High school. Four years of homework and hall passes, four years of teachers and friends. And four years of the same friends, too, as you're doomed to fall into the trap of joining a tight, exclusive clique and never being able to socialize with anyone outside of that small circle. That's what Bratz 4 Real asserts, as it sets up a story of four fashion-crazed friends who band together to eliminate their high school's clique system, and encourage all different kinds of students to start interacting with one another. It's an interesting premise, one that shows more promise than the storyline used in past Bratz-brand titles. But while the theme of this adventure works pretty well, its execution ends up being pretty shallow.
It's a constant string of short conversations. As you control one of the four Bratz friends, you run around their high school, the local mall and an adjacent park talking to non-player characters, then talking to more non-player characters, then going back to the first character ... and so on and so forth. The plan the Bratz have concocted involves bridging the gap between different social groups, none of which is comfortable with talking to any other. So your character is constantly serving as the messenger, moving from the nerds to the jocks, from the punks to the goths, from the populars to the preppies and every other combination in-between.
It's interesting from a plot perspective. You see the popular girl in charge of costumes for the school play reach out to a punk chick with clothing design experience for help. You see a preppy who loves to proofread manuscripts assisting a nerd with his latest anime fanfiction. You see bright, cheerful cheerleaders come together with drab, gothic girls and find common ground, and it's all very heartwarming to see.
Except that you don't actually see any of it. The interest of the plot gets brought down by the implementation of the game, because whereas the conversations you have imply that these different kids are getting together to hang out, they visibly just keep on standing in the same spot in the game world and not moving an inch.
It's a bit of lost potential. And it's sometimes overturned, but the NPCs in the Bratz world never get to be nearly as mobile as the Bratz themselves, who are always on the run from place to place. They're busy young women, after all, and they have more to attend to than just reuniting a separated student body &#Array; they're still mad for fashion in the midst of this, remember.
So you'll get a lot of clothing-, hairstyle- and makeup-focused interaction between Jade, Sasha, Cloe and Yasmin while the story plays out, along with trips to the mall for supplies and new outfits, and occasions to design your own. That's probably the most compelling piece of gameplay in the package, as while you're hanging out in the Bratz getaway loft you have the option of calling up a design interface to create your own shirts and skirts, hairstyles and make-up looks.
The shirt and skirt interface is most similar to the pattern designer seen in Animal Crossing: Wild World, as you're given a blank grid and a set of colors, and whatever you create within the square is then applied as a texture to wrap around your chosen article of clothing. Hair and make-up are designed similarly, except that you get to "paint" directly on the hair or face of the active Brat. Altogether, the three design features allow for a lot of customization, and that's always a plus in a game like this &#Array; the girls can end up looking however you want them to, and, in contrast to the non-visibility that is a problem with the other student characters in the game mention above, the changes you make to any of the four playable girls' looks will render visually in the game world.
And, as is customary with the majority of DS titles, you'll also find a handful of mini-games tossed in here for kicks, some of which aren't that bad. There's a take on DDR where the zones you tap on the touch screen to complete a "step" constantly shift up and down the screen, which is pretty cool and challenging. And you'll also have the option to own and care for a dog or cat, as well, entering them in competitions, raising their stats, et cetera. Not all that revolutionary, but they're little touches that help to round out the experience.
One last oddity to address, though &#Array; the sound. It's not there. There's just not any background music at all most of the time, which is really weird and off-putting. The high school gets a consistent, short, repetitive piece of music that loops in the background, but the mall has no tunes to support it, and several other occasions throughout the game are played in silence. It's an oversight worth mentioning, as it's the kind of thing that damages the appeal of the experience and seems like it shouldn't have been a problem.
Bratz 4 Real does some work to recast the shallow, self-absorbed Bratz girls in a more redeeming light, using them and their friendship to tell a tale of unity and breaking down social barriers. But whereas that premise and the game's compelling customization options prove to be solid positive points for this package, Bratz 4 Real is still a game brought down by a variety of other oddities. The lack of sound through most of the adventure is weird, and the lack of visible interaction between the students you're "reuniting" is weirder. It's a game that's worth a look for established fans of the brand and those girls who enjoyed the Bratz 4 Real feature film that this adventure's based upon, but gamers who aren't already a part of that clique likely won't feel that this title provides enough significant inroads to encourage their entry.
