Barbie In The 12 Dancing Princesses

Barbie in the 12 Dancing Princesses for the Game Boy Advance is based on the movie of the same name. I am not sure what happened about this time, but the Barbie franchise was given the Madden series a run for its money when it came to annual games! These games are clearly aimed at kids and to be fair some are much better than you would think but is this one of them?

Wait I Am Invested In The Story!

As far as the Barbie games go, I must say that Barbie in the 12 Dancing Princesses has the most interesting premise behind it. Barbie is playing the role of Genevieve who is part of a family that has 12 sisters! An evil witch called Rowena comes to the castle and poisons the king and captures Barbie’s 11 sisters! It is up to Barbie to save them all and save the day.

The games presentation is pretty decent, but to be fair if you have played any Barbie game from this era, you have seen it all as far as the graphics go. They are not bad and the animation is good enough so I am sure kids will be happy with the way the game looks.

Is This Barbie Or Metroid?

While comparing a game based on Barbie to Metroid may sound really weird. It is actually the best comparison that I can think of for this game. It is a 2D platform-style game like most of the other games in this series, but there is more of an emphasis on exploration with Barbie in the 12 Dancing Princesses than the other Barbie games have.

The royal estate that you have to explore is rather large and will take you a while to get through. This makes this a game more suited to little Barbie fans who want more of a robust challenge from a video game.

I Have The Power!

Ok so that line is from another Mattel franchise, but it is actually very fitting for this game. As I said, Barbie (sorry Genevieve) is on a quest to save her 11 sisters. What is cool about this is that when you save one sister, you will learn a new ability that will help you get a little further. I was surprised at the number of different abilities Barbie has in this game.

You get a butterfly net that can be used as a weapon, stilts get you past previously impossible gaps and you get the ability to make stairs out of magic ribbons. This is just a small example of the different abilities you will get which help you to explore more and save your sisters.

As far as the Barbie franchise on the Game Boy Advance goes I would have to say that Barbie in the 12 Dancing Princesses offers more than most of the other games. It is not an all time classic or anything like that. However, I do feel it offers a better challenge and has more substance than the majority of other games that are in this franchise.

7.5/10

Pros:

• It has a pretty decent story
• Plenty of abilities to learn as you play
• More challenging than most other Barbie games
• The platforming is solid
• It requires some fun exploration

Cons:

• There is a DS version which is an enhanced version of this
• Younger kids might actually find this a tad too tough