Disney Junior Games Online Review

I'm sure it's evident at this point that I am not a child. I am a Disney kid at heart, but I'm nearing thirty years old. However, the purpose of this blog is to review and preview all Disney games and gaming gear. That includes the stuff designed specifically for the under ten years old demographic. I do have an Epic Mickey review in the works but while I'm replaying it for a refresher I thought I'd take a look at the Disney Junior website.

Disney Junior is a block of child friendly programs found on the Disney channel designed with children aged from toddler to pre-teen in mind. It plays on the Disney network every morning from six in the morning to two in the afternoon. Those wanting more of the kid friendly programs can switch their televisions over to the Disney Junior channel and watch things like the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Doc McStuffins and Chuggington all day long. Advertisements during the Disney Junior block, or on the Disney Junior channel, make mention of the various games that can be found online at the website and for download at the App Store for iPads and Kindles.

So what sorts of games are available at the Disney Junior Games website? Due to the age range of the intended audience, none of these games are particularly difficult. Players will find a multitude of educational games, teaching math and colors, as well as numerous puzzles, memory matchers and music makers. I decided to play around with an action game and a math game.

Action - Pooh Sticks - How anyone can call Pooh Sticks an "action game" is beyond me. For those unfamiliar with the game, the premise is to drop a stick in a river and watch it move from where it was dropped to a specified spot in the river that serves as a finish line. This is generally played with a number of people; the winner is the one with the stick that gets to the finish line first. The online version requires moving the stick, the cursor, up and down the screen to avoid obstacles such as rocks, logs and lilypads. There are no power ups, no prizes, just a timer and it really doesn't matter how fast or slow you play. Piglet will always hope you will play again.

The graphics are bright and well drawn, the music is annoying but the animation runs smoothly. Pooh Sticks is visually appealing but that's all it has going for it.

Without a second player, this is an incredibly boring "action" game.

Math - Manny's Pinata Birthday Bash - Handy Manny is an engineer with a toolbox full of sentient tools, most of which speak Spanish. The purpose of this game is to create a pinata for Manny's birthday party. There is a mix and match aspect where the player can customize their pinata using three different shapes, three patterns and two different colors. After the pinata is constructed, it needs to be filled with toys which  involves a short memory game, if you can call it that. A list is provided, featuring three different objects that must be selected to continue. The list provides both the English terms for the items and the Spanish terms. Getting passed that, we finally get to the math part of the game, where players must solve very basic math problems (all addition from my few playthroughs) to hit and break open the pinata.

For some reason a score is kept yet I have no idea how the points are figured out or even what the purpose of scoring is. There isn't a different ending, no consequences, so it seems pointless to keep score.

As expected, neither game offered any sort of challenge, though both were brightly colored with cheery repetitive music. I suppose if a parent or babysitter had no qualms about letting their tiny tots play with the internet for a while, the games on the Disney Junior website could entertain.

Rating: 
Demographic: 2 - 5 year olds, boys and girls.
System(s): PC
Players: 1

Disney Universe Review

Very seldom am I tempted to play a game that is multiplayer. I'm more of a lone wolf, so to speak; I enjoy testing myself with puzzles and challenges rather than having to wait for others to try and catch up. This probably stems from a childhood of school group projects where I did everything and my teammates sat on my laurels. Enough of the griping, though, because this particular Disney title actually made multiplayer fun.

Disney Universe is an action packed puzzle solving game published by Disney Interactive Studios that came out in 2011. It was released for the Playstation 3, Wii and Xbox 360, as well as for Microsoft Windows, though I haven't had a chance to play the PS3 or Windows version. My experience with this game was on the XBox, which was new for me as I'd never used the console before. Getting used to the unfamiliar controller took me a bit and even with this game being primarily a button masher type, I still had to remember how to knock bad guys back, pick up items and run around all at the same time.

