Maybe it was a mistake from the beginning, thinking that a Disney trivia game was going to have something to offer adult fans of Disney movies looking for nostalgia. Maybe it was a mistake thinking that a Disney trivia game would have questions about Disney films. Or, indeed, have anything to appeal to persons over five years of age.
Our bad, I guess.
Disney Think Fast – actually, it’s supposed to be THINK Fast, because, in the absence of bite, one is forced to fall back on bark, and nothing compensates for the lack of actual thinking required like writing the word ‘think’ in all capitals on the front cover… Anyway, most of Disney Think Fast (as I will stubbornly refer to it) requires about as much thought as getting out of bed in the morning and putting your pants on: if you have basic hand-eye coordination, and the ability to identify shapes and colours, you will be able to sail through most of the rounds with laughable ease.
You may be thinking that I’m too harsh. It’s a children’s game, after all. But most of the questions are not simply easy: they’re pitched at about a two-year-old level. For anyone old enough to have attended a year or more of primary school, the only thing that keeps Think Fast from being as dull as the morning wake-up routine is the sheer ridiculousness of the questions. Example:
“In Aladdin, Abu gets turned into an Elephant. Which one of these is an Elephant?”
And then you pick which of the four pictures has an elephant in it. I kid you not.
As it turns out, more than two-thirds of the game turns out to be filled not with easy-if-you’ve-seen-it movie trivia questions, but rather with easy-if-you-have-eyes object recognition exercises. In some cases (as above), these questions are tied (very) loosely to Disney movies. But then come even more generic and over-simple questions – not even paying lipservice to the theme (and title!) of the game.
Now, there are some cool touches. The quiz show you’re participating in is hosted by the Genie from Aladdin, and while he isn’t voiced by Robin Williams, the stand-in does a very decent job. And the player avatars are classic Disney characters like Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, and Donald, which is pretty cool (although some more options would have been nice). There are also a handful of exciting settings (that don’t have any real bearing on anything, but are pretty, and engage nostalgia in a way that the gameplay so miserably fails to).
All in all, it looks and sounds very nice. Think Fast does unexpectedly well in terms of presentation and polish. But underneath that, there’s just, well… nothing much at all.
Not recommended for anyone with hands big enough to hold the buzzers. But for your very young children, it could well be a goer if you’re looking for another use for your Buzz! buzzers.