The first time that a Disney Park was featured in a game was 1990's Adventures in the Magic Kingdom for the NES. This was an adventure game developed by Capcom that featured the player exploring a Disneyland/Magic Kingdom amalgam to retrieve six silver keys so that the castle gates could be unlocked in time for the afternoon parade. It had five mini-games based on famous Disney attractions- Space Mountain, Autopia, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, The Haunted Mansion and Pirates of the Caribbean- and a series of Disney Trivia questions that the player must answer to earn a key. It's a fun game that features the first digital interactive recreation of a Disney Park.
The Walt Disney World Explorer was a computer program released in 1996 for both Macs and PCs. On the surface, it seems like a glorified interactive map of the World, but it's actually much more than that. This program has a page for each attraction and some include behind-the-scenes videos, while others have mini-games like a Foley Stage at the Monster Sound Show and an interactive coral reef in The Living Seas Pavilion. There are also some Hidden Mickeys throughout the game, and finding 10 of them treats you to a Mickey Mouse retrospective Walt Disney recorded for an episode of the Wonderful World of Disney. Other features include a trivia game and guided tours of attractions throughout the parks by category. Overall, it's a cool time capsule featuring attractions that are long gone and well worth tracking down for any Disney Parks fans.
Walt Disney World Quest: Magical Racing Tour was released in 2000 for the Sony Playstation. It's a version of Mario Kart starring Chip and Dale in their rescue rangers clothes racing a variety of new characters around racetracks inspired by various WDW attractions. The plot of the game is simple: Chip and Dale accidentally destroyed the fireworks machine, and are racing around WDW to find the missing parts so the fireworks can go on as scheduled. This game is fun, but in my opinion it would benefit greatly from more responsive controls and more lenient AI for the other racers.
Virtual Magic Kingdom was an online multiplayer game released in 2005 to promote Disneyland's 50th anniversary. Players could not only roam the virtual park in search of pins and other mini-games and treasures, but they could also create their own room with various artifacts from attractions past and present. The game sadly shut down in 2008, but it still has a strong following online with at least two separate attempts to recreate the game. The game was key to the plot of Ridley Pearson's The Kingdom Keepers:Disney After Dark, but the version in the book was based off of a beta version of the game, so it featured some ideas, like being able to pick up items like a soda can, that didn't make the final cut.
Kinect Disneyland Adventures is the first official digital recreation of Disneyland Park. It was created to show off the features of Microsoft's Kinect device for the Xbox 360, but Disney fans bought it so that they could visit the park anytime from the comfort of their own living rooms. Various attractions are featured as mini-games, but the coolest part is just walking around the park and taking in the sights. My only complaint is that they were unable to secure the rights to Roger Rabbit, Star Wars and Indiana Jones, so those attractions are just unmarked buildings in-game. On the other hand, this features the video game debut of the characters from Song of the South, so it can't really be that bad. Overall, this game is the closest we'll ever get to a visit to Disneyland from our own homes.
Individual attractions and movie franchises have had games based on them released as well. The Haunted Mansion was released in 2003 as a tie-in to the movie, but it was based more on the ride's mythology than the film. Pirates of the Caribbean has had numerous games made, including an MMO that recently shut down. Games like the Epic Mickey series and Kingdom Hearts III feature elements based on the parks, with EM's Wasteland being a twisted version of Disneyland and KH3 featuring ride vehicles that are apparently used during boss battles.
As proven by these and other games, Disneyland's mythology is richer than people give it credit for. There are so many original characters and stories that are ripe for adaptation, and video games seem to have been the go-to medium for these types of adaptations. Here's hoping for another great Disneyland-inspired game soon.
