"A game that just doesn't offer much to do"

I have no idea what appealed to me about Nintendogs. Maybe it was the fact I could own a puppy of my dog or maybe because I thought it would be a lot of fun. Frankly, neither of them were good reasons. The puppy choices are tame (not breed wise but color wise) and frankly, the "game" isn't very fun. Shall I explain? Read on!

It's a puppy sim game, there is no story. The game forces horrible random dog walker son you that repeat advise over and over and over. The hosts of the competitions are pathetic, give lame jokes and bored me to death with the constant pointless dialog.

The graphics in the game are a mixed bag. The dogs look amazing with the fur and what not, until you realize after a few minutes that the dogs don't look right, it's sort of hard to explain. Now, the dogs look good but my god everything else looks like crap. The backdrops fit the areas that you're in, be it your house of on a walk by the park or ocean. The problem is simple, there is frightening white ghosting going on with the backdrops, large portions are just white, sort of like fog but not. It's like buying a painting that has a giant white splotch because someone had just forgotten to paint it. It's just unacceptable.

The sound in the game is a mixed bag. I found most of the dogs sound alike. And they sound sort of off at times. My Dachshund sounds nothing like the one in the game and my neighbors sounds nothing like the game one either. The music in the game is mind numbing. It wasn't bad at first, sort of cheerful, happy music. Then after an hour you realize that forever and ever this stupid one tune will be played. It's sort of like hating rap music and turning on MTV during one of its many rap-athon moments but hours and hours of rap music.

The voice recognition in the game is very poor. I found my dog couldn't understand me when I tried tot ell him his name and you must speak it a certain amount of times in a row for it to learn its name or tricks. I found out that the game uses the first sound from the name. I got peeved at my dog for not understanding the name after 15 minutes of trying so I tried to call him stupid *BLANK*. I now call him ST and he comes to me. This is just not acceptable, I know the DS at this point and time is lacking but please don't rush these games out.

The control in the game is simple. Everything is done with the stylus. It's all very easy, I did find moving around the map to be a pain if I was in the car or something because it seemed super sensitive. But to be honest, you just hit buttons or spots and that's it. You can pet your dog but that's only entertaining for so long.

Ah, the gameplay, or lack there of. Okay, let's start with how the game starts you out. You have X amount of money and you can buy any available breed. You take the dog home and it shows you how to name the dog. Click a button, speak the name when the mic appears and after a number of repeats s/he will know their name. You can then take your dog for a walk. It won't be far but the more you walk the further you can go. Along walks you encounter other invisible people with their dogs or trash or present that your dog will bring you (wow poochy, you brought me yet another stick! how exciting....). You can buy toys and use them with your dog. The bubble blower for example has you blowing into the mic to blow bubbles.... Sounds neat but it gets old.

And that's what Nintendogs does; it gets old, very quickly. A week later I am sick of messing with the game. Sure you can walk your dog, play with it, bathe it, take it to the park, the gym or enter it in a contest. The thing is, you can only walk every 30 minutes. Only 3 competitions a day, which is your only way to get more money besides selling items you, find that you don't want.

You dog can not get sick, he does not get older, and he does not die. He may run away but it's pointless because after a while he comes back. You save money for a new house of more dogs, you can have 8 dogs. The new houses are pointless. They all look rather bland and feature the wonderful white splotch effects mentioned in the graphics. There is a so-so amount of items to find but really, who wants 10 different kinds of collars? The toys are entertaining for a while but there are so many items that get no use because they are useless, except you can sell them....

Too be honest, something is compelling about this game. No idea what but I go and grab it for 10 minutes, walk my dogs and then grab it again a few hours later and wash and repeat. No need to feed or water your dog because for some reason, mine brings me good items when it's starved, plus nothing bad happens except he'll run away for a little while. Not a big loss.

The replay value is high, IF you don't already own a dog or if you're madly in love with your new puppy and want to teach it new tricks. The tricks are hard, my dog knows a few but if I say it, he doesn't do it.... It feels pointless. And that is where I'm at with the game, it is utterly pointless. It's a weak sim game. The voice recognition is poor, the amount of collections is very weak compared to other games and the fact that you can only do so much in a day is pathetic. And the game does follow real time, you can cheat I'm sure but it doesn't matter.

Buy the game if you want a new puppy without the real hassle but for the price tag of 30, it's a rather dull and pointless game that just doesn't offer anything new to the genre. I wish I hadn't picked up the game, it just has no point. Seaman for the Dreamcast was much better and had more depth to it. I don't understand why Nintendo didn't do more with this title.

Story - 1/10
Graphics - 8/10
Sound - 5/10
Control - 9/10
Gameplay - 6/10
Replay value -8/10

Final Score - 6/10

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 09/06/05