Nintendogs: Dachshund and Friends

"You know that enthusiastic cute voice you put on when talking to pets and babies? Yeah, this game will make you do that alot!"

Nintendogs is another one of Nintendo's entry into the non-game games genre. Like Animal Crossing and Electroplankton it has no clear final goal (rescue the Princess or save the World... that kind of thing). Instead, it encourages communication between you and your DS. Or specifically, these pint-sized adorable miniature puppies (they're no bigger than a box of tissues) called Nintendogs.

I'm going to make this review deliberately vague in scoring categories, as to more accurately portray how the game really plays. Like I said before, there is no clear goal let alone story. In fact, as I'm writing this, I have my DS sitting beside me just letting my puppies run around the virtual home playing and fighting with each other. I can simply call one of their names to get their attention, which will then allow me to more directly interact with one. If I happen to get more than one pup's attention though, they'll both be nudging each other away from the screen in order to better their chances of playing with their owner.

The first thing you notice about this game is that the puppies are extremely cute. No kidding, this level of cuteness is so intense that it will make the toughest burly man into a "goo, goo, ga, ga" father figure. The models, the animations and the expressions all work together to give you the impression that these guys are real. Simply outstanding in this department.

After you buy your first puppy, a simple tutorial informing you how to name your pet begins. Say the name 3 times or so, and you get to write it down and your little doggy will be labelled as such from then on. Its a shame that only 7 characters are allowed for the names, but I guess this is the Japanese version where 7 characters actually means 7 syllables.

Straight after the naming, you get to teach your dog its first trick. Here's a hint for all importers: if you can read katakana and hiragana, just teach the dogs using the Japanese names; if you can't read any Japanese, then just learn the patterns for each move from faqs and remember what name you've associated with each pattern; if you know Japanese (read and understand it), then obviously you'll be right regardless. I found it very hard in the tricks contest to tell my dog to do a move when I wasn't sure what the move he was supposed to be doing was. But I can read hira and kata, so I decided to teach my 2nd dog completely in Japanese so commanding it during the contest was a simple as reading out what move they wanted me to do.

Tricks are probably the main thing you'll be doing in this game. There are other things, like the competitions and walking, but the tricks is where most of the actual gameplay is involved. Also, there seems to be quite a few tricks that you can teach your dog. After a while, when you've "leveled up" certain tricks, you can combine them to make new tricks. Getting your puppy to stand on its hind legs, then jump will become a sort of bipedal hop; or getting it to kneel before you tell it to jump will make it do a back flip. There are more of course, and likely more than what's in the faqs here.

Unfortunately, you can only teach it 4 tricks per day, even if you delete a previous one. This is similar to the 3 fossils per day in Animal Crossing, where it just limits how much you can do each day with the game. This is fair enough, because being able to teach your puppy every trick in the game on your first sitting would be unrealistic, not to mention defeating the purpose of the whole game in the first place. (... although, I don't see anything stopping anyone from pulling off the timedata cheat like in AC...)

Very similar to a real dog, the puppies also require regular bathing and exercise. With the washing, you'll have to make sure you pick up the right kind of shampoo, otherwise it won't have as nice an effect. Exercise comes in the form of walking your dog around your town. While walking, you can find items on the ground, meet other dogs, or visit playgrounds and discount shops. Your pet will also mark its territory with 1s and 2s. The 1s seem to just be that - marking its territory. You can't clean it, and it doesn't seem to effect anything else in the game. I haven't left a 2 lingering around yet, so I'm not sure what happens if you do...

Entering your pet into contests is the only way to make money in this game. With money, you can buy more puppies, upgrade your living quarters and of course buy more items. There are 3 different competitions: Disc Dog (frisbee catching contest), Agility Dog (guide through obstacle course), and Dog Contest (perform tricks). Each of these competitions will get harder each time you clear one. And if the relationship between you and your puppy isn't solid, then they it will show during these comps. I should also mention that there is also the Owner's Points system, which is just basically your EXP. These will reach certain milestones and mainly unlock more breeds of dogs among other things.

So yeah, that's basically it. There's a bit more to the game of course, but it wouldn't be fair to just list everything and make this a boring read... its long enough as it is. This game is perfect for anyone who likes dogs, or even pets in general. Some people I know hate dogs, but can see themselves playing this game and enjoying it immensely. This game can be played for long or short periods of time, so it's good on long trips or quick breaks. Also, its a perfect example of all of the DS's unique features in one package. Highly recommended for anyone wanting to speak in that enthusiastic baby talking voice.

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 05/23/05