Decidedly Sound investment or Dreary Stupid idea?

Yesterday evening in Japan-o-time, Nintendo announced the DSi, the next iteration of the Nintendo DS. With the DS being the console that changed the gaming landscape, paving the way for the family-friendly Wii, and having sold in huge numbers, any change is clearly dangerous.

Nintendo runs the risk of a drop-off in sales with people waiting for the DSi, or people being underwhelmed by the hardware specification, and therefore getting tempted by something more powerful, or more open (like the Pandora).

There’s no word regarding whether the DSi will support non-stupid router security, but here are my thoughts on the announced features, in patented* ‘hurrah’ (good) and ‘hurroo’ (not good) format:

* Not patented.

Bigger screens

The screens are apparently 17 per cent bigger than the ones on the DS Lite, meaning 17 per cent less squinting, but they appear to be the same resolution, retaining compatibility. Although some muppets are reporting both screens are now touchscreens, they aren’t—only the bottom one is, but again this is good from a compatibility standpoint. Hurrah!

No GBA slot

We all knew this was coming, surely? However, this presents a double-whammy, and a triple whammy if you go ‘yarrrr’ a lot. No GBA slot means no GBA games (which means no Rhythm Tengoku), but it also means games that utilise the GBA slot for expansions are scuppered. This also means anyone making use of a 3-in-1 for playing loads of naughty GBA titles on their DS is stuffed. Hurroo.

In fact, no GBA at all

With the GBA slot gone, so is the GBA hardware, bringing to an end the original Game Boy line entirely. This makes us sad. Not as sad as if our puppy died, but about as sad as if our PVR missed off the last three minutes of QI. Hurroo.

SD slot

This sort of replaces the GBA slot. And there are all sorts of exciting things you can do with an SD card, right? (Spoiler: ‘yes’ is the right answer—see below). Hurrah!

Built-in cameras

The big black dot on the front of the DSi isn’t a skin condition (sorry, beauty spot)—it’s a magical camera hole! This would have enabled your DS to take the place of a digital camera, if only Nintendo hadn’t kicked itself in the face with the resolution. Think iPhone’s camera’s bad? Wait until you get a load of the DSi cameras, both of which are 640 by 480 resolution (0.3 megapixel). Yes, that’s not a typo—the DSi’s cameras will be on a par with those from a really rubbish mobile phone.

The photos will be editable using the stylus, presumably dumpable on to the SD card, and high-res would have been somewhat tricky to deal with, but I can’t help but feel a little short-changed here. Hurroo.

DSiWare

This one’s the biggie. The DS is currently the odd console out, lacking downloadable games content, but that’s all about to change. DSiWare will bring to the DSi a range of titles between no money and about seven quid in cost terms.

What these games will be is unclear, but I suspect Game Boy releases are on the cards. However, emulation software for the DS via the naughty internet shows that while the GBA is out of reach, the system can definitely run NES, Spectrum, 8-bit Sega and even Neo-Geo titles without stumbling, and so here’s hoping for some serious variety. Hurrah!

Opera

The browser’s now built in to the firmware (which we just bet also has some nifty way of blocking R4s and similar cards), and so it’s free. That is all! Hurrah! (Apart from the R4 speculation, obv.)

Release date

The Japanese will get their hands on the DSi, priced at about 100 quid, in under a month. November the 1st is the happy-time date. With us being a worldwide economy, that means a simultaneous worldwide release, right? Wrong. Nintendo has set their Mug-o-tron to ‘high’, and will milk the UK for one last Christmas, before unleashing the DSi in Europe next year. “We’re aiming to launch DSi in Europe in Spring 2009,” said Nintendo. Translation: “We’re aiming to get idiots to buy a DS this Christmas, and then a DSi in March. Mwahahahahaha!”

Don’t be an idiot, readers. Make Nintendo suffer for taking the piss out of you. Not so much a ‘hurroo’ as a MAJOR FAIL.

Overall, this announcement rates fairly highly on the game-o-scale. It’s not a Rhythm Tengoku of goodness, but more like a Zoo Keeper where you’re forced to play Quest Mode against your wishes every 40 minutes.

Causing lactic acid build-up since 1983

Konami understands retro gamers. Unlike certain other companies, Konami isn’t content shovelling the same old garbage out to consumers time and time again. Instead—and particularly with handheld games—its retro content appears full of thought and devotion.

This was definitely the case with Arcade Classics for the GBA and last year’s similarly titled DS compilation, but New International Track & Field shows that the same magic still flows through Konami’s veins when it comes to more focussed titles.

As its name might suggest, New International Track & Field is the latest in Konami’s long-running sports series. In practice, it’s essentially 1983’s Track & Field and 1984’s Hyper Sports mashed together, doubled in size, and redecorated, with the ’80s pixelated athletes replaced by a cast of super-deformed Anime-inspired characters.

Gameplay, however, remains firmly retro, with the button-bashing of the original titles replicated by smacking seven shades out of your DS buttons. And for users who grew up with joystick-waggling home conversions, the alternate control method of frantically scrubbing the stylus back and forth evokes fond memories of severe arm-cramping to shave a tenth of a second off of your best 100 metre dash time.

