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I love it how this country talks about how cars should become obsolete and public transport should be the mainstream way of travel. Stuck on top of a hill means that I don't really use too much public transport. I might catch the bus once or twice a week but I've rarely used the train to get anywhere. When I got invited to Nintendo's Post E3 Games Tour in London, I thought that the train would be the best way to get there - quickly and efficiently. Of course, this meant some careful planning on my behalf, looking up times on the Internet and making sure I was ready to leave early morning. Even though I got my part right, and lived up to my side of the bargain, the train I was supposed to be catching from Leeds to London got stuck in a large delay - holding it up for more than an hour. I was there on time but the train wasn't! But this is where a DS comes in handy. You can run around and complain to every train rep in a red uniform that walks past, or you can calmly sit down and play a couple of Mario DS mini games, try and race through Wario Ware, or beat your best scores on Yoshi Touch & Go. I would have hated to be waiting for hours on end without my DS - a perfect demonstration that no matter where you are, no matter what your troubles are, the DS is always there for you! And to think, I was only a couple of hours away from touching a whole range of DS games that aren't going to hit the shelves for a long, long time - I felt very privileged! In the end, thanks to Geoff's careful directions and the frequency of the superb underground trains, I managed to get to the Soho Lounge with two hours left to look around. I could have stayed there all night to be honest, but two hours was more than enough time to get around the DS games I was looking forward to the most.
Despite being almost eighteen years of age, I enjoyed Kirby: Canvas Curse more than I enjoyed anything else, or at least as much as I enjoyed Mario Kart! Other games came extremely close to Kirby, but I feel that Canvas Curse is the DS game that stood out of the crowd for me. You see, I like innovation - which is probably why Nintendo are always a personal favourite of mine when it comes to doing things new. They always know how to introduce new concepts and always go the right way about it. Canvas Curse reminded me of Yoshi Touch & Go, but even from the demo I got to play, I could sense that this game would be a lot longer and possibly even more enjoyable to play than the little green fellow's first outing. This game is totally touch screen independent and will have you frantically drawing and tapping on your DS screen every second of every minute you spend on this marvel. The demo didn't make the story very clear but I do know that, due to some type of 'canvas curse,' Kirby can't use his legs. Throughout his entire adventure, Kirby assumes the form of a ball!
If I'm honest, this game is just what I'd expect a full touch-screen support 2D Sonic to be like. In fact, the game reminded me of Sonic in many ways; it's fast paced, balloons are used to checkpoint Kirby's process and springs, chutes and other Sonic inspired objects are here to aid or annoy our little pink friend. So while the environments may look a little Sonic encouraged, the controls can only be described as superb - and it's definitely the element that gives Kirby a leg up above the rest! With Kirby being a ball, he bounces like one and sometimes even defies gravity like one. Try tapping Kirby and you'll make him spin around, which makes him accelerate in the direction he is going. Spinning Kirby can also take enemies down, which gives it another Sonic feel, because a spinning Sonic could usually cut through enemies in a similar ways. With your ink, you can draw lines for Kirby to roll on, bounce off and, where necessary, protect our pinkie from danger. One neat thing I managed to pull off with my time on Canvas Curse was grabbing a power up. I'm told that there will be many pick ups and power ups in the final game - in this particular match I experienced the electric power. Power ups are executed by tapping Kirby himself. With this power intact, Kirby spins around as normal but unleashes a wave of lightening that rotates 360 degrees each time. If you manage to get hit, Kirby loses his precious powers. To prevent a hit, it's always a good idea to stun your enemies. By tapping on an enemy with the stylus you can stun them for a good few seconds. These few seconds can be crucial to get near the target and take it out! I was also able to make Kirby climb near vertical walls that I drew, by constantly tapping on him. His spin eventually got him to the top! The top screen acts as a level map and is useful for finding out where to go. It displays all the crucial information you need, including the ink bar. By drawing, you are using up ink - so the meter depletes. The meter fills up in a matter of seconds if nothing is drawn though but I can see that harder levels will probably have ink restrictions, so you'll have to use it sparingly and wait for the meter to fill up before proceeding. It looks like Canvas Curse incorporates plenty of scope and strategy, so every player will have their unique way of playing. From the time I got to play with our Pink Crusader, I would say that this game is definitely worth looking out for!
