There's a very good chance that due to some less-than-stellar production values, you may miss one of the better puzzle games to hit the Wii. Now, Puzzle is a broad category, we realize. Games like Professor Layton and the Mysterious Village are little more than a collection of puzzles, but by virtue of their storytelling become something greater. On the other side, games in the Fire Emblem series are known for their storytelling, but are at heart just fancy set pieces (aka "puzzles"). The line between strategy and good puzzle-solving is sometimes very gray, but there's no such line between good and bad production.

Bruiser & Scratch, to not beat around the bush, is just not a very attractive game. It doesn't do anything visually that would have been out of place on the Gamecube, perhaps even on the N64... This isn't a problem for gamers willing to "scratch" (sorry, couldn't avoid the pun) beneath the surface to determine what stuff Bruiser & Scratch is made of. There are gamers that still judge a book by its cover, even with years of examples to the contrary. What they'll see at a glance are extremely juvenile graphics... we're talking happy suns, bouncing bunnies, and talking animals dressed in clothes. Folks that start playing through the Tutorial Mode may even perceive this is a game with stripped-down game boards, set in some type of Outer Space environment. Turns out this isn't at all a fair representation of Bruiser & Scratch, but it's the first one many people will have, that may scare them away.

Beyond the Tutorial, Bruiser & Scratch features some really interesting design that includes dreamy, almost surreal imagery. Sure the characters look like homework from an undergraduate computer-animation student, but that doesn't dilute the gameplay. The boards feature a smart camera that moves as you do, and that can be repositioned to show alternate viewpoints of the action. This is helpful for people that have trouble visualizing the movement of objects on the board in the standard isometric perspective. Music rarely makes or breaks a game of this type, but Bruiser & Scratch includes a solid offering, along with some sound effects as you move pieces around the board. There is dialogue between the story segments, which only adds to the surreal quality of the graphics. If that sounds like a polite way of saying the dialogue is campy at best, well...

Bruiser & Scratch may be the first time we've played a game where the Tutorial ends up being harder than the actual game... By the end of the 11th level in Tutorial Mode, there will be more than a few stumped players. A few may have given up in a previous level, but puzzle-game fans are a hardy lot. Our guess is that advocates for games of this type will really enjoy the challenge, and anyone that has played through a good strategy or puzzle game realizes there is that mental block, followed by experimentation, followed by epiphany. Bruiser & Scratch can be wicked hard, but there are rules you start to discern over time that make solving its puzzles easier. The tutorial mode explains that this is a game of moving objects around a board, mapped out with a grid that provides your only options for movement. North, South, East, and West are the only choices you have and there are several major complications. One unusual aspect of the board in Bruiser & Scratch is that it "warps" you and the objects you push, a la Pac-Man and his little tunnels that go in one side and come out the other. This simplifies movement of both your character and objects on the board. You'll be judged on the number of moves, making it important to use the warping feature to full advantage. Problem is, if you push something across the warp-point without a stopping block, the object comes around and knocks you out, ending the level. The other complication in Bruiser & Scratch is that not all objects are created equal. Identical pieces will merge, while two different pieces will just block one another. This fact is often the key to solving a level, but also greatly complicates your planning.

Apart from the Tutorial, you'll have two options to move forward in the world of Bruiser & Scratch. Challenge Mode is like an extended Tutorial, leading you through a whopping series of 75 boards, each with a unique solution set. The tutorial introduces the notion that some boards feature more than one solution. Challenge continues this and presents the player with other features that almost guarantee replay value. The second time you play a board, you'll be compared to your previous score for time, number of moves, number of pushes, and your actual solution. There are only so many permutations to each board, but you'll be amazed at how many exist after you labor to just find that one that will let you move forward. Moving forward in Challenge to sample new levels is easy, but in Story Mode, you'll have to go methodically through each board. The intervals between are occupied by some dialogue and a story that unfolds to explain how Bruiser & Scratch got to this crazy world in the first place. I mean, we saw "The Incredible Journey," so we know cats and dogs are capable of some major feats, but these two would give "Macgyver" a run for his money! We can only wish our pets grow up to be as smart as Bruiser & Scratch...

We had to chuckle at an FAQ on developer Steel Penny's Web site asking, "Is Bruiser & Scratch suitable for young children?" The answer says that Bruiser & Scratch has an "E" rating, meaning kids 6 and older will find no objectionable content. Our interpretation of the question is a bit different. Bruiser & Scratch just isn't a realistic endeavor for young kids. Sure, it's completely harmless and saccharine in its presentation, but the level of challenge is too frakkin' much for little ones! We've played plenty of games with kids younger than 6, so we know that children have incredible imagination and can be very good visual problem-solvers. The break with young kids and Bruiser & Scratch comes from the logic required to solve many of these levels. Perhaps a precocious 6-year old would surprise us, especially if someone had really invested time in teaching him the rules... Mostly, kids below the age of 10 will lack the patience, if not the brainpower, to work through Bruiser & Scratch. Our gray matter ain't what it used to be in our '20s, but we know a healthy challenge when we see it. Steel Penny has a forum on their site that already includes solutions, and there will be numerous FAQs online in no time, assuming Bruiser & Scratch finds its fan-base. The older kids and adults will definitely enjoy the mental workout, as it stands head and shoulders above the majority of casual/puzzle games that are typically released with a very tepid level of difficulty.

Control is dead easy in the game, using the NES-style grip on the Wii-mote. Pushing blocks and moving around the board is really all you'll need to figure out. Apart from that, you can only change the camera angle, or go back to the title screen. It's a shame that Bruiser & Scratch doesn't include an "Undo" option, even in a limited fashion. As you become more aware of how the game works, you'll notice when you've made mistakes. The game forces you to play through, or restart the level, even though you may have just botched one move. Some type of feature allowing you to take back a move would have been smart, and would make Bruiser & Scratch accessible to a larger audience. Coupled with this is a weird calculation the game makes on when you are stuck; it seems to let you play through longer than it should before telling you you've hit a dead end, which is frustrating.

The bet that Bruiser & Scratch makes is a dangerous one: substance over flash. Few game developers went broke making shoddy games that look like a million bucks, but gamers do tend to remember titles with depth and quality gameplay over those with just incredible graphics. Try going back to some of the classics from N64 or PlayStation today, and you'll wonder how you ever sat in front of the tube, transfixed by Link or Solid Snake in their old incarnation. It isn't like most Puzzle games are breakout hits, but services like Live Arcade and WiiWare are certainly increasing the odds for independent developers, by providing a platform to serve fresh content up to an eager audience. Bruiser & Scratch does a nice job hitting the goal of good, challenging, puzzle-based gameplay. It doesn't do the game justice to glance at a screenshot, since most gamers over the age of 10 will recoil at the lack of sophistication. Even a 10-year old may recoil, because there just isn't much high-end production evident in Bruiser & Scratch. What is high-end are the industrial strength puzzles that fill this game and make for a great deal of lateral thinking, visual problem-solving, and brain-wracking challenge. For gamers that know, completing Bruiser & Scratch will be a major badge of honor. Those who don't get it? Well, they're the people that will have to sit the conversation out in years to come, when the rest of us stand around reminiscing about sleeper hits like Bruiser & Scratch.