Spoilers for the first Drawn to Life are unmarked. You Have Been Warned.

Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter is a Platform Game in the Drawn to Life series, released for both Nintendo DS and Nintendo Wii, published by THQ. Both versions of The Next Chapter serve as sequels for the first game. The DS version was developed by 5th Cell, the same studio that worked on the first game, whereas the Wii version was made by Planet Moon Studios.

While both versions take place after the first game with Mari taking over the role of mayor of Rapoville from her father , both stories deviate significantly as a result of being developed by different studios, and as a result the characters and locations seen varies between versions.

The DS version has Heather finding a scepter on Jowee and Mari's secret beach and she unwittingly revives Wilfre after picking it up, allowing him to possess Heather's body and begin his plan to drain the color from the world and forcing the Rapoville Raposa to take refuge aboard a giant turtle sent by the Creator. The story for the DS game is noted to be darker than both the previous game and the Wii version. The Wii version concerns the creations of Rapoville being stolen, and the Hero looking into the disappearances on Mari's request. After retrieving Wilfre's journal from an abandoned shadow factory, Mari learns of Wilfre's plans to use the four Artifacts of Power to overthrow the Creator, and she sends the Hero to retrieve them before he can.

Both versions were released October 8, 2009 in Australia, October 16, 2009 in Europe and October 27, 2009 in North America. Unlike the first game, neither version of The Next Chapter was released in Asia.

The Next Chapter would remain the last games in the Drawn to Life series, aside for a Compilation Re-release of the DS version and the first game, for 11 years until the announcement of Drawn to Life: Two Realms in 2020.

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• Abnormal Ammo: Invoked. The Shooter’s ammo is drawn by the player and as a result the Shooter can hypothetically fire anything. Averted in the Wii version where the Shooter’s bullets are preset.
• A Dog Named "Dog": The first boss in the Wii version is a large shadow monster creatively named Boss.
• Adventures in Comaland: The ending of the DS version reveals the Raposa world to have been Mike's car-crash coma dream.
• All the Worlds Are a Stage: In the DS version, before the Hero can access Wilfre's mansion in Wilfre's Wasteland, they must go through levels themed after the three villages they visited throughout the game to break the barrier preventing access into the mansion.
• Ambidextrous Sprite: Averted with Heather, who gains a new set of left facing and walking left sprites to fix the oddity of the shadow-covered half of her face not accurately showing in the first game.
• Anti-Escapism Aesop: For as much as the main draw of the games is "your creativity can make anything real," the second game ultimately veers brutally into this territory. The entire world is the dream of a comatose kid in a car accident. How do you win? By convincing the kid to wake up and erase everything. The third game retcons the catastrophic implications of the second, but the themes of anti-escapism remain, particularly in the theme of the second game's ending.
  My real dreams and real love
  You need the things that you can touch
  This make-believe is not enough
• Anti-Frustration Features: Almost every creation in the game has a preset template available for the artistically challenged.
• Art Shift: The ending of the DS version uses a painterly style with realistic humans to contrast with the rest of the game's cartoony art style.
• Background Boss: The Giant Robosa remains in the background during the fight against it, with only its fists coming into the foreground.
• Belly of the Boss: Once the Giant Robosa is damaged enough times, it will suck the Hero inside itself where they’ll have to take out both of the Robosa’s eyes and its heart. Once a part is defeated, the Giant Robosa will spit the Hero back out. This continues three times until the heart is taken out, defeating the boss.
• Bookends: At the beginning of the DS version, the player must answer questions and draw a picture of a Noodle Incident, and shows a request to the Creator in gibberish. At the end of the game, after the world fades away, it shows Heather and Mike, while Heather is shown answering the questions asked at the beginning of the game. The request to the Creator turns out to be a prayer to God for Mike to get better.
• Break the Cutie: In the DS version Mari learns the truth behind the world, courtesy of Wilfre, and attempts to undo everything she and Jowee did to prevent its destruction. Jowee, meanwhile, has to pick up the pieces trying to restore the world without her, believing she's a traitor until he was also shown the truth.
• Canon Discontinuity: The Wii version of The Next Chapter was originally canon to the DS version, with the Wii version happening before the latter but after the first game according to an interview by IGN. It would later be rendered non-canon by Digital Continue in 2020◊, with the only reference to it since being a mask based on Circi that was added to Two Realms through a Creative Pack update.