This game Pac n'rules! I must admit that I was pushed for time when Pac N'Roll came around but from what I played, I really want this! It's like Super Monkey Ball and, like Kirby, it's the controls that make this game great. The top screen sees your Pac Man rolling about stages to rival those monkey ones seen on the Gamecube. The 3D graphics are amazing but you can tell that it's more gameplay over graphics right from the start. To make Pac Man roll you have to use the touch screen. Have you played that Snowball mini-game on Mario DS? You have to roll the ball with your stylus to make the snowball bigger. Well, a similar concept is used here. By stroking your DS's screen with the stylus, you can move Pac man in that direction. Obviously it's a lot harder than it sounds, as you have momentum to take into account, which makes taking corners a challenge and forces the player to go slow at some points in the game - like when you're traversing a thin bridge! Some other elements are in play here and I managed to discover two. If you want your Pac Man to stop quickly, touch and hold the stylus in the middle on the Pac Man on the touch screen. This feature is particularly good for, well, stopping quickly! Another great feature is the boost; if you stroke Pac man from top to bottom in one direction, he sets off quickly in that direction. I imagine this'd be perfect for taking a tensely narrow bridge with speed so you don't have time to mess up and fall off! The game looked and played smoothly - take it from me, this will be a must have come release!
Viewtiful Joe DS was one of the most Viewtiful games I saw, both visually and concept wise. Viewtiful Joe is graphically amazing, the top screen showing Joe right close up, looking as good as ever, where as the bottom screen is where all the action takes place, zoomed out just enough to see what you have to do in all its graphical cel-shaded glory. Like the console counterparts, Joe kicks, punches, dodges, and goes crazy when those enemies come out for a good beating. Punching enemies on your DS has never felt better either, with the close up camera on the top screen showing you all the action, you could be happy with what's on offer here purely for the side scrolling beat 'em up action. But then there's touch screen support. I got to play about with one of Viewtiful Joe's special abilities. I've seen the top of the mountain and the view from there is viewtiful! The ability I spent my time on was one that allowed you to spilt the touch screen's view in two halves - a top half and a bottom half. While this might sound confusing, in practice it couldn't be simpler. You use your finger to touch half of the touch screen and then drag it in the direction you want it to go in, leaving the other half you didn't drag intact. But why would you want to do this? Well, if a fire is blocking your path and there's a leaking pipe above then you could drag the half with the pipe to drip all over the fire, to eventually put it out. I thought this was quite clever but there were more than just fires to put out. I could move away the roof of a building and then jump inside it, pick up some coins and jump back out. Another level saw me using a giant overhead magnet to move bits of scrap metal - all these challenges required some degree of thinking and I was so glad that an action packed game like Viewtiful Joe still has time to stop and give you a little to puzzle over. You're going to love this one!
