If experimentation wasn't the norm in the Chibi-Robo series, then Park Patrol might've been the black sheep. Replace the action-adventurism of the original game where you explore an expansive house with environmental activism about managing a park... then add some fighting in there.

If Park Patrol can be compared to really anything, it must be the Animal Crossing series. A game about customization, management, and completionism of your park (as well as managing your 'money', which in this case is literally your power supply).

The main difference is Park Patrol does actually have a story in there. Without spoiling much, it is a pretty creative take on the ways we neglect our environment, and it doesn't hide it's honesty at parts, in that it doesn't just remain a fictional parable but also indicates that us in the real world have things we could be doing better. "Remember, Miasmo (the big bad) is lurking behind every exhaust pipe and smokestack, waiting in the shadows to make his return" or something like that as is said at the end of the game.

Essentially, the game fits the system of having different living toys (as is the norm in all Chibi-Robo games) who you become friends with. In this case, you have toys like a mascot for an American football team, one of the free rangers from the past game, and a stereotypically French marionette who wants to be freed from his strings, among other toys. I can safely say that all their designs were smart and creative, and they were all lovable characters with personality quirks of their own.

Basically, you recruit for them to work for you at the park. You pay them in "watts" (like I said, your power supply) to build structures, or terraform the land. Eventually, they run out of watts, so you have to recharge them, and each time you do they will advance a little in their own story. For example, the Free Ranger egg gets a new job after wishing for one (won't spoil what it is). They advance in their story by interacting with the other toys you have in your team, if they have power left.

The main thing of the game is basically growing flowers, which you do via giving them water (obv) and dancing along with a boombox (not so obv). The dancing part is a pretty cool system, but it was a little hard to figure out at first. I eventually got used to it. Basically, you have to spin the outer circle of the "record" that appears on screen and you have to do it at a certain constant speed. When you do that, you will get a score, if it's above 70 the plants will throw off seeds that multiply the number of flowers. After a certain amount of flowers are grown, the space they are on will turn green, and one of the objectives of the game is to turn the whole park green.

Now, I completed the main story and I still have not turned the whole park green (though I've turned most of it green). At first, it was a repetitive venture, with the assistant in this game, Chet (RIP Telly, in this game apparently) being kind of annoying and saying the same things over and over, with the same high pipsqueak voice. Sorry Chet, love you though.

The routine is going to feel very repetitive in this game at first. It basically goes like: plant flowers, get toys to do work for you, then when they are out of commission go back to town the recharge them. I'll give it to the game though, it does get much better with variety, and while not having "as much" to do as the original Chibi-Robo, there was still a lot to do. You get new park projects, like games you can build (a bowling game for example), and there is plenty to do in town as you can meet new toys over the course of the game.

I was really impressed with how well they managed to leave room for a story in a simulation/management game.

Oh yeah, the game has battles where you have to fend off "smoglings" (and later, "Smoglobs") from destroying your plants. This was kind of annoying because I could never get to the smoglings fast enough, and the only vehicle that I found easy to control was the bike (the car(s) are surprisingly hard to control).

Overall though, a surprisingly fun and addictive game. Frankly, I prefer it to Animal Crossing: Wild World as my favorite simulation game on the DS. While it might not be the feast that the other Chibi Robo games could be, namely the original and Okaeri!, it is still a very very worthy and smart game that did a lot of revolutionary stuff for a DS sim game.

Mario fans when I show them try to show them actually good games like Sonic Superstars

one of my pet peeves is when people make dismissive, empty critiques like "this game has bad level design" with no elaboration. let me hit you with some facts: i've been playing the hell out of sonic superstars and it is CONSTANTLY fun. a little messy, sure, but messy in that way like sonic adventure ie where the whole thing's overflowing with creativity and vivacity. even when it's explicitly pulling from older sonic games it finds a way to spice things up... much like the beloved sonic mania. i'm just sayin'. in the first level alone (which is not green hill, hold your applause), you're bouncing between the (gorgeous) foreground and background and blasting up walls and around loops where like, the inside of the loop is facing you. it's badass!

i'd like to recant a statement from a previous iteration of this review and say that i love sonic superstars' boss fights. i don't believe a bit of challenge or obtuseness negates fun. the fang shmup fight is probably the worst, and like, even that one has some dope ass environmental stuff going on with the robot assembly and fang's little animations in the breaks between dodging his bullets. the keyword is variety. no part of this game is "samey".

now onto the real shit: superstars is SO SO SO pretty. the first thing that struck me was the sick way the rings would cascade towards you if you had enough when you took damage (not the first title to do that iirc but neat nonetheless). i could ramble for ages about how cool the levels based off of unused concept art are. and this is possibly the best the cast has ever looked in a 2d sidescrolly sonic. it's one of very few sonic games where you can play as classic amy- and she's the strongest character! her hammer jump is absolutely cracked and trivializes boss fights. a lot of people have also pointed out the return of fang, but MY favorite sonic superstars character is the New Girl trip. i want to give her a hug and a pat on the head. look at her dynamic with amy! truly the lovers of the century. it's nice to see amy doing anything other than thirsting over the blue boy for once. the other big Me Thing is, of course, the music. here lies perhaps my most egregious take: i love all of it. yup. all of jun's tracks. i live for that fake genesis snare. the boss fight theme is funny every single time. shit rocks. game rocks. i love sonic.

(if y'all are wondering why i posted this again, it got taken down cuz i broke a community rule. i have since edited the review)

edit: listen, if Cjer (follow them) and i had been able to play death egg as trip and amy we would have beat it in like 15 minutes. as it stands, i still enjoyed the final boss. wish i would have gotten to beat it instead of dying immediately in the winning run and watching cj crush it with one ring. during the credits sequence, cj was getting all the balloons and i was getting dragged along the back of the screen because i hadn't noticed it was interactive which i think is a good allegory for our entire playthrough.