Generally, I’m into playing games with a great story, something I can really get into. But sometimes, you just want to take pictures of dogs.
In Pupperazzi, not everything you do is take pictures of dogs. Sometimes you’re taking pictures that a dog asked you to take, or collecting golden milkbones so you can buy more film for your camera. But everything is in service of the goal, which is taking pictures of dogs. Swimming dogs, dogs in hats, dogs on boats, dogs on scooters, dogs at work, even dogs doing jumps on skateboards.
The game starts you out on a beach full of dogs, with just a few objectives - take a close-up photo of a dog, and take a picture of a dog with a lighthouse. As you clear these, new objectives are given, and new locations open up. A boardwalk, a city, and eventually to the moon. Why are there pups running around on the moon? It doesn’t matter. Don’t ask questions, just take pictures of dogs.
You obtain different lenses and filters in the course of the game, but this progression felt a bit antithetical to the casual nature of the rest of it, and I would have preferred at least the option to have all that at the very beginning of the game. I was also a bit disappointed that the game doesn’t judge the quality of any of your photos, although can a photo with a cute dog in it really be anything other than awesome?
Pupperazzi is a fun little diversion that made me laugh out loud more than once with its escalating absurdity, and it doesn’t overstay its welcome. If you can take a photo on your phone, you can play Pupperazzi.
