Disney Characters Just Do Nothing (Disneyland Adventures)

Game: Disneyland Adventures
Platforms: Xbox One, Xbox 360, Windows
Played On: Xbox One
Price: £14.99
Available on Xbox Game Pass: Yes

I know, I’m sorry, I can already tell what you’re thinking but I did warn you all that I will play every kind of game. So yes today I will be talking to you about Disneyland Adventures, developed by Frontier Developments and published by Microsoft studios. Remastered for Xbox One by Asobo Studios. No spoilers in this there’s no story and I played this on Xbox One which there is an option to play this game on Kinect or controller and I chose controller as I have some self respect so let’s head to Anaheim, California to the most magical place on earth.

So straight out the gates I have to be honest, this game is stunning. Even the angriest most cold hearted person will find a bit of cheer when first setting eyes on where we are, so imagine how a child (who this game is for) will be blown away. Genuinely it’s actually quite incredible the detail that’s here.

We then meet Micky who introduces us to the land and my god what is this?? It’s actual voice acting, now I can’t be too surprised in a Disney licensed game backed by Microsoft but even still it’s a proper voice on a character that is Micky mouse. Now I will admit that some characters are just ‘the closest person’ that was available, so no, Tom Hanks isn’t Woody.

So we’re here, we do a few things for Micky to get us used to the mechanics of the game and then we’re away!! We are free to go around Disneyland, you can go wherever you want. The map isn’t so huge that you’ll get lost but it’s big enough to explore and feel special. The map itself is split into 8 parts;

Main Street USA: The sort of Disneyland experience of the game
Adventure Land: Aladdin and Jungle book Characters
New Orleans Square: Princess and the Frog, Pirates of the Caribbean, and the haunted mansion (for some reason)
Critter County: Winnie the Pooh, Song of the South (I was surprised this was here as well)
Frontierland: Toy Story
Micky Toon Town: Self explanatory, these characters are also in Maine Street (other than Chip and Dale)
Tomorrowland: Stitch, Finding Nemo, more Toy Story
Fantasyland: Literally everybody else, also this place is 3x as large as the others

As you explore it gives you paths to a few characters to talk to and they’ll give you a few missions to get some tools to enhance the experience, you will get a camera, a magic wand, a laser blaster, a fishing rod, a megaphone, a spyglass and a water squirter. These are used to find secrets and collectibles around the park.

One thing that I thought was a very nice touch is the ‘Hidden Micky’s’ there are loads to find and gives you the great reason to sit and explore the park and have some childish wonder, there really is something for everyone and anyone with kids who has game pass this is a great game to play with them.

So really that’s it, explore, talk, all these lands have fun mini games that tie into the movies, any child will find this magical and fully enjoy the experience over and over. But that’s not why I played it... I played to get 1000/1000 Gamerscore. And quite frankly this might be the masochistic thing I’ve ever done.

There’s is a reason I’ve titled it the way I have and frankly that’s because it’s a very accurate description. And I also wouldn’t be exaggerating if I said this was collectibles the game. So let’s have a guess where most of the achievements lay?? No you’re wrong, it’s completing everything, I mean everything!!!

As I said it’s a kids game so nothing too hard but it’s long, so so long, finding all the secrets and completing all the mini games is time consuming, especially as a lot of the mini games will take more than once to perfect. I’ll get into one later on. Right now I want to talk about the lazy characters who do nothing and honestly show how entitled they are.

These people, these selfish, lazy people don’t do anything, for example, yes I’m happy to help you Winnie the Pooh, you’re a delight and no one can hate you, but when you’re asking me to give a message to piglet who is 5 feet away then you’re taking the piss Pooh!!! And it’s all of them, collect this, tell so and so that, bring this to them, after 12 hours I’m getting fed up of your s**t Cinderella!!

If you’re wanting this perfection then you’ll have every emotion go through you, from joy at a little Easter egg one second to blinding rage because Pinocchio lost his pissing homework again and needs us to wander around Disneyland to find the pages. But this is nothing, I mean nothing to the splash mountain mini game.

To perfect this mini game you must go through a passage of not being hit by projectiles being thrown at you by Br’er Fox and Br’er Bear who I can only assume have Bradley Coopers character from American Sniper in there, on top of this you’re in a boat which handles worse than the Titanic looking at an iceberg. Now I don’t mind challenges in kids games, and if you needed to just complete it then fine, you can’t lose these mini games, but perfecting was hell.

And I could forgive all of that, all of it, but this section comes 5 minutes in, it comes after another poorly handling stage but worse of all it comes after an 2 and a half minute unskipable cut scene that is just the worlds most annoying thing, and after the 6th go you’ll be wanting it all to end. So there’s you’re warning, it’s an easy game to perfect, but you do so at your own mental risk.

But let’s mark it, I guess I should give it two marks here, one I’ll give for my experience of perfecting it to 1000, and I’ll put that here, it’s a 3/10. It’s easy, it’s starts off very cute but soon all of its charm wears off and you won’t be able to watch Disney for a month.

Now for its real score, and I have to look at what this game is meant for, it’s meant for kids and I know if I was a kid and not very used to video games but still wanted to succeed and get lost in a world over and over again I would be playing this day after day. I don’t think anyone past 11 years old will get full enjoyment but this is a great first game for a child or even better and great game for a family to play, with controller or Kinect, all for a very fair price, and it’s charm will last a long time, I mean come on... it’s Disney!!

8/10

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