Electroplankton was a game I looked forward to immensely, but I never got a real feel for it on the show floor. The main problem was hearing the rich sound behind a lively atmosphere and pounding music. I was determined to get some response out of these fish though, so I persevered for a little while longer! I was able to select all these different fish from a menu and I could then read about each fish's unique capabilities. Some fish respond to noise from the microphone, others follow a path you have draw for the fish, creating sharp notes, or long notes depending on how you drew the line. For example, a more jagged line might result in a harsher response from the fish, whereas a long line would let you listen to a longer, more relaxed note. I enjoyed the sounds the fishes made - and I'm definitely going for this title when it comes out, just for the sheer weirdness this game presents. Although I couldn't work out the objective of the game and found it difficult to hear under the circumstances, it left me intrigued. And that can only be a good thing. It looks like I've saved the best till last. Mario Kart DS is amazing. For a start, this game promises to be online. So what I got to play at the show was only the beginning - I can only imagine how good online play will be, matching up with other people in your skill pool and racing to your heart's content. I'm so excited about this and you should be too! Mario Kart DS plays just like any other Mario Kart game. We know the score by now. Race against other Mario characters in a little kart, taking corners in your stride. I can't say much has changed since the last Mario Kart game but that's not a bad thing at all; Mario Kart will always be highly playable in my book, regardless of old concepts or new concepts seen in Mario Kart: Double Dash!! - and I like to think that Mario Kart DS is a crossbreed of Double Dash and Mario Kart 64. Power slides were assessable in this game; they felt like the proper power slides from Double Dash - something that I loved from the Gamecube version. The other half is borrowed from Mario Kart 64 and that's traditional Karts and very similar looking graphics. Of course, the DS has its own two cents to throw in. The bottom screen acts as a map and a way to adjust the camera. Out of all the games that need a map, a carting game like this really does have a use for one. You can see all the characters' heads whizzing around the map and you can quickly see your position and how close or far away you are from the next opponent with just a quick glance. The graphics in the varied locations are gorgeous too - colourful, detailed and smooth, perfectly capturing the Mario Kart vibe. Mario Kart DS controls like a dream. While many people may have feared that the d-pad wouldn't be enough to take Mario around the corner safely, I know for a fact that the controls are tweaked fantastically to give you a fluid feel. Power slides make manoeuvring around a real joy, too. I never had any problems with the controls in general either - from the moment you pick it up you seem to know the controls without having to look, it's almost second nature. One of the shoulder buttons controls the power slides, weapons are easy to fire and accelerating is as easy as pressing a button. That is, unless your name is Geoff Holland and you press reverse instead of accelerate right from the word go. Everybody shoots forward and Geoff zooms backwards. Pure comedy there from Geoff! [I thought you promised you wouldn't mention that! Shamed Ed]. Wi-fi matches seemed really easy to set up and people were able to get a mass game going in a matter of minutes. With or without friends, Mario Kart DS is going to be THE game for the DS. If you only look forward to one game, make sure it's this one! And on that note, it's over to Dave for the DS games he covered and that extra special something smuggled in by the kind people at Nintendo! Thanks Dex - and special it is, but more on that later! I did try and get round as many of the Nintendo DS exhibits as possible, but while I had no problems testing the graphics and gameplay, unfortunately I couldn't really comment on the sound, as the music being blasted around the bar made it impossible to hear anything! However, here are my impressions of the ones I had a good look at. My first to try was Kirby: Canvas Curse. It plays a lot like Yoshi Touch and Go, in that you have to draw lines for Kirby to traverse around and can double-tap him with the stylus to get him to perform certain actions. Where it differs from Yoshi is that you can guide him around a large playing area, rather than being restricted to a continual right to left scroll. It's tricky to pick up initially but I got used to it and was soon guiding Kirby around ledges and over or through enemies, picking up goodies as I went. Graphically it's pretty nice, the lines you draw are rainbow coloured and clearly visible, while the characters are well-defined and cute. Next up was Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory. Most of you will be very familiar with the gameplay and this tried and tested approach meant only a few differences for the Nintendo DS. Your vision and some inventory items are controlled via the touch screen as you pad silently about the place, which makes it easy to switch quickly from normal vision to infrared or heat sensitive. I'm hoping the graphics on this one will be tuned up a bit before release, as it wasn't the best definition I've seen and also the movement appeared a little jerky. However, it did seem a good example of what the DS is capable of, considering its performance limitations as a handheld. Looking for a third person shooter, I came across Goldeneye: Rogue Agent. While this has received only passable reviews for the home console release, I was quite impressed with what I saw. The stylus controls where you can look and the D-Pad allows you to move forward or backwards in the direction you are looking and to strafe left and right. Also, it provides a nice interface for your weapons too; a quick tap on the bottom of the screen allows you to change the weapons you're holding and, like Halo 2, Rogue Agent offers dual wielding. Graphically it does better than Splinter Cell, being smooth and of a higher definition. The opposition was easy to spot and well defined, while the industrial backdrop within which I played was in keeping with Bond movies. I was most intrigued by Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, which bizarrely places you in the role of a prosecutor in a law court! The upper screen tells the story, introduces you to characters