There’s no denying that the Disney Princess are one of Disney’s most profitable properties. The’ve appeared on merchandise everywhere…
… Like direct to video movies (That people wish didn’t exist)…
…had video games…
… and even manga!
While I grew up with them, I wouldn’t say the Disney Princess are my favorite brand. When I was younger, it was easier to believe in love at first sight, and stuff like that. Now that I’m older however, I can look back and see where there might have been some flaws.
However, that’s not the point of this post. The point is that we need better video games for this franchise!
There seems to be a stereotype that the video games girls want to play are dress up games. Not games that will challenge them. I mean, there are puzzle games, but there aren’t a lot of good games for this franchise. It seems that the developers just thought, hey, it’s for little girls, we don’t have to put our best effort into making these games.
I know that’s often true for many video games based off of children’s properties. However, there seems to be more of an effort put into boys games than girls games.
Take the game featured up above, Magical Journey. It gained negative reviews with mainstream critics, with many saying only little girls would like it – for a little bit. However, It got some love for having solid graphics, solid gameplay, and an interesting villain, who was a wicked Princess!
It later had a kind of sequel called My Fairytale Adventure. It was less well received than Enchanted Journey.
This was probably due to having a much thinner plot, a lot more handholding during gameplay, less time with the actual princesses, and the lack of an actually villain. Not that a villain is necessary, mind you, but with the game’s plot being so simple it would have made it much more interesting.
Most of the video games fore this franchise are like this. I, for one believe, anyone who likes Disney Princess deserve better.
Games developed for little girls should use this much handholding! I’m not expecting the game to be as complicated as many games geared towards adults, but kids can handle more than you expect!
Let’s compare to one of the Disney games geared towards boys. This is an older game, yes, but it’s still is a good example. This game is called Disney’s Villans’ Revenge. The plot is that several Disney villains have taken over the endings of their stories, and the player must defeat them and return the happy endings.
I wasn’t able to find any reviews for this game, but it certainly seems more interesting than many of the Disney Princess games.
Now the games for Disney Princess don’t have to be exactly like this game, but it would be very interesting.
Personally, I’d like a game like Kingdom Hearts. The game is an RPG that merges Disney with the Final Fantasy video gameseries.
In the series, the Disney Princesses are Princess of Heart, the only beings with completely pure hearts.
Here are two commercials for the original Kingdom Hearts:
(Although the second one smacks of 2002)
youtube.com/watch?v=QNvTWohCFjI
youtube.com/watch?v=7uMMKDd1Fr0
One thing to note is that neither of the commercials bring attention to the Princesses
Why can’t we have a game like that? It would be a kid friendly RPG, where the princesses are the main characters, saving the princes? It would be the most awesome thing ever! Girls would love that!
What I’m just saying is, the developers can make better games than what is coming out right now. Just because it’s for little girls doesn’t mean that it should be half-assed.