Short but sweet experience
The movie Toy Story 3, as of the time of the writing of this review, holds several records and is regarded as a masterpiece of animation. In my personal opinion, the third entry of the franchise deserves all the praise it gets, but it comes as a surprise that most of the games related to the movie are also quite enjoyable! With the exception of the PC/Wii versions which suffered unexplainable content limitations, the other versions seem to fare very well. We'll focus on the DS game here.
Gameplay
Here you take control of either Woody or Buzz, depending on the section or stage you are currently playing. The game flirts with different genres, and you'll be alternating constantly between them. The main sections are made up of platforming, in which you guide either of the heroes through locations of the movie, completing tasks, going after collectibles, and advancing the very summarized plot. Each character has unique moves that you collect as you go along, and both feel fun to play, both when you are using a lasso and when you are falling with style.
There are also linear parts in which you'll play as Woody running through a long environment or Buzz flying through space, controlling only their position on screen, rather than their movement, which is made automatically and constantly. You'll need to avoid obstacles, dispatch some enemies, and at the same time keep working on your collectibles. There is some really clever design going on around these, and Woody's cart level is to me the absolute jewel of the DS version. It is interesting that the developers managed to squeeze these into the game as being part of the imagination of the toys, in which they see our everyday situations as epic struggles, just like in the beginning of the third movie. Nice!
Another section of the game is the tower defense portion of the game, which I feel is the weakest. To those unfamiliar with the genre, this type of game relies on you positioning defense towers on strategic spots of a map in such a way that you block the advance of enemy troops that come in waves from a fixed spawn point. Here in Toy Story 3 the genre gets a toy makeover, and while it's not downright bad, it just feels out of place in relation to the rest of the game, that seems to work so seamlessly. Also, the difficulty curve here is a notch above what you might be expecting! Winning at the tower defenses is not necessary to advance the story though, which alleviates that somewhat.
Finally, there is Buzz's shooter section, which is a bit of a First-Person Shooter. Parents should not raise an eyebrow here, as it is all very cartoony and mild. This section is unremarkable, but fun anyway, and gets the job done. Perhaps more time should have been put into making it more interesting, but I fear making this kind of complaint, because decent movie games are already so hard to come by, so nitpicking hardly seems like the best thing to do.
Graphics and sound
This left me with quite an impression. I am not somebody who is impressed by high pixels counts and such... my thing is art direction. And just like the amazing Pixar movies, the portable game somehow manages to be perfect in that sense. The scenarios, albeit cramped, are detailed, colorful, and to be honest, quite moody. I was very impressed that my DS was producing such moody graphics, something that very few titles manage to do. There is a good variety of art assets, the characters are rendered well, and the scenarios, as already mentioned, are fantastic.
Sound feels okay, and while it isn't exactly noteworthy, there is no reason to turn it off or anything. It fits the game, and pieces like Toy Story's main theme are included, which is always a good thing.
Replay value
Well, this one here is hard to tell. Everything in this world comes at a cost, and in Toy Story 3 for DS's case, the cost of it being so well produced was that the money was coming from Disney, which then tacked on a lot of interactions with their DGamer web service. From what I hear, it's a very non-exceptional children's social interaction website with 3D avatars and such, but I never managed to test it, as the service is hard-locked only to a few countries. I'm not going to waste too many words going on about how a company that is supposedly about magic and all those fake things shouldn't go around locking people from outside the USA from participating in their services, considering that Toy Story 3 had a worldwide release, and they insisted on attaching so much DGamer content in every copy of the game.
To explain it briefly, the game has a lot of Achievements, but instead of unlocking things in-game, you unlock clothing and other such resources over at DGamer. There is a pretty hidden way of accessing the clothes in a wardrobe inside the game without having an account at the site (by clicking the DGamer option and choosing to go offline), but it just feels unnecessary.
Anyway, the collection aspect of the game in itself is very fun, and you'll go around the game world collecting Pixar Balls, which stack up in every mode you play. Every level in the game can be replayed, and there are a few which you are quite likely to want to replay, especially the ones involving the characters' imaginations.
The experience, however, is indeed quite short. You'll be done in a few hours. Don't expect a whole lot in this sense.
Veredict
The game is worth the time of anybody who enjoys the franchise, child or adult, but in a general sense it fares better as a rental than a buy. If you manage to snag a cheap copy though, don't think twice.