IViva Pinata! rented Viva Piñata (it’s on the 360) this weekend expecting to pop it in, check it out briefly, and then send it back. Instead, Eileen and I have spent a good chunk of the weekend doing some virtual gardening, building our very own Eden. This is possibly the single cutest game I’ve ever played. I don’t have rugrats, but if you do, I can’t imagine any parent objecting to content in Viva Piñata, and I suspect most video game-oriented parents who play with their kids may find themselves at least as interested as the little ones are.

Basically, you spend time building your garden and attracting new kinds of animal pinñats to it, some of which are fairly wacky. You’re able to grow fruits, nuts, and vegetables (some of which are required to keep some types of animals happy), cause animals to engage in “romance” (G-rated) that results in the Stork delivering an egg. You can name your animals and buy various accessories for them from pirate hats to ‘yokel teeth’ (which Beth, one of our ‘Sparrowmints,’ has been running around wearing), and send them to friends on Xbox Live if you wish. Speaking of which, if anyone wants to send me something, I’m ‘Sarapis’ on XBL and my garden is ‘Eden.’