Pikmin is a very engaging game. I definitely need to go back to it to get a better feel for it, but it didn't take me long to call up some Pikmin and take down a couple flowers. Once the Pikmin take down a flwer, you get a puck shaped object which they can drag back to their homes to spawn more Pikmin.

The beginning is very simple to play and easy to pick up. Of course, I get the feeling that there's a lot more to learn and the gameplay looks to be pretty deep. It's easy to build up a nice following in the demo. I got up to 24 Pikmin at once and gleefully ordered them to take down a barrier. There's a wonderful feeling controlling a mob of little creatures who will do your every bidding with a simple button press. I suppose it's a bit like RTS games in that respect, but the feel of Pikmin is quite different.

The graphics are nice, too. So far environments don't seem too complex, but animations, textures, and models are sweet. Controlling the game is mostly done with 2 buttons (A and B) while camera work is done with the shoulder buttons.

I managed to down a few enemies with my army but got too cocky and stayed out as night approached. I soon stumbled upon a large spider like creature and tried to sic my army on it. The result was pure carnage. My poor Pikmin army was reduced to 4 as the day ended. I need to go back to do more and hopefully this time I'll keep more alive.