Unlike most Disney games that I'm familiar with, Disney Universe doesn't appear to have any sort of plot. The player, or players if you're playing co-op, is represented by an oddly colored, big headed creature that enjoys dressing up as various Disney characters. Gender apparently doesn't matter to these blue, green, purple and yellow beings as your character can jump around as Donald Duck, Tinker Bell, Stitch or Rapunzel without any noticeable differences to the player avatar. The game starts with a set of fifteen various Disney characters for players to dress up as and more character costumes are unlocked when creatures wearing the new costumes are rescued from world stages. The new unlocked costumes have to be purchased with in-game currency, though I doubt anyone ever had to worry about not being able to afford the character they wanted. The gold needed is generously dispersed when solving puzzles, winning mini games and defeating enemies, as well as being sprinkled about levels.

Where gameplay is concerned, as I've previously mentioned, there's little more to do than button mash. Bad guys come out during various stages, you mash buttons to beat them up and collect coins, and occasionally the player will need to figure out how to progress through the various stages by solving simple puzzles. Every stage offers additional mini games that offer more coins as prizes. These became incredibly repetitive after the first five or so as there only seem to be about three different kinds of mini games; defeat something, collect more gold than the other players or run amok and try to avoid getting hit with projectiles.

Donald and Pumbaa in the Lion King stage.
Screencap taken from a playthrough by CoinOpTV on YouTube.

When I played, I had other people on my team and therefore cases where one player needed to stand on a platform while another character turned a lever were easily handled. I remember a few times when I wondered how on earth anyone playing single player could possibly solve puzzles like that without the assistance of a team mate. After checking out videos of single player gameplay, I am disappointed to report that the puzzles aren't any different at all, they just require more speed. Instead of having someone hold the lever, a short timer starts ticking and you have a few seconds to turn it yourself and then get up on that platform. Failure requires running back to the lever to try again. Honestly, the entire game seems to lose a bit of fun if played solo.

My group played for maybe two hours and we finished four out of the five default available worlds. I'm sure with another half hour we could have easily defeated the game. That makes buying Disney Universe seem like a bad idea, given that the game takes virtually no time at all to breeze through. I'm assuming that's why DLC, or downloadable content, was made available. Through the online shops on the Wii, Xbox or Playstation, players can purchase "packs" of content, offering more costumes and stages to play with. Personally, I'm not a fan of the necessity to buy more content to keep a game interesting.

Rating:
Demographic: 8+ years, boys and girls.
System(s): Playstation 3, Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii and PC.
Players: 1 - 4

Where's My Water Review

Unlike a lot of people these days, I do not live on my cellphone. Like any other normal adult, I live on my computer. That can make finding and playing certain games difficult, particularly when they're released exclusively for handheld devices like iPhones, Blackberries and Android phones. Thankfully Disney made sure to release a free version, though far shorter, of their surprisingly popular Where's My Water? title for desktop web browsers as well.

Released in 2011, Where's My Water? is a simple puzzle game featuring cartoon alligators. One particular gator, Swampy, lives in a rather dirty sewer city and wants nothing more than a bath. Unfortunately for him, he has neighbors that prefer chewing on the water pipes to more hygienic activities, which prevents our soiled hero from getting clean. Our job is to redirect water from either pools of standing water or from leaking pipes to Swampy's broken shower pipe so that he may bathe. The trick is that we don't actually get to touch the water, we can only clear a path by touching dirt obstructing the way. Sound easy? It would be if it weren't for those pesky laws of physics the game developers remembered. Water won't always flow in the direction the player might want, so figuring out how to bounce it off walls or movable platforms will be necessary. Points are awarded for speed, collecting rubber ducks and for providing more than the minimum amount of water needed for Swampy to get clean.

I don't see how washing with stagnant water is going to make Swampy feel clean, but this is about an alligator with an obsessive need to bathe. Realism isn't that important.

Though this game appears to be directed towards young kids, the graphics and very repetitive soundtrack are a sure sign this was meant for someone easily entertained, I have to admit that the puzzles aren't entirely easy. The first few levels aren't a problem at all, as it goes with most games, but then a few curve balls get thrown in for good measure. Eventually we have to deal with bombs in the sewers, which can be used to the player's advantage if detonated at the right time or place. For those young achievement hunters out there, accomplishing certain tasks during the levels also unlocks achievements, which can unlock special prizes like bonus stages and extra points.

