Viva Piñata US demo

By Tom Bramwell Published 13 March, 2007

On Live now.

It's taken a while to happen, but Viva Piñata has finally arrived on Xbox Live Marketplace in demo form. Depressingly though, it's only available to US gamers.

That's likely because the demo is set to appear on the UK's Official Xbox Magazine in the near future, where it'll probably occupy the same 1GB of space.

Of course, you could always create a fake US Xbox Live account and use that to download the demo, but we couldn't possibly condone that. Much.

Were you to be a bit NAUGHTY and ILLEGAL though you'd discover that Rare's third big Xbox 360 exclusive is a masterpiece of time-sapping management and creation rituals.

Getting animals to mate and giggling at their silly little dances (foxes doing the Foxtrot, for example) is top fun, and that's before you get into the hidden depths of water features, cross-breeds, variants, fertilisers and setting fire to bats.

For more on what makes it good, plant yourself on the review page. We'll let you know when the demo arrives outside the US.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000. Follow him on Twitter.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (22) Latest comment 5 years ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • HarryB #1 5 years ago

    It's good and not for kids when you actually play it.

  • Der_tolle_Emil #2 5 years ago

    Hopefully it will be played a lot. The game is great and deserves much more recognition that it's currently getting.
    Edited by Der_tolle_Emil at 13/03/07 @ 11:03

  • RuudVanPistolrooy #3 5 years ago

    Top game. The missus loves it too (keeps her quiet whilst I play Company of Heroes on the PC).

  • Singularity #4 5 years ago

    I've only played VP once since I got it at release. : (

    /shakes fist at career

  • sharpfish #5 5 years ago

    Already got the game, and it's great (almost completed it).

    Demo will shift a few more units though i'm sure.

  • kissthestick #6 5 years ago

    ahahaaha, a little late no?

  • psychokitten #7 5 years ago

    Excellent game, hopefully this (very late) demo will get a few more people to give it a chance.

  • morriss #8 5 years ago

    GOTY last year on the 360 without a shadow of doubt.

  • jonnyreb #9 5 years ago

    "That's likely because the demo is set to appear on the UK's Official Xbox Magazine"

    God I hate those magazines.....run by a bunch of fanboys pretending to be journalists giving high scores to shitty games because they are strategic to the console.

    Then, a year later, pointing out the issues with the games they praised a year ago because the sequel is released.

    I've bought a few of them and I have to say the Official XBOX magazines are by FAR the worst...I can't see any reason why anyone would buy it apart from the demo's (which are now all on Live anyway, except this one which means I'll have to buy the stupid mag and use it as a BBQ lighter afterwards).
    Edited by jonnyreb at 13/03/07 @ 11:36

  • kissthestick #10 5 years ago

    "can't see any reason why anyone would buy it apart from the demo's (which are now all on Live anyway, except this one which means I'll have to buy the stupid mag and use it as a BBQ lighter afterwards). "


    not everyone has online remember, possible Core users too.

  • kissthestick #11 5 years ago

    "Of course, you could always create a fake US Xbox Live account and use that to download the demo, but we couldn't possibly condone that. Much."


    Lmao..

  • septimus #12 5 years ago

    Just buy the game. It's far less painful than buying the Official XBOX magazine crap.

  • Weezer #13 5 years ago

    "I've bought a few of them and I have to say the Official XBOX magazines are by FAR the worst...I can't see any reason why anyone would buy it apart from the demo's..."

    50,000 other people would disagree.

    "... (which are now all on Live anyway, except this one which means I'll have to buy the stupid mag and use it as a BBQ lighter afterwards)."

    God, if that's the worst thing in your life, then you must have a fucking wonderful life.

  • mattigan #14 5 years ago

    Or maybe you could send him one of the cover CDs you've got knocking around the office? You do work for the magazine don't you, that's the only reason I could think of someone coming on here and defending it?

    When I think of any "official" gaming mag, the phrase "dog eggs" usually springs to mind.

  • Darren #15 5 years ago

    I find it somewhat amusing that the UK is not getting the Viva Pinata demo because a UK official magazine has the exclusive rights to it for their cover disc! I mean the game has been out for FOUR months now so I can't see it shifting any extra copies of the magazine somehow! LOL

    Yeah, "better late than never" but even so, is there any point in releasing a demo to a game this late?

  • bob1008 #16 5 years ago

    From the press release:

    "The playable demo provides a taste of what’s available in the Xbox 360 game, which is available at stores for a suggested retail price of $49.00. This demo will be available in the U.S. only on Tuesday, March 13. Localized versions of this demo will follow soon after in Japan, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the U.K."

  • Paulanator #17 5 years ago

    I'm dying to give this game a go and have almost bought it on several occassions.

    A good demo would probably push me over the edge. Hurry up and release it in the UK!

  • smelly #18 5 years ago

    >It's good and not for kids when you actually play it.


    Why is it not for kids? It's suitable for all ages. Which (imho) is a good thing.

  • Fatnick #19 5 years ago

    Closing tha gate after the horstacchio has bolted?
    Edited by Fatnick at 13/03/07 @ 16:38

  • mattigan #20 5 years ago

    It's not good for kids because if you want to do more than get a few wirlms or sparromints on the go, it starts to get a bit too involved for your average kiddiewink.

  • gamecat #21 5 years ago

    is 25 quid in Argos at the mo

  • DrunKao #22 5 years ago

    I played the demo last night and enjoyed it. I'm not going to play it again till I can spend a whole day on it, seeing as the demo doesn't save. The demo has a lot creatures in it to play around with, so I can imagine that a person spending hours just on this demo. That makes me wonder what kind of limit the demo.

    Microsoft made a HUGE mistake releasing this demo so late. They could've sold many more copies. I think they would've been better off releasing the Viva demo than Crackdown. People were going to buy Crackdown regardless, but only avid gamers browsing gaming sites would know that Viva was any good, and even then they still wouldn't buy it till they knew how it played.