Miffy's World WiiWare Nintendo Review

Players are greeted with a tutorial explaining the controls upon boot up; one which cannot be skipped even when continuing a previously created file. Get past this and Miffy’s World presents itself as a point-and-click adventure, Miffy’s movement controlled by the D-pad and the Remote Pointer used to move a chunky cursor to select the items you want to interact with. It’s Miffy’s job to help her friends to find items that they need through a few different locations. When you find these items and point at them, a key appears to indicate where you should click and you get taken into a mini-game; a simple puzzle as a pair-matching game, or a small nine piece jigsaw, for example, which kids playing the game will enjoy.

The visuals are plain and colourful, and it is upon them that the ‘story’ rests. Thought bubbles will pop up over characters to show what items they want, and a small drop-down box will show who you need to go to next on the quest. Different characters help in the quest in each area; be it Miffy’s town, the beach, the zoo or the snowy mountains, there are different quests to help keep your child entertained throughout. Each area also has a small house which you can use to store items or throw them away, as well as put up pictures of Miffy’s friends, earned by trading in pictures of zoo animals that are coloured in by the player. You can also colour in the portraits of Miffy’s friends.

All characters in the game are voiced by the same female voice actor, except for the zoo animals and pets. Miffy doesn’t say anything herself and her friends, family and school teacher don’t say much to interact with the story, but they say enough to keep your child entertained. Besides the one player mode, there is also a two player mode so that a parent with an extra Wii Remote can hop in and help their child out by highlighting potentially useful objects with stars. There’s no menu or option to save, but the game will save the items you’ve collected automatically. Be warned of a glitch, however: if you press the 2 button on the Wii Remote while on the loading screen, the game freezes and so does your Wii, with the only option being to switch the Wii off by holding the console’s power button down.

Miffy’s World is a fun, but short, game with loads of entertainment value for a youngster. The visuals are nice and clean, and there are enough mini-games to keep your child entertained even after they’ve completed all the quests. Though it’s a little on the expensive side at 1,000 Nintendo Points, if your young child enjoys Miffy in other mediums, they will definitely like this.