Blogcritics Category: Gaming: Nintendo

Nintendo Announces Wii Price and Date

Matt Paprocki — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 04:29:36 EDT

It's official. The constant rumors, debates, and general arguing can be put to rest. Nintendo has announced their next home console, the Wii, will find its way into North American and South American homes on November 19. Its retail price will be $250.

This information comes from the company's Japanese press event, which has received significant attention over the past week. This puts the company in an interesting position, going directly against rival Sony Computer Entertainment and their Playstation 3 console. The lower price point of the Wii undercuts Sony by $350 when compared to the Playstation 3's $600 model.

Nintendo states that 25 games will be ready at launch. The price of the console includes Wii Sports, a compilation of easy-to-grasp sports games. The company debuted tennis as this years E3. "Virtual Console" titles, which are downloadable games from Nintendo's history (from the NES to the N64), will range from $5 to $10.

Nintendo's goal is to draw in a non-gaming audience with the Wii, and with the lowest price point of the three new consoles, the company puts themselves in position to do so. The success of the Nintendo DS, the company's touch screen-based portable, shows there's an audience.

Nintendo has also promised 4 million units to be in worldwide stores by the end of a year, likely the benefit from less expensive and familiar hardware. While Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Sony's Playstation 3 battle on the high end of graphic and sound chips, Nintendo's unique, downplayed approach makes them stand out for the opposite reasons.

Matt Paprocki is the reviews editor for Digital Press, a classic video game website which he called home after his fanzine (Gaming Source) published its final issue. The deep game collection which spans nearly 30 systems and 2,000 games line his walls for reasearch purposes. Really.

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Nintendo DS Review: Star Fox Command

Ken Edwards — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 13:01:10 EDT

Star Fox Command brings the series back to its roots in stunning 3D on Nintendo's dual-screen. It is fitting too, as Star Fox was such a break from the normal 2D fair everyone was used to when it shipped in 1993 on the Super NES.

There is no denying that Star Fox and Star Fox 64 are the most loved games of the series. Developer Q-Games did right by drawing from these games, as well as adding unique mechanics only possible with the DS and its stylus.

Star Fox Command starts off where Assault left off, albeit with no on-foot missions (thankfully). The Star Fox team is disbanded, as the threat of Dr. Andross is no more.

But this would not be a video game without something sinister, this time in the form of fish-like "Anglar" aliens. This of course means the Star Fox team must be assembled once again to fight ... or not.

An odd choice, and a blatant attempt to lengthen the story mode many times over, (nine, to be exact) a number of dialog choices will be locked during your first play through of the game.

That is right, this game has nine different endings. During your first go, which should only take a few hours, you won't be meeting up with all of your team members.

This also means that you won't be fighting all the enemies, or revealing the entire story in one continuous fashion. The anticlimactic "ending" has a slim sugar coating -- the story gets better each time you play it.

I have mixed feelings about this presentation, because on the one hand I would have rather just had one cohesive story with multiple arcs in it.

On the other, however, the game play has that fun nostalgic feel to it, and it works quite well in this portable format.

Dialog scenes between characters are sans voice acting, similar to the original. Everyone talks in gibberish. There is an option to record your voice, using the built-in mic.

You are asked questions such as "What is your favorite color?" and " How old are you." These recordings are then inserted into the game as your player character speaks. It is sort of hard to understand, but it does allow for a bit of personalization.

You don't just jump from dialog scene to combat; the single-player game is not just fought from the cockpit, but from the command deck as well.

Each mission is preceded by a "you sunk my battleship" game. You (and your allies) have a finite number of moves to dispel or engage enemy targets before they sink your battleship, err, flagship -- the Great Fox.

If you run out of turns, or the Great Fix gets hit, it's game over. There is also a time limit, but you should not max this out.

This added turn-based strategy adds a lot to the difficulty the game, as the action combat can be a bit on the easy side. Of course the combat is all dependent on how you play the turn-based strategy sequences. So plot your path on the overhead map, and you could avoid some enemies all together.

