Starting Xmas Early with Marvel Disney Infinity

Last week we sat wondering about Xmas, Yes that is right, my mind is already running and although we decide every year not to go mad , we simply do .

It is not hard to have too much fun buying those all exciting Xmas list presents , especially when there is 7 of them and panic hits ,but me and my husband decided to start now.

Our children are not spoilt, they simply get a treat now and then and it is usually something they all play with together like for instance a swing set for the summer or computer games which they prefer to play together rather than alone.

Last month we bought another new T.V to put in the sitting room for the little ones to play their computers on.

Kaiden had received his Playstation 3 for his birthday back in March but their bedroom already had a very old T.V in it which belonged to his older brother and there was no room for another.
We are basically waiting to get moved to a bigger house, so while we had the spare money we thought we would grab a bargain . 
After all the new home will have an extra room so we would have needed another T.V for the smaller boys anyway.

When dad came in holding the new T.V , the kids were pleading for a game they could all play together downstairs on ,so last month he bought Minecraft and a couple more controllers.
Playstations seem to be the favourite in our house our of all the consoles as the girls already have one upstairs in their room and their dad has the new Playstation 4 in the sitting room.
When you have 7 kids but separated between three bedrooms it only seems fair for them to be able to have their own so of course dad bought them .
I know some of you may say it is too much but when you think over 12 months how much you spend on them all £50-£100 every so often , it does add up but not to the extent it would feel at Xmas when the pocket is a little lighter.

I have to admit we are the type of parents who buy our kids things during the year then go mental at Xmas to but then we struggle after Xmas to pay anything of we should have bought without the use of a catalogue.

For instance we spent around £3000 last Xmas and just got it all payed of . It was not easy and this year I wanted to buy things beforehand so started to save up a little .

My husband and decided this year we were going to do things a little differently.
We did not want to use catalogues, instead we saved up on club card points from our grocery shopping from Tesco which gave us around £100 , baring in mind you can double that to £200 when the club card vouchers are spent in store nearer Xmas so that will come in handy.
We then decided to try and buy the big things they ask for early , things we know they will ask for which we would either struggle to get at the time due to sell outs or lack of work coming in meaning a smaller budget .
Don't get me wrong the kids always have a fabulous Xmas but us parents stress like crazy and that is why we thought that getting the new T.V and one of the other big presents on the Xmas lists while we could now.

Yes I know your going to say , 

''So you get them early, fair enough so why not wrap them up for Xmas?''

Well, we are the type of parents who get excited and love seeing the kids faces light up, we simply have no patience for waiting for Xmas to come .
Last Xmas we put the kids to bed on Xmas eve after our Christmas eve celebration at the local church and my husband woke them up spot on midnight to get Xmas started . 
I honestly thought we would all be asleep for the rest of the day but we were awake the whole 14 hours of Xmas day and it was definitely worth it. (although I am demanding not to do the same this year as we were worn out for a week afterwards ).

Anyway, this year we have had a Xmas list which included 2x Disney Infinity Marvel Starter sets.
The sets cost £50 each , (one for the girls Playstation 3,one for Philip who has an Xbox and one for the two smaller boys who also have the Playstation). Now don't get me wrong for being their main presents they wanted it only adds up to £150 and it is a bargain compared to the £250 we spent on one Child's main present last year but there are so many characters to collect and once you get them all they add another 10 for us to buy lol. 
After buying everything for the Disney Infinity Marvel , all the characters and bits and bobs it simply adds up to more than £200-£300 anyway .

Last weekend , my husband was sure he wanted to go treat himself to the new Fifa15.
Now watching a 30 odd year old man sit screaming at a computer game is something I have to say is an experience in it self, but he works very hard all day every day and it is the one thing he does enjoy every weekend on a night time when kids are in bed and he wants to have a little fun so I do not grumble , if anything, I enjoy getting my me things done .
He decided to go and get himself a game but after an hour I got a picture message with a rather large total , I knew the smaller boys were wanting the Marvel set and had a feeling that was the thing he had added to the basket but he refused to let me know , just told me not to be mad.
Not sure what he meant by that , he knows I let him get what he wants as I am to soft with him lol.

Well he walked through the door and this is what he bought-

So to make it fair , we told the kids it was Kaidens early Xmas present , Kaiden is the only one out of them all who shares his computer unlike the others who don't let anyone on it without a fight , he is also the only one who looks after his games . 
We have spent a fortune on the 11 yr old who has managed to break every single game bought for him so far , I merely refuse to buy him another until he gets his own room, hoping he will look after them and not use the younger boys as his excuse when something gets broken although it is never the 4 year old who has a broken toy or game. 

The way we see it is , Kaidens Computer and T.V is downstairs (although he does take it to our room sometimes to play on with his dad), we can watch them all together playing and the game which can be played by mutual players so although there are still two more to buy for , it is one Xmas present of the list and Kaiden will now only need the remaining characters .

It also gave us the opportunity to see if the others who actually asked for it would play it too or would it be a waste of money come Xmas .

