Viva Pinata Review
1. This is a cute game without violence except for slapping someone with the shovel. Don't expect Gears of War's gore and blood and you'll be fine. One of the few games on the 360 I'd recommend for children.
2. The game goes like this: Build up your garden slowly but steadily. You stay in your garden all the time and try to get animals come into your garden. More and more animals will appear and you need more and more plants, trees, animals or food to be able to make them stay in the garden.
3. The graphics serve their purpose and are cartoonish. No realism intended.
4. It'll take pretty long until you get all animals in your garden. Since the first ones are quite simple and little (worms, small birds) and the last ones are huge and rare (elephants, etc.) I was HIGHLY motivated to keep playing. Also, the more you advance, the more items and food you can use to get animals stay in the garden. There are bad animals too which you can just slap with your shovel (as mentioned before) to make them go away or "kill" (again, you don't see any blood, heck, you don't even see them dying, they just disappear and you see candy falling on the floor which is a great idea - like the whole game) them. There are also helpers so you can focus on getting more animals.
5. All in all I have to say that if you appreciate cuteness you'll probably like this game, if you find the above mentioned likeable too, of course. I had such a great time that I would lock myself into the room, darken it (sorry, can't see a thing when the sun is shining into the room) and forget time. I must have been playing this a very long time, I have no idea how long, but it's not a 5 hour game. More like 50.
This is probably the best sentence to sum this game up:
On the one side, it's so simple yet it's so deep and motivating.
This is strange, but it is what I experienced. Also, I have to mention that it was refreshing from all those action games, shooters and rpgs. Maybe Rare, the developer, decides to make another one? I hope so! Also there is an expansion for this game (which I haven't tried yet, but I think it is good, too) so that is that.