Originally conceived as a point-and-click adventure game, it was put on developmental hold until Nintendo producer Shigeru Miyamoto gained interest in the title and overhauled its production.

was generally well received, with praise for the premise, the charming storyline, and sound design, but some gameplay mechanics and the quality of the graphics drew some criticism.

Chibi-Robo eventually finds a large robot in the basement with a missing leg called Giga-Robo, who was once a companion of the Sandersons', but had to be deactivated due to its high electricity consumption.

When George purchases yet another toy, Helen locks herself in her room and tells him that she wants a divorce, prompting the rest of the family to do housework in an attempt to make up for it.

Once the aliens land and greet him, Chibi-Robo uses a time machine made by the visitors to go into the past to find a code to enter a safe in the master bedroom containing Giga-Robo's leg.

[12] George upgrades Chibi-Robo's blaster, allowing the small robot to defeat the Queen Spydor, recover Giga-Robo's missing leg, and rescue the Sandersons.

The objective of the game is to become the top-ranked "Super Chibi-Robo" in the world by accumulating Happy Points, a collectible gained by doing good deeds for the family and for various toys in the Sandersons' home.

An important task in gaining Happy Points is to clean up messes around the house, such as disposing of trash or scrubbing dirty footprints.

[6][8][9] With Chibi-Robo's assistant Telly Vision as his speaker, the player is often prompted to give either a positive or negative response to each question or request.

At the start of both day and night, the player begins in the Chibi-House, where they can charge Chibi-Robo's battery, save at the electrical outlet, or connect to the Citrusoft "Chibi-PC" to purchase a variety of items and power-ups with Moolah and use scrap metal to build "Utilibots", robotic helpers that ease the navigation of the Sandersons' home.

[7][14] The gear available from Citrusoft includes the "Chibi-Copter", used to reach far-off points or fly down from a high place safely; the "Chibi-Blaster", used to eliminate obstacles and fend off the hostile Spydorz; and the "Chibi-Radar", used to detect hidden objects.

These include the toothbrush, used to clean up stains; the coffee mug, used for protection; the spoon, used to dig holes; and the squirter, used to hold fluids and squirt them.

[7] For instance, if the player poses for Mr. Sanderson while wearing The Drake Redcrest costume, he will give Chibi-Robo Happy Points.

The gameplay was different as well; instead of a platform-adventure game, it played like a point-and-click adventure title, where the player was not in direct control of Chibi-Robo, but was rather conveying commands to him by clicking a cursor around the area.

[5] Director Kenichi Nishi had previous development credits such as Chrono Trigger, Moon: Remix RPG Adventure and Incredible Crisis.

[19] Nishi's approach to game design, even with Chibi-Robo!, was to always take a standard, orthodox method and "crash it, twist it, or create a totally different direction".

[6] The reason Nishi chose to make the majority of the cast toys is because humans are "too big to interact with [Chibi-Robo] and create all the drama" and that it added a sense of fantasy to the experience.

Still, rather than use these topics as major themes for the player, Nishi felt it would be more effective to bring them in as "ordinary things to enhance the adventure of daily life".

[29] Critics Greg Mueller of GameSpot, Mathew Kumar of Eurogamer, Bryn Williams of GameSpy, Shane Satterfield of G4, and Matt Casamassina of IGN all applauded the game's charming setting, compelling storyline, and complex characters.

[9] Considering the joyous atmosphere of Chibi-Robo!, Satterfield was pleasantly surprised at its inclusion of controversial topics like divorce and its possible distortion of a target audience.

[26] This attribute was criticized by Jinny Gudmundsen, a columnist for USA Today, who thought that the interpersonal issues negate the game's overall charm and render it inappropriate for younger children.

[30] Writers for Computer Games Magazine praised Chibi-Robo by interpreting deep, symbolic meaning in its more subtle aspects.

The publication found the game to use "overarching narrative arcs" and "stock melodramatic devices" among the Sandersons' dysfunctional interactions, "emotional crisis points, downtime, and rhythms and cycles of action" between its day and night events, and "evocative music" as a way for characters to communicate their feelings.

[9][28] James Mielke of 1UP.com similarly enjoyed the "near-constant sense of discovery" and the tiny details included by Skip with earning Happy Points and Moolah.

[23] Casamassina, Mielke, and Williamson were satisfied that they had to frequently recharge Chibi-Robo, but Mueller was dismayed to have to stop one's current task in order to find an outlet.

[8][9][14][28] The GameSpot contributor was also aggravated with the mere five-minute intervals for the day and night cycles, which he considered a major interruption of the game's pacing.

[9] Casamassina commented: "Few developers would be brave enough to create a title whose main character generates varying musical notes whenever he takes a step, but this is exactly what Chibi does - and it's actually very whimsical and cute".

[8][14][23][27] Casamassina encountered low-polygon 3D models and a below-average frame rate; Satterfield stated thst the game operated at "Dreamcast level".

[8] Satterfield and Casamassina regarded the cutscenes as awkward and repetitive; the former of the two claimed that they "amount to ugly characters recycling the same animation routine over and over while gibberish comes from their gaping maws".

[32][33] According to Media Create, the GameCube version was the fourth best-selling game in Japan for its week ending on June 26, 2005 with nearly 29,000 copies sold.