Producer Blog: Making Friends

A second producer blog is now online!

Hey, everybody! My name's Matt Yang, and I'm the Lead Designer of SimAnimals Africa for the Nintendo™ DS. I'm going to talk a little about this brand new game we've been working on.

Well, with a name like SimAnimals, we should probably start with … the animals! There are a dozen different animal species that you can find in SimAnimals Africa, from Aardvarks to Zebras! The more areas you explore, the more animals you'll find. However, if you want to keep them around, you'll need to make friends with them.

When you first meet an animal, they'll be a little cautious around you. They'll struggle if you pick them up, and won't like being put in your backpack. However, if you feed them their favorite foods and give them a nice rub now and then, they'll soon take a liking to you. Once you've tamed them, they'll let you rub their bellies and will happily let you carry them from area to area.

Remember though, these are wild animals. If you decide to be mischievous with them, they won't like it and they'll avoid you. If you keep pestering them, they might even fight back!

Earning an animal's friendship has another cool perk. If you can get an animal to completely love you, you'll be able to unlock and use their secret ability! Every animal species has a unique ability that can help you on your journey. If you need help finding bugs, a friendly meerkat can dig for them. Or, if there's a lion that's been pestering your zebras, you can use the zebra's power to give that lion a kick he won't forget! There's a bunch more, but I don't want to spoil the surprise. You'll just have to find those on your own.