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Disney Princess — Enchanted Journey by Papaya Studios is truly an enchanted journey. You are a little girl with a magic wand (your Wii-mote), and you travel the lands of the various Disney Princesses, helping them recover lost magic or thwart evil. All through that, you free butterflies that have been captured and subverted by evil witches into Bogs that surround and harass you. This is a title written for very young children — ages 4–8 — and kudos to Papaya Studios for a truly marvelous job.

I loaded the Wii, and the game opened with a movie in which a glowing ball of flying magic — a pixie — told the story of an abandoned castle that needed the magic returned. The children sat enthralled as the movie played and the character — a young girl — entered the castle. Until they were shown how to select their character's hair and clothing, the character is faceless — shrouded with a hooded cloak. Playable as either single player or co-op, I handed the controls to my 5-year-old niece and her 4-year-old brother. Both characters are launched in the same world with Player 1 as the leader. The camera is centered on Player 1, and players must cooperate as they can only get so far away from each other.

I helped them with the selection/customization of their characters, as little hands are not the steadiest. After selection of dresses, hair, accessories and the colors thereof, a voice over instructed them on the use of the remote controls. The joystick of the Nunchuk is used to move, and flicking of their magic wand (the Wii-mote) is used to throw magic spells "make a big boom" (a powerful area effect spell) or do the "magic twirl" by waving their magic wands side to side to open boxes, dispel a curse or activate magical items. They also were asked to try out the different actions on the items in the castle. (Yes, it's a tutorial.)

And being a Wii, it didn't matter if they shook just a little or went crazy. Papaya took into account the age of the little heroines and heroes and let all movement count. What began as tentative shakes soon became proud waves of the wand!

When that was done, we were told to explore the castle. Up the stairs and down the hall we went and found the center of the castle, which took us into a cutscene in which Player 1 inserted her magic wand into a receptacle. The castle shook, and portals to worlds of the Disney Princesses lit up.

Disney Princess — Enchanted Journey doesn't have great numbers of items to find. There are no failures if you drop a number of items and no real aiming required — just a magical journey through familiar lands and the performance of a number of different tasks that young children can manage. Not only that ... there's a distinct lack of a requirement of an adult to be present to read and instruct! In fact, they expected me to teach them to play the game, and I categorically refused, instructing them to listen with their ears and watch with their eyes and do as instructed. They gained a necklace with five pieces to fill and had a magic wand to assist them in their journey.

I directed them to the easiest, Ariel's world, to begin. They quickly grasped the controls; in fact, they would correct me! Most minigames are single player, and both players got a chance to play the game with Player 1 going first. Some games actually had a two-player component — such as the last game in Ariel's world in which both players worked together to train the chorus before it split into single-player games. At all times, they worked together to free butterflies by smashing the Bogs with magic. "You did it!" "Yay!" soon devolved into ... "I killed more Bogs." "No, I did!" "But I killed the last one!" Ahh ... sibling competition.

Ariel's world was broken in to small areas of completion, each no more than a few minutes - easy on the easily distracted. Even with goals to work towards, nothing pushed them towards them. They were free to wander and explore under the sea as they pleased. This continued as they entered each of the Princesses' realms.

After Ariel, I directed them to the easier worlds of Jasmine and Cinderella before they entered the world of Snow White. Each world has a different theme. In Ariel's world, they restored music. In Jasmine's, they dispelled mirages and found the real Abu. The next weekend, we helped Cinderella with time and started helping Snow White with her color issues. They enjoyed Cinderella immensely but found Snow White such fun that they replayed her world. Something about making bushes blue and red tickled their fancy. They did turn to me to assist them with the colored Bogs the first time they played it through, but apart from that, and some hand-steadiness issues, the game was compelling enough that they wanted to replay it each weekend — and show it to their friends on play-dates.

Throughout, a voice over (the pixie) provided hints and tips, instructing them to follow the trail of diamonds when they didn't seem to be running in the right direction or telling them where they had to go — back to the forest/town/farm/etc. — if they dawdled. On dry land, they also discovered jumping, and climbing, and pushing and pulling — all using the same button on the Wii-mote. Simplicity of controls for children that age is important and well-done in this title.

The single-player game is a little more difficult, as some tasks are just simpler with two. For example, in the mines of the seven dwarves, one of the minigames was to assist two dwarves with moving their railroad handcar up the mine. The single player has to play both dwarves by clicking one and then the other. In the two-player mode, each player had charge of one dwarf. Little hands had an easier time of holding steady than moving the Wii-mote back and forth accurately.

Besides the minigames — catching items, matching colors and memory games — there was the delightful discovery aspect of the game that the children enjoyed. They learned quickly that anything that sparkled could be "magicked" with a wave of their magic wand. Bushes flowered. Chests opened to reveal treasures. Items that had swirls of black-green had been cursed by the witch and could be "magicked" aright. Of course, after you completed each chapter, you were thanked by the Princess herself.

My competitive nephew was chomping at the bit to finish the entire game to unlock Beauty's area just because it was locked and urged his sister repeatedly to continue on rather than replay a favorite chapter in a particular world, and eventually, of course, they got there.

That he had to play a little girl made no difference to my nephew. Indeed, he had just as much fun selecting dresses, accessories and colors as my niece did. I figured out later that it wasn't "him" he was dressing, it was me! When they played the two-player game, he'd want to play "Aunty Carol" because I was Player 1. The only criticism I have here for the two-player game is that the second player's necklace doesn't "glow" at the completion of each world. I don't remember what I told my nephew, but he was certainly disappointed, and it was another reason for them to fight over who got to be Player 1. Once they actually got into the game, however, they soon forgot that, since both players were equal in game, and although Player 1 got to go first in the single-player games, they had to cooperate to get anywhere and, cooperatively, they could master the tasks in the more difficult worlds of Snow White and Beauty and the Beast.

There are few &mdash very few — game titles suitable for young children and even fewer for children of this age. Papaya Studios has managed to create a game with the wonder and cinematic feel of a Disney movie plus fun, interesting games that young children of 4 and 5 are capable of mastering. The cooperative two-player game is particularly well-done as it is true cooperative play in most instances, requiring each player to pull the same weight. It was a wonder watching them dispel the colored Bogs in Snow White's forest. They decided between themselves which color they would be responsible for, and both would do the third. In this particular game, they had to twirl in a colored spot (red, blue or green) to change the color of their wand's magic in order to free the butterflies captured in that particular colored Bog. Playing it in single-player mode, they both required my assistance. But in two-player, they played cooperatively and actually ran through the house to announce to their Daddy and Mommy that they did it. They freed all the butterflies in Snow White! All by themselves!

If you have a Wii and have young toddlers in your house, treat them and yourself this Christmas. Get this game. There is no reading required; everything is spoken! The voices are the same familiar friends they hear each week on the cartoon series. Did I mention we are still playing it? We don't replay the saved games. We erase them and start new games so that they can get the appropriate icons in their necklaces and the castle floor to glow each time they complete a chapter. It's only when they must play Beauty that we go back to that one saved completed game.