• Cash Gate: In the DS version, progression in the story is usually locked behind an area that’s had its color drained, requiring you to pay Color Drops and fill it in to proceed.
• Cerebus Retcon: Mike in the first game was little more than a joke character, and implied to be an adult and a computer programmer who somehow ended up in the Raposa realm. The ending of the DS version reveals he’s a boy who ended up in a coma as a result of a car crash that claimed the lives of his parents and injured his sister, Heather. Somehow, this event lead to Mike’s conscious becoming connected to the Raposa realm.
• Cheat Code: In the Wii version, holding the Wiimote upside-down while the game is paused and pressing A, B, C and Up on the D-pad will reward you with 100 Rapo-Coins.
• Coloring in the World: In the DS version, Wilfre begins draining color from the world. During gameplay, the player is able to restore color to blank areas by paying Color Drops and filling in the area manually. Coloring in certain areas is mandatory to progress through the game.
• Compilation Re-release: The DS version of The Next Chapter was re-released as part of Drawn to Life Collection alongside the first Drawn to Life, released exclusively in Australia and North America.
• Continuity Cameo: Bubba and Count Choco can be seen amongst the spectators in the Wii-exclusive Raposa Sports minigames, being the only place they appear in this version.
• Damsel in Distress: Heather being kidnapped by Wilfre is one of the events that sets the game’s plot into motion in the DS version.
• Darker and Edgier: The DS version manages to take a complete 180 from the original game. Rather than helping bring back fellow Raposa into the village, the Hero and the Raposa have to bring back color into the world after it was all drained by Wilfre. And then there's the ending involving Mike being the victim of a car crash, sending him into a coma and being tended to by Heather with a heavily disfigured face.
• Death Is a Slap on the Wrist: The DS version of The Next Chapter does away with the lives system of its predecessor, and instead you retry the section from the beginning if you die.
• Demonic Possession: The beginning of the game in the DS version has Heather find a scepter on the Hidden Beach. Picking it up results in her being possessed by Wilfre.
• Dream Apocalypse: In the DS version, after the Creator taps the Eternal Flame one last time, the world and Raposa disappear one by one, resulting in Mike in the real world waking up from his coma.
• Dream Intro: The DS version begins with Heather joining her friends over for a picnic, then they suddenly turn dark and creepy, that the darkness covers up the area. Heather was almost caught by it, until she sits right back up in bed.
• Evil-Detecting Dog: In the DS version, Crazy Barks acts like this around Sock, the new Raposa, when he gets aboard the ship. But no one seems to pick up on this.
• Flowers of Romance: In the Wii game, DJ asks the Hero to retrieve a Frozen Rose for him so he can use it in his marriage proposal to Erika.
• Go Mad from the Revelation: In the DS version of The Next Chapter. Mari doesn't quite go mad, but does join Wilfre after he shows her Mike unconscious in the real world.
• Gotta Catch Them All: The plot of the Wii game involves the Hero having to collect the four Artifacts of Power after learning that Wilfre plans to use them to overthrow the Creator.
• Harmless Enemy: The Dodos found in the basement of Turtle Rock are unable to hurt the Hero, and will just harmlessly bounce off them. Likewise, the Hero cannot hurt them. Downplayed with the Sheepdog enemies seen in Watersong as they'll attempt to push the Hero into hazards.
• Hitbox Dissonance: You can make your hero bigger or smaller than normal. However, this doesn't change the size of their hitbox, so don't think that by shrinking your hero you'll make the game easier.
• Interactive Start Up: In the DS version, after drawing your Hero, the title screen allows you to control the Hero inside their room aboard Turtle Rock. The top screen by default is an illustration based on the game’s box art with Mari, Jowee and Heather, and you can freely draw on top of this illustration or erase it and replace it with something else like the Jowee title screen doodle in the first game. After beating the game, Mike is added to the player’s room, sleeping in their bed. Interacting with him will allow you to watch the game’s credits.
• Interface Screw: During the opening of the DS version, you’re taken to the Creation Hall to draw a Hero for the Raposa, only for the drawing interface to fall to pieces after a few seconds and the game to cut back to the Creation Hall, where the marionette that the Creator bestowed life into in the first game has had its color completely drained.
• Invincible Minor Minion: The Dodos and the Sheepdogs in the DS version cannot be killed by the Hero, and likewise are unable to damage them in return, though the latter can still push the Hero into hazards.
