I Played Disney Princess: Enchanted Journey. Here’s What I Thought.
When most people think of Wii games, the first ones to cross their minds are the juggernauts. Wii Sports, which launched a thousand console sales (over a hundred million within the first year, to be more accurate); New Super Mario Bros Wii, which blended the 2D and 3D sides of the Mario franchise to great monetary success; Mario Kart Wii, the first motion-controlled instalment of the classic franchise; all of these were massively popular and beloved by a generation of families who were largely getting into video games for the first time.
Disney Princess: Enchanted Journey (2007) for the Wii was by no means a commercial failure, but does not stand the test of time nearly as well.
The Wii was home to massive amounts of short and shallow titles referred to as shovelware; Enchanted Journey could cynically be considered among them. However, I wanted to capture the spirit of childhood by playing a game designed for eight year old girls, something I actually used to be (although I am currently neither eight years old nor a girl), and so it was this game I chose to play for my retro game review. Let it never be said I don’t do things for you.
Enchanted Journey opens with the tale of a kingdom, Gentlehaven, which has been struck by a curse. It needs to be saved by a plucky young amnesiac girl — that’s you! — who travels across at least four different princesses’ kingdoms, solving their problems and helping to restore the castle back home on the way. Each kingdom has three levels, and each level consists of a few minigames or fetch quests to help the story progress.
After all of this (cover your ears if you don’t want spoilers… for… Disney Princess: Enchanted Journey…) you fight a final boss: the evil Zara, who wanted to prevent all princesses from achieving their happy endings, since her own princess dreams were crushed when she was just too evil as a child. Once she is defeated and the curse lifted, the truth is revealed — you, yes, you, little girl at home, were the princess of Gentlehaven all along, and you can now reclaim your crown.
I played the game on co-op mode with my guide and friend Avery, who’s been playing the game since their youth and now regularly speedruns it on livestream. This was incredibly useful to me, a beginner, who wanted to get through the process and find out all the little details without having to put too much thought into Disney Princess: Enchanted Journey.
The first thing I noticed is that the game is absolutely not designed for co-op — every time the little girl speaks, the second player’s mouth moves in perfect unnerving unison with the first, and when the idle animations play at the same time it makes them look like synchronised automatons. Often, player two will spawn out of a cutscene standing on top of an NPC, or stand awkwardly in the middle of a cutscene and get in the way of what you’re meant to be looking at.
It also makes the combat laughably easy, not that it was particularly difficult in the first place, being a game designed for young children. Quick attacks are done by shaking the Wii remote, and charged attacks involve holding the remote up and then bringing it down once you’ve amassed enough energy. However, the charged attacks are largely pointless, as four normal hits will kill any standard target, and attacks home in on the nearest enemy regardless of where you’re looking. It’s easy to spam your way to victory, even on specialised enemies with unique powers such as a freeze mechanic or spawning weaker clones, and even during the final boss fight. We played through the levels from most to least difficult according to the game’s internal scaling, but they all seemed fairly evenly matched, other than the minigames which seemed to insert artificial difficulty on the harder levels.
An anticlimactic, unexplained ending that hinted at the villain’s potential redemption but went nowhere with the concept brought an end to my experience with Enchanted Journey. Avery asked me whether I’d like to play the bonus Belle level; I politely refused.
I remember a youth full of similarly underdeveloped, overpriced Wii games, so if you’re looking for nostalgia, this may just be the place for you. However, I wouldn’t recommend it to those seeking the ultimate Wii experience in the modern age of gaming. To you, I suggest just picking up the Mario title.
Disney Princess: Enchanted Journey is available on Steam for PC or on Amazon for console.