Using the stylus, you move Fox and your teammates around the map. Each have their own fuel gage, so you can only fly so far. Once captured, you can also launch missiles from the Great Fox, thus avoiding ship-to-ship battles.

Another use for the stylus is to remove fog from the map, which reveals enemies or items such as missiles or fuel cells.

Using the stylus to literally draw your flight pans works great. This strategic element also adds quite a bit of depth to your plans of see ship, destroy ship.

Once you engage the enemy, game play movies from the 2D map to the 3D action and heart of the Star Fox franchise.

The DS continues to amaze when it comes to what we expect out of 3D visuals on the handheld. Star Fox Command is no exception to this, with highly detailed environments and aircraft. Each team member's ship is different, and the modeling for them is wonderful.

This is easily one of the best looking 3D titles on the DS to date.

As in Metroid Prime Hunters, aiming is done entirely with the touch screen. This will feel natural for veterans of Hunters, but take some getting used to for others. You will get the hang of it, and find that the controls are very responsive.

Along with aiming, the touch screen has many other functions. For starters, it shows a mini-map of the area. There are buttons to perform a U-turn or a loop, as well as a button to drag-and-drop bombs with.

You can also speed up or slow down by double tapping the top, or bottom of the screen. Finally, performing the all-important barrel roll is done by scribbling back-and-forth on the touch screen.

This leaves every single face and shoulder button, and D-pad, to use for firing your ship's laser. Hold a button down long enough and you can fire a homing missile towards a locked-on target (some ships do not have lock-on features, but have other attributes).

As complicated as this might sound, it does not cramp your hands like the control setup in Metroid Prime Hunters. The stylus controls work quite well, making it easy to maneuver your ship in the thick of an intense firefight.

Beyond the previously stated episodic-like nine story endings, Command supports a few multiplayer modes.

The game supports up to six-player local wireless play with only one cartridge. There are also four-player Wi-Fi battles, easily the best part of the game.

Battle Royale allows for ranked play for four, and Free Battle gives options to play against friends or random people in matches with two to four players.

In both cases, you battle in different arenas with various power-ups. Gone are the strategy segments from the single-player game, which makes for fast paced action (when in the game).

Connecting to opponents is not the fasted process in the world, but it is better than other Nintendo Wi-Fi games.

The object of multiplayer is to collect the star "cores" left behind by destroyed opponents. You cannot simply kill someone, but must also pick up this star icon. This leaves room for some great strategy, as someone else can swoop in and take your kill.

At the end of the match, the person with the most stars wins. It is simple in design, and execution, but the end result is fulfilling.

With all this aerial mayhem, you might think the frame rate would take a dive. For the most part, the game keeps up at a steady clip. There is noticeable choppiness when you get a lot of ships, lasers, and buildings on screen at once, but its not enough to ruin your Top Gun fantasy.

With clean menus, a sharp presentation, and clear, colorful 3D visuals, Star Fox Command continues a strong legacy on the DS. But don't think you need to have played Star Fox to get enjoyment out of this portable jet fighter.

Star Fox Command is rated E10+ (Everyone 10 and older) by the ESRB.

Ken Edwards is the Gaming Editor at Blogcritics. Usually going by the title "Professional Student," he both works and goes to school part time at BGSU. Ken works for Student Publications as the Webmaster and System Administrator.

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Nintendo DS Review: Madden NFL 07

Matt Paprocki — Sat, 9 Sep 2006 16:24:37 EDT

It's a noticeable improvement this year for DS owning Madden fans. Switching the game play from the top screen to the bottom has created numerous changes, many for the better. New, intuitive uses of the touch screen separate this from all of the other versions of this title available, though the core game play remains overly dated.

Full franchise play is of course the heart of the game given that it does not support Nintendo Wi-Fi. There are no differences or surprises here. Multiple seasons roll by as you try and build your team. It's a basic presentation, with no off-the-field concerns aside from free agents, trades, the draft, and preparing for the next game.

