As someone now dangerously close to leaving his mid thirties, I was the perfect age for the boom of 3D animation in movies. It’s hard to quite put into words how big a deal Toy Story was when it first blasted onto cinema screens, with toys and merchandise everywhere you looked. This success was absolutely warranted too, because even by modern standards it’s an exceptionally written movie that still holds up visually despite huge advancements in technology. Obviously such a success story had to branch out into the world of video games too, and these were also rather beloved. Toy Story: Retro Roundup! features a whole host of these classic titles, and some lovely extras to boot.
Toy Story: Retro Roundup! centres around five core games, but has multiple versions of all of them. This takes the grand total of old school Pixar games up to eleven, of admittedly varying levels of quality. I was very intrigued to see how these games felt from the futuristic year of 2026, and of course started my journey with the original Toy Story.
There are three versions of Toy Story you can play in Retro Roundup, but the Sega Mega Drive version is very much the recommended one to play (as the SNES version is missing some levels and the Game Boy version is just dire). At first Toy Story comes across as a simple 2D platformer, but actually it’s a ridiculously varied game. There’s a stage where you wander around the claw machine in an old 3D FPS style looking for aliens, a stage where you have to help toys hide when Andy comes rushing in, and multiple RC car racing stages. It’s a game that’s fun to play through and look at too, because the clever faux 3D visuals are actually rather impressive. Some stages are a little unfair and overly punishing I must admit, but the rewind feature of the collection means this isn’t much of an issue.
Next up is A Bug’s Life, which most of you will be aware isn’t a Toy Story movie. Still it was Pixar’s other early movie, and is a nice inclusion to the collection. The two versions of the game are very different this time, with a fairly basic platformer on the Game Boy and a foray into 3D on the PlayStation. I remembered loving the PS1 version of A Bug’s Life, and it’s still a clever game today. It’s more of a puzzle game than a straightforward platformer, with lots of collectibles and different seeds you need to plant to reach them. Although somewhat cumbersome to control by modern standards it’s an interesting title that’s well worth checking out.
After the brief foray into ant life, the next game in Toy Story: Retro Roundup! is Toy Story 2. There are two included titles based on the second movie, another somewhat throwaway Game Boy game and another 3D offering on the PlayStation. I’d actually never played either of these before, and had a great time playing as Buzz in the PS1 version. It’s more of a straightforward 3D platformer this time around, but with lots of collectibles to gather across familiar locations. There are some clever elements too like shooting your blaster in first person with a reflection in your visor, just like Samus has in Metroid Prime.
It’s another unusual title that I played next in Retro Roundup, in the form of Buzz Lightyear of Star Command. The two titles bearing this name are based on an animated series that I didn’t know existed, with different bots of the week featured in each stage. The PS1 Buzz game is a sort of action platformer with linear stages, while the Game Boy game is more like a weird shmup. I can’t pretend either of these really clicked with me, but they feature some interesting ideas like collecting tokens to spend on new weapons in each stage.
Last but by no means least is Toy Story Racer, which you can probably guess is a kart racing game. This was another game that passed me by growing up, and is another game with two versions. The fact they made a pseudo 3D racing game on Game Boy Colour is very impressive, but it’s about as rough to play as you’d expect in the modern era. The PS1 game is fantastic though, with loads of different characters, tracks and challenges to complete in its absolutely massive single player mode. It might have the most content of any kart racer I’ve played, and it really surpassed my expectations.
If Toy Story: Retro Roundup! was just a selection of old games it’d be fine, but it has way more features than just this. There’s the jukebox where you can listen to loads of different bleepy versions of “You got a friend in me” and “Strange Things”, and there are fact sheets about different toys and events related to Toy Story. I really appreciated checking all this stuff out as a fan, but not as much as the very best extra.
There are also over an hour of videos all about the development of the games, which are incredibly interesting. These feature all the trials and tribulations of creating the first Toy Story game alongside the movie being made, interviews with Jim Hanks who voices Woody in all the games, and so much more about all the different titles in the collection. As far as I’m concerned these video features are worth the price of admission alone, and they helped me really appreciate this collection.
I can’t pretend that all the games in Toy Story: Retro Roundup! are fantastic by modern standards, but this collection couldn’t do more to highlight them. With cheats and rewind options they’re easier to enjoy, and save states help with this too. I had a wonderful and nostalgic experience with Retro Roundup, and if you’re a Toy Story lover like me you’ll probably find it delightful.
