Viva Piñata

Viva Piñata is a garden simulation game released in 2006 for the Xbox 360 developed by Rare and published by Microsoft Game Studios. A sequel called Viva Piñata: Trouble in Paradise was released in 2008, along with a portable version of the original game titled Viva Piñata: Pocket Paradise for the Nintendo DS published by THQ. It is included along with its sequel, Viva Piñata: Trouble In Paradise, in the Rare Replay compilation game released for Xbox One and can be played on Xbox One by backwards compatibility.

Gameplay
In this game, you own a garden that you can customize to your will. Piñatas may come to the garden if you meet certain requirements. You can also grow plants and trees, and sell and purchase items. Level up by earning awards which are earned by successfully growing plants, getting Piñatas into your garden, and romancing Piñatas which makes a person deliver an egg to create a new member of the family. Leveling up increases the selection of items you can purchase such as upgrades to your tools, new surface packets, food, buildings, and decorations.

However, not everything is easy and carefree. Some Piñatas will eat other kinds of piñata to meet a certain requirement, be it becoming a resident or even to romance. Some kinds of Piñatas just don't like certain other kinds and will fight as soon as they get in contact, such as the Barkbark not liking Kittyfloss. Certain red plants are potentially dangerous to your Piñatas but are required to meet a certain requirement for a piñata. Also, red sour Piñatas exist primarily to harm your garden by doing bad deeds in your garden, such as eating seeds or starting fights with your Piñatas. Also, after getting your garden level up enough Professor Pester will order Ruffians to attack your garden, and eventually, he himself will start to bash your most expensive Piñatas in your garden, breaking them immediately. You must deal with him immediately lest you lose one of your prized possessions. If a Piñata stays sick for too long, Dastardos will come to destroy it, however, you can cure it by various means, the most simple one is to ask Doc Patchingo to cure it for you.

Why It Rocks

 * 1) Over 60 different species of Piñata creatures to discover and make resident in your garden. The kind of creatures you can find include worms, birds, ladybugs, crabs, geckos, gorillas, and vultures, among others.
 * 2) Beautiful stylized graphics. Piñatas actually appear to have paper sheets on them, and the whole world has a very natural feeling.
 * 3) A day and night cycle exists in the game which actually does affect the main gameplay.
 * 4) The Journal gives you information about your garden, Piñatas, items, and more. It has short descriptions of all objects, Piñatas, and people that will be in your garden, and also has a list of requirements for each condition.
 * 5) Talking to the people who enter your garden is meaningful. Leafos will give you hints if you talk to her, and Seedos will give you free seeds to help you grow new plants. However, some of her tips may be wrong, so test to make sure they are correct.
 * 6) Choose what you want to do with your garden, and how you want to advance in the game.
 * 7) Customize your garden with fences, toys, lamp posts, statues, paths, houses, grass and tall grass packets.
 * 8) Get upgrades to your tools as you level up which will make managing a garden easier, and also give you new abilities such as being able to dig flower holes and create water ponds. You can also purchase upgraded watering cans which store more water.
 * 9) Level up to increase the size of your garden, and also gain additional items to places such as more accessories, decorations, and more buildings.
 * 10) Hire Helpers in your garden who will do certain tasks such as watering your plants, selling your produce, scaring off unwanted piñatas, and mining to get special items.
 * 11) Create multiple gardens and share your progress between them such as experience and chocolate coins. You can also transfer Piñatas, buildings, and objects between the gardens using the mail system to store Piñatas and objects in crates.
 * 12) Sometimes you will get a notice from Langston Lickatoad who will ask for you to send a pack of Piñatas. Accept and complete his request to send the selected Piñatas to a party, which will increase the value of those Piñatas and improve their mood.
 * 13) Taming sour piñatas will turn them into resident piñatas who have a special ability that you can use at any time. Also, some other piñatas have special abilities which can be harnessed to improve your garden.
 * 14) Reaching certain levels will give you an additional story in the storybook in the Journal.
 * 15) The requirements for getting Piñatas to visit, become resident, and romance get more complex as you get further into the game, and so does the complexity of romance minigames.
 * 16) Each kind of Piñata has a different maze to go through for the romance minigame, and you will be rewarded with a romance dance after completing the challenge, which is unique to that piñata.
 * 17) Some piñatas can be evolved into different forms, by completing special requirements. For example, to get a Reddhott, redirect a Taffly to a Firebrand torch and pour water on it.
 * 18) Buy accessories to decorate your Piñata, change its appearance, and add value to the Piñata.
 * 19) Making certain kinds of Piñatas happy and satisfying conditions will cause them to produce a special item.
 * 20) Feeding your Piñatas a certain type of food will change its color.
 * 21) Of course, since this is a garden, after all, you can grow trees and bushes that bear fruit, vegetables, and flowers. Of course, you should water the plants to make sure that they grow properly, as they will die if they aren't watered or they are watered too much. You can also fertilize your plants to make them grow more branches or grow larger.
 * 22) The game has references to Rare's older titles, such as Banjo-Kazooie, Kameo: Elements of Power, and Jet Force Gemini, in both the structures you can buy and accessories you can get for your Piñatas. For example, a Fizzlybear will shoot out golden jigsaw pieces in a fight, which is the main collectable of Banjo-Kazooie. Also, the same Piñata also can wear a "Breegull Carrier" accessory on its back which is modeled after the backpack Banjo wears in which Kazooie, a Breegull, commonly rests in.
 * 23) Great soundtrack and music.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) Some long loading times:
 * 2) * Long loading times when entering shops such as Costolot's can take 30+ seconds to load the shop so you can enter it.
 * 3) * If you have more than 8 gardens it can take 20+ seconds to load the list of gardens you have.
 * 4) The video that plays when starting the game has little relationship with the game itself, as it is actually the intro to the TV series. Only one of the Piñatas talk in the game, Langston Lickatoad, and he is not able to be tamed. The only other character that appears in the intro that appears in the actual game is Leafos, the human with a green mask, and she only appears in the intro of the TV series in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo, and doesn’t appear in any episodes of the series. Hudson is in the game, but only his voiceover (in the video which plays when a new save starts) is present.
 * 5) The reason why Professor Pester became evil is incredibly lame, and his equally lame plans involve eating candy and capturing the Piñatas.

Game Tips

 * 1) Purchase a Halo of Hardness accessory for a Piñata to make that Piñata quickly cure itself without having to call Patch.
 * 2) The Viva Piñata TV series actually has some hints on how to play the game.