[Mush xx]

Viva Piñata, developed by Rare is surprisingly complex and has a longetivity span on a scale that any developer would be proud of. Advertised and presented as a children's game Viva has a lot to offer to adults too, in fact the younger members of the family will be calling you to help them find their green fingers for the first few hours. There's a lot to learn in a short amount of time. It's not that it's a hard game, but it is tactical. The object is to make your garden attractive to the many species of Pinata that will visit your garden and also make sure they stay there and multiply. It's not all sugar either there is spice in the form of the sour species and other baddies which will if you let them, reduce your popularity very rapidly. So, what exactly is a piñata? Most of our little ones have not even heard of one before. A piñata is an animal or container suspended in the air from a tree or ceiling that is filled with sweets and toys used to celebrate special occasions such as birthdays and Christmas in Spain and Mexico. piñatas are made to be easily breakable and the object is that you beat it with a stick to collect the sweets and toys. The difference is the piñatas in the game are not suspended they run around and live their day-to-day lives. Piñata Island is a vibrant and busy place with a lot going on; when you first start the game you will get an introduction to the island and shortly after meet your guide. Leafos will teach you all you need to become an Alan Titchmarch, but first you need to clear a waste land, removing all rubbish and smoothing down the hard ground by whacking it with your shovel. After preparing the ground you are now ready to start making it attractive to the many different species of piñata that will visit and take up residence in your garden. Graphically this game is vibrant, looks good and generally has a happy feel about it. Everything is customisable down to the grass you will plant. Your job is to become an experienced and capable gardener. In fact the game is based around customisation. You can give your piñata a name and design a label for those piñata brought up from birth in your garden. Leafos will introduce you to the journal. The journal is a book you will use a lot to plan and upgrade your garden. It also includes information about your environment you have created. Through the journal you can access helpers, shops and builders, everything you need to build your garden. Leafos has that children's programme presenter voice, you know the one where they speak to the children in a high pitch voice. She is very informative and goes through each step, although can be a little annoying. Everything in your garden has a value. Some of the piñatas are rarer than others and are worth more chocolate coins (Viva's currency) than others. You can make any piñata worth more by buying accessories and sweets for it. In other words you can set goals to increase the value of your piñatas and the overall value of your garden. As you increase the value and the popularity things will happen, shops will become available, helpers to help you do the day-to-day chores, your rank will increase and the word will get out attracting new residents. Piñata visit the garden if you have provided them with at least one of their needs, this can be a simple as offering the right amount of grass, or perhaps the plants they need or the right prey. For example a pond will attract Licktoads or Quackberries (toads and ducks). Or having a Whirlm (worm) might attract a Sparrowmint. To keep them there though you must make sure all their requirements are met. To do this you highlight the piñata and press the Y button this shows you everything they need to be happy and stick around. At first these non-resident piñata are black and white, until they meet their first requirement. The game does get a little confusing and it's very easy to get distracted and sidetracked. Once the piñata are happy they have a heart above their heads, make two of the same species happy and then you can start romancing them. To romance them you highlight one of them and then the next one. They will do a little dance then a mini game appears, the object here is to get the piñata to the other piñata by avoiding the walls, which after three hits will finish the romancing and by collecting the coins. Successfully doing this results in both the piñata doing a happy romance dance to a jukebox in a cut scene, which is quite enchanting and amusing. Storkos then drops off an egg and the egg then hatches. The baby piñata then wraps itself in a cocoon, hatches and then becomes a resident. Some of the piñata can not be found by attracting them the usual way and these can be coaxed in by sweets you can buy from the shops. Sweets can be happy, romance or bad, bad sweets will cause your piñata to become ill. Luckily if one of them does become ill you can call in the doctor, but leave them unattended and Dastardos a rather un savoury character will make an appearance and "fix" them for you, by smashing them and revealing their sweets from inside them. The resident builder's job is to ensure your piñata have a home to live in. These homes are all individual depending on which piñata it is for. These houses can be placed anywhere you choose as long as you have room for them. Perhaps one of the great things about these homes is the ability to look inside them. You can see the home your piñata is living in. The majority of the time everything is happy and rosy, but occasionally a fight will break out between the piñata. Some of the species are natural rivals. Because there are a lot of different species in your garden, the food chain is brought into action and larger piñata will eat smaller piñata. Resident piñata will only eat other ones on your command, but the wild ones are a different matter and frequently that piñata that is worth a lot of chocolate coins ends up eaten or ill. If you don't intervene quickly enough by hitting the rival with your shovel or calling the doctor it's curtains or sweets strewn across the garden! Growing plants from seed is another part that is necessary as a lot of the piñata like to eat either plants or seeds. You are provided with a watering can from close to the beginning. As you may expect giving the plants too much water or too little will kill them. You will also get weeds popping up and luckily another helper Weedling can help with those. As Viva piñata is quite complex, you have a menu system in a circle. This is quite tricky to select the one you want as you use the thumb stick or wiggle stick I like to call them. You can quite easily miss the one you want. As your garden improves so does your title and with that title comes new things that you can buy and upgrades to your shovel. Keep doing this and Piñata Central will pay you a visit with challenges. Should you pass these then your Piñata that you send to them in a crate are boosted in value and sent out to parties worldwide. Viva Piñata does have an Xbox Live part, but this is done by placing a crate in your garden and trading your piñata with your friends online through a post office. It also has co-op. There's a great part for children to watch about safety on Xbox Live done by piñata sitting on a sofa playing with an Xbox 360 and warning against accepting images from strangers, as yes we are all strangers on Xbox Live! Generally a warning to children using Xbox Live, which I think all games aimed at children, should have if they are to go on or access Xbox Live. Viva Piñata is a delight to play whether you are three or sixty three. It will appeal to the young and young at heart. This is a game that is both amusing and educational with a long life span and very addictive as you can customise everything. It is colourful and you will have a laugh at the romancing part, I did! And as Rare say Don't beat'em, join'em! Graphics 8.2 Gameplay 8.0 Audio 7.0 Longevity 8.4 Overall 8.2