On the field, hot routes play a significant role. Unlike the convoluted set ups of other versions, the DS allows the player to literally draw a new line for their wide out to follow. The ease of use means the changes can be frequent and be formed to the defensive set up with little worry as to the play clock.

The same goes for the defensive side, changing players assignments from blitzes to zones or over to man coverage. This fluid means of change has been implemented with care, and the lack of time before the snap is only a minor concern here as well.

Sadly, the new kicking meter doesn't work as successfully. This bizarre feature has the player tapping the screen in two spots. The farther away the markers are, the more power on the kick. Going diagonally from one corner to the other means you have maximum power every time.

For accuracy, you need to draw a line as straight as possible between these points. Obviously, this is hit or miss, and accuracy feels random because of it. Stranger yet, it feels nothing like actually kicking a ball and it's hard to see where the concept even came from.

Aside from those changes, everything else remains the same. The graphics seem slightly downgraded (aside from day/night lighting), and cause issues when receivers head downfield. Defenders can be hard to spot when they blend in with the line markers on the field.

Playing this one feels like a throwback as much as the graphics look like one. It's a loose, fast, and slightly hard to control game of football. Issues that weren't noticeable in the Nintendo 64 and Playstation versions become painfully obvious here.

Defense is especially difficult on the DS. The opposite side of the ball has some exploits to use, like a slower turning speed for defensive players, and a ridiculously fast jump that makes interceptions nearly impossible to time properly.

Halfbacks have the advantage with overly strong jukes and stiff arms. These are problems the series has brought with it since the first edition on the DS, and little effort has been done to correct them.

As a potential sign to come, some of the mini-games have implemented touch screen mechanics. A target-hitting passing game has the player flicking the stylus to toss the ball, and it could potentially become a component in a future update if refined.

The game definitely needs something new to move away from its somewhat sloppy game play that doesn't fall into the "classic" category, and new features using the touch screen are the right step.

Madden NFL 07 is rated E (Everyone) by the ESRB. This game can also be found on: GBA, GameCube, PC, PS2, PSP, Xbox, and Xbox 360.

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Atlus Announces Etrian Odyssey for U.S. Release

Aaron Auzins — Sat, 2 Sep 2006 02:29:33 EDT

Atlus recently announced it will be making its way onto the Nintendo DS next year with the North American release of Etrian Odyssey.

Known as Sekaiju no Meikyuu in Japan, the game carries a heavy-hitting list of talent including Kazuya Niinou (Trauma Center: Under the Knife) as director, Shigeo Komori (Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner) on story design, Shin Nagasawa (Final Fantasy IX) creating the game’s monsters, and Yuzo Koshiro (Actraiser, Streets of Rage) designing the sound.

The game takes place in a small town named Etria, where a crack in the forest opens way to the labyrinth of Etria. While the labyrinth is perilous, riches, fame, and more await adventurers. With the forest aspect to the story, Atlus is promising warm and bright environments including forests, jungles, and groves rendered in a three-dimensional engine and displayed in first-person on the top screen.

Players will be able to venture out into the labyrinth in parties of up to five characters, choosing from a personal guild that can host up to 20 characters. By defeating enemies in turn-based strategic combat (which Atlus describes as being very similar to the Shin Megami Tensei series), more than 20 battle skills can be learned and utilized by your party. The characters' skills will depend upon which of the nine available classes are given to them.

Landsknechts are masters of melee combat, survivalists are rangers with knowledge of forest lore, protectors utilize shields to protect the party, dark hunters strike with whips, medics heal with skills and techniques, alchemists control paranormal phenomena, troubadours assist the party through song and dance, warlocks use forbidden magic, and bushido are masters in bladesmanship.

Etrian Odyssey makes full use of the touch screen, leaving the player to plot their own progress through the labyrinth. Not only can players map out their progress, but also make special notes of treasure, doors, pits, stairs, or any other special event.

