We're not sure how many more adorable, yet invariably manipulative virtual puppies we can handle. It's bad enough that Nintendo tricked us into caring for a cleverly programmed lump of polygons with Nintendogs, and now it seems that Sega wants in on the pooch petting action. Famitsu's website reveals a new game from the house that Sonic built that features an array of obscenely colorful (and vaguely edible) puppies, along with plenty of equally cute mini-games. And yet...we can't possibly resist doggies playing Air Hockey. We just can't.

Of course, the rational, non-awwwww reaction to this would be to cry "copy", "clone" and "cash-in", but judging by the screenshots, it appears that this game focuses more on the aforementioned mini-games than actually caring for your pet. The screenshots are really all we have to go on, what with Google Translator devouring the page and spitting out the unhelpful "It probably will come in contact with the room DS tea dog of the tea dog!"

An in-depth investigation (we Googled it) reveals that Tea Dogs (Ocha-Ken) is actually an anime series that has already spawned a GBA game or two in the past. Given the massive success Nintendogs has enjoyed across the world, this might actually have a shot at coming to US shores.

[Via DS-x2]