Nintendo, and the Wii by extension, is king of "cute." Sure, there's some similar flair for memorable characters and landscapes on other platforms, but mostly in the first party space. Where third parties are concerned, it's as if once developers reach the point that they know they'll be bringing out an almost painfully cute and quirky product, they vote Nintendo. The Munchables is the cutest thing we've seen in a while, and we've seen our share of cute things. Falling somewhere on the cuteness scale between Reese Witherspoon in Legally Blonde and PaRappa the Rapper, The Munchables features a bevy of overgrown vegetables turned evil by marauding space pirates, being gobbled up by unclassifiable-but-cute creatures that love to eat vegetables. Sure, Maw did that "eat your enemies" thing on Microsoft's platform already this year, but without nearly the same cute quotient.

The Munchables shows that it fully appreciates its own strengths by featuring sections where you can replay the game's music as you unlock it for new levels. The depiction of a band of vegetables jamming out on the game's soundtrack is a nice touch, and you can also spend time dressing one of your hungry protagonists in items unlocked during play. The music and video from a level is automatically opened once you complete that level, but special items need to be earned by gathering hidden items. One interesting visual feature in The Munchables is that your character grows larger and larger by eating enemies, changing your perspective on the surrounding level. The upside of this is that you can visually ID veggies as being less of a threat (i.e. "edible") once you outgrow them. The downside of this is that you will have a hard time finding small, hidden items once you grow large enough. Hard to tell if this was intentional from a design perspective, but it does encourage gamers to inspect each area thoroughly when small and creates greater challenge for treasure hunters.

Saying that The Munchables is a game about eating your enemies almost says it all, but there's method to this madness. The backstory on why you need to travel around eating angry vegetables is largely incomprehensible, but suffice it to say that space pirates play a part in all this. What's at stake are some magical orbs, the power source for denizens of several islands in the world of The Munchables. The orbs are repatriated by being (no joke) extruded from the hindquarters of our heroes, after a hearty eating session. The ultimate power source for each island, guarded by a fearsome boss, looks like either a mound of soft-serve ice cream or a mound of something extruded from one's hindquarters... Did we mention there is a quirky side to this cuteness? The implications of orbs and mounds are largely obscured in heaps of rainbow color and primary colors, so don't expect your younger kids to even catch onto the jokes.

Each stage includes several areas filled with eating mayhem, and you'll take on one of two available characters to chomp your way through to victory. A condition for victory may be to eat a certain item or series of items, and you'll need to satisfy several conditions along the way. The main condition is growth. Facing off against pirates at your current level, which is established at the beginning of each area, means a good meal. Trying to eat a Level 4 pirate when you're still at Level 3 will only result in bouncing off the pirate and probably being damaged in the process. You can attack this problem in one of two ways: Either smash into the pirate and reduce him to several lower-level pirates of the same type, or go around eating lower-level pirates until you level up. This dynamic makes fun variations in gameplay possible, depending on your preferred style. The strategy of attacking higher-level monsters works up to a point, but becomes impractical when surrounded.

The boss characters feature similar gameplay, but generally require a combined approach of attacking/reducing and eating. You'll enjoy the boss battles rather than become frustrated, but some take time to play out. The play time on The Munchables isn't that long, but there's replay value in several ways. You can run back through against the score you set for the numbers of orbs collected, or go for perfect scores when collecting special items. Eating more pirates will cycle you through various "evolutions" in your current character, and although these aren't required, they are fun to watch. The multiplayer is limited to a second player riding shotgun with an extra controller, shooting enemies. Why at least a real two-player wasn't included here is strange, considering how fun it would be to munch with a friend. Perhaps the logistics went beyond what was possible on the hardware, but The Munchables is worse for not having a more robust multiplayer or online component.

The level of challenge here is moderate, at best. Eating mechanics are generous, and you can keep moving to stay away from enemies in almost all the areas. Some of the platforming expected to reach special items is a stretch because of the game's loose controls, but there's not enough of this stuff to become a frustration. There are some tips and a training level to acquaint you with the controls and strategies in The Munchables, but most players will have an easy enough time just jumping in. Some of the options for play seem more fun than practical, but this is just another way of adapting to different styles. Special pickups throughout each stage range from very helpful to strictly whimsical, adding to the lighthearted atmosphere. Pegging The Munchables as an action game with some puzzle elements is accurate, but only younger gamers will find the puzzles here very puzzling. The hidden items are often well hidden, and won't reveal themselves until you've approached them at the right level or with the right technique. Full completion of The Munchables will require some skills, but nothing out of reach for today's twitch gamer. The focus definitely seems to be on having fun and laughing at The Munchables' antics, rather than testing your core gaming skills.

Controlling your munching isn't always as easy as it should be, but the game is fairly forgiving. You move with the analog stick on the Nunchuk or the Classic Controller, and press (A) to gobble up pirates. The (B) button controls attacks, and popping the Wii-mote up does a jump. Variations on your typical munch include supercharged gobbling action, combined with a targeting featuring using the (Z) button. Simple gameplay deserves simple controls, and The Munchables doesn't exactly deliver the goods. The basic controls for jumping, moving, and eating are plenty to get you through the game, so we probably could have dispensed with the Nunchuk completely. There's a loose feel to the movement that doesn't help when it comes time to hop across platforms or jump at targets, which you are occasionally required to do. The very limited platforming action makes this acceptable, and enemies are sufficiently dumb as to not pose a great challenge.

The Munchables takes a simple enough idea (hey, it worked for Pac-Man) and dresses it up in some zany Shinjuku trappings to take things to an entirely new level. The hitches in the game's controls aren't nearly enough to make you regret picking this up as a rental, and fans of world-devastating cuteness in their games will need to buy a copy or two. Especially for kids that aren't ready for epic twitch games, but are too old for Nickelodeon-style kiddie fare, The Munchables fills a need. There's plenty of fun here... if you have a taste for it.