At GDC this year, we got hands-on with Tactile Entertainment’s critter simulation game, Pocket Creatures… we’ve now had more time with the game, as well as grabbed over 6 minutes of video for your viewing pleasure…
Pocket Creatures is a Tamagotchi meets Black and White style game in which you raise a very cute and furry creature on a deserted island, inhabited only by the local flora and fauna. This is more of journey of your creatures discovery than a game, as there is no plot, or in fact a beginning and end. Instead you simply interact with your creature through intuitive touch controls which in turn interacts with his or her surroundings.
Slates appear in the environment giving you tips on what to do, but it’s more about experimentation. For example, in the video below you will see our TouchGen creature exhibit different moods. These allow you to harvest it’s energy to perform tasks ranging from healing other critters, watering plants and zapping pests with electro lightning. The moods depend on how you treat your creature, where stroking him or her will reveal positive moods for healing and love, but prodding or slapping it will cause negative and even evil tendencies. How you react with other critters will also influence the creature, so for example inflict pain on a platypus enough times, and our creature will eventually do the same without instruction. The video also shows how other critters can become useful tools. Such as the platypus’s bill used for digging, the woodpecker for breaking objects and the anteater for sucking up water and disposing of termites.
As you can see from the video, the graphics and animation are beautifully done, adding a huge amount of realism and personality to the creature. I’m sure we have only scratched the surface of what pocket creatures and it’s world can offer, so look for our verdict when the game hits the AppStore soon as a Universal app for both iPhone and iPad at a low launch price of $2.99.
