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Disney Friends is a virtual caretaking game aimed squarely at the younger set. In Disney Friends, you are a brand new guardian. Your job as a guardian is to spend time with, feed, play with, and generally keep occupied and out of trouble your four Disney friends.

As a trainee guardian, your first mission is to care for one of the little green alien dudes from “Toy Story.” You’ll learn how to move around the play area, interact with your friend (you can tickle his tummy with the stylus) — either talk to him through the microphone or by choosing phrases from the menu — and give him things from your inventory. (You’ll learn other things as you move on to your other friends after you finish your training.)

Tinker Bell will handle your orientation. She tells you about being a guardian. She’ll give you a tour of the guardian lounge. She’ll also give you advice to get you started in your role as a guardian.

The central area of the game is laid out like a small suite of rooms. Tinker Bell’s bell is in the center of one of the rooms. You ring the bell (with the stylus) to get access to her store to buy things for your friends or to get upgrades to the lounge. Don’t worry. It’s easy to earn money. You’ll find little gold Disney coins all over the place as you play with your friends, and these little coins replenish themselves every time you leave an area and come back. You’ll also find little mouse ears to collect.

Along with the bell, there are a few other goodies to explore. The book holds pieces of pictures that you unlock from each of your friends as your relationship grows. The grandfather clock actually lets you set an alarm. Finally, the hat rack runs the game credits.

A couple of doors down is another room that holds the collectibles you’ve accumulated. There’s a trophy case (so far, I have a little model of Stitch’s ship). The pin display on the wall shows all the different pins you’ve earned. There are up to 64 different pins you can earn. So far, I’ve gotten 20. There also are four lighted pedestals to display some reward I have not yet earned.

Off the central room are six doors. You’ll have access to three doors initially — the little alien, the area to set up wifi and Stitch’s door. The other three doors lead to Dory from “Finding Nemo,” Winnie the Pooh and finally Simba from “The Lion King.”

You will begin the real part of your guardianship with Stitch. Stitch loves peanut butter sandwiches. You need to feed him when he’s hungry. You’ll start with a few and will need to buy more as you earn some coin. Initially you’ll interact with Stitch in his clearing. I chatted with him, fed him sandwiches and tickled his tummy. We got to color a picture together (which we can then display in the guardian lounge) and made up a song together, and I got to set up little pretend buildings for him so that he could play monster and knock them all down. As we got to be better friends, he took me to see some of his other favorite places: first, his beach (where we helped Pleakley with his mosquito project), then to Lilo’s house (where we played soccer and helped her with laundry) and finally, to the Oahana fair.

You’ll have a little gold bar in the upper right area of the top screen that shows how your time is progressing with your friend. You’ll want to fill the little bar every day with each of your friends (as you unlock them all). Earning guardian points by caring for your friend is what unlocks other friends. Increasing your friendship with each individual friend is what unlocks their three special locations.

I discovered that Disney Friends keeps track of the days. One particular day that I went to play, after unlocking Dory, she took me to the “Fish Are Friends” meeting being held by the sharks. I got to help the one shark with his speech for the meeting.

Each friend has different foods they like and toys they want to play with. I got to create a picture with each friend to display in the lounge (and you will in fact see the picture displayed in the lounge). I got to make a little song with each friend that also can be saved and played again. Each friend has a special activity of some sort that you can do at any time, as well as having different location-specific games.

Disney Friends is all about teaching your little guardian about taking care of their little Disney friend and making them happy. The friends definitely react to the care they get. Stitch is always so glad to see me. He gets in real close to the screen and tells me, “never go away again — OK?” He’s a sweet little guy. We’re best friends now after spending a lot of time together.

I’ve heard Disney Friends be compared to Nintendogs, but that’s not exactly right. In Nintendogs, you are definitely taking care of a pet, and that pet takes a lot of micromanagement. With Disney Friends, you are taking care of a friend. To me, there’s more of a relationship to the Disney friends than my child will ever have with one of her virtual dogs.

If you have multiple youngsters, they will have to share. There is one saved game, and that’s it. I’m not saying it would be hard for them to share &mash; since the game is made up of caring for their friend, but if sharing is an issue, be aware that two separate games will require two separate cartridges.

Disney Friends is a sweet game that teaches a child about kindness and friendship. The music is perfect. The graphics are nice. The voices are actually pretty true to the original actors (even when the original actors were not involved). I can easily recommend Disney Friends to your young Disney fan.