Imagine you’re scrolling through your preferred social media feed and you see a video ad. You like dogs and the ad features the cutest dog you’ve ever seen in your life. He’s looking out over a pristine turquoise ocean. (You love the ocean.) Did I mention he’s wearing a distinguished, dapper monocle? (Secretly, you’ve always wondered how you’d look in a monocle.) And then it gets weird. A bunny (isn’t she cute?) on a penny farthing rides up to the dog, disembarks, and the dog takes off. Then offers you a coupon to buy a Reese’s Cup (which just so happens to be your favorite candy). Not only are you confused what the heck any of that had to do with the advertised product, you wonder just how the advertising company seemed to see you so clearly. After all, you might have searched penny farthings once on the internet, but as far as you know, nobody else knows of your secret collection of miniatures.
Bullseye: Advertising on the Internet
Advertising companies pay for information and Google, Facebook, and everyone else sells you as its 
product. A fruit ripe for the picking.
And that’s how Instagram finds me. Obviously, they know I have a Disney podcast. They know I’ve been to a Disney park on five different occasions. They probably even know that I used to sleep with a stuffed Simba who foolishly predicted when you squeezed his paw, “We’ll always be together.”
So, as soon as Disney advertised their newest game, Disney Heroes: Battle Mode, to me on Instagram, they knew I’d download it.
About the App
Disney Heroes: Battle Mode is an RPG (role playing game) released in May which challenges you to defeat a virus that’s corrupting pixels and turning your heroes against each other. As part of the game, you free victims from this virus by leveling up your team, gaining new heroes, upgrading your characters’ abilities, and completing various challenges. For a more complete list of objectives and strategies, check out this page.
I found this game to be a pretty unique experience compared to the other few Disney games I’ve played. It’s the first RPG I’ve done, which was quite daunting, but the game basically runs itself. The pink and white exclamation marks in the game make it easy to find what you should click on and the initial tutorials make important concepts clear like how to level up your characters. Once you reach a certain level, you don’t even manually have to fight anymore and you can speed up the battle process using the fast-forward arrows.
It’s an easy game to play while doing something that (should) require more of your attention like writing an article for the internet.
Strengths of Disney Heroes
One thing I enjoy about this game over Emoji Blitz and Magic Kingdoms is that there’s a clear strategy. It’s worthwhile to develop some characters while others aren’t worth your in-game currency.
Also, a balanced team is a successful one. From my experience and observations, it’s good to have one to two tank characters, two to three damage characters, and a support character to work through the campaign. Luck doesn’t play much of a factor, so if you do a good job picking your team and upgrading them, you’ll win.
You can learn what type of character you have by going to the “Heroes” tab, selecting a hero, and selecting “Detailed Stats” at the bottom of the Stats page. Your chances to win increase when you develop your characters and upgrade their skills.
You’re able to play the campaign using stamina to fight battles. Each battle costs either 6 (normal mode) or 12 (elite mode) stamina, which allows you to play for a while. But, there’s plenty to do within the game to keep you busy, even when you run out of stamina.
Also, the game allows you to interact with others via your guild and the chat bubble in the top left of your screen. I haven’t spent a lot of time in the chat room, but when I asked what diamonds are for there, since Disney Heroes doesn’t make it clear, and got a quick answer in seconds. (The short answer to my question? You can buy diamond crates, hero chips, and probably a few other things I haven’t discovered yet.)
Weaknesses of Disney Heroes
Although it’s convenient that you can set the game to basically play itself, I somewhat wish that wasn’t an option. In my opinion, it shifts the game from something that you play, to something that you manage. I’d much rather play a sport than be the coach.
Also, unlike Disney Emoji Blitz and Magic Kingdoms, the selection of characters remains small with only 28 characters to obtain when Emoji Blitz and Magic Kingdoms both have over 100. For example, Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy, and Pluto can’t be found in this game. That wasn’t a typo…no Mickey. Also absent are many of the characters that have made Disney so successful. Simba? Nope. Alladin? Alladin who? Anna or Elsa? MIA.
I’d imagine as time passes, they’ll dip into their huge treasure trove of characters to enrich the game and keep it fresh. However, for now, it’s a bit disappointing that the characters are so limited.
Finally, the way you can shop for items in the game is a bit too convoluted. Unlike other games that have only a few different types of currency that allow you to purchase different items, this game has at least seven types of currency, which gets confusing.
And you can buy objects in many places besides the Market, which also complicates things. You may spend your diamonds in the Market only to discover you could’ve spent them on a crate (which appears in a different spot in the game) you’d much rather have. My suggestion would be to make the Market more inclusive of all things available to buy in the game.
Disney Heroes Rating
Overall, the game’s enjoyable and fun, but it doesn’t give me the magical sense of personal accomplishment that I find so necessary in my gaming experience. Also, due to the shortfalls in character selection and their Marketplace, I’d give this game 3 out of 5 Mickeys.