such as the judge, the defendant and the witnesses in each case, while the touch screen below offers you the chance to bring up the folder containing details of the case and then cross-examine anyone who comes to the stand through multiple choice questions. There is plenty of quite amusing banter between you (the rookie attorney) and pretty much everyone else in the courtroom. The characters and scenes are depicted in a Manga format, with that definitive Japanese cartoon style; much enjoyment is to be had from the reactions and expressions of each person throughout. I was pleased to see Advance Wars: Dual Strike making an appearance, as I love the SP releases, so I spent a good half an hour playing one level of this strategy game. The touch screen contains the top down looking map upon which you move your troops, tanks, artillery and so on. The screen above depicts a fair amount of information, such as troop status, terrain information and so on. The only other noticeable difference between the SP versions and the DS one is that upon engaging the enemy, you're treated to a nice zoom in of the guys under fire, in a lovely 3D effect. Also, during battle the characters facing each other express their feelings facially and verbally, as their forces are either wiped out or defeat the opposition. Unfortunately I couldn't really see any other enhancements and wondered if I'd missed something. I'm hoping it'll be fleshed out even further when it's finally released on the DS, to make fuller use of its capabilities. One of the highlights of the DS games was a crazily cute artificial intelligence number called nintendogs. The idea is that you visit a pet shop and choose from one of three puppies on display. You can take the one you choose home and it's up to you to feed him, groom him, play with him and generally look after him the way you would any normal dog. It's a very simple concept but done with such style; an incredible amount of work has been put into making the dogs amazingly lifelike. While at this stage we could only play with them and not purchase one, it was immediately apparent this was artificial intelligence that pushed the specs of the DS to its limits. The dog I chose was a golden retriever and I was soon having a lot of fun with him. There are a variety of ways to interact but I found the pull rope and skipping rope the most effective. The pull rope can be guided through the air via the stylus and you can make your puppy leap for it, bite on to it and pull back. The other puppies wander over, tails wagging, to see what all the fuss is about. The jump rope you can spin by rotating your stylus on the screen while a puppy holds the other end and your dog tries to comically leap over it. He doesn't always succeed, which leads to more hilarity. What really got me was the 3D rendering of the dogs; they are very lifelike indeed and often look like actual film footage of animals, rather than graphics created to react to you. Their 'dogginess' has been perfectly captured, from their bright little eyes and noses to their playful skips and pattering about, right down to the way their tails thrash when they are excited. However, just playing with him isn't going to keep the dog you buy happy. You have to give him around the clock attention, feeding and grooming him regularly, tending to him if he gets sick and also training him in a variety of ways. The game runs in real time, as it reads the internal clock on the DS and knows exactly how long you've been away. It places the dog's condition as if it had been left alone for that exact amount of time. People who owned Tamagotchis will know exactly what I'm on about, although this title promises to be far more elaborate than those toys. I will definitely be getting my hands on this game and when I have a full version in my hands I'll be sure to let you know if it lives up to my now high expectations! My favourite DS game from the entire show was by far the weirdest but with a subject that fitted the use of the DS stylus perfectly. Called Trauma Centre: Under the Knife, it tells the story of an up and coming surgeon who wants to save lives, become a master with the scalpel and earn the respect of his peers and that cute little nurse that just turned up. While this story is told in text and via a similar animation approach to that used in Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, the gameplay differs wildly. You actually have to operate on patients, using the stylus to control scalpels, needles, antibiotic wipes, bandages, ultrasound scanners and more! The area being operated on is displayed on the touch screen, while the person in the operating theatre helping you out is on the screen above, leaning over the patient and providing you with advice or encouragement. There's a strict time limit representing the stability of the patient, although I didn't really notice this until the third level when I had to do a complete and rather nasty operation unaided. It was only then I felt the pressure of getting an op done quickly, as I swabbed the patient with antibiotic gel, made an incision, opened him up to find his spleen, used ultrasound to locate the tumours, drained them of fluid, cut them out, stitched the holes, bandaged him up and saved his life! I felt like a real hero when I was done but soon realised I was always going to be seen as a rookie doctor unless I remembered to use antibiotic gel on the stitched wound before I bandaged it. This game is a perfect example of the way you can manipulate things with the stylus and gives that feeling of working with a real object. I had a similar sensation moving the animals around in Zookeeper, of actually changing something in a real physical space, but what better way to express this than through surgery on a human body?! This spatial manipulation is helped along by some great graphics; the bits you operate on are three dimensional, well shaded and just the right hue of internal organ. Any action you make with your stylus has an immediate effect on the screen, particularly the incisions you make with the scalpel and the stitching of the operated area later. It may sound a bit gruesome but the bloodier side of it has been toned down, while the feeling of pressure and need for skill with surgical implements heightened, making the gameplay utterly compelling. I am absolutely desperate to see this game released, because after just three levels on the demo version I was absolutely gagging for more! Not only is this an original concept, it has found the perfect device to bring it to life and it should turn out to be an instant classic.
