The Dog Island/Minigames

There are three minigames in The Dog Island: One of the sub-plots in the game revolves around your interaction with the Victory Gang. In order to prove yourself to them and eventually become their leader, each requires you to best them at their individual favorite pastime. The of these events become the minigames. After beating the Victory Gang dog at their respective minigame, you can then go back at any time and talk to him to play the game.
 * 1) Sledding
 * 2) Racing
 * 3) Soccer

Your high scores are tracked for each minigame in the Records section of the Memo in your menu. Sledding and racing are scored by time to completion, and soccer is scored by number of wins and losses. Each minigame has different courses and difficulty levels. You will win an award for getting first place in any event, and this is the only way you can obtain certain items like Silver and Gold, which are used in creating new accessories.

Sledding
You can play the sledding minigame after beating Gordon in Snow Village. Sledding consists of moving down a straight course, flanked by two other dogs on identical courses, as fast as you can. There are fences separating the contestants, so you don't have to worry about bumping into each other. As the difficulty of a certain course increases, the composition of the power meter changes and your competition gets better.

Movement is generated by stopping a timing line over different parts of a power meter running across the bottom of the screen. The blue timing line will move back and forth across the meter, which consists of a black bar with an orange section and a smaller red section. Stopping the timing line outside of the orange or red sections results in very little forward movement. The orange section is the normal movement, and the red section is the most powerful. You stop the timing line by holding the Wiimote normally and flicking upwards when you want to stop it.

The only other control you may need is to face your character in a certain direction. Just before the timing line starts to move, your dog will face towards the pawprint cursor on the screen when you hold down the button. Although you don't need to hold the button down the entire time, it may be easier than trying to time your button presses to correspond with the timing line starting.

Bumpy Road
This is the first sledding course and is a straight shot to the finish with a small hill in the middle.

Obstacle
In this course you are forced to use the button to navigate around logs that obstruct portions of the path. Dodge left and right around the logs to finish the race.

Puddle
The last course is straight and flat, but has two puddles in the center. Puddle make the orange and red sections of your power meter smaller. If you have a hard time getting the correct timing in these sections, it may be faster to use the button to circumvent the water.

Racing
The racing minigame will be accessible after beating Will in Gigili Village. Racing will come the most naturally, as it utilizes the same controls as running normally in the game. Each race is separated into different types of terrain, with the last course being a composite of all terrains. You race against three other dogs and they get faster as the difficulty level increases. Other than stiffer competition, there is no change in the course due to difficulty level.

Each course consists of multiple legs running towards different colored flags. At the bottom of the screen, an arrow of the same color as the next flag will point you in the right direction. The arrow will point directly to the next checkpoint, regardless of intervening obstacles. When you have run through each flag, the white arrow will point you to the finish line.

The other dogs will jostle you if you get near them, so keep that in mind when choosing your route. Additionally, running into trees will knock your dog back onto its haunches, costing some time. Often the most direct route is through trees or across water or ice. There is no course where the optimal route includes swimming, however running through trees and over ice can speed you up if you are comfortable with the risks of hitting trees or falling into holes in the ice.

Soccer
The last Victory Gang dog you face is McCoy in Rune Village. Is played using just the Wiimote and the button. You will start out in the middle of a tiny soccer field with an enormous soccer ball between you and your opponent. The purpose, just like real soccer (or football if you don't live in the U.S.), is to get the ball into your opponents goal. Put the pawprint cursor over the ball and run towards it. When you run into the ball your dog will go up on its hind legs and start pushing the ball.

Since you only have a side-view of the action, you will need to adjust the cursor location until you learn how to manipulate the ball left and right. If you slip off the ball, you will fall to the ground stunned for a few moments. Each tournament is divided into three rounds, and each round is won by scoring three goals before your opponent.

Chick
The first tournament is played on grass and is obviously the easiest.

Cow
This tournament is played on the ice, which makes it more difficult to reclaim the ball if you fall off.

Elephant
The Elephant tournament is once again on grass, this time with more skillful opponents.

Lion
This is the harder version of the Cow tournament, also played on ice.