• It Tastes Like Feet: After restoring to Maximilien’s fruit stand in Watersong, he’ll offer the Hero a Water-Apple for half price, before remarking that it tastes like seaweed and begging them not to tell anyone.
• Jungle Japes:
  • In the DS version, The first half of the Galactic Jungle, in both the main village hub and levels, features jungle foilage growing around futuristic Cyberpunk architecture.
  • Jangala in the Wii version is the first gate visited in the game, and as its name suggests is full of lush greenery, waterfalls, and inhabited by stereotypical diminutive tribesmen bearing spears and dart blowguns, feral-looking Baki wearing animal pelts instead of their usual scarves as well as a tribe of non-hostile monkeys.
• Kill It with Fire: In the Lavasteam levels, Baki that come in contact with fire or have lava dropped on them will be set alight and begin frantically running about before dying shortly afterwards.
• Late-Arrival Spoiler: Both versions of The Next Chapter spoil Wilfre killing the Mayor near the end of the first game right at the beginning of their respective stories as Mari is stated to be the new mayor of Rapoville.
• Lethal Lava Land: Lavasteam in the DS version is located in a volcanic region of the Raposa world, with the World Map icon representing it with a minecart and factory equipment around an active volcano, and the Lavasteam levels feature lava and fire as a hazard. The workmen of the village harvest the lava for use in metalworking.
• Lighter and Softer: The revised ending of the DS version included in Drawn to Life Collection changes the game’s infamous ending, using an artstyle closer to the one used for the rest of the game and instead of being rendered comatose after a car accident that claimed the lives of his and Heather’s parents, Mike falls out of a tree while trying to catch fireflies on a trip with his family, resulting in him being knocked unconscious, and both of his parents remaining alive.
• MacGuffin Delivery Service: Mari sends the Hero to reclaim the Artifacts of Power after reading in Wilfre's journal that he intends to use them to destroy the Creator, with them already having the Crystal Mask from the Monkey King and the pen and pencil that was retrieved alongside Wilfre's journal. This results in them being delivered to Town Hall, straight into Circi's hands, who plans to use them alongside the stolen Book of Life to resurrect Wilfre.
• Magic Music: The Power of Song, passed down from mayor to mayor, ensures Watersong’s prosperity. Mayor Rose losing her voice risks the village’s destruction. When it comes time to pass the torch, the process of transferring the Power of Song from the previous mayor to their successor kills the former.
• Monster from Beyond the Veil: The Version-Exclusive Final Boss in the Wii version is Wilfre resurrected as a mindless Giant Scribble Monster, created from Circi's failed attempts at remembering what he looked like in life.
• Mood Whiplash: The Galactic Jungle from the DS version, a Cyberpunk place where there are millions of harsh laws all Played for Laughs to a degree, takes a turn for the worse when you realize Click was behind the whole "government," and it only gets worse the further you play into the game.
• Motion Parallax: The Rocky Railroad level in the DS version uses parallax scrolling by rapidly scrolling the level's background image to give the impression the train the player traverses on top of is moving.
• Mustache Vandalism: Two of the preset creations in the Wii version are portraits of Wilfre, with the game’s prompt for both of them telling the player to vandalise them, including drawing a moustache on both of them.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Cindi reuses the generic Rapogirl villager sprite seen in the first game.
  • In Lavasteam, the player can find three NPCs who are Palette Swaps of the generic Raposa boy, girl and old man villager from the first game.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero!: In the DS version, Heather nonchalantly picking up a random scepter that washed up on the Secret Beach results in her accidently reviving Wilfre as well as getting possessed by him.
• NPC Round-Up Mission: The villagers that are kidnapped by Wilfre during the DS version’s opening cutscene end up in the different villages visited throughout the game. Unlike the first game, rescuing them is completely optional. There's also a mission in Lavasteam that involves you and your allies being captured, with your goal being to rescue each ally by fighting through the level and reaching them.
• Orphan's Plot Trinket: Heather’s pendant is used by the Raposa for a majority of the DS version’s story to track her down after she’s abducted by Wilfre before Sock tosses it overboard after the player completes the Galactic Jungle. At the end of the game, it’s revealed that Heather (and Mike) in real life were orphaned as a result of a car crash.
• Palm Tree Panic: The first three levels of Watersong are set on the village’s beach, and feature tropical foliage and a surfboard creation that the hero gets to ride during part of the first level.
