Graphics, Sound and Music:

On the bright side, the graphics are good. The dogs bark and jump like a real pup. I imagine the amount of data that could be fit into the is finite and the graphics are taking up most of that space. The puppies look fantastic. It is too bad that the same can't be said for the rest of the game. The dog walking maps and the whole dog walking experience is lacking graphically. The sound is realistic enough to make my real life dogs to look quizzically and bark back to the DS.

Multiplayer:

With another DS and another copy of any Nintendogs version, two players can use the wireless capabilities to let their pups play together. There's even a "bark mode". Like Pictochat you turn it on, and when another player with the game who also has "bark mode" on, passes by your DS system will bark to let you know there's another doggie nearby.

Conclusions:

There is a limited amount of things to do in Nintendogs. Even though it is a revolutionary game and it has a high fun factor it does taper off with time. Unfortunately just about everyone agrees on that. It is a shame that there are not more environments in the game, and some would say not enough incentives to keep you playing for long. You can only enter the puppy in contests three times a day which I think is a serious flaw in the game design. It should permit more contests daily for Flying Disk as well as the Agility and Obedience trials. Perhaps the thinking was to teach kids not to tire out their real life puppies. Somewhere though the line needed to be drawn between the fun as a game, and its use as a learning tool. The limitations leave you with about a half hour of game play per day. If I use a comparison with the Pokemon games where you can get a zillion hours of gameplay, then this game falls far short. For that reason, I'd love to see this game come to the Wii which has lots more power and media that can hold a more vast version of Nintendogs.

Different people react differently to sim style games. If it is a sim that is about a topic that interests you to begin with then it will work for you. I think it can be broken down this way with Nintendogs, if you are a dog lover then you will love Nintendogs. You'll be fascinated by the life like puppies, and be blown away by the power of cute. I give it 8 wags of the tail.

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