The game I played wasn't the paid version of the game, and it's obvious that online players uninterested in paying get a much shorter gaming experience. The full game offers chapters to play through, each chapter offering twenty stages of increasingly difficult levels of gameplay. Online players choosing to try the free game only get ten stages of the first chapter, though if you collect enough rubber duckies you can unlock a bonus eleventh stage.

Play Now: Where's My Water?

Rating: 
Demographic: 8+ years, boys and girls.
System(s): iOS, Blackberry, Android and PC.
Players: 1

Disney Princess: Enchanted Journey Review

Let's get this gaming blog started right with a review. Granted, possibly not the most eye catching of titles to start us off with, but stick with me, you might be surprised.

Because Disney seems to like hard gender lines, we've got games tailored for boys and games tailored for girls. Children of the female persuasion get the Disney Princess line, video games with boxes virtually slathered with images of the most popular of Disney's princesses and a hearty helping of pink.

Now bring me that pink horizon.

Disney Princess: Enchanted Journey seems to be a toned down, "girly" answer to Kingdom Hearts, having come out in 2007 after Kingdom Hearts I, II and Chain of Memories were already on the shelves. The main character is entirely customizable, from hair to skin tone to clothing style and color. The player picks the little girl's name, as well, giving young children the chance to put themselves into the game as far as customization will allow. After your pixie guide gives you a quick tutorial, you're gifted with a special wand that you get to use to bop enemies on the head. The wand, similarly to Sora's Keyblade in Kingdom Hearts with the addition of keychains, can change appearance depending on the world you're playing in. There's no killing in this game, only changing the enchanted Bogs back into the butterflies and creatures they were before an evil princess came to the four (five with Belle's special unlockable stage) different worlds to foul things up.

These are Bogs; Genie themed for Agrabah.

I found the premise of the story interesting, if not cliche, but this game wasn't really made for my demographic. The villain of this tale is a princess that doesn't want to be "princess-like"; she's not into being kind or courteous. The player gets to visit Ariel, Cinderella, Jasmine and Snow White in their respective worlds to fix issues that the Bogs and their mischief are causing. Ariel and her mer-friends have lost their ability to make music, time has decided to go a little wibbly wobbly in Cinderella's town, Jasmine's dealing with confusing mirages and Snow White's world is being drained of color. Once all four worlds are completely saved, each world has three short chapters to get through, the player unlocks the fifth world where we meet Belle in the Beast's ballroom. There really isn't a problem there, you just get to play Keep Away with a few Bogs.

Sort gems with the dwarfs to foil those rainbow muddying Bogs.

From a technical standpoint, the graphics are pretty good and the voice acting's not half bad. Given that more than a few of the characters are voiced by their original actors (Jodi Benson is Ariel, Paige O'Hara is Belle, Linda Larkin is Jasmine and we even get Tim Curry playing a sailor in the Little Mermaid stage), it's worth it to sit through the dialogue. There's virtually no challenge to this game, even though there is a difficulty range given to each chapter and world. Pixie states that Ariel's world is the easiest while Snow White's is the hardest, but I doubt anyone will notice any change in level. All you need to do is change the Bogs back into their natural forms, play a few mini puzzles and collect gemstones, which aren't really worth anything. There's no currency in the game, no leveling up, and once the gem counter reaches it's limit, nothing happens.

I had the opportunity to play this on both the Playstation 2 and the Wii, haven't had the chance to play it on the PC, but I would suggest going the PS2 route if possible. The Wii-mote isn't nearly as responsive as it should be, though twirling it around like a wand was a little fun. There is a two player option available, with the second player being just as customizable as the first. Replayability is incredibly low but one run through isn't painful. Enchanted Journey is also an incredibly short game; you might waste two hours, max. Give it to a kid the game was made for, though, and they could be busy for a while.

Rating:
Demographic: 4 - 8 year old girls.
System(s): Playstation 2, Wii and PC.
Players: 1 - 2