Impressions: Viva Pinata the TV Show

Microsoft and 4Kids’ Entertainment are giving it the ol’ college try with Viva Pinata. By manufacturing and maneuvering the property into such a vital and precarious position, its startling success or explosive death is sure to be entertaining to watch.

Unfortunately, the sneak peek at the TV show posted on Xbox Live was not so much fun. Teaching valuable cliche life lessons about lying and pride, the cast runs the gamut of typical cartoon antics with just a touch of what I like to call “internet humor”. That is, replacing typical jokes with the most ridiculous sentence fragments the writers could brew up. All in all, completely uninspired.

While this wouldn’t be such a big deal for, say, Mario or Sonic — whose abysmal TV shows came well after their gaming success — Viva Pinata has to fire on all cylinders from day one. If the game falters, if the TV show can’t even hold a kids’ attention, it could all crumble. And both Rare and 4Kids’ Entertainment haven’t had such a great track record in recent years.

I’m still intrigued by the game’s Animal Crossing-esque “living world” and its uniquely colorful designs. But with a seemingly bland show (and innevitable branding) backing it up it’s already got hurdles to overcome in order to attract the kind of audience that Animal Crossing enjoys.