The town of Etria itself is ripe with information and supplies for adventurers. Citizens at the pub will give players quests to complete and an item shop will sell items already found in the forest. Even more items can become available by combining items found in the forest.

Currently, the game is scheduled to release in the first quarter of 2007 with a retail price of $29.99. No Nintendo Wi-Fi or local wireless options are slated for the release.

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Nintendo DS Review: Break 'Em All

Jason "Njiska" Westhaver — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 22:52:19 EDT

Way back in 1976, Atari founder Nolan Bushell created a game called Breakout where players would use a paddle, a la pong, to bounce a ball and break several lines of multi coloured bricks. Though the game was simple in design, it was incredible addictive and shortly after its release many clones appeared on the market trying to capitalize on it's success.

Now, more then 30 years later, D3 Publisher of America has desided to bring back classic ball-breaking game play with Break 'Em All.

Keeping in line with other popular Breakout clones such as Tatio's Arkanoid, Break 'Em All features a number of useful power-ups to help the player accomplish his goal, however unlike many clones these power-ups are earned by breaking bricks and rallying, not by catching falling items.

In addition, players get to choose which power-ups are available from a series of options such as:

Slow, or fast with a point boost
Wide paddle, or or small paddle with a point boost
Catch the ball, or mirror bounce

Having the option to choose power-ups allows players to craft the game experience around your own abilities, which makes the play experience more comfortable for novice players, while at the same time giving hardcore players the ability to knock up the difficulty.

Break 'Em All expands on the original Breakout style of gameplay by offering players several drastically different modes of play.

The first is "Tokoton Mode", which itself comes in two distinct flavours, Stanadard and Random. In standard mode player's simple bounce their way through 50 preset levels by breaking ever block on the screen, but in Random mode the level are generated on the fly offering players over 3,000,000 different combinations. It's simple classic arcade game play and it's just fun.

Next there's Quest Mode, which requires players to bounce the ball into an exit rather than destroying all bricks on the screen. Each mission in consists of three regular levels followed by a boss battle where players are required to hit a specific target a number of times in order to defeat their enemy.

Quest mode also features a multiplayer variation where players compete head to head in a race to the finish. While simple, it's actually quite fun and allows less skilled players a chance to try out the more difficult missions.

Finally there's Survival mode, which can easily be called the games weakest point. Instead of following the Breakout mould, survival mode instead makes the player a brick and fires hundreds of balls in their general direction.

As players survive, they'll eventually gain greater defenses to protect their brick. However often they do more to hinder than help. Simply put, Survival mode just plain sucks in every way possible. Even the multiplayer is crap.

Touch control in Break 'Em All is tight and players can easily activate power-ups simply by tapping the on screen button. Using buttons to play is equally smooth, however it's not as easy because where touch screen which allows your paddle to immediately jump into position you need, button control makes you scroll over.

Curiously, one of the game's only major flaws is the catch power-up, which doesn't have an on screen release. Thus players using touch control are forced to use the one of the face buttons -- this can be quite the distraction. While at first it may just seem like a minor annoyance, it becomes quite frustrating when you realize the power-up doesn't end until you lose a life.

All in all, Break 'Em All is a fine addition to the legion of Breakout clones already on the market. And while it's impossible to stress just how badly Survival Mode sucks, at the end of the day it's still a good game.

Break 'Em All is rated E (Everyone) by the ESRB.

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GameCube Review: Viewtiful Joe - Red Hot Rumble

Matt Paprocki — Thu, 24 Aug 2006 04:09:16 EDT

Being the second attempt from Capcom to branch a key franchise into a melee fighter (the first being Onimusha Blade Warriors), Viewtiful Joe should stay in the platforming realm. Red Hot Rumble is a mess of scattered concepts, ideas, and failed execution. It's completely unplayable with four players, the games key draw, and one-on-one battles are incomprehensible.

