It’s easy to glance over certain types of games. Especially during busy times of the year, where many games are released on an almost daily basis and niche games are lost in the madness. Thankfully, developer Skip Ltd shouldn’t have that problem with Chibi-Robo. Its publishers –Nintendo and Bandai – have smartly released the puzzle-platformer during one of the year’s most game-less periods. Perhaps because there’s nothing else on GameCube to play, Chibi-Robo will get some attention that it otherwise wouldn’t have got, because frankly, it’s an entertaining experience that’s really quite unlike anything else out there and it deserves it.

The Facts

• Play as a robot responsible for cleaning up its master’s house
  
• Explore a huge house filled with many diverse rooms, each different from the last
  
• Earn money to upgrade Chibi-Robo’s gear, allowing you to traverse previously un-passable areas
  
• Make people happy by cleaning up stains, throwing out garbage and helping the family along the way
  
• Rated E for everyone
  
• Only on GameCube

Cleaning House
Admittedly, Skip Ltd isn’t the first to grow a full video game out of concepts that are normal every-day activities for most of us. For instance, Nintendo released Animal Crossing on Nintendo 64 and later on GameCube this generation, a title that employs perhaps the most mundane gameplay ideals possible: running around doing chores for your neighbors and collecting furniture. Sure, there was more depth to the formula once you got into it, but on the surface, it seemed that’s all there was.

The reason we bring up Animal Crossing is because, at its foundation, Chibi-Robo is very similar to Nintendo’s unique title. For instance, both games are totally different than your everyday release. Neither really has an bold storyline. Neither has a graphical focus. Yet, like each other, both are surprisingly fun experiences.

The game opens up with a cut-scene showing the Sanderson family. The cut-scene isn’t spectacular, but it has a cute and charming art-direction, and much like the overall game, it’ll eventually wins you over. Everything is animated by humorous dialogue that will put a smile on your face. It’s little Jenny’s birthday, and she’s just turned eight years-old. The little girl – dressed as a frog, no less – is opening her presents when her father surprises the family with one last gift. Upon opening it, she finds a little robot; a Chibi-Robo. The game reveals that Chibi-Robo is apart of a growingly popular trend in the game’s world – robots that clean your house and help with anything you ask them to.

Eventually the cut-scene wraps-up and you get control of Chibi-Robo, whom you’ll be controlling throughout the rest of the adventure. You control him from third-person, moving him about his huge surroundings with the analog stick. However, because Chibi-Robo is only a few inches tall, everything you must do with him quickly turns into an adventure. Thankfully, Skip has concocted a control scheme that’s intuitive enough. The A button works as the primary action button, letting the robot pick up trash and carry out a number of other actions along the way. The X button, on the other hand, lets you access your inventory of Chibi-Gear. The B button lets you un-equip your currently selected Chibi-Gear. The R button lets you look at a map of the room you’re currently in. The Y button swings the camera into first-person, letting you get a down-to-earth view of things. L and the C stick, finally, let you manipulate the camera. The former centers the camera while the latter works the same way the stick works in any other 3D game.



It's birthday time at the Sandersons
While the control scheme definitely gets the job done and easy to adapt to, we do have some small complaints. The biggest problem is the camera – no surprise. For the most part, it’s decent enough and is never an absolute problem. But it can be a bit wonky and hard to control at other times. The sensitivity just feels too slow, for example. And you can’t pull it back as far as we’d like. Because the camera can only be pulled back so far, the game requires that you must venture to places if you want to see what’s there. In some ways, this makes the game what it is. But it’d be nice if you could pull the camera back just a little further.

In case you’re confused, the main concept behind Chibi-Robo is pretty basic. Your job is to patrol the Sanderson home, keeping things clean and keeping the family happy. The game has a day and night system and utilizes the GameCube’s internal clock similarly to Pikmin. In other words, by default, each day and night lasts about five minutes, giving you just enough time to clean, explore and converse with the Sandersons. There’s another catch to the formula, though. Chibi-Robo can only run on his stored energy for so long. Scattered throughout each room are a number of electrical outlets for Chibi to plug himself into and recharge. Expanding on this concept, in fact, the robot must carry around with him a plug, which is attached to his backside. He can either let it drag behind him or hold it atop of his head. Carrying it on top of his head lets him walk faster.



Chibi-Robo plugs himself in to recharge
A lot of games that are designed around time limits and other constraints like the battery system in Chibi-Robo – well, for a lack of a better way of saying it – suck. That’s just not the case with Skip’s title, though. There are a number of reasons for this. Initially, Chibi only holds a small charge, but through advancing into the game, he’ll be able to hold more power, letting him explore longer. This means that you’re not always limited to the same amount of time per battery. What’s more, even though there’s a time limit to each day, the day/night system creates an addicting momentum that keeps you playing “just one more day” late into the night. And because you can choose between three lengths for the time of day – five, ten and fifteen minutes – the day/night length doesn’t feel too long or short.