Lets take a look -

Starter set includes three figures including Thor, Iron Man and Black Widow

DISNEY INFINITY 2.0: MARVEL SUPER HEROES STARTER PACK
INCLUDES:

• Disney Infinity 2.0 Video Game Software
  (Please note: The Disney Infinity 2.0: Marvel Super Heroes Starter Pack and The Disney Infinity 2.0: Toy Box Combo Pack include the same Video Game Software).
• Disney Infinity Base
• Disney Infinity 2.0 Marvel Super Heroes Figures: Iron Man, Thor and Black Widow
• 2 Disney Infinity 2.0 Toy Box Games
• Disney Infinity 2.0 Marvel's The Avengers Play Set piece
• Unique Web Code to unlock Disney Infinity 2.0 online content
• 1 Poster

Cost £57

Thor

Black Widow

Iron Man

Disney Infinity 2.0 Marvel's The Avengers Play Set piece

2 Disney Infinity 2.0 Toy Box Games

My husband decided to grab all the Marvel characters he could find in the store and picked up firstly the Spiderman playset which included Spiderman himself , Nova and the Spiderman play set piece.

Cost £28

You get Spiderman and Nova in the twin set for Spiderman

Disney Infinity 2.0 Marvel's The Spiderman Play Set piece

Nova

Spiderman

Having Captain America as one of our favourites of the Marvel Heroes , my husband could not resist picking him up too and he cost £14.

Captain America

Also Hawkeye seems to be one of the favourites to which his Uncle picked whilst in the store with his dad so he was also £14.

My thoughts on the Game-

So now that our sitting room has now been hijacked by Disney's Avengers and Spider-Man figurines We have been enjoying this game for the past week now.
 Every one of our children aged 4 - 11yrs are loving it.
Not only can the original Disney Infinity Figures be played on this game but there is an actual game play with missions which we struggled to find as often on the original.
 It seems the little ones want to play the game rather than just build in Toy box and to be honest another game like Mineplay would really bore me.

As the new range of collectables have arrived , there are also many more toys to unlock with in game super heroes like Spider-Man, Iron Man and also others like Rocket and Groot (Which is our next two buys), with ingenious upgrade trees and harder challenges there are more ways to create your own adventures which seem to interest the children a lot.

The figurines are sculpted fantastically, capturing each character to its true self with its own personality. The fact I want them all on a shelf in their bedroom speaks volumes to me as they do not look a cheap toy, they look ornamental .

I like the fact that the originals like Donald Duck and Aladdin are main characters in the opening of this game, Donald is after all my most loved original Disney character.
It also has some other classics which are hi-lighted, such as Malificent and Tinkerbell .
The fact that they have made this a Marvel wonder and included the Disney to, makes it appealing to both girls and boys and yes even us mums and dads.

Due to the fact that there is also Sky Landers Trap team which is another similar game (also on the Christmas List ), I prefer this one best just for the figures alone so both will be under the Xmas tree this year in our home.

Getting three characters in the starter pack and then having to pay out between £14 - £30 for extra characters (and there are lots with more coming out ) seems a little steep but to me it is worth the money due to the amount of hours our children have already played .

The thing that seems to capture my little ones heart is the power of each character, they have their own styles and the graphics when playing them are far better than the Original, to me it seems the same game with upgraded abilities and more action.

You do have a more realistic play with these characters though, the fact that you were constantly given extra life when you had died already many times previously, meant it was way to easy to get through the game (even by smaller ages like my 4 year old son) , this time you are encouraged to take a little more care with them in play . 
The characters have a certain amount of energy and if you die or use it all up you need to replace the worn our character with another one to let the character refuel so to speak. 
To me it seems a great way to stop children playing with their favourite character all the way through the game, it enables them to explore more of the characters , finding out which power or ability can be used for a certain mission or area of the game.

We are aware that Hulk, one of my youngest sons favourites is to be released separately in October , an exclusive to the game and a must have after seeing his little car road rage scene on the Disney release , I am sure he will be a funny one to play.

One thing we found with this game is that the characters, infinity base are all compatible so now we have two bases which seemed a little silly considering we would have preferred to just buy the game alone and it is all compatible.

The starter sets seem to be a little money maker for me, no need for new base and the characters are a little extra treat but it is only the game your paying for , it is all you need to play if you already have the original Disney characters . 
I do not see why there was not an option for a downloadable upgrade of the Marvel game  (at cost of course) to add onto the original instead of forking out for the whole thing again.

The fact we have 7 children can be a handful for many games but the children have learned to take turns although asked for their own this Christmas  for a little more freedom.
Two players can play at once in the game and that is due to the fact that the base is not designed to adjoin any more characters onto it which seems a little basic.

For me this is a game for all the family (although you must be willing to share due to lack of players enabling to play at once) .

The Marvel has been a great high light to the Disney game and unless you are a gamer and appreciate the visual high definition and reality of games then this would be a fantastic addition to your childhood memories .

For me and my husband the high light is that we love the characters such as Thor and Captain America , the classics for us, not just the usual Spiderman and I like that marvel are finally giving them the spotlight they deserve.

Marvel Disney Inifinity 2.0 is most definitely one of the best games us, as a family have enjoyed from ages 4 years to 30 years and Ii am pleased we have added it to our collection on Playstation Gaming.

Have you got this on your wish list, what do you think?