It's hard to imagine another game this hectic. Things randomly happen, collectible items appear from nowhere, collision detection is spotty, the controls (especially when it comes to double jumping) are touchy, and the fighting engine is an afterthought. Rumble's biggest issue is that it's stuck in an identity crisis war with itself.

For only having two attack buttons, it's amazing that the player feels like they have no control over these characters. It's mostly due to this being an ADD nightmare of fighting games. The basics are no different from Joe's other gaming endeavors, including platform hopping, enemy bopping, and items dropping. The problem is, each round of the fight is something different, and the actual brawling takes a backseat to something else.

At the start of a round, you're told what the goal is. It could be beating up your opponent, taking out a boss by causing more damage than your foe, knocking out enemies that appear, or rapid collecting. Actually hitting and draining the life bar of your adversary is useless aside from a small points bonus at the end of the match.

This only causes problems as you struggle to cope with objects flying everywhere, animated backgrounds obscuring the brawl, and the occasional teleportation to some alternate stage that starts oddball button mashing mini-games. None of this makes sense, and it's impossible to keep track of what's going on.

With four players, you're better off ramming on the X button because you'd likely have more success. The collectibles are beyond the point of being out of hand, and trying to find them or get the jump on your opponent for the win is a hopeless dream.

The single player story mode is fine, and clips from the TV show add to Viewtiful Joe's established and enjoyable storyline. There's definitely too much text to shift through, but it's the only time during the game where you can follow what's happening on screen. Unlockables include most of the roster, extra videos, and puzzles (which adds yet another item to collect and deal with during the fights).

There's a decent game buried here. It's sadly hidden in the mess of ideas that should have been split up into potential (and likely) sequels. With the focus where it should be, Red Hot Rumble may work. As it stands, Capcom has little hope of turning this into a successful spin-off.

Viewtiful Joe Red Hot Rumble is rated T (Teen) by the ESRB for Violence. This game can also be found on: PSP.

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GameCube Review: Super Monkey Ball Adventure

Aaron Auzins — Tue, 15 Aug 2006 00:24:48 EDT

Monkeys. Balls. Oh, the countless jokes I could make about the game’s title - Super Monkey Ball Adventure. Unfortunately for gamers, the real joke is this game’s tedious, fetch-questing adventure aspect.

Super Monkey Ball has always been known for its simple but frantic single player puzzle mode and its addictive and highly competitive multiplayer modes. While both of those elements are still present in Super Monkey Ball Adventure, they are hacked down in number and take a complete backseat to the chore that is the story mode.

In order to flesh out the puzzle mode, developer Traveler’s Tale added a full-fledged overworld environment to the game’s story mode. Things begin innocent enough with the Monkey Ball crew barbecuing bananas on the hottest day of the year. But when a mysterious “mechanical bird” flies overhead and crashes into the local lighthouse, the situation turns ugly when the monkey heroes not only have to investigate the crash but also find out why the joy of Monarch is missing.

With all of the monkeys’ joy gone, everyone on Jungle Island has a sudden dilemma and players will later discover the same has happened throughout the monkey world. For the most part, it ends up that almost all the monkeys are now missing something and it’s up to you to fetch it for them. While the idea seems good on paper, the big 3-D worlds just add an annoyance factor with extremely frustrating and mundane tasks.

The worlds' layouts consist of areas that are either completely flat or inclined and fail to capture the essence of speed or precision that the games before brought to the table. While some areas are easy to access, extremely awkward camera angles, poor collision, and a pretty much useless map will lead to a lot of frustration as players attempt to navigate the remainder of each world.

When a player does reach someone in need, missions sometimes just add up to trial and error and require a lot of exploration. While there are some enjoyable missions such as ones that require stealth and running down monkeys, they are mixed in with a huge number of missions that are nothing more than “collect this” and “find this.”

