The beginning of Dogz is promising — you go to a petstore, pick the most adorable ball of fur you can find, and give it its own special name. Will’s beagle is named Max. Then you go home and … do the same things, over and over and over again.
The various puppies are just as cute as they can be. And Dogz has 49 different pups, drawn from eighteen breeds, so there’s a lot of choice when you pick your pooch. But it goes downhill from there. Gameplay is a whole lot like actually owning a pet, with very little of the warm cuddlies that make the experience worthwhile. The dog poops where it shouldn’t, and you get to clean up after it. It sometimes obeys, and sometimes doesn’t, and you have to reward it for obeying and scold it when it doesn’t. You pet it, and brush it, and (after 20 long days) take it for walks, but the only reward for players is that it gradually, slowly becomes more and more trained. That may be enough when you’ve got a real live dog to pet and who will lick your face, but it’s just boring when contained in a 2” screen. Oh, and you get to spend time at school, which consists of: “Hi, Will!” “Hello, Will!” “Hi, Will!” “Hello, Will!” “Goodbye, Will!” “Bye, Will!” “Bye, Will!” “Goodbye, Will!”
(Dad suspects that the game is subtly teaching discipline. Not only do you train your dog to eat, poop, play and sleep, all at the right times and in the right places, but your kid character must also perform chores, pick up after the dog, and eat and sleep on schedule. If that’s something you want for your kid, you might check it out, but it’s unlikely an easily bored or distracted kid will get very far in the game without external rewards.)
A particular pet peeve in our home of three kids (plus Dad) is a game with limited save game slots. Three slots is often not enough; five is a lot better. Dogz has one. That’s right — if you want to save a new pet, you have to get rid of your old one. Brothers and sisters can’t each have their own dog (unless you buy multiple copies of the game). There’s a chance that memory is an issue, but we can’t imagine that it takes much memory at all to store a dog’s name, breed, duration, and a handful of stats. (There is an “Always Together” mode, which allows you to store a puppy once it’s completely trained, and then start a new puppy, but that’s available only after weeks of work; you can’t be training two pups at the same time.)
A lesser problem is that the vocabulary in the game is occasionally way over the head of a typical seven-year-old. There are words that are typically learned in fifth, seventh, even ninth grade, often with very little context for them. (Examples include “attitude,” “obedience,” “persistent,” “reduce,” “stress” and “misc.”)
The mini-games include Puppy Reversi (which has nothing to do with puppies, but is a reasonable challenge for early elementary kids), Puppy Quiz (which starts recycling the same questions after about 20 questions), and a water gun and puppet to actually play with your puppy.
Bottom line — as much as you want this cute puppy to be fun, it’s just not, for kids or adults.
David, the dad: Got my start in gaming with Steve Jackson Games (paper gaming), first as a tester, then as a developer and editor. Was GURPS and Car Wars system guru for awhile, then edited and developed for TSR (AD&D) and FASA (Mech Warrior, Renegade Legion), before turning to computer games. Spent six years as Origin Systems Publications Manager, then our department spun off into its own little company, Incan Monkey God Studios (IMGS). Since 1997, we’ve been a freelance content and design house, specializing in strategy guides. We created the first strategy guides for MOGs (Ultima Online, EQ: Ruins of Kunark) and now create the best MOG guides (IMHO, of course).
I like to analyze and optimize while playing games, so I much prefer games that require thought rather than action.
Evie is twelve years old and is an avid reader, especially of fantasy. Favorite authors include J.K. Rowling (of course), Brian Jacques, Cornelia Funke and Tamora Pierce. These reviews are her first published writing.
Will is nine years old and loves to investigate, especially dinosaurs and astronomy. These reviews are also his first published writing.
Jesse is seven years old and has just started reading chapter books. He likes Hank the Cowdog and cartoon books, especially Calvin & Hobbes, Baby Blues and Donald Duck.
If you're interested in the (roughly) thousand-year-old triceratops stone in our pic, check out the Dino Art. Some of the accompanying text can be a bit strident, but it's still a puzzle why Central and South American Indians knew pretty precisely what dinosaurs looked like over a thousand years ago.
