When I received this game in the mail, and put it into my DS GBA port, I had no idea what to expect. There in front of me was this game with a picture of the pop star Hilary Duff, and her cartoon counterpart of her show. There they were, just being the girls they are and showing precious smiles and pretty make-up. What could I possibly expect? So I put in the game and started it up. Let me just tell you this: I didn't even believe it myself how much fun I had with the game.

Your Guilty Pleasure
As you start the game, you are presented with the story which revolves around a 3 day period in Lizzie MgGuire's life. There are a total of 12 levels evenly divided between these three days, each day coinciding with a theme set for that day. The first day is all about Lizzie's day at school. The challenges in this day are truly humorous. While in the school halls, overfilled lockers bust open and damage you, manholes are dangerously present every few steps, the floors are wet and slippery, and you can even step on nerds to jump even higher. Your goal in these side-scrolling challenges is to collect as many diary collectibles as possible while you try to reach the end of the level. Next, you get to participate in a food fight at the cafeteria, ultimately beating the lunch lady herself. After your messy adventure, you get to play some Badminton, followed by the slowest cheerleader chase in history. For someone that is about to be beat down by cheerleaders, Lizzie sure knows how to keep it cool and walk instead of run. Lizzie's school sure is dangerous.

Your second day revolves around some R&R time. You get to walk the beach shoreline, play some volleyball, try out some cheerleading moves, and even go water skiing. This girl sure knows how to have fun. Lizzie's adventure ends with some of the best challenges in the game. First, you must change Lizzie's clothes. That's right, you get to dress and change the clothing of Lizzie's cartoon counterpart. This proves to be an interesting challenge as you must match the picture of what she wants to wear with the actual clothes themselves. This means going through the hats, the shirts, pants, shoes, and accessories to try and make Lizzie as best looking as possible. Next, you must be a waitress and serve customers their food and then clean up after them. This is similar to the waitress minigame in Tales of Symphonia, where Colette must tend to the needy customers. This is definitely the most chalenging minigame in the game, though not necessarily the best. Lizzie continues her day with a shopping spree, where you must go to different stores in the mall and pick up items under a certain time, then bring them back to the center of the mall while avoiding cheerleaders and road blocks. The last day ends with an Exitebike-esque challenge that is defintely reminiscent of the classic NES game, which is great. All in all, the minigames in this game are nice and have a great variation, which is perfectly supplemented by the nice graphics.

The visuals in Lizzie McGuire 2: Lizzie Diaries are great. From the moment that you start the game you'll see the nice resemblance between the game's visuals and the show's cartoon segments. The animations are nice and when Lizzie fails a challenge, the effects are nice and polished. Some of the levels, such as Water Skiing, show great detail in the water and obstacles that imperil your path. The cartoon world of Lizzie McGuire is perfectly recreated with these visuals on the GBA.

Soundwise, Lizzie McGuire 2 is not something for audiophiles. The sound effects are nice and give life to the game, but they aren't anything spectacular or amazing. The audio isn't bad, either, though; it is just nothing special. There are instances where the audio is good, though. Jumping on nerds creates a BOINK! sound that will make you enjoy jumping on these poor misunderstood kids. Overall, the audio presentation is average, and nothing you'd turn the volume down to in annoyance.

And then there was fun for an hour!
Lizzie McGuire 2: Lizzie Diaries is a fun game that definitely appeals to the younger female gamers. I laughed when I had to play the game myself, yet looked back and laughed at myself for judging the game before I had played it. This game is extremely fun and enjoyable, but the biggest disappointment was the game's length. Once I had completed all the levels and played all the games, I had only played for about an hour. The timer in the game clocked in at 59 minutes to be exact, and I was shocked to know I had finished so quickly. From what is there, however, the game is a fun experience. If you're looking for a Christmas gift for a young girl, this is your best bet. Maybe you can even use that as an excuse to try the game out yourselves!