Ping Pals is a ripoff. That's really all you need to know about THQ's standalone chat software for the Nintendo DS.
Every DS unit comes standard with a copy of Nintendo's Pictochat installed, so it's hard to imagine who exactly the target audience for Ping Pals is. Everything useful that Ping Pals does, Pictochat can do. The rest of the game – like avatars, single-player chats with bots, and buyable pictures/sound effects – are useless gimmicks that do nothing to add value to what can only be called highway robbery.
There's a sucker born every minute. Don't be one – leave Ping Pals where it belongs: on the shelf.
-George