The Sims 2 Pets (GameCube) Review

The Sims has always worked by making the mundane things in life fun. Cooking, cleaning, talking to boring neighbours, taking our the trash, hitting the toilet for over an hour (why does it take Sims so long to go pee-pee?), are some of the dullest things imaginable, yet we pay good money to do it in virtual reality. Why? Because we love playing God, we love clicking on these gibbering little people and making them wet themselves, burn down the kitchen before shoving a gravestone of their loved one right outside their front door so every time they go to empty the bins they have a nervous breakdown and spend the next five hours crying in front of the whole neighbourhood. And if you're not sadistic like us you can have fun doing all of the above without the misery and cruelty involved.

The simplicity of it all is what makes it work, you click a few times and then watch your Sim scuttle about completing lots of fun little tasks as you plan your next God-like move. The Sims 2 Pets really is a joy to play...if you buy the PC version. On the GameCube it is possibly one of the dullest games ever conceived. Not only have EA made it as boring as watching paint dry with your eyes shut, but they've also made it look uglier than a drowned terrier covered in animal entrails. How? Read on...

In The Sims 2 Pets on the GameCube you take control of your Sim and have to physically walk them around as if you are playing in the most boring action game ever conceived. Here the challenge is running to the toilet, scrolling down through the options, selecting 'Use' and then sitting there waiting for your pixilated Sim. Admittedly there is an option to play in 'classic' mode but it is so badly implemented that it is just about unusable. Not only is the gameplay cut down and made laborious and irritating, the presentation of the whole game is hugely compromised. In short, this game looks awful.

All the options are stripped away too, making the console version severely lacking in depth. You can't customise the look of your Sims enough to make it very worthwhile and there is far less variety in furniture and building options. At the end of it all this game is so graphically lacking that whatever you do it will look underwhelming and botched together. Where this game does come into its own (as you might guess by the title) is with the pets section. Be it pooch or be it kitty you can kit out your 'happening' pet in all the latest styles. As depressing as the world of animal fashion is, there is something wonderfully amusing about doing it in this game. You really can make your pets look remarkable ridiculous with very little effort. There are sunglasses, shoes, funny socks, hats and jumpers...just about everything you could ever need to make your pets look like idiots and alert the RSPCA in the process is present and correct.

The Town Square is also a rather fun little addition, pointless as it may be. There are loads of places to buy pet products and to run around being bored stupid and then you can go home and guide your Sim through his or her tedious daily life. The gameplay is so unintuitive and everything takes so long to do that sometimes a trip to the market just seems like too much hassle. We'd much prefer to just sit at home and keep on running to the toilet again and again. Nothing beats it.