DS Reviews - Page 4

A bold bat platformer

Batman is certainly no stranger to the world of video games, seeing releases on just about every console imaginable over the years, so it's no real surprise to see yet another developer trying their hand at the caped crusader. Developer WayForward has created two brand new Batman titles, this as well as its Wii counterpart, based on the hit animated TV series Batman: The Brave..

Fun in little need of fine tuning

Custom Robo won't ring a bell to a lot of Nintendo fans on this side of the world. Though the first title hit Japan in 1999 on the Nintendo 64, it wasn't until 2004's GameCube update, the fourth in the action-RPG series, that the franchise saw a western release. The games revolve around players creating their own...

Absolutely di-vine

After spending years helping Sega create some of its most popular console releases during the Mega Drive and Saturn eras, Yuji Naka decided it was time to form his own development studio. His main goal was to create gaming experiences that appealed to a much broader audience. No better title could sum up this goal more perfectly than his newest creation Ivy the Kiwi?. Not only..

Your only limit is your creativity

To DSi owners, Art Academy will be a familiar sight. Last year we saw Art Academy: First Semester and Second Semester, a set of artistic tools by Nintendo. While First Semester received positive reviews, Second Semester was criticized for being “less of the same”, resembling an overpriced expansion pack rather...

Return to glory for team Star Fox

The Star Fox series is one which holds a special place in the hearts of many gamers. Featuring a colourful cast of anthropomorphic animals led by Fox McCloud across the Lylat system, it all began back in 1993 on the Super Nintendo with the original Star Fox. The game was a huge hit and has since seen four sequels...

Shooting star

Shoot 'em ups are a rare thing on the DS. Even with the rise of DSiWare last year, we have still seen little in the way of more traditional shooters for the console. Early release Nanostray was one of the first games to step up to the challenge and fortunately, it doesn't disappoint. Published back in 2005 by Majesco, the game is a spiritual successor to the Iridion series on the GBA,..

Low on originality, high on fun

Giana Sisters DS began life as a limited personal computer release called The Great Giana Sisters back in 1987. Due to the game's extremely close resemblances to Nintendo's NES release Super Mario Bros., the game was yanked from store shelves soon after its release, making it quite a rare find today. Now DTP...

When classic compilations go wrong

Since retro compilations started to become a decent way for companies to earn money off their old IP, it's become the norm to see classics from some of the bigger names in the industry repackaged in each succeeding generation of consoles since the late 20th century. Unfortunately Atari has mis-stepped with its...

Harry Potter gets the LEGO treatment

Some of the most successful movie series of all time have already received the LEGO treatment, so it's no real surprise to see the immensely popular Harry Potter series given a blocky makeover. While LEGO Harry Potter doesn't stray too far from the trademark gameplay mechanics the series has featured in previous...

Potent point-and-click

The DS, initially thought of as the ideal format for point-and-click adventures and hidden object games, has seen a veritable deluge of such titles. It seems like for every few flops there's a classic awaiting discovery. Runaway: A Twist of Fate doesn't quite fit into the latter category, but it's more than decent enough for any respectable adventurer's collection. This title..

It's slime time!

You'd be hard-pressed to find a video game series more influential to the Japanese RPG genre than Dragon Quest. Although the constantly-evolving Final Fantasy titles have generally remained more popular over the years, the former has stayed a favourite among long-time fans for its uncanny ability to retain the old-school console RPG...

Animazing

Tearing up many RPG conventions that its publisher Square Enix put into place, The World Ends With You is vibrant, energetic and an absolute blast to play. You play Neku Sakuraba, a young Japanese kid who wakes up with no recollection of who he is or how he got there. So far, so standard, right? It would be, except for the fact he wakes up...

A demented good time

Dementium II, the sequel to 2007’s Dementium: The Ward, has many characteristics spawning from a mixture of the Resident Evil-style survivor horror sub-genre and a first-person shooter. You control your character in a first-person perspective through many creepy, unsettling locales, but it’s not your ordinary shooter: it has many elements that are seen in your typical..

Tactics, but not as we know them

Developer Quicksilver Software is no stranger to the Star Trek licence, having developed the well-regarded Starfleet Command for the PC, which is itself an attempt to deliver a computerised version of the venerable board game Star Fleet Battles. Tactical Assault is essentially a stab at a port of Starfleet Command to the DS, but focusing on the wrong aspects of the..

A fresh update to an old-time classic

Let's get something out of the way right now: Mahjong Quest Expeditions has nothing to do with the game of mahjong (a four-player game more akin to gin rummy or poker): it's a solitaire game which is played using the same tiles and there the similarities end. Nevertheless it can be a fun diversion and the fact that it's appeared in some form on nearly every..

A monster disappointment

Kaiju Busters (or "Monster Busters" as its effective English translation goes) is just one in a long line of monster-based video games that we don’t often get to see in the West. This handheld effort from Bandai Namco inevitably draws comparisons with Capcom’s massively popular Monster Hunter games, and in that respect already has a lot going for it: an RPG..

Not a code breaker

Role playing games are rapidly becoming a staple genre for the Nintendo DS, with more and more quality titles arriving on the handheld. With Final Fantasy games, Dragon Quest releases and even new titles in the form of Nostalgia and Sands of Destruction, there is a lot of competition among a crowded market so Avalon Code needs something special in order to s

The DS boldly goes where no handheld has gone before

Infinite Space begins with a familiar enough RPG scenario: youthful protagonist Yuri (are protagonists in JRPGs ever anything but youthful?), trapped on an oppressive planet and dreaming of life as a space traveller, is whisked from his tedious existence by Nia Lochlain, a kind of female Han Solo...

A real do-it-yourself project!

Back in 2003, the developers at Nintendo introduced a game that was basically nothing more than a huge collection of minigames that lasted only seconds, but were tossed at the player in rapid succession. While the idea initially seemed a bit ridiculous, it turned out to be one of the most addictive game releases and...