Puzzle to Go Wildlife Review (DSiWare)

DSiWare's got more than enough puzzle games already, so we can't say it was unexpected that the service has now finally gotten one based on the traditional definition of the word.

Based on nothing more and nothing less than jigsaw puzzles, all you'll be doing here is dragging around pieces of a puzzle in an effort to snap them all together and form a picture of an animal. It works quite simpley: holding a piece with the stylus lets you slide it around, while the D-pad moves the screen around. After all, if every single piece was on the same screen, it would be pretty much impossible to do anything.

With 25 different images to puzzle together, the game's got quite a bit of content. Unfortunately, unlocking all of it will require a very large amount of time. Every puzzle can be played with either 68, 88 or 130 pieces – each one will give you one star for each "difficulty" it's cleared on, for three stars total per puzzle. However, here's the catch: completing a puzzle with the largest amount of pieces doesn't instantly give you all three stars.

You only unlock one new image for every four stars you earn, which means it can take upwards of an hour just to unlock one new puzzle. Better get used to solving the same puzzles three times with different amounts of puzzle pieces!

If you think the game's stock puzzles take far too long to unlock (we wouldn't blame you), then thankfully there's also a neat feature making use of the DSi's capabilities. Any picture you've got stored on the system can be turned into a puzzle (on any of the three difficulties), so you can have fun putting your own head or your pet dog together.

The presentation is about as basic as it gets; the menu is incredibly simple, while the exact same repetitive music plays both while on the menu and while putting together a puzzle. Would it have been too much to ask for two or three different songs?