Once upon a time, a castle was built. Upon its completion, six special guests visited the castle and left six shining tiaras. The tiaras were so bright that the castle became known as Castle Bright. Every year, the people would come from all around to view the tiaras on a special day known as the Celebration of the Crowns. On the eve of the Celebration, the tiaras are removed from the castle. Playing as Lily, the castle’s caretaker, you must search for the six Disney Princesses and unravel the mystery.
Again, Disney Princesses: Royal Adventure absolutely nails the presentation aspect. The visuals are appealing and the story is simple enough but also contains a bit of mystery. Where the game falls apart is gameplay – which seems to aim for a very stereotypical version of the game’s audience.
The game is broken up into six main “quests”, each involving the search for one of the six Disney Princesses: Snow White, Cinderella, Aurora, Ariel, Jasmine and Belle. In order to locate the princesses, you must first help out the people living around the castle, but not before completing favors for other members – leading to an endless circle of fetch quests. One character will ask for a white flower, but in order to get the seeds, you must first help the gardener’s brother find his missing chickens. Eventually the clues you gain will point you towards a magical portal leading you to the Princesses’ worlds, only to receive another fetch quest.
Some favors will lead you to one of the village’s shops, at which point you can play one of five mini-games. These include a matching game where you match outfits; a memory game where you remember a short sequence of potions; and a music game where you hit timed button presses. Of the five, the only interesting game is the music one – which is also the one that you see the least.
Even with the included mini-games, Royal Adventure becomes very repetitive and dull. Nothing happens as you roam from favor to favor and there really isn’t all that much variety in the number of things that do happen. It is almost if you’re playing through one long, drawn-out tutorial just waiting for the real game to start. Its not until the final quest that things become interesting, but even here all of the decisions are made for you, so you’re basically just following a set path.
