewy leaves with Silvermist and painting ladybugs with Rosetta. What's the point of the mini games? Collecting ingredients, either to check off needed supplies for fetch quests or for Tinker Bell to use in the construction of new clothes and jewelry, which she can then either wear herself or sell to other fairies from her workshop for "fairy medals", this game's version of gold. The fact that there is a currency system for pixies is probably the most unbelievable aspect of the entire game.

Performing the endless fetch quests will eventually reward the player with friendship points with the various pixies scattered about the Hollow. Get a high enough friendship rating and the fairies will spout off a special numerical code, which can then be input into a book that Queen Clarion keeps at the Pixie Dust Tree. These codes may not be worth the trouble in the end, however, as they merely provide Tink with more ingredients. Harder to find alternate colored versions, sure, but in the end they're still just flowers and berries, and really only used to make more clothes.

All those leaf dresses are just different colored variations of Tink's normal dress. So much clothing.

I suppose one fun aspect of this game would be the rewards for booting up on certain holidays. Around Halloween in the real world, powering up the game can reward the player with a special orange or purple witchy costume for Tink. Christmas offers a red or white holiday outfit, and there's a special surprise for showing up on your birthday.

One thing I really have to bring up is the age rating on this game. Disney decided 3+ made sense, but I dare anyone to hand this game to a three year old and see what happens. The kid might get excited over seeing familiar characters but I'm not sure anyone that young could play this on their own. The only sounds in this game come from background music and effects such as flying or touching objects, the characters don't have voice actors. It's all text based dialogue. That is a lot of reading for a child that young. Not to mention the only way to get rewards worth playing the mini games involves playing them at the normal or difficult settings; easy would be better suited to a three year old's mental capabilities, as well as speed of motor functions, but the easy level offers virtually nothing worthwhile.

How many three year olds know the words 'decorum' and 'maintained', let alone 'Minister'?

I can't really comment on the replayability of Tinker Bell as this game literally has no ending. Completing a season by acquiring everything a Minister asks for never heralds an end, rather it moves the game into the next season. Tink is in a never-ending cycle of Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter until the player decides they've had enough of the same job, day in and day out, getting nothing out of it besides maybe some new clothes and a bit of cash, just to do it again the next season.

Rating: 
Demographic: 6+ years, girls.
System(s): Nintendo DS
Players: 1