Dress Up! Time Princess: Look Amazing While Rewriting History

What if you could save Marie Antoinette from her ill-fated end? Or be Helen of Sparta and stop the Trojan war? What if you could look amazing while doing it?

Dress Up! Time Princess (will be referred to as DUTP from now on) is a 3D animation fashion game that intertwines fashion with history as gamers have to dress to impress while saving the world in each story. Released just this year, world wide, on August 27, 2020, DUTP has quickly amassed an audience and has added 7 additional stories to its inventory.

Originally introducing players to the story of Marie Antoinette, DUTP has added Helen of Sparta, Gotham Memoirs, Magic Lamp, and Swan Lake to its story catalogue. Each story features you, the protagonist, as you travel back in time to alter the past (fictional and nonfictional), saving yourself and the friends you make along the way.

When you download the app, the first story you gain access to is Queen Marie. In this book you must change who Marie is as a person and make choices that put the citizens of France first, before the aristocrats, in order to save your neck. While most of the stories reflect folktales and history you may be familiar with, the book Gotham Memoirs is probably the most ambiguous story to date. It features a journalist in the 1920s who must find her footing after being fired from her big-time newspaper job in New York City. Although the plot isn’t based on one identifiable person, like Queen Marie or even Swan Lake, it does address a lot of societal issues that were prevalent during the 20s. For instance, the protagonist faces sexism in the workplace and in life, poor conditions of mental health hospitals, mob related crime in the city, and shady landlords. Each story in DUTP’s inventory features unique clothing you collect as you play and get to keep in your closet once the chapter has been completed. Which leads to its best feature: you can dress up your avatar whenever you want!

What is unique about DUTP is that it is resourced based rather than puzzle based. While a lot of renovation or fashion games might require the player to first complete a matching game before upgrading your living room or dressing up for the next event, DUTP relies on the resources you collect throughout the story or in the “marketplace.” There are some time management elements but mostly when waiting for life to regenerate or waiting for the “marketplace” to refresh. I must note that I use “marketplace” lightly because in reality there are numerous ways to gain resources via in-game lottery, mini games, cats scavenging, and a traditional marketplace set up. Each element of the “marketplace” adds to the story as it is all connected and makes for great opportunities to connect with other players.

A major downside to the app based game is that resource gathering can be frustrating. Since almost every chapter requires a specific outfit, you are constantly making new clothes. While not inherently a bad feature, especially because it adds to your closet inventory, it can be annoying when gathering resources takes multiple days. I personally have spent upto 3 days collecting resources in order to play the next chapter of a story. It’s rare for gatherings to take that long but has happened two or three times for me thus far. If you have patience, this game is definitely for you!

With all that said, if you love fashion, fantasy, and history, I highly suggest this game! The story animations are enchanting and the characters endearing. It’s a fun way to kill time and to relax in another world while looking FANTASTIC.

Dress Up! Time Princess can be found in the Apple store and Google Play store.