Frogger is back for the 21st century, but this time with a Disney twist.  Reinvented by the folks at Hipster Whale, this game not only features the same premise as Frogger (to get across the road, pond, swamp, or whatever other obstacle might be in the way) but even features 8-bit graphics like the old game.  The difference is this one has many more features to it that make it fun, exciting, and challenging for anyone ages 4 and up.

Based on their original hit game Crossy Road, Disney Crossy Road features Disney characters from across a wide variety of different genres.  You begin the game with Mickey Mouse (of course) but quickly build your collection of different characters, each of whom might reside in a different video world.  There are characters from animated movies like Wreck-It Ralph, Toy Story, and the recent smash hit, Zootopia.  There are characters from the recent live action hit, The Jungle Book.  And there is even a world based on The Haunted Mansion.  Each world is unique with different obstacles and features that make it fun to play in.

Characters can’t traverse worlds though.  If you play with Rapunzel from Tangled, she can only be used in the Tangled world.  The same is true for Rafiki who can only be played in The Lion King world.  And for all the other characters as well.  But it makes sense when you play it.  Each world is tailored to those characters including special powers, obstacles, and music just for them (and the music is done in that retro 80’s arcade style also). There are so many characters to collect with different levels of rarity.  From classic to rare to epic, you’ll have fun trying to collect them all.  There are even SECRET characters that can only be unlocked when certain criteria are met.  My daughter and I unlocked Adult Nala for The Lion King world when we were playing in The Jungle Book and got hit by lightning.  But there are a lot of different characters to find and discover.

Primarily you earn characters by collecting coins in the game.  Every six hours, the game gives you a gift of coins (usually enough to buy you one or more new characters from the prize machine).  You can also collect coins during the course of play.  They’ll be scattered randomly throughout the different worlds.  If you pop in your coins and you already have that character, it gives you special coins for a different machine that is guaranteed to give you a character you don’t already have.  I’m pretty certain it doesn’t unlock the secret characters, but it’s great when you start collecting duplicates from the machine to know your coins aren’t going to waste.

The worlds are really inventive.  Other than just having different background music and different environments, so many other aspects are different, too.  For example, in Big Hero 6, there are Super Suit versions of all the main heroes.  When stepping on a white glowing square, these heroes use their Super Suit to leap way ahead in the game so scores based on distance are generally higher than in other worlds.  In Wreck-It Ralph‘s world, you can collect items for bonus points and if you collect the cherry power up, you can hit surrounding items like trees for even more bonus points so scores are much higher in general in that world.  My favorite is The Haunted Mansion.  You not only hear narration by “The Ghost Host” and background music from the attraction itself, but the items float by like they might in The Haunted Mansion.  To keep the attraction lit up, you have to activate candelabras located throughout as well as avoided all of the obstacles.  It’s really a lot of fun.

If you’re looking for a simple, fun game for all ages that doesn’t cost anything to play (you CAN purchase additional characters, but why would you?), check out Disney Crossy Road for your mobile device.