On our recent trip that included One More Disney Day, we had an opportunity to experience the new Sorcerers of the Magic Kingdom game.  My children DS 13 and DD 14 weren’t very excited about the game initially, as they thought it was for little kids.  On day one we attempted to sign up at the Main Street Fire Station, but the location was down for maintenance.  We made our way to Liberty Square.  (The Fire Station usually has MANY more people in line for cards and training, so head to Liberty Square behind the Christmas Shoppe for your cards!)

The Cast Member explained that their single training window was down at the moment and asked that we go to the Fire Station.  We explained that we had been sent to him due to maintenance.  He asked that we give him a few minutes to set up a Liberty Square window for training.  He returned, scanned our Annual Passes, provided us with individual RFID key cards and 5 spell cards per person.  As the kids sorted through their cards, they became a little more excited about the game because they were finding characters they liked.  I was excited to get a Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride card!
We made our way to the window beside the Hall of Presidents for the required “training.”  It was a short video that at least one of us were required to view.  I honestly didn’t see the sense in watching the video because it was pretty self-explanatory, but I respected the CM doing his job as instructed.  My RFID key card was chosen for the training.  The kids were allowed to skip this on their cards because they were watching with me.  I played my first round against Dr. Facilier and beat him by driving over him with Mr. Toad.  This is where the game became wonky.  It usually instructs a person to make their way to a DIFFERENT window, but my key card was telling me to stay at the same window.  The one family behind me was willing to let me play again.  I beat the next window and was instructed STILL to stay at the same window.  A line began to form behind me, but I was curious, so I played once more.  It continued to tell me to start at a the SAME WINDOW.  Out of respect for others in line, now about 6 deep, I moved on.

I decided to test another window that was vacant in Frontierland to see what would happen with my card.  It allowed me to pick up where I left off.  After completing that window, it told me to STAY at the SAME WINDOW!  This was becoming boring to me, so we moved on to ride a few rides in a quiet park.  Later that day, I decided to test my card in Fantasyland on a vacant window.  Now it would become even stranger!  I was given Yzma to battle in Fantasyland, not Adventureland.  I hadn’t completed the Liberty Square mission yet and I was doing a mission in the wrong place.  After completing the window, it was asking me to REPEAT the SAME screen, not the next part of the mission, but the EXACT same thing over.  I was frustrated with it and took my RFID card back to Liberty Square later.  The CM did some sort of computery thing and said all is good.  It was still broken!

We decided it was best to try my son’s RFID card for the actual experience and to see how long it would take to complete a mission under normal circumstances.  His card was working properly and we defeated Ursela in Fantasyland.  We left the park for some fun in Epcot.

After spending time at Hollywood Studios the next day we all returned to the Fire Station for our 5 more Spell Cards each (they will allow this for anyone over 7 years of age).  We received a few duplicates and we began trading to add to our set.  My son wanted to see what would happen if we used multiple cards and he threw four spells at Cruella De Vil on Main St.  Between getting more cards of their favorite characters, trading with other sorcerers and the excitement to see what the combo spells would do, my teens were beginning to really enjoy the game.  (We decided to hold my DD 14 RFID until One More Disney Day for our Ultimate Tour).

Over the course of several days we gathered, traded and collected 56 of the 60 available Spell Cards.  My DS 13 really enjoyed beating all the villains and becoming an Easy Level Master Sorcerer.  He returned to the Liberty Square location and leveled up to Medium and received 5 more cards as a bonus.  He was rather confident that he could defeat a villain on Medium, but was defeated on his second Liberty Square window and realized he would actually have to think about what characters and skills he’d need to use.

Overall, my teens really enjoyed their experience with this game and we gained some valuable knowledge:

1.  Play the game during the first or last hour of operation, during parades or fireworks.  The windows can become busy quickly and it will greatly affect your enjoyment of the game.  (I’ll give you a handy chart at the bottom)

2.  Any card will defeat any villain on EASY level, but not the case on Medium or Hard.  We spoke to a CM that had tried 21 times to defeat a villain on Hard, but had no success.

3.  Trade with others.  Help them fill out their decks and they will help you.  My son sometimes traded two or three cards for one he really wanted.  It reminded me of the days when I would trade a Mike Schmidt and Dennis Eckersley for Dale Murphy.   Some cards are more “rare” than other cards and some people seemed to just be trying to get those from my kids.  My son didn’t mind giving up rare for common to complete his set, but he always bent the corner before trading so the guy wouldn’t try to sell it on Ebay as perfect.

4.  Expect this game to require A LOT of your time!  There are a grand total of 9 different villains to defeat in order to level up.  On average it takes about 2 minutes per window to continue along in the game.  You must conquer 39 windows in order to level up from Easy to Medium.  It will also require 30 to 60 minutes of walking around.  That means you’ll invest a minimum of  108 minutes walking at a quick pace with NO ONE in line.  If the windows are empty you’ll spend more than 1 1/2 hours becoming a Master Sorcerer.  If the windows are even slightly busy on average, you might spend 7 hours or more!  (It’s time for a KtP chart)