Viva Pinãta: Trouble In Paradise -- Pester Me No More.

Viva Pinãta is a game, unlike Animal Crossing. What does Viva Pinãta have that Animal Crossing does not? The answer to that is threat and a sense of purpose. In Animal Crossing you just go about your exceedingly boring lives without concern or any discernible goal. Viva Pinãta is very goal orientated, so you're always focused. The game doesn't tell you what you should be focused on, it leaves it all up to you. But it provides enough things to do in its very Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon interconnected ways to always keep you focused on your particular goals. And that alone is brilliant. But Rare takes it one step further with the inclusion of threat and annoyance. So while you're focused in on your goals the game continually throws a little danger and annoyance your way. Adds in a little chaos. The game's bad guy is Professor Pester. He's just your typical cartoon villain. He wants all the candy and he's out to get it. He'll enter your garden once a day after you've reached a certain level. He'll come in and browse around until he finds the pinãta he's looking for. Usually one of the more valuable ones filled with more candy. He'll proceed to kill it unless you somehow stop him. It's a pretty major threat. You can't get a pinãta back that he's killed without rebuilding it exactly and that can be a lot of work. There are numerous ways to stop him. They range from creative garden design to pure bribery to fighting back with certain pinãta species. The professor also employs what are called ruffians. They'll periodically enter your garden and cause you some annoyance. They can't instantly kill pinãtas like Professor Pester, but they have a variety of ways to annoy based on their type. Some will cough up sour candies that will make your pinãta become sick. The sickness can lead to death if you don't get them the medical attention they need in time. Other ruffians will throw dirt around messing up or otherwise altering the landscape of your garden. They might destroy flowers, trees, or bushes. They can get into fights with pinãtas themselves or start fights between pinãtas. The game goes further still with the addition hostile plants and pinãtas. Sour pinãtas will enter your garden based on your level and essentially do the same things as the ruffians. You'llneed to figure out what it takes to tame each of the sour pinãtas and turn them into tame residents of your garden. The weeds will plant and sprout themselves and fast rates compared to other plants. They'll mature and again attempt to wreak havoc in your garden. An unchecked weed will soon multiply and unchecked weeds will soon overrun your garden. Simple diligence and awareness is normally all it takes to combat each of game's threats. It amazes me to see the reactions to people who have come into the second game without playing the first one. A surprising amount of those people are freaking out over the game's actual game aspects. You know, win, lose, that sort of basic thing that actually makes games what they are. I've seen multiple screen shots of gardens overrun with weeds. Or posts bitching about how Pester killed their most favorite pinãta. It's these very aspects that make Viva Pinãta what it is to me. I've gotten to the point in the game where Professor Pester is now a non issue. In that time I've only lost one pinãta to him. And it was totally my fault in that I wasn't paying attention. He comes only during the day. Once a day. So you know to look for him then. Once he's been taken care of you're free to do whatever until it's that time again in game. I have only one sour pinãta left to deal with. And the ruffians have been dealt with. I'm at the point where I can start knocking off my goals. And once that's done, I'll be able to set up my ideal garden. Rare is aware of the nature of this and even goes so far as to offer up a for fun only mode with zero threat. Of course you can't earn any achievements in this mode. And people are actually bitching about that. If you don't want any game to your actual game, then I'd suggest playing Animal Crossing. But for the rest of us who actually like our games to have actual game to them, Viva Pinãta will offer you just what you're looking for. And I'm sure as hell am grateful for that.