Today, I put a lot of time into my 3DS. Not for any particular reason, but mainly because it was handy and I was thoroughly enjoying the games I was playing on it. For the most part, I played a ton of Animal Crossing: New Leaf. But in between gaming sessions, I tried to mix it up a bit, and because I have a blog to write, I figured I might as well play a game I hadn't wrote about for the project. Thus, I ended up playing Pushmo, a cute little downloadable title from the eShop. I downloaded this game when it first came out, and played a lot of it back then, but haven't really touched it in quite some time. To my surprise, when I went to play it today, I realized that somehow my save file never got transferred when I did my original 3DS to XL swap-over. What a bummer that was, but ultimately, it just meant that I had to start the game over and play through all the super-easy, yet fun beginning puzzles