My Pet Shop works the middle ground between more realistic vet/zoo simulations released recently on DS, and more cute-and-cuddly fare. Instead of character design that seems inspired by The Sims or other similar fare, the denizens of Green Town lean more toward the super-deformed side of the spectrum. The town itself is a cheery place, and as you open up new areas to explore, you'll find diverse settings that range from sunny forest glades to snowy mountains. The musical backdrop is thin on variety, but there are a number of plinky J-Pop tunes as themes, and lots of sound effects. There is even one attempt to bridge the touch-screen controls with sound in an unusual way; as you train your pets, you can use a whistle to tap out long/short patterns that prompt the pets to do tricks. It's a more consistent way to achieve your goals, compared to actually whistling into the DS microphone. I've never been convinced of the utility of the mic when it comes to its use in gameplay... There's a tinge of Animal Crossing here as well, since you can decorate your surrounds and dress the pets up in costumes. Eventually, this is about the only novelty in the game, once you've played through the basics. Trading items with friends makes the whole customization thing more social.

Drawing from many of the aforementioned reference sources, My Pet Shop combines pet care, pet collecting, and even some rudimentary action and RPG gameplay. The big draw here is collecting and caring for pets, while getting to know people in Green Town that want your help. Before you and your mother arrived in Green Town from the big city, where Mom ran a pet shop, this little berg had no pets in circulation. Strangely, all the pets are living around the town in various locations, just waiting for someone to entice them into a life of human companionship... You'll start the game by learning the ropes from your mom and spending some time in the woods. Although young kids won't realize this, the gameplay of My Pet Shop draws heavily from the RPG genre. In the case of My Pet Shop, you'll visit cheery woods instead of a dungeon, but the purpose is exactly the same: gather items and pets, which you can convert into money or use to satisfy requests (read "Quests") from characters throughout town. For our money, My Pet Shop is a good gateway game to almost any of the current RPG titles out there.

Capturing animals is only the beginning. Once you get the little critters back to the shop, you'll need to find a worthy adoptive family or friend. You'll meet people around town that make explicit requests, and if you happen to have already found a suitable animal, you can turn it right over. The lucky owners will then return to the pet shop and ask for your help in grooming, feeding, training, and walking these pets. You can maintain your own regimen with pets in the store, and eventually enter them in contests. Most everything you do in the store helps you raise money, as a combination of the allowance Mom gives you and a bonus for good performance. Other than mini-games in the store, you'll have some opportunities to "play" as you collect animals outside town, and lots of shopping and socializing. The multiplayer component starts and stops with trading, which is great if you have friends with copies of the game.

All but one aspect of My Pet Shop are extremely accessible across all age groups. The mechanics of capturing an animal require some patience at first, until the mechanics are fully understood. The best technique is to have a piece of food that the animal you are trying to capture really loves. Even so, younger kids will need some help at first with the captures. There is also a lot of dialogue explaining the mini-games, so you'll need to help non-readers get a leg up on these games. Compared to animal vet games that have tried to recreate very realistic procedures using the touch-screen controls, My Pet Shop greatly simplifies all the mechanics. It is very hard to "lose" while playing a mini-game, but there are degrees of reward granted for better and best performances. Once the Contest feature opens up, the degree of challenge increases, but there are many opportunities in advance of that to master the controls.

The previously mentioned mechanism for training, using a long/short tap to simulate different ways of blowing your whistle, highlights the creativity that went into My Pet Shop. Even though there aren't many complicated motions used in the game, there's a lot of variety. You'll rub, swipe, point and tap as you work through the various challenges in the pet shop mini-games and the capture sequences. Most all the basic navigation is mapped to the touch-screen, with the face buttons as back-up. You'll be prompted to save at the end of each day, which keeps things simple for younger gamers. The only problem at the beginning of the game is that the interface feels a bit cluttered. My Pet Shop actually does a nice job of trying to simplify things by hiding icons that you don't yet need - once you get to a point in the game where you take on a job that requires that icon to initiate its mini-game, you'll have access. This is all good, but once things open up a bit, you'll find it a bit confusing.

Playing for more than a few hours clears up everything, but a few hours is a steep learning curve for a game that is otherwise extremely user-friendly. Kids, especially young ones, will need some guidance from a parent or older sibling to get a leg up. Once you get into the My Pet Shop groove, Green Town is a nice place to be. The replay value is a bit low unless trading items and customizing your room at the pet shop has great appeal. Seeing the more exotic animals contained in the areas you'll open up later in the game is also a nice incentive, plus more advanced mini-games where you'll start appreciating the value of training and caring for your pet. Kids that love animals may really take to this one, and it certainly has a cuter look than the more intricate zookeeper and veterinarian simulations on DS. Recommended.