[xXN1GH7M4R3Xx]

 h99, on Dec 28 2006, 12:25 AM, said:

If anyone is in two minds about buying this one because its a children's game i would say do it, its no kiddie game and it is really fun!

Thats me!

You may have just pushed me off that fence...

[ShagDoubt]

Good review Mushy

This game is the perfect antidote to the usual head-shoting/chainsawing/apex-hitting/curb-stomping intensity that we spend most of our gaming lives attempting to perfect.

I'll give anything that Rare produces a fair crack o' the whip and i'm enjoying this one immensely.

[R31DY]

I've been thinkin about gettin' this one for a while now...........

[Pheature]

Choclate coins! toys for children! !!!! AN ADULTS GAME !!!!

Dont get me wrong im not downing this game, but me personaly, im a 20yearold boy who enjoys shootem ups football, racing and other GREAT NEXT GEN games, i belive this game is aimed at 3-15 too 30-++ year olds, it misses a gap, i see it intresting as a prospect but what really puts me off this game is 3 things1it is really for a child. 2. graphics seem a bit too unorignal. 3. if my young brother should be able to complete it, why should i bye it formyself for no challange at all.

thats me personaly, if u like sorts of games like this, which none are really about, but for sonic on the dreamcast ther is a subgame like this in the caos section, sum might remeber, i enjoyed that loads but i was a child, if i was to play it now id say i would get bored while easily,

thanx for the review it actully has raised my intrested in the game, so i will look up more about this, also dont want to "LOOK BAD" when my freinds come to my house and see Viva A childs game and laff at me!!! but from this review all i wud have to do is let them play, and surely that would change ther mind...

[WALKEN]

Who cares about the Lame little donkey game Reidy who's the pretty girl in your sig, shes beautiful

[R31DY]

Kate Beckinsale *mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm*

ps. don't tell Loci