Artoon is a Japanese developer that was formed by ex-members of Sonic Team, the group responsible for the Sega hero's adventures on the Genesis, Game Gear, Saturn, and Dreamcast. While not all the team members made a break for it to Artoon, some key players, including character and level designers jumped ship to this company. And these folks are now working on Game Boy Advance product – the first game: Pinobee: Quest of Hearts, a side-scrolling action game that pushes the 2D capabilities of Nintendo's next handheld.

Pinobee is inspired by the children's story Pinocchio. Pinocchio, Pinobee. Get it? He's a bee. But not a real one – he's a robotic bee that dreams of becoming a real live bee. And if you complete this game, you might fulfill his wish. The idea is to collect items, butt-stomp enemies, and get to the end of the level. Pinobee can do a Yoshi-style burst to double and triple jump in the air to gain altitude or distance, depending on where you want to go with your jump. When you're on your last available jump, Pinobee comically lets you know he's out by growing his head big and whimpering – very anime in style.

What's special about the game is the Rayman-style painted backgrounds -- this game pushes the Game Boy Advance's color capabilities in a very good way, offering multi-layered scrolling backgrounds that give a very good impression of depth. All the characters are 3D modeled and pre-rendered similar to what Rare did with Donkey Kong Country. You'll also be able to re-enter a stage after completing it, locate some hidden items which will change the storyline and possibly the game's ending.

Pinobee will be one of the first games available for the Game Boy Advance when its released in Japan this March 21, 2000. Hudson Soft will have the game on display at the Tokyo Game Show this week, where we'll see how far along the game has come since Pinobee's debut at Spaceworld last month. Like all Japanese third-party GBA companies, Hudson hasn't announced any US plans for Pinobee…yet. But it looks great and could compliment the system hardware quite well stateside. We'll just have to wait…

-IGN.com