Before I saw the Nintendo Direct that unveiled “Chibi-Robo! Photo Finder” as a new title from the Nintendo 3DS eShop, I’d never heard of the franchise before.  But I was totally sold on this game as soon as I saw the demos.

Chibi-Robo! Photo Finder is so cool.  It takes advantage of the 3DS’s camera to allow you to take photos of every day objects and turn them into “NostalJunk” that will fill a special museum in Chibi-Robo’s world.  He has some help from a talking iPhone-looking thing, and of course the Curator is around to encourage you to complete your task.  In addition to taking photos, you are able to explore 3D environments (such as a kitchen countertop, or a messy desktop) and do a bit of cleaning, or complete special jobs (via mini-games) to earn Happy Points.  HP is what you use to buy new film, which is what you need to take photos.

Admittedly, this game does suffer from the same issues that any game involving the 3DS Camera faces: lighting sensitivity.  The 3DS Camera is quite dark, so you will need to have really good lighting in order to take a clear enough photo for it to register in-game.  If you don’t have good enough lighting, the game will say that it blends into the background too much.  I had the same problems when I played Spirit Camera.  But as long as you have good lighting, the game works just fine.  You will need fairly good photography skills to make sure that the object you are taking a picture of will fit well enough in the film’s outline!  You are scored on accuracy, and if your photo is under 60% accurate, it won’t count!  It’s not easy, my highest score so far is a 74%…

I don’t want to give too much away, but here’s a few photos from the game.  I think this game is a lot of fun!  There are some repetitive parts when you need to scrounge up more Happy Points, and you start off with only a 50% battery in the beginning of the game, so it’s challenging right from the start.  For $9.99 I think this is a great casual game.  Awesome for when you want to play something quick, or if you want to hone up some creative photography skills!