Catz
Score: 70% ESRB: Everyone Publisher: Ubisoft Entertainment Developer: Ubisoft Entertainment Media: Cartridge/1 Players: 1 - 2 (Wireless) Genre: Family/ Simulation/ Themed
Graphics & Sound: There is only so much you can do with simulated or virtual pets. Feed them and train them. You can show them affection and bond with them. When it comes to a game like Catz from Ubisoft's Petz collection, I felt that they were grasping at more activities for you and your pet to do, and not enough actual cat variety or originality. But, none of activities felt as satisfying as the other games in the series. I like that instead of cartoon representations, it looks like they went for as much realism as you can squeeze out of the engine. You could change some attributes physically, making them look ridiculous like in the screenshot, but the overall look was satisfactory. When it comes to sound on a handheld game, especially one you spend a lot of time with, you would try to make it as non-repetitive as possible. Well, you would try. There isn't much thought into the music, but it doesn't play a role in the game anyway.
Gameplay: Catz starts out with you choosing a name. From there, you choose the cat you want. You can play with it for a while to decide if it is the one that is the best choice for you. There are only five species you can select from, so the selection is a little limited. After you have chosen your feline companion, you are then taken to an adoption test. Don't worry, you don't need to study. They will flash a series of images side by side, and all you have to do is be able to tell which one is a cat. I guess they figured there may be some confusion up to this point, rather you were here to adopt a buffalo or something. Now that you are able to figure out which one is a cat, you may name it and take it home. Once you get home, you will have time to get acquainted with your cat. That is, until your PDA starts going off every twenty seconds. Everyone from the adoption agency to your Aunt Rose will be contacting you give you advice and helpful hints. Your PDA is used for shopping as well. You use Kitty coins as your currency. In order to earn Kitty coins, you will need to pay attention to incoming messages from the adoption center. You purchase things for your cat as well as your apartment to create a cat-friendly environment. You have a camera that you will use to submit photos for the "Catz Weekly".
Difficulty: Once again, we have run into the common DS problem with the microphone in Catz. They hide it better with Catz though, because basically if your cat is agitated with you, it will ignore you. And, anyone with a cat already knows that it is going to ignore you no matter what. The little errands that you are given by the adoption agency are not that inventive either. There needed to be more to do in order to earn some coins. You sit around a lot waiting for something to happen. Keeping the cat fed, clean, and trained is repetative. I have praised this in the past, because it is how you actually train animals. Here, it was too easy and far less realistic.
Game Mechanics: All of the options in Catz are straightforward and laid out well. I never had any issue with navigating anything in the game. The mission system needed some serious help in order to make it more palatable. They were just boring. I am sure that any kid playing the game will get used to the repetition and it seems obvious the repetition is for their sake. This was more of a pure virtual pet than any of the other games in the Petz series, yet it didn't have the same flair as most of the others. It looks good and plays well as a virtual pet, but it lacks that intangible replay factor, that would keep you playing the game.
-WUMPUSJAGGER, GameVortex Communications AKA Bryon Lloyd
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