Your quest – to become a master gardener of a land called Piñata Island. The success of this new venture is signified by the variety and rarity of the Piñata creatures populating your adopted garden. Each creature is suited to a different environmental condition, and is attracted to a garden based on these characteristics. For example, the Whirlms will only start meandering in if enough soft soil is available for digging; the Raisants start to sniff out the situation after an enticing array of fruit trees are planted; and the Newtgats appear after a pond has been created. Don’t expect everything to be available from the beginning, but the game teaches you new ways to develop your garden as time progresses. This includes new plants, water options, decorations and items – all the residents, including a neurotic seed vendor will be available to guide you on the development process. A side note, as Piñata creatures are mentioned – everything is named after some type of food, to remain true to the yummy scrummy sweet candy goodness that bursts forth after a hefty whack with a stick. Never mind what Larry David thinks of Piñatas.
They must be isolated and studied to determine what nutrients may be extracted for our personal use.
Initially you only have access to a rather dilapidated square of land, complete with hard, unfertile soil and old junk best suited to the dump. Viva Piñata starts out as a triumphant chain of events, building each new activity upon the success of the previous efforts. Each advancement brings further options. For example, your go-to tool will be the Shovel, which can take care of most labouring duties, but it won’t be able to work with everything until some upgrades are granted by the local craftsmen. You’ll also receive a watering can and grass seed bag early on. This metaphorical chain of events begins to widen as you begin receiving rewards, and in turn becomes less linear and more accepting of garden designs and goals that are set by the player. Everything can be positioned, planted, chopped, changed and poked – if only to figure out what will happen. You play God to everything in the garden, and it’s always a treat.
Each Piñata features a number of requirements to increase its interaction with the garden, and to increase your level of control. For example, new Piñata will appear (shown by an introductory cutscene) near your garden, but are initially black-and-white. If they wander in of their own accord, you can access detailed information, as well as resident requirements. These requirements are what’s needed for the Piñata to officially live in your garden. If a Roario (a hyper-designed lion) is to become a resident, for example, they require eating two Doenuts, two Zumbugs - and the garden must be worth over 50000 chocolate coins (the official currency). Therefore, you must ensure that the garden has been developed in the appropriate way for future residents. This can lead to some backtracking and forced landscaping, but it's always in the spirit of progress.
Upon becoming residents, you can then directly control the Piñata actions, or simply let them wander around on their own. The next major goal, however, is to “romance” two Piñata. To begin courting, you will need two of the same Piñata (gender doesn’t come into the equation) as residents, and subsequently a list of requirements for romance will appear on the information screen. These lists usually include building a little specialised love-shack for whichever type of creature you want to romance, as well as one of two other objectives, which could include eating a specific type of food (An aphrodisiac? Maybe). When the requirements are met, a small love heart will appear over the “qualified” residents, and simply match them up to begin the love-making. The physical romancing process actually takes the form of a small mini-game, which has you take control of one Piñata and guide it through a maze of bombs to reach its mate. The rarer the Piñata, the harder the maze is to navigate. It’s a pretty tacked-on game, but is always fun to play nonetheless.
Low-budget remake of Peter Pan.
The progression through various upgrades and advancements is nigh on perfect, save for a rather full-on learning curve. This isn’t to say it’s difficult to understand, but the opening hour throws a heap of new information and Piñata creatures into the mix within a relatively short period of time. It’s important to keep your eyes and ears open, or something critical may be missed. Fortunately, the game keeps a Journal to organize your collected creatures, storyline achievements and item information. It’s a useful tool that’s easy to access, navigate and understand. Every time it seems progress has hit the ceiling and there’s nowhere to go, something will almost definitely happen to mix things up. This could include a new Piñata creature appearing, which potentially changes the way your current residents are behaving, or some of the local townsfolk may pop in to offer some advice and the occasional extra item. These events keep the gameplay constantly fresh and always provide something new to try out in the garden. If one criticism can be made, it’s that the first garden space upgrade takes a little too long to achieve, causing an overly hectic amount of activity to bottleneck in the first area. Still, a handy "event" system lets the player know when progress is moving in a positive direction, and every achievement is announced with a fanfare of celebration from the creatures and the local residents. Nothing can dampen the spirits of Piñata Island!
After the first few hours, it’s up to the player how things progress from there on out. Let natural selection take its course, and you’ll find a few nasty creatures may slink by in the dead of night to gobble up any unsuspecting residents. These creatures can be exterminated by giving them a whack with the shovel, available via a quick-select button system on the D-pad. In fact, everything is easily accessible, given that menu items are selected by rotating the left analogue stick to rotate and point at the different options, each represented as a flower petal.
Everything in and around the garden looks stunning, but the standouts are the Piñata creatures themselves. Staying true to the real paper pincushions, each creature is actually covered with small, brightly-coloured pieces of paper – which can represent fur, or feathers, or anything you so imagine. The camera allows you to zoom in for a closer look on the garden goings-on, and the object detail holds up perfectly under any level of scrutiny. All the environments are vivid and imaginative, particularly the houses and features surrounding the playable area. There are two evident problems with the visuals, however. One is the lack of customisation available for the land itself, meaning the majority of the game will be built on flat, green grass without much to work with on a base level. Regardless, this is nicely offset by the array of inhabitants and items to place and interact with, so the blank canvas of creation becomes progressively more dynamic as you play. The second issue occurs in the form of framerate lag, which may pop up every so often as a particularly bustling amount of activity hits the garden, but it’s never a major deterrent.
A veritable menagerie of madness.
The music in Viva Piñata boasts one of the finest soundtracks on the Xbox 360 to date (rivaled only by Oblivion), and perhaps the best on any platform this year. Soft, subtle and fun melodies enhance the gameplay to a height otherwise unattainable; such is the musical impact. The bottom line is that the music is pretty much perfect. There is one problem, however, and it’s simply that there isn’t enough of it. The melodies drift in and out as randomly as the Piñatas themselves do, but regardless of any “concentration” time the player might need to spend working, the music would be a welcome companion around the clock.
Online features are available through Xbox Live, but given that this is a kid-friendly title, steps have rightly been taken by Microsoft to ensure that no inappropriate behaviour is exhibited. The only real option is to trade goodies with your friends online, or download extra items to use. Whether or not the online functionality seems practical or limited is largely based on how much you already use Xbox Live.
It’s possible to go on and on about what Viva Piñata has to offer, but part of the fun is about discovery and experimentation within the game. With this being said, it’s strongly recommended to immerse yourself into the unknown and take everything as it comes. This is a stunning effort from the team at Rare, who have produced their greatest title since the golden-days (get it? HA) of Nintendo 64 gaming. Viva Piñata has an unstoppable, infectiously happy theme that’s instantly enjoyable for kids, but any age group will have an equally large amount of fun. It isn’t without its flaws, including putting too much emphasis on romancing, as well as a sometimes frustrating, cluttered Piñata management system – but it really is up to the player to determine at what level to succeed and interact with the environments. Anyone dismissing this as a silly children’s game will be missing out on an absorbing, memorable experience that easily ranks among the best for the Xbox 360. The title itself says it all – Viva Piñata!
Should be at the top of the screen.
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