Players are also not able to take multiple missions and if you should fall off the map and fail the mission, your monkey comes back in a seemingly random location with the mission deactivated. You then have to track down the monkey in need once again and start the mission completely over. After failing a mission multiple times, the repeated process becomes quite annoying.

The frequent disc access will also have players banging their head against the wall. Every world is made of multiple sections, which require loading when going back and forth. Accidentally entering another section during a mission will cancel the mission and players will have to start from scratch no matter how far they are into the task.

On a good note, however, the large worlds will keep curious players rolling around for quite a long time. The landscapes are riddled with bananas that, when enough are collected, will help players accomplish a few more missions and -- more importantly -- purchase extras that will increase the number of features in multiplayer.

Over the course of play in story mode, some neat power-ups become available to the player. Incorporated into the game as chants players learn to string together, the monkeys can customize their ride with power-ups. While some simply transport players to a different location in the world, others deck your ball out with a spring-loaded boxing glove, suction cups, invisibility, growth, and more. Of course, the power-ups are the key to solving much of the later missions in the game.

The puzzle and multiplayer modes still remain in the game with more than 50 new puzzles, which are also encountered periodically throughout story mode to unlock certain doors.

Puzzle mode is basically the original single player modes from the first two Monkey Balls in which players make a mad dash for the exit for maximum points. The multiplayer modes are cut in half with three new additions – cannon, bounce and tag. While it brings new games to the table, the only one I personally found any fun was the addicting Monkey Cannon, which has you shooting down other players’ castles by using your monkey ball as a cannon ball.

Graphically, Super Monkey Ball Adventure loses its flair over the previous titles through the story mode’s generic looking environments. Instead of the bright, zany graphics of the puzzle mode, players are given areas that seem like they were pulled out of Sonic Adventure with frame rates that sometimes aren’t consistent with the action.

All the sound in the game is recycled from previous versions, including the ever-annoying monkey talk. The story mode is filled to the brim with these sound bytes and will drive anyone older than 10 completely insane. Pound for pound, every sound byte in the game is 100 percent from other versions of the game. You get nothing original, but, just as in the previous versions, what you’re given does its job.

The game controls just as well as the previous versions, but the game is chock full of horrid camera angles that will cause many bad situations for your monkey. Although there is some questionable physics with the inclines, your ball will do everything you command it to do.

Overall, Super Monkey Ball Adventure is an excellent idea that falls victim to poor execution. While the game is very playable, the story mode will try many gamers’ patience and the cutback in everything that made the game a success in the first place is lost among the expansive fetch-driven single player mode. Players will most likely spend most of their time in the puzzle and multiplayer modes for a quick fix of monkey action.

Super Monkey Ball Adventure is rated "E" for Everyone by the ESRB. This game can also be found on: PS2 and PSP.

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GBA Review: Drill Dozer

Matt Paprocki — Tue, 8 Aug 2006 09:41:50 EDT

From here on out, every video game should let the player take hold of a drill.

While not all games will use it in the same innovative fashion as Drill Dozer, the pure satisfaction of wiping out walls, enemies, and entertaining boss characters is unmatched by any gun or sword. Drill Dozer's entire gameplay revolves around this simple mechanic, and with finely tuned level design, it's one of the best titles the Game Boy Advance has ever seen.

Creating a superb cast of characters done in a quirky, 2-D lighthearted style, players control a band of thieves after a precious red diamond. Their means of theft is pretty straightforward: drill through anyone or anything in their way with a bi-pedal machine, complete with oversized drill attachment. Walls, platforms, background objects, and other hazards are no match.

The drill serves other purposes aside from cartoon violence too. It can be used to reach higher platforms, push the player backwards at a high speed, or find secret areas hidden in walls. This leads to a plethora of innovative puzzles that are required to advance.

It also creates some irritating and endlessly frustrating sections too. The sign of a great game though is whether or not you continue on regardless of how difficult things become, and Drill Dozer has a great hook to convince you keep playing. By collecting cash during the missions, you'll be able to unlock new levels, extra health bars, a stronger drill, and secrets. This creates an entirely new set of levels when the game is supposedly beaten since most are unavailable until after the credits roll.

