You make some good points, but because you haven't played the explorer for very long you do not understand what the issue is that has frustrated some of us on this board. There are only so many places to explore. There are 12 items of treasure to return to the king. Once you've returned them all, there aren't any more. There are two flower books. Once you've got both of them, you can pick all of the rare flowers. Once you've picked all of the rare flowers and returned them to Madam Gardenia, there are no new ones. As for shopping, the stores run out of stuff (other than taco fries) eventually and there is a limit of items that your explorer pet can carry (other than taco fries). There are only certain items that can be transferred to your mini-pet, most of them cannot be transferred. When you collect money or haloes or pitchforks, they do not go to your mini-pet. Once you've unlocked the two tunnels to Gigalympia, the gate to Gigaville, the bridge to the other part of the jungle and the tunnel to Magma mountain, there is nowhere new to explore. The quests become repetative and there are no new prizes to obtain. At a certain point the game loses its interest. It seemed reasonable to assume that eventually the game ended and that you would eventually start over with a new character. Most video games do have an end after all. Have you never played Zelda?
In fairness, it has been a lot of game for the money and kept us entertained for quite awhile, but I guess at some point we were expecting an ending. Sadly, we've come to the conclusion that there is no end.
