Should you adopt another EyePet on the PSP?
The whole augmented reality thing is a double-edged sword for me as a gamer, I like the concept but so far it’s been poorly executed with the hardware necessary for it to work like cards which your creature can only appear on, it moved a step further with EyePet & Friends no longer needing the card, but it still lacked accuracy of your movements. The latest PSP version takes a step back and brings back the card…
EyePet Adventures has all your typical EyePet things like playing with toys, dressing it up, washing it, but it also adds a submarine section where you steer underwater to collect items. It’s nice because it doesn’t actually require any cards or motion control, but is controlled merely through the analog stick. It doesn’t exactly set the game on fire though and it wears off quickly, unfortunately there aren’t a whole lot of new features in this version that wasn’t in any previous incarnation.
It’s pretty thin on content to be honest and there’s little reason to get it unless you’ve never played an EyePet game before since this has the best features of the handheld versions. It does have its moments that are enduring, but as with any other augmented reality game on the PSP/PS3, it has its share of problems and is a pain to do the simplest things when they should be easy.
Visually, EyePet Adventures is a nice looking game…but like its counterparts, it hasn’t upgraded much, nor did it really require a lot of eye candy due to the augmented nature of the game. The EyePets themselves look cute, and the tutorial is told through anime-style cutscenes, but alas there’s no way to skip it for those who’ve already played a past game, making the whole tutorial most of an endurance test until you actually get to play the game itself.
The Verdict
EyePet Adventures feels rushed, it doesn’t have anywhere near enough new content to recommend to those who have a past game in the series, but it’s a good entry for those who haven’t.