• Polish the Turd: Maximillien is well aware the fruit he sells tastes awful, and asks the Hero not to tell this to anyone.
• People's Republic of Tyranny: The Democracy of the Republic of the People of the United Space Fortress, or DOT ROT POT USF for short. The opening scene for the village has Zsasha, Unagi and Cricket being arrested for very minor infractions.
• Prefers the Illusion: In the DS version, Wilfre discovers that the whole world might be created by a boy in a coma. Rather than allowing the Mike to wake up, thus potentially ending the world as they knew it, he conspired to keep him in his coma so as to continue their existence. He also briefly convinced Mari to help him, but she and the rest of the Raposa, later decided it was worth the risk of potential non existence in order to allow Mike to wake up and free the world from darkness.
• Rash Promise: Watersong's main conflict stems from the fact that Mayor Rose foolishly promised to give her voice to Salem, against her son's wishes. She made the deal to the promise conch, which cannot be unbroken without the conch's magic, so when she lost the bet, her voice was gone as a result of her impulsiveness and pride... which isn't great for a village that literally requires music to exist.
• Scenery Gorn: The walls inside of the mansion in Wilfre's Wasteland have color leaking out of the walls.
• Self-Sacrifice Scheme: After defeating Wilfre, the remaining Raposa willingly allow the Creator to erase them and their world from existence to save Mike’s life.
• Shout-Out: In the last stage of the first world in the Wii version, there's a section where you must climb up sloped platforms while dodging large, rolling obstacles to reach the level's boss - a giant ape - at the top. Sound familiar?
• Sleepy Enemy: The Sheepdog enemies found in Watersong sleep until the Hero approaches them, at which point they wake up and become Pushy Mooks.
• Spared by the Adaptation: Both of Mike’s parents are alive in the ending of the DS version included in the Compilation Re-release.
• Spirit Advisor: After arriving in Wilfre's Wasteland in the DS version, the Mayor's ghost appears and asks the Hero to help Mari find her way again, and tells them how to disable the force field around Wilfre's mansion.
• Steampunk: Lavasteam. Smokey, the clothing choices of the NPCs, the Robosa mining robots and even the giant Robosa that serves as the village's boss shares this aesthetic.
• Suddenly Speaking: During the beginning of the DS version, Heather, the Cute Mute from the first game, asks for the Hero to stop Wilfre as she's being dragged into a portal, while also yelling the cryptic hint "Kemi-Kewa!". The Wii version shows her able to speak complete sentences.
• Turtle Island: Turtle Rock in the DS version has is a large turtle with a small village on its shell, complete with Creation Hall, and serves as both the base of operations for the Rapoville survivors throughout the game as well as their method of traversing the sea.
• Undead Counterpart: Several of the later Watersong levels feature ghost versions of the standard Baki enemy. Unlike normal Bakis, they can't be killed with weapons, only a Goomba Stomp, as your weapons just phase through them.
• Unexpected Shmup Level: The DS version has three of these, more specifically, the fourth and final levels of the Galactic Jungle, with the second of these actually being the village's boss fight, and the sixth level of Wilfre's Wasteland.
• The Unfought: You never get the chance to fight Circi directly in the Wii version, as she's (presumably) killed by the Giant Scribble Monster after its creation.
• Version-Exclusive Content: Both versions of The Next Chapter follow vastly different stories, and as a result characters outside of the ones from the first game, locations, and even most of the creations are exclusive to their respective version. The Wii version contains several Mini Games that are not included in the DS game.
• Version-Exclusive Final Boss: As a result of both games having vastly different stories, the DS and Wii version have unique final bosses. The DS version has you fighting Wilfre and his "Ultimate Creation": a iridescent storm cloud topped with a throne which he sits on. The Wii version instead has you fighting Circi's failed attempt to resurrect Wilfre.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: In the DS version, the Hero unlocks the ability to transform into a blob and a spider, and can switch between all three of their forms at will.
• You Don't Look Like You: In the Wii version, due to Planet Moon Studios using a slightly different artstyle.
  • Downplayed with the Raposa in general, who are all depicted with the short triangular ears characteristic of males regardless of gender.
  • Played straight for Pirate Beard, who goes from a gray-furred clean shaven Jack Sparrow lookalike in the DS games to an orange-furred moustachioed generic pirate dressed in red.
• You Have Researched Breathing: In the DS version of The Next Chapter, you need to upgrade the Shooter twice until the Hero gets the bright idea of shooting up.