What makes Toy Story 3 even more special than its great cooperative play is that it actually makes good use of its license. Movie tie-ins have a reputation for being awful, but developer Avalanche Software has found a good way to use the Toy Story name without just creating another rehash of the movie’s plot. Instead TS3 has both a decent, story-driven game that touches upon some highlights from the film, as well as an inventive open world game called Toy Box mode.

The story mode is still fun and worthwhile, but Toy Box is really the selling point for the game. It’s essentially an open world quest-driven game where you play as the Sheriff of a toy town, using Woody, Buzz, or Jessie. And since it doesn’t follow the movie’s plot, the entire world is based around the idea of how the toys perceive their environment when they’re being played with. The result is a mode that still has all the familiar faces that you’d expect from the film franchise, but that introduces a host of gameplay elements that fall well outside what a simple follow-the-film game would allow.

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