Release date(s) April 24, 1996 Developer Media Station, Inc. | Initial release date 1996 Mode Single-player video game | |
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Genre(s) Point-and-click adventure, interactive storybook Series Disney's Animated Storybook Publisher Disney Interactive Studios Platforms Microsoft Windows, Macintosh operating systems Similar Disney's Animated Storybook games, Disney Interactive Studios games, Adventure games | ||
Disney's Animated Storybook: Toy Story is the fourth entry in the Disney's Animated Storybook point-and-click adventure interactive storybook PC game series, based on series of theatrical and home video releases. The game was developed by Media Station and published by Disney Interactive. The game is based on the 1995 Pixar film, Toy Story, which was the first feature-length computer-animated film. It was released on April 24, 1996. It is the only Animated Storybook title to be based on a Pixar (and, by extension, fully computer-animated) film.
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Conception
The vision of Marc Teren, VP of entertainment for Disney Interactive, was to create games with a "true and fair representation of the original property", and aim to capitalise as "ancillary products to successful theatrical and home video releases". To achieve this, Teren helped ensure the games were animated by Disney animators. From December 1994 to February 1995, the company had hired 50 new employees. Children's Business suggests the series came into fruition because in the contemporary entertainment market, it was "customary now for entertainment companies to release CD-ROMs to support a film or TV show".
Development
Disney and Media Station collaborated to create more than 12,000 frames of digital animation for each game, as well as 300 music and vocal clips. Digital music and sound effects were composed, orchestrated, arranged, edited, mixed and synchronized at Media Station. The games had hundreds of clickable hotspots that produced animated gags, as well as many mind-challenging interactive games. The voice cast sometimes consisted of actors from the films reprising their roles; meanwhile, at other times voice soundalikes were used.
Commercial performance
On May 13, 1996, PR Newswire reported that in the three weeks since the release of Disney's Animated Storybook: Toy Story, the game had sold more than 100,000 copies at retail. Revenues from Toy Story were included in Pixar's second quarter financial report.
Critical reception
Entertainment Weekly gave the game an A rating, commenting that Disney's Animated Storybook: Toy Story contained "all the familiar scenes" from the movie it was based on, albeit augmented by entertaining point-and-click activities. The site also praised the animation, noting "the sequences in Animated Storybook (which so closely mirror those in the film) have an immediate, you-are-there quality", in comparison to other video game adaptions of movies which "present scenes from the original flick in a truncated, non-interactive manner that can be mildly off-putting for both kids and adults". WorldVillage gave Disney's Animated Storybook: Toy Story the ratings of: Ease of Use – 5, Learning Value – 3, Entertainment Value – 4, Graphics – 5, and Sound – 3. It added that the game is "indeed a work of art". AllGame gave Toy Story a rating of 3.5 out of 5 stars. The Washington Post said the absence of the flim's two main stars "does not diminish the enjoyment" of the game. The Buffalo News said the game "captures the spirit and humor of the film". The Record thought the game had "first-rate production values". Robertson Stephens analyst Keith Benjamin said "This is the most compelling CD-ROM title I have ever seen". The Mirror said the game was "brilliant". MacWorld praised the game for its visual similarity to the film it was adapted from, commenting that "the 3-D imaging is superb".