Although some of the events are needlessly fiddly (mostly regarding timing—something not helped by the intermittently inept instructions provided), most are actually a lot of fun. Double-trap shooting is perhaps the best, practically identical to the skeet-shooting event in Hyper Sports and similarly addictive. Springboard, javelin and archery also provide a decent mix of physical endurance and precision timing that ensures this compilation isn’t all about repetitive scrubbing or bashing.

As is seemingly law these days, New International Track & Field begins with most of its content locked, and while most unlockables are trite (such as new character outfits), some achievements unlock new characters that have their own challenges. These are typically based on events elsewhere in the game. Standouts include Evil Rose’s hammer variation, where competitors are thrown from a wrestling ring on to a scoreboard, and Simon Belmont’s skeet-shooting-inspired-vampire-bat-massacre, set in a spooky castle.

A few irksome difficulty spikes, a couple of really awkward events, and the hateful way in which you can enhance your athlete’s performance by yelling into the microphone (quick tip, DS developers: using the mic like this makes gamers hate you) stop New International Track & Field from reaching the dizzy heights enjoyed by retro remake Space Invaders Extreme, but Konami’s game isn’t too far off the pace and wins a well-deserved silver medal.

New International Track & Field is out now, and although it’s not worth the 30 quid RRP, it’s well worth tracking down for a wee bit less.

It pongs. You won’t want to break it out at a party. Etc.

“It may seem familiar, but it’s like nothing you’ve ever seen before!” boasts Taito about Arkanoid DS. However, this isn’t entirely true—I’ve seen plenty of half-baked Breakout games over the years.

The fact remains that Arkanoid was never that good in the first place. Stripped of its shiny graphics, it was just another in a long line of bat-and-ball games, albeit one with a few power-ups and some nice level design. Converted to home systems, it was soon bettered by a slew of contemporaries, including Krakout and Traz, with only the most devout of Arkanoid followers continuing to fly its flag.

Arkanoid DS, however, manages to stamp on even on the rose-tinted glasses of those deluded souls. Vapid layouts combine with graphics that would embarrass a Commodore 64 to make a game that appears more dated than the mid-1980s arcade original. And if you’re waiting for me to say “but at least the gameplay remains intact”, you’re going to be disappointed: of all the Breakout-oriented games I’ve played, this is one of the worst. It’s too easy, far too dull, and you tend to get stuck for ages on the ‘last brick’, something hardly helped by the play area stretching across both DS screens and yet also being extremely narrow.

If Arkanoid DS was a homebrew effort, I wouldn’t be so scornful, but this is a commercial product. And when you compare it against Space Invaders Extreme, you see just how far Arkanoid DS is from being an exciting and essential update.

Arkanoid DS is out now, if you’re interested (read: if you’re a masochist). The Japanese version also comes with a little detachable DS paddle, but the game’s still rubbish.

He’s got a whole world in his hands

As someone who’s been pining for a DS version of Civilization for a couple of years, I wonder whether the realisation of such a product could ever have been anything other than a disappointment. Unfortunately, after a few weeks’ play, ‘disappointment’ pretty much sums up my opinion regarding the DS port of the latest game in the famous turn-based strategy series.

To be fair to Firaxis and Sid Meier, it’s actually the DS itself that causes some of the problems with this game, and the Civilization core remains largely intact. You get to take a civilization from prehistory to modern times, building and moving units, researching technology, and aiming to become the greatest in the world via various means (domination, economics, technology, or by building the UN). However, with Civ basically being a strategy title, it’s problematic when that aspect of the game is hampered.

First and foremost, the DS screen is too small to provide you with a decent overview of the world. Although the team wisely ditched the 3D graphics from the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions, opting instead for an iconic approach similar to the original Civilization, the map still feels cramped, and moving around it is a chore. This problem could have been alleviated somewhat by providing the option to allow the map to appear—at least optionally—on both screens; unfortunately, one screen is mostly reserved for pointless battle animations.

Elsewhere, the streamlining of the original concept to hammer it into consoles rather than PCs and Macs has neutered it. Although the game is faster, it’s become more of an overt race than a game of chess. Instead of investing in technology and thinking of long-term plans, a war-obsessed AI largely forces games into tending towards moving units, protracted wars and conquest. The technology tree is very basic, and random events are frequent and absurdly powerful. It’s not uncommon to end up with tanks in 200 AD, especially if you stumble across Atlantis, which always spews forth a number of technological advances.

It’s not all bad news—the game is quite fun, and gives you a quick Civ-style fix for when you’re away from your PC. However, rather than being captivating in a ‘total addiction’ sense, this game instead feels ‘annoyingly’ compelling in the same way as Puzzle Quest: you can’t put the game down, but in your heart of hearts you know it’s actually a somewhat tedious slog that could have been a lot better.

Civilization Revolution is already out in the US, and comes to Europe towards the end of August.

This is a public service announcement

Feeling low? Life getting you down? Tired of being force-fed yet another pointless, dull and tedious brain-training game when looking for something great for your Nintendo DS? If so, you need Space Invaders Extreme!

Reviewed on this here site back in April, Space Invaders Extreme is out today in the UK, and you’re a total banana if you own a DS and don’t pick up a copy. (And if you’re from the US, you’re a double banana, seeing as you’ve already had over two weeks to get your copy.)

We now return you to your usual programming.