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Now that my old arch-enemies are no longer a concern, I can continue to write something about the game instead of bickering for a page or two. Virtual Villagers: The Lost Children is a casual game that involves managing the people of a small village on an island called Isola. The game starts out as two members of the original village (from the first game) wander through a cave, and fall through some vines and into a pond. From there, they discover they are trapped on another part of the island, along with a bunch of children from a different group of villagers, on a isolated part of the island. But there are no adults, so where did they go? It is your task to make your village thrive, take the responsibility and guide your people to a safe, long and happy life.

If you have played the first Virtual Villagers, this game play is very similar. Your village starts off with a few villagers of working age, and a few children scampering around the island. You are capable of viewing each villager's likes and dislikes, skills, age, and overall condition. Each villager can be assigned jobs, and be trained in skills, from gathering food, to researching technology, learning about medicine, construction, and making babies! (That is the most fun one.) Dropping villagers on different areas of the island can make them do new things, well, at least ponder how to do new things. Initially villagers can't do too much; unskilled and no research for your village means a lot of the objects around the map simply don't make much sense to them.

As time passes, your villagers will gain in skills, and be able to construct and figure out an object's use with proper research or training. From learning how to climb trees, build new huts, or learn how to harvest crops; your villagers evolve into their own little people, with their own little achievements and wacky personalities. Like Ophelea, the brunette who loves to run anywhere and everywhere... well, one day (foolish me) I call her pretty, and it goes straight to her head. The next thing I know she doesn't want to learn anything, and hates working, so she slacks off all day! Every time I look she is over swimming in that pond! GET BACK TO WORK! So each person has their own little life, it can be amusing, and annoying at the same time to deal with, just like real people (though those are mostly annoying).

So when you have people like Ophelea working for you, you get the options to micromanage your people. Children play a much more important role this time around, and can gather mushrooms for food, as well as collectible items; as you complete sets of collectibles you gain bonuses for your village. When you aren't mushroom hunting, you need to keep the slackers in check! Ophelea is most likely back slacking off already... probably chatting with someone else and making them not do work too,(grr!) or looking at a puzzle she has no hope in figuring out. So you need to smack her around a bit, and to get her back working. And when you yell at your monitor because she's slacking off when you look back on your village? That's perfectly normal, don't worry. Now, you don't have to micro manage at all, you can check in on your people every so often, close the game and it will continue running in real time. It takes a good length of time for most things to happen in Isola, so you need to often shut the game down and let it automatically work for a night or so any just check up on them at a later time. As the passes, your villagers will work away (or in some cases not work) invisibly; personally I enjoy the micromanaging and taking part of the little people's lives. With all the collections, mushrooms, and more involved puzzles you can certainly spend a lot of time watching over your village.

As with the original Virtual Villagers, the game is very casually oriented. You can pause things and walk away with no harm, play just a little bit a day and let your people work when you aren't there, or become much more involved if you wish. The graphics and sound are nothing great, but it is a casual game, right? The game engine remains the same, and likewise the few issues with the game play still remain. My biggest beefs are with females always being the "parent" and completely incapable of performing any actions during the two years of baby watching. This might not be so bad, if the females gained a proper amount of skill for spending two years raising a child, but they don't gain anything for it. In fact I'm pretty sure that "parenting" skill only involves how great you are in bed, as trainee parents take a long time to conceive; exactly what are they doing in that hut? And why can't a third person come in to ...umm... train them?

Anyways, despite the couple bugs found, I REALLY enjoyed Virtual Villages: The Lost Children. I absolutely loved the first game, and now I can easily say I was not disappointed at all with the second! With wackier villagers, calmer (allied) parrots, and a more complex puzzles and involved storyline; I am hooked. Great for the casual gamer, or just anyone who loves to play with little sim people. Create your villagers, watch them grow, and learn. Experience their good and bad island fortunes; and hell, occasionally let them have a little fun and slack off (not Ophelea, she has to get back to work) it is the island life after all.