Nintendo DS mini-reviews

[Uncle Yuan]

As I said earlier, I recently got a Nintendo DS.  Many people responded with some good suggestions for games, so I thought I'd start a semi-permanent thread of mini-reviews (mmmm, love that hyphen key!)

For consistencies sake, I'm proposing a single paragraph review and a 1-5 scale rating.  Think of one as "Argh, immeadiate trip to Gamerz" and 5 as "I'll still be playing this next year."

So far I've only played one game to any extent:

Final Fantasy III: I know nothing about this series, so those with a strong attachment may feel differently, but I'm only half way through and already I'm burned out on the game.  Ostensibly a RPG, 75% of the game play revolves around killing an assortment of monsters that randomly pop up as you're traveling, crawling through dungeons and etc.  This just looses it's appeal after a while.  Particularly when you're traveling through zones you leveled out of a while ago (which you may do to go back and buy supplies).  On the positive sides, the story line is good, the graphics are decent (particularly on fight screens), some parts of it are quite amusing, the overall quests are fun enough, and the "jobs" (think "classes") aspect is pretty cool.  But in the end these points can't counteract the tedium of "walk five feet, kill some monsters" for me. 3/5

[bredon7777]

Mario and Luigi- Partners in Time

An excellent RPG - Mario and Luigi get mixed up with Boswer who tries to kidnap the princess (for the umpteenth time).  What you think would be a rehash of earlier games turns into something quite different when Professor E. Gadd and his time machine get involved leading to the eventual team up of Mario and Luigi with their younger selves. Deep storyline, fun combat, innovative use of both screens make this a worthy sequel to "Superstar Saga" for the GBA and a must have for anyone who enjoys RPG's.  Two minor complaints - there should've been a section where you could play as Bowser and the one time you must use the touch screen aspect of the game feels very shoehorned in - keep this game from getting an  a perfect score.  4/5

[Previsionary]

Yuan: FF1-3 were very repetitive, and  that goes for almost every game in the series or games in general, but from what I recall, the only thing that drew me to the original games were the classes and the storyline...though I'm more of a fan of 6-9. Personally, I'd urge you to try Final fantasy tactics (original or gba remake or DS version that should be out next year)...though most of the games have some type of tie to another in the series, but you'd need to be a fan to really get them/understand them.

Bredon: The current Mario rpgs remind me of the snes rpg...how i miss playing it just for nostalgia purposes. :P


New Super Mario Bros.:  I suggest this mostly because it takes an old game from the 80s, revamps it with new graphics and such, and actually adds new stuff to it. However, to me, it's kinda short and sometimes Giant Mario can be a hassle to use. On the plus side, it does add in several minigames and carries over enemies from other mario games...so yeah.

[Captain Pluto]

in ff 3
u need three friends i think to send u mail so that u can unlock cool stuff

[bredon7777]

Trace Memory

A pretty good adventure game which makes excellent use of the touch screen.  The plot veers on incomprehensible at times, and as is the case with most adventure games there's no replay value; but it's one of the very few games that makes decent use of the touch screen and that makes it worth playing on that score alone - 3/5


Resident Evil - DS
A near perfect port of the original playstation game, with some extras puzzles to take advantage  of the DS touch screen.  Limited replayability and the minigame being lame are the only flaws. 4/5.

[Zippo]

Dragon Quest Heroes: Rocket Slime

I finally picked this up a few days ago. It's really quite a unique game.

You play as the hero "Rocket" and adventure around various areas trying to rescue your captured friends. The game is overflowing with puns. If you can appreciate a good pun, you'll love the dialouge in this game.

Where it really shines is in the "tank battles". They're totally different from the rest of the game, and really unique from possibly anything you've played before. It also offers a good diversion in customizing your ammo supply. They're an absoloute blast to play, and make for incredible mulitplayer.

There's also pretty good replay value in the form of "tank master mode" in which you can collect different tanks and battle then against computers in a ranking challenge.

[Uncle Yuan]

Here's a couple more:

Age of Empires III: The Age of Kings: Now, if your a fan of turn-based strategy games here's a great little game.  I've never played AoE, but I am a huge Civilization fan and this game does a great job.  Act as the commander of one of five factions moving through four medieval ages as you try to conquer, well, the map.  There is only two resources (food and gold) but tons of units, some interesting techs and some very crucial stretegic decisions.  As you win games you earn empire points which can be used to unlock maps, units and even campaigns.  You can definetely see where they cut things down to fit the smaller system, but t still retains that crucial "one more turn" factor.  There's also a nice use of the double screen with the playing field on the bottom with mini map, unit/building info or tactical analysis on the top.  It also has the best touch-screen controls I've run across so far.  5/5

Note: AoE is one of the older games available for the system and is very hard to find in stores.  I could not find it at Target, Wal-Mart, Best Buy or K-mart.  I eventually found it at a game reseller, otherwise you have to go online to find it.

Contact This is one wierd little game.  At it's core it is a single character RPG, but there's so much wierd stuff tacked on that it really winds up being quite fresh.  There's different outfits that grant your character classes, a "cooking" section where he can craft HP and stat boosts from food items that get dropped (it he's good enough), a little digi-pet aspect, stickers and decals that do anything from permanent stat boosts to nuke enemies and a pile of other little things.  The basic story involves the professor's quest to regain the fuel cells aliens stole from him, with Terry (the PC) doing all the running around and fighting.  The fighting system is very simple, which I like since I'm not a huge "twitch" player, and most routine conflicts can be run away from.  The down sides are a location based save system (which makes this a tough game to play for just a few mintues) and way, way, way too long spent traveling between mission maps with nothing much to do.  It's also a very challenging and complicated game - I'm getting my money's worth out of the walk through I down loaded!  4/5

[Dweomer Knight]

For those interested in Age of Empires, try Best Buy.  They seem to keep the game regularly in stock.

Final Fantasy VI has been released for the GBA (which can be played on the DS).  The dialogue has been completely redone from the ground up to be more true to the original Japanese, also it includes some content that was left out or watered down form the original release that was considered too graphic/mature/disturbing at the time.  If you didn't like it the first time around none of this is likely to change your opinion but this was one of my fav FF games (I finished all of them except 8 (the only one that bored me) and X2).  I rate it 5/5 but modify that based on your overall perception of the FF franchise

DK

[bredon7777]

Hotel Dusk: Room 215- Excellent Noir adventure game.  Lack of replayabilty is an issuie (though thats the fault of the genre, not necessarily the game).  However, it commits the sin of having the "best" ending only be avaliable if you've solved an obscure puzzle that you only get one chance at. 4/5

Brain Age- Fairly accurate age predictor. Exercises amuse at first, but get very boring, very quickly. 2/5- 3/5 if you like Sudoko (me, I can take it or leave it).

Children of Mana- Its Diablo more or less.  Story isn't even compelling enough to get me through it once, and I have no interest in playin git again to see how the other characters handle.  2.5/5