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Petz
Series of virtual pet video games From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Petz is a series of single-player video games dating back to 1995, in which the player can adopt, raise, care for and breed their own virtual pets. Developed by PF.Magic, original Petz (Dogz and Catz) has sold over 1.5 million copies worldwide.[3] The series has grown to over 22 million copies as of 2011 since coming under Ubisoft.[4]
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Development
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The original Petz games — Dogz: Your Computer Pet and Catz: Your Computer Pet — were developed by PF.Magic, released in 1995 and 1996 respectively. They reused the graphics engine used in the game Ballz. Rob Fulop developed the first title in the series, Dogz: Your Computer Pet, following the controversy surrounding his previous title Night Trap and with the desire to make a game that was "so cute and so adorable that no could ever, ever say it was bad for kids". He claims to have consulted a shopping mall Santa Claus to understand "exactly what kids wanted" who informed him that puppies were a popular gift request every single year, leading to the idea of a virtual puppy.[5]
After earning revenues of $8 million in 1997, PF.Magic was acquired by The Learning Company's Mindscape division for $15.8 million in 1998.[6] In 2001, Ubi Soft (Ubisoft, since 2003) acquired the entertainment division of The Learning Company, granting Ubisoft exclusive publishing rights to 88 titles, including Dogz and Catz.[7]
Ubisoft would publish Catz 5 and Dogz 5, in 2002, as the last games following the original style, before putting franchise on hold for three years. After releasing Dogz and Catz for the Game Boy Advance in 2005 and 2006, Ubisoft announced their intention for a "revitalisation" of the series, in direct response to the success of Nintendo's Nintendogs.[8] Many of the successive games were localised games from Japan or Europe in origin and were simply rebranded with the Petz name.[citation needed]
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Animals
The initial games were limited to dogz and catz, but additional animals were also introduced. These animals include Pigz,[9] Bunnyz,[10] Monkeyz,[11] Dolphinz,[12] and Hamsterz,[13] some of which received their own games.
Users learned how to reverse-engineer the system, and began producing additional breedz, toyz, playscenes, clothes, and developer tools for the games, as permitted by PF.Magic, Mindscape, and Ubisoft.[14]
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Games
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Notes
- Originally published as multiple different entries in the French Alexandra Ledermann series, depending on platform
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Reception
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The original software was generally well received, with The Salt Lake Tribune giving 1995's Dogz 4 out of 5 stars,[44] and PC Zone and Entertainment Weekly giving Catz an 8/10 and B+ respectively.[45][46] However, later games where less well received, in particularly compared to other virtual pet experiences that were available, with the 1999 Game Boy Color games negatively compared to Tamagotchi,[47][48] and 2005's Dogz for the Game Boy Advance, being seen as an attempt to ape Nintendogs.[49][50][51][52] By 2007, Joystiq recommended buying games in the series only for "people you hate".[53]
The Petz series is also notable for the online community that grew around it,[54] which game designer Nathalie Lawhead speculates is part of the reason for its success and enduring legacy.[55]
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References
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