Out of all of the great offerings the DS has coming up in the next few months, Nintendo has touted Nintendogs as the perfect DS game, fully utilizing the unique dual screen, touch pad and microphone hardware of the DS. It holds true in practice, as the only real forms of input are the stylus and voice recognition – features unique to the system. The experience may be original, but does the fun last?

You start by selecting one of six breeds of dogs, which vary depending on which of the three games you buy. After looking through all of them, I brought home a shetland sheepdog which I named Ringo. The dogs react realistically when you introduce them to their new environment. They curiously rome around, sniffing and exploring their new surroundings. After you name them, they’ll react when you literally call them and run up to the camera to play. All you can really do right away is pet them, rub their stomachs and make other basic motions with the stylus.

Once the dog is ready to learn, you can teach him tricks. For instance, to get the dog to sit, you rub its head and then move the stylus down. Once he’s done that, you assign the phrase “Sit down” to this motion. After three or four times of hearing this phrase, you won’t have to use the stylus anymore to get the dog to sit; the voice recognition works well.

The game runs on a real-time clock, so if it’s daytime in the real world, it’s daytime in the game. If you try to teach your dog too many tricks in one day, it’ll get tired of learning and you’ll have to wait another day before continuing. It can learn most tricks that dogs generally perform, such as sit down, lie down, shake, roll over, spin and beg. Other tricks you can teach the dog are fairly ambiguous. At times, a lightbulb will pop up (signifying that the dog has performed a new trick), but it won’t make it clear what the trick was.

Nintendogs

These tricks can also earn you money. One of the three competitions is based on obedience. You’ll be given a time limit and a short list of tricks to perform. Your dog receives a score from the judges, and prize money is awarded appropriately. As you win competitions, you move up class levels and compete for more money.

It’s recommended that you walk your dog at least once a day. When you do, there are question marks spread around the neighborhood, and they usually yield one of two results. More often than not, it’s one of your neighbor dogs. Your dog will play around with it for awhile, and it gives you a chance to get some friendly advice from the dog’s owner. Other question marks signal a wrapped gift lying on the sidewalk. Your dog will bring it to you, and it’s generally something goofy like a tissue box, a boot, a disposable camera or a juice bottle. On occasion, you’ll get something fairly useful, like a new soccer ball or frisbee. If you want to teach your dog to catch a frisbee, the best place to go is the park. Teaching your dog this skill is crucial to winning one of the competitions, the disc catch.

With prize money, you can choose from a small set of interiors for your house or buy dog care items or accessories for your pet. None of these are particularly entertaining or important to the game (with the exception of dog food and water). The best thing you can do with this cash is buy new dogs. You can own up to three, and they’ll interact with each other realistically.

Although it’s a novel idea, Nintendogs gets old in a few days. Once you’ve taught your dog all the tricks, it’s pretty much the same procedure every day: pet it, toss a ball at it, feed and water it, take it on a walk, then enter it in a competition. You can only do three competitions a day, so you’re even limited in that regard. Nintendogs might be something fun to show to your friends, but there’s simply not enough to do.