Despite all these outstanding new DS games to look at, the highlight of the show for me turned out to be the Game Boy Micro. When they say Micro, they're not kidding; it's actually slightly smaller than my mobile and much better looking to boot! It was the first time I had seen it and when it was waved in front of my face, I was astonished. How could they have crammed all the features of the Game Boy Advance SP into such a neat little lightweight silver rectangle?
The first thing I noticed was that the screen was about a third smaller than the SP, but this does not detract from the device at all. In fact, the resolution is so sharp even the smallest writing, such as on Zelda: The Minnish Cap, is perfectly legible. It even seemed sharper than the SP and this plus the reduction in size gives the impression of a device with a much better resolution than the SP, even though it has exactly the same number of pixels onscreen. Part of this difference in definition seems to be because the device is genuinely backlit, so the light is projected through the pixels and straight onto your eyeball, as opposed to the SP, which is refracted light from the front-lit design. Another improvement on the SP is that the light output can be controlled via a contrast switch on the side, allowing you to raise or reduce it depending on the general light conditions at the time. This in turn also gives you the opportunity to conserve the battery, although I was told the battery life is about the same as the SP anyway; a good eight hours playing fully lit.
As the Micro is not a foldout like the SP, I was concerned that the screen, placed squarely in the middle with the D-pad and buttons to either side, would get scratched. When I mentioned this issue I was shown an additional feature that raised my eyebrows; the front of the Micro is a façade and can be taken off and replaced at any time. Not only does this mean you can replace the clear plastic through which the game shines but you can also choose from a wide variety of different designs for the replacement! Even if the screen doesn't get scratched, you can choose a new look for your Micro in exactly the same way as you can for your mobile phone. The plans are to have several available at launch with plenty to offer shortly after and, if plans go ahead, it may even be possible for Micro fans to design their own!
That you can tweak the look of an already cool machine is great but I would be quite happy to leave any Micro I purchase (and I will buy one!) as is; it is gorgeously sleek and contoured to fit the hand, the silver industrial look is beautiful, the start and select buttons glow a lovely blue when fully charged and sharp red when the battery is running out, the silver shoulder buttons are slim line and discreet, the dedicated hole for headphones (another improvement on the SP) is hidden underneath and to top it all off, it is incredibly light. When the game cartridge is removed you can see the reduced weight is because the electronics have been compacted so greatly that they fit into a space not much bigger than a mobile phone battery. The one sacrifice this causes is that the Micro cannot be connected to the Gamecube, although this isn't a big problem, as the whole point of the Micro is to be tiny and lightweight to carry around.
The
Game Boy Micro is designed not to replace the SP, but to offer an alternative
for people who hadn't considered gaming before and to tempt them into
purchasing something they can slip into their pocket and pull out and
play at any time of the day. The stylish and sleek design is also to
attract those non-gamers with an eye for such things but without putting
off those gamers who want to purchase something elegant and simple they
can take anywhere at any time. Ultimately the goal when designing this
was to expand their existing range, encourage more people to play games
and discover the joys of Nintendo. A release date before Christmas this
year is hoped for and while there are no firm pricing details yet, we're
promised that it will be competitive. I for one will definitely be laying
my hands on one as soon as they are available and will give you the
full details, once I've finished caressing this object of beauty! |
