Drawn To Life Month – An Introduction

Hello everyone! I've promised this a while ago, and I never got around to doing it... until today. In my collection of games, I have a lot of Mario games, a lot of Sonic games, a lot of Raving Rabbid games... With that, you'd think I'd make a whole month about those, right? Well... I've decided to go for another series, one you might not know much about. Fear not, though; I'll be here to explain everything.

What IS Drawn to Life? It's a trilogy of games:

-Drawn To Life, a DS game;

-Drawn To Life: The Next Chapter, a Wii game;

-and Drawn To Life: The Next Chapter, a DS game and the official finale, in my opinion. Since the last two games have the same name and were made by different companies, I just like to believe that the Wii version of The Next Chapter is located between the two DS games. 

Now, what is the concept? Well, the idea is simple. You create most of the things in the game. There's a plot, and every few minutes you're ordered to draw something in particular. Now, you can draw whatever the Hell you want: If they ask you to draw a beach ball, you can draw an urchin because you're a sadist. Or if you're lazy, fill the whole drawing field with black and claim that the black square or rectangle is actually something else. Luckily for you, drawings were made available for you, so that you can avoid drawing entirely. Now, since the game is called Drawn To Life, you'd think people would be encouraged to draw their own things and show creativity, right? Whatever. The developers made one already, you can use it and skip the entire point of the game.

Now, there's actually a plot to all this. You're watching a village of fox-like people as they struggle, both as a community and as a species, during hard times. Darkness has spread all over the world, and next to no Raposa is still living in the village. Yes, Raposa. The characters are as cute as this name lets out. Look at this. Aren't they adorable?

"Rapo'!"
And that's just the main Raposa characters. The younger ones
are absolutely a-do-ra-ble.

Now, here's the twist. The Raposa consider YOU like their God. The remaining Raposa get in contact with you as the game starts, and as a result you design (draw) a hero for them. Make it like a famous character! Make it a totally original character! Make him/her look like Samus, Deadpool, Finn the human, Bella, whatever; if you can draw that character with pixels, in relatively small drawing spaces, you can use him/her in the game. Then you will control that character as he/she runs and jumps across the levels to pick up pages from the Book of Life (their own Bible, where the Creator – you – has stored knowledge of most of what exists) and captured Raposa.

The whole point is: You draw your own hero, then you draw his tools, his weapons, and then you save the world with him/her.

The series is known for being very funny, with some characters that seem to exist solely for comic relief, and moments that will extract a laugh from you. References and parodies of genres and famous characters, among others. But it's also known for being a sad game. And when I mean sad, I mean tear-jerking. You WILL cry the first time you beat the first game. You will. Trust me. Aside from that, there's great moments of adventure, friendship, and even a hint of romance.

As far as I know, only three games were made. The ending to the DS version of The Next Chapter makes it so that this story cannot be continued. It's the very definitive end. Sadly, I only own the other two games. As a result, this Drawn To Life Month would be missing its most important part. Here's what I'll do this month: I will review the two games I own, putting more emphasis on the plot, as usual... and once I'm done reviewing the Wii version of Drawn To Life: The Next Chapter, I will go over the plot of the last game, without discussing much of the gameplay (because I haven't played it). And give Drawn To Life Month the ending it deserves. (There's a Spongebob edition, but I really couldn't care less for that one, as it's an entirely different game.)

This series is packed with emotions, great moments of fun, great moments of sadness, a lot of heartwarming scenes as well... It's all worth giving the whole series a look. And that's what I'm doing this month. Follow me through this adventure spanning three games. You should enjoy reading about it. Who knows, maybe you'll look for those games later. Have fun during Drawn To Life Month.

(Note: No, the reviews won't be as sober as this introduction was. I used an intro because I didn't want to waste half a review explaining Drawn To Life Month. The reviews will contain comedy, like they usually do. But don't count on me to ruin the heavy moments. I wasn't joking when I said this game was sad, and I intend to keep the emotional weight of the important scenes intact.)

See you this Friday for part 1 of the Drawn To Life review.