Basics
The Tiny Chao Garden is a simple two-dimensional Chao Garden that you can play with on the Game Boy Advance. It is included in Sonic Advance, Sonic Advance 2, and Sonic Pinball Pary. It can also be downloaded from the GameCube games Sonic Adventure 2 Battle, Sonic Adventure DX, and Phantasy Star Online Episode I & II.
It is a tiny garden that can contain only one Chao and one Egg. Being on a portable console, you can feed and raise your Chao wherever you like!
Overview
The first time you enter the Tiny Chao Garden, you will see a normal egg sitting there. To hatch it, move the cursor over it and press the “A” button to rub it. Keep rubbing it and it will hatch! Alternatively, you can just leave it alone and it will hatch eventually. Once your Chao has hatched from its egg, it will start roaming around freely!
The top-right corner of the screen shows the name and type (evolution) of your Chao. Please note that Chao can appear very differently in the Tiny Chao Garden to how they normally would, so don’t be surprised if its appearance doesn’t match its actual colour or evolution. The game gives your Chao a random name to start off with, but you can change this by clicking on the name with the “A” button and typing in the new name. In each of the pictures on the side of this page, the Chao is shown as to be a child. Please note that time does not pass in the Tiny Chao Garden at all! This means that Chao do not age, and will never evolve or die while they remain in the Tiny Chao Garden.
You can view each of your Chao’s stats on the right of the screen. Swim, Fly, Run, Power, and Stamina are all displayed; however, you can only view the level and progress to the next level, not the actual points or the grades. The Mood bar shows you how the Chao is feeling: the more full up it is, the happier the Chao feels. You should pet your Chao every so often by pressing the “A” button on it to make it feel happy and loved. Occasionally, weeds will grow in the garden; you should pick these out as they will make your Chao feel unwanted and neglected! Feed your Chao to keep its Belly bar full.
The bottom-right corner of the screen displays the number of rings that you currently own. You can collect more rings by playing the main game (in the case of Sonic Advance, Sonic Advance 2, and Sonic Pinball Party), or by playing the included mini-games. You can use these rings to buy items from the shop.
Versions
As already mentioned, the Tiny Chao Garden can be accessed through numerous games. These Tiny Chao Gardens are not all identical; there are some small differences between them.
Version 1
The first version of the Tiny Chao Garden is included in Sonic Advance, and downloadable from Sonic Adventure 2 Battle and Phantasy Star Online Episode I & II. It has all of the basic features described in the overview, and includes a rock-paper-scissors mini-game.
The Tiny Chao Garden which is downloadable from Phantasy Star Online uses a modified Version 1 system. It includes a title screen, and most importantly, a Tails Chao! Instead of starting off with a normal egg, you get a golden Chao with the name “TAILS”. When you transfer this Chao to Sonic Adventure 2 Battle or Sonic Adventure DX, you will see that it is an otherwise unobtainable Character Chao that looks just like Tails. This is the only way to obtain the Tails Chao without hacking!
Version 2
The second version of the Tiny Chao Garden can be found in Sonic Advance 2 and Sonic Pinball Party, and can also be downloaded from Sonic Adventure DX. This version builds on the previous version, and adds some small features. Chao can fly around and swim in the lake if they have high enough Fly and Swim stats. Also, “Z”s appear when a Chao is fast asleep. Finally, each Version 2 garden has its own mini-game, different from the rock-paper-scissors minigame of Version 1.