Even with its addicting levels, Drill Dozer's greatest asset is pure satisfaction. No matter how many levels you run through, the drilling never becomes repetitious. This is done by making sure the player (while always using the same buttons) is always drilling in different ways. While you may need it to defeat enemies, a few minutes later the drill is used to turn a switch.

The game does take a few turns that feel cheap, like taking away power-ups at the end of each level, and inserting them in obvious places when visiting the next (the drill special bits, up to three levels of power, are required to clear every stage). This is an easy way to keep the player out of areas they're not necessarily ready for, but also feels restrictive.

While an obvious gimmick, Drill Dozer uses a rumble feature. It's not the strongest vibration in a video game, though it can have a gameplay effect. When switching gears to power-up the drill, the three levels of vibration let you know when it's time to switch. While there is also visual confirmation of the timing, you'll quickly learn the vibration does a better job than an on-screen meter.

Couple all of its positive aspects with a classic soundtrack that sounds like it was ripped from one of many early Mega Man games, and Drill Dozer earns what will undoubtedly be cult classic status. This is a dying breed of video game, and the only reason you need to justify keeping your Game Boy Advance. This is a system selling title.

Drill Dozer is rated E (Everyone) by the ESRB for Cartoon Violence.

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Nintendo DS Review: Magnetica

Matt Paprocki — Sat, 5 Aug 2006 01:54:46 EDT

For a game slapped with a "Touch Generations" label (a way for Nintendo to draw in non-video game players with accessible, easy to grasp concepts) Magnetica is hard. While a knock-off of Puzzloop and the more recent Zuma, Magnetica's tighter confines, fast moving pieces, and rapidly increasing levels separate it enough to be its own game. The extra modes and wildly fun multi-player keep you coming back.

With its core concepts, Magnetica adds a few of its own touches. Instead of having one spot from which to shoot balls, you'll have up to three in later levels. With some of the complex layouts, it makes sense, while also forcing players to pay attention to every move they make. Shooting a colored ball to help it join with two others of the same color is only a matter of flicking the stylus on the touch screen in the direction you need it to go.

Clearing levels is done by eliminating a certain amount of balls from the screen, and you'll be helped by various power-ups. Depending on the chosen mode of play, these vary from color-clearing spheres, slot machines, coins (for points), and more. Wireless, single card multi-player adds a staggering amount of ways to dismantle your opponent, including some that bring in other DS features like the microphone.

Progression when playing solo takes place in quest, puzzle, or challenge. The latter is a series of levels you'll need to clear to 99 in order to advance. Quest is similar, only with a different set of objectives and unique mechanics like the above-mentioned slot machine. Puzzle is self explanatory, giving the player a set of balls to clear in a certain number of turns in increasingly difficult stages.

This is a solid variety of play modes, though there's nothing to unlock. You'll gain a screen of developer credits if you fight through either the quest or puzzle modes. The seemingly endless challenges are not worth the effort. This is a title that will keep you busy for some time, regardless of whether or not you're an expert in the games it's copying. The challenge level is definitely set on high, mostly due to its level design and cramped quarters on the bottom DS screen.

Still, Magnetica's bright graphics, addictive, derivative concept, and multi-player (where available) more than make up for the lack of extras. No matter how many times you fail to clear a level, you'll be back. Magnetica brings that unexplainable addictive hook that great puzzle games always have along with it.

Magnetica is rated E (Everyone) by the ESRB.

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Nintendo Boasting Strong DS Lineup For Fall

Aaron Auzins — Tue, 1 Aug 2006 22:11:57 EDT

The Nintendo DS, having passed a sales milestone, is looking to carry its momentum into the fall season with a number of recently released titles. Nintendo recently commented on the success of the system worldwide, moving millions of units in less than two years.

