Pixar movies are wonderful, aren’t they? They are reliable nuggets of almost unadulterated joy, to the extent that the studio’s latest release, Inside Out, even includes a very chirpy character called Joy, voiced by Amy Poehler. There’s a similar spirit to this free tie-in iOS game that Disney has released alongside the movie, but will it attract the same huge critical acclaim? That’s very unlikely, but this remains a lovely little gem of a game.
On the subject of a little gem, that is not, unlike what the screenshot below could lead you to believe, what you regularly fire up the screen when playing Inside Out Thought Bubbles. It is instead meant to be – yes – a thought bubble, and the main objective of the game is to wipe out other bubbles on the screen by landing bubbles of the same color alongside each other. Occasional extra little missions along the way, like hitting literal targets or rescuing ‘mind workers’, help to vary the gameplay.
It’s relatively standard fare for a puzzle game, but the cutesy charm and sensible difficulty curve effectively keeps boredom or frustration at bay. It’s certainly hard not to feel upbeat as Joy makes quips – in Amy Poehler’s voice, we are pleased to notice – like “I couldn’t be happier!” and “This is going to be amazing!” Well, not quite, Joy – but Inside Out Thought Bubbles is a real tonic all the same.
