Toy Story Mania
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| Toy Story Mania

Toy Story might be old news now, and at least a hundred animated kids' films have been released since - about love-sick robots, dancing penguins and the like. But that's clearly no deterrent for Disney, which is continuing to support the licence with games like this one.

We're pleased to say, though, that Toy Story Mania isn't typical of your average film cash-in. It's not some lazy platformer for kids either. Shock, horror - Toy Story Mania actually looks and plays like quite a bit of thought and work has gone into it. We could do without the Toy Story theme music playing over and over again throughout, but that's one of the only dubious inclusions in the game. The rest of it is bright, breezy and surprisingly playable whatever your age.

The whole of the game is available to you from a map screen when you first begin. So there are five different games to play, and a prize area where you can trade tokens you've won for extras in the games.

These games are simple, but they also last for numerous rounds. Each round gives you a target score to achieve and sometimes an accuracy percentage to meet, as well as a time limit and occasionally a limited amount of ammo.

Admittedly these targets are meant for younger players, and the older ones among you won't find it at all difficult to breeze through most levels. The only sense of achievement more seasoned gamers are going to get is from repeatedly playing to unlock tokens and beat their own high scores - which actually offers a fairly decent challenge.

The five games then are all different but all are also accuracy and target shooting related. So, the Space Range is a sort of hoop-la competition that uses an aiming reticule similar to those you get in first-person shooters for lobbing grenades. Chuck your hoops over space rockets and those little cute aliens from Toy Story everyone had dangling in their cars for about a year after the film came out, and you collect points.

In Balloon Land, a series of balloons drift around the screen and sport numbers for a limited time. Hold down the relevant numbered button of your keypad and your target zooms towards the balloon. When you let go of the button, your bullet is launched and if you hit it, you get the points.

Boot Camp and Wild West are the most similar - both giving you free aim to fire at targets that pop up. However, in Boot Camp they're stationary targets on a firing range and in Wild West the screen scrolls constantly left to right, giving you a tighter time to pick out and hit targets.

Of all the games, Egg Toss offers the most depth and is most fun. Taking place down on the farm, your goal is to hit as many animals as possible by launching eggs at them. A power meter at the bottom of the screen lets you choose the strength of your shot - so for something in the distance you hold it longer than for a duck that's right in front of you. With bonus rounds, score doublers and moving and stationary targets, Egg Toss would do well as a game in its own right.

Toy Story Mania has undeniably been designed with younger gamers in mind, but it still offers some depth, including lots of unlockables. Its bold, colourful visuals too are far from shoddy. If all kids games were as good as this then we could stop whinging about them for a while and be happy. If you're under, say, 12 years old and your hero is Buzz Lightyear, this is the perfect game for you.

Toy Story Mania

Neatly designed game featuring all the Toy Story characters. Has five different mini-games, each with multiple rounds and each very enjoyable. Far surpasses your average licensed kids' game
Score
Kath Brice
Kath Brice
Kath gave up a job working with animals five years ago to join the world of video game journalism, which now sees her running our DS section. With so many male work colleagues, many have asked if she notices any difference.