The DS launched on November 21, 2004, and has since sold 21 million units worldwide -- a rate Nintendo equates to nearly one system sold every two seconds. Nintendo of America’s Senior Vice President of Marketing and Corporate Communications George Harrison further added the Nintendo DS was “North America’s top-selling video game system of any type in June.”

With the DS approaching its third year on the market and with the launch of the re-designed Nintendo DS Lite, a number of first-party titles are still on the menu, including a mix of old and new franchises.

Star Fox Command is slated to launch on August 28, according to Nintendo's website, and will support eight-player dogfighting locally with four-player support over Wi-Fi. In this adventure, the touch screen will allow players to draw their own routes for the mission as they take over bases and advance through the stages. As always, the branching storyline of missions is still intact in the franchise.

Mario vs. Donkey Kong 2: March of the Minis has a tenative date of September 25 and looks to take a new spin on the original format. Players will take control of the robotic Mario minis and try to guide them toward an exit -- Lemmings anyone? A custom level creation will allow players to trade and even post on Wi-Fi.

Touch Generations, the developer behind the likes of Brain Age and Nintendogs, will lead the fall lineup with Clubhouse Games to be launched on October 9. The family-friendly cart will feature more than 20 classic board, card, and party games and will feature multiplayer and Wi-Fi connectivity. Checkers, darts, billiards, and card games are among the number of activities included in Clubhouse Games.

Nintendogs will hit the system once again on October 16 with its newest iteration, Nintendogs: Dalmatian. The new version will allow players to select the previously-hidden dalmatian straight from the start and will eventually allow about 20 breeds to be selected after unlocks.

On October 23, Magical Starsign will hit the dual-screened system. Originally titled Magical Vacation, the game will host up to six players in a science-fantasy adventure based on the power of magic. A player will be able to link with five other players to explore dungeons together in RPG format.

October 30 will launch two new spin-offs of existing franchises. The Pokemon universe expands with the release of Pokemon Ranger. In this adventure, Pokemon trainers are substituted with ranchers -- lassos are thrown at wild Pokemon and by encircling them with the touch-screen, they become tamed and aid you in battle.

Also on October 30, the story of Mana will unfold even more in Children of Mana for the DS. The Mana Tree needs help once again in this action-RPG. Children not only features the standard single-player quest but also cooperative or competitive gameplay for up to four players.

The offbeat Japanese release Osu! Tatakae! Ouenden! will finally find a home in the U.S. under the name Elite Beat Agents on November 6. The rhythm game features secret agents who assist people in need through song, whether it be helping a student with homework or guiding a lost dog home.

Following the success of New Super Mario Bros., Yoshi will get his turn in the spotlight once again with Yoshi’s Island 2 on November 13. Based off the crayon, paper format of the SNES title, part two adds Baby Peach and Baby Donkey Kong into the 2-D platforming mix. By switching between the infant characters, new abilities are bestowed upon the player. As of the time this article was written, there was no indication of whether multiplayer will be added or not.

The DS will become a rock ‘em, sock ‘em arena on December 4 with the release of Custom Robo Arena. The portable version of Robo allows players to customize their own robot to do battle in “the sport of tomorrow.” Multiplayer and Wi-Fi connection will allow players to match up their custom creations against a friend or online.

December 4 will also launch another Nintendo mascot, as the puffy, pink hero Kirby will star in Kirby Squeak Squad. Straying from the Canvas Curse format, Kirby returns to the traditional directional pad gameplay in this 2-D platformer. The touch screen acts as Kirby’s stomach in this new adventure, allowing players to drag eaten enemies and items together and mix up all new powers. The game will also feature multiplayer for up to four people locally for the sub-game modes.

Gamers with a Nintendo DS will also be pleased to know Final Fantasy will be hitting the Game Boy Advance yet again on November 6. Through the DS’s backwards compatibility, those with the system will be able to pick up and play Final Fantasy V Advance. Nintendo is promising new job classes, new dungeons and new enhanced features in the portable re-release.

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