Pet Pals: Animal Doctor comes to Wii

Legacy Interactive’s Pet Pals: Animal Doctor is available for the first time on Wii. (You can also play it on your PC or Mac.) This simulation game lets players feel like they are veterinarians diagnosing and treating hurt animals. 30 real life medical cases were created by real working veterinarians from actual field experience and contribute to the authenticity of the game play. Unlike the computer game, you can use a Wii controller to simulate real veterinary tools.

I mentioned to two young friends that I was reviewing Legacy Interactive’s Pet Pals: Animal Doctor on the Wii. They told me they enjoyed playing Majesco Sale’s Pet Pals: Animal Doctor game on their Nintendo DS, so I was looking forward to seeing a similar game.

Goldie’s Pet Pals: Animal Doctor review

Since we don’t have a Wii yet (it’s on our list for Santa) I went over to a friend’s home to have her daughter, Goldie – a Wii expert – try out the game.

Like most adults, 10-year-olds don’t read directions, so she popped the Pet Pals: Animal Doctor disk into the console and started playing. At first, I was bothered by the appearance of the hospital staff who looked like they had just left a military combat game. I would have preferred to see men and women in scrubs, just like at real vet hospitals. But Goldie didn’t seem to mind.

She quickly chose a gerbil who wasn’t eating or moving much for her first patient. Basic maneuvering from waiting area to treatment room was easy enough. However, using the Wii controller to pick out the abdomen, which Goldie was told to do from the help tips, was too hard since it was such a small area. She couldn’t get the pointer to stay on it. Instead, Goldie chose to go back to the waiting room and try another animal, a boxer with a swollen snout.

Using the Wii controller, she then had to get the proper view of the animal, use the magnifying glass to zoom in on the problem area, and find and choose the “blue dot” that showed you which part of the animal to treat. Then she had to find the right diagnostic tool – a stethoscope – to take vitals.

By the time Goldie and her dad figured this preliminary part out (she still hadn’t treated the animal) over 40 minutes had gone by and she was very frustrated. She finally gave up when she couldn’t get the diagnostic machine to work. (Goldie had to grab the dot as it was at it’s peak on the heart machine, which was impossible to do so with the Wii controller. It’s just too sensitive.)

Part of the problem with Pet Pals: Animal Doctor is that there is a countdown – you only have so many minutes to diagnose and treat your patient before it shuts you down. (Presumably your animal has just died, which was rather upsetting for Goldie but made us adults laugh.) Since the learning curve is tough on this game, I would like to see a  way to turn off the clock so you can at least get the hang of the tools before trying to race through all the steps.

With Wii’s popularity, I find that many companies are rushing to get out Wii versions of their games. In the case of Pet Pals: Animal Doctor, I don’t think this is a great idea. The Wii is for games that involve motion like playing an instrument, dancing, or swinging a bat. Playing veterinarian is all about small movements like applying a bandage or giving a shot. These gaming movements are better served by a mouse or toggle button than a Wii controller.

It’s too bad because Pet Pals: Animal Doctor is a terrific educational program for kids into helping animals. If you are looking to get this game for your child, stick to the PC Pet Pals: Animal Doctor version or try Zoo Vet: Endangered Animals for Nintendo DS.

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