From Frogger to Crossy Road
As you dodge stampeding buffalos on your way to an unknown goal, you may think that these developers, Hipster Whale, were amazing for creating this game. Don’t get me wrong, this game is perfect and for obvious Disney reasons, better than the regular Crossy Road. However, this idea all came from a classic golden age retro game about a frog trying to make it’s way home. Frogger is actually an arcade game that was developed by Konami and released in 1981! Contrary to Crossy Road, this game had an ending goal but the gameplay is the same. Observe;
Now we zip into 2016 (2014 for the original Crossy Road) when Disney Crossy Road launched. Now, the game is endless without a need for souls/lives/energy, whatever you want to call the cruel toll most mobile games have for their gameplay. Now along with logs and cars, you survive across a slew of levels from your favorite Disney franchises. The 300+ characters all have unique quirks and sometimes benefits, that keep the game interesting. Compare Frogger to what you see in this clip below of my gameplay of Crossy Road. Don’t mind the fails.
Disney Crossy Road – The Details in the Pixels
Besides the game’s concept of jumping and skipping to the next line constantly trying to beat your score, there are some objectives you can complete for a bit of extra loot or even in some cases an extra character. There are four buttons at the bottom of the screen and they correspond to the screens below. I’ll describe each screen briefly as they correspond to the buttons on the right image’s lower half. Let’s identify them first for the sake of the rest of this feature.
Top Left Button – Daily Stamps – Check with Circle
Bottom Left Button – Character Select – Mickey Mouse Icon
Top Right – Special Character Gacha- Ticket/Gacha Ball
Bottom Right – Fourth – Settings (Cog Wheel)
Circle Icon
The Circle Icon links to the Daily Stamps section. This is a highly encouraged activity as not only does it net you extra coinage, there are some characters that can only be obtained with this method. Then below the little stamp collection, there are two extra activities you can do for random currency. In regards to currency, you can get yellow C (Coins), blue P (P..Points?) and green Tickets which we will go over as the showcase proceeds. Now of these two activities, one you will usually be able to do while another, I call the bait box. It almost also requests you do something with a character you don’t have and then prompting you to pay for said character. It isn’t ever expensive and is a cute way to support the developers if you enjoy Disney Crossy Road.
Mickey Mouse Icon
This is the Characters Select screen. On the top, you will have each of the major movie titles available and then from there, you can choose one of the characters in that movie. What I love about this game is that the most obscure characters make it into the game. Some of my personal favorite inclusions you may recognize; Bomb Voyage from The Incredibles and Jerry Jumbeaux Jr. from Zootopia. You may notice four smaller buttons on this screen.
The little loot box looking icon will lead you to a character purchase screen. You can spend yellow Coins here to get a random character (Duplicates ARE possible) or your blue Points instead for a guaranteed new random character to be added to the roster.
The dice icon will select a random character for you to play as and will automatically load the stage for you to hop right into gameplay.
Pressing Play will activate the highlighted character and start the game immediately as well.
Special Character Gacha Icon
This is the ticket machine. Green tickets are obtained from upgrading your characters or as a rare drop from the challenges. The special thing about drawing from this machine is that the extra special characters you usually win in challenges can be won here also. I’d consider tickets as a premium currency since it is the hardest to get but not impossible. Once unlocked, there are certain characters that will drop tickets on a daily basis so I’d aim for one of these first and then move on from there. These are Diamond tier characters that can only be unlocked via stars. Stars are given for upgrading your other characters so, that is where the grind will begin.
Cog Icon
This is the settings screen. They have added a new icon that looks like Mickey’s ears to it but no matter how many times I press it there seems to be no use for it. It seems like it would be an option to reset data so when it is working and confirmed I will be able to update this article.
TIPS
Now for some TIPS to get us through the character list that grows 700+! Some are resources while some a tips I have found just through observing or picked up on forums.
Some characters can only be unlocked by super secret methods. A few good resources where you can verify the way to unlock a character are:
~About Coins and Points. Every time you use your coins to buy a character there is a chance that you get the duplicate. However, the chances of that happening are so unlikely, you are better off STRICTLY getting characters via coins rather than Points. Save your Points to level up your characters and get extra coins/ tickets from them.
~Visibility is more important than you think. When maneuvering the character about the level, make sure that you do your finger dancing right below the character so you can see where you are going. If you play in landscape mode you see more of the stage but I never really found a need for it.
~ DO NOT SIT STILL for too long or you’re DEAD fluff-butt.
~Some characters can only be unlocked by super secret methods. A few good resources where you can verify the way to unlock a character are:
http://www.secretcharacters.com/category/disney-crossy-road-secret-characters/
http://www.pocketgamer.co.uk/r/iPhone/Disney+Crossy+Road/feature.asp?c=69716
Disney Crossy Road – Disney Wiki – Has the best up to date list of characters as well as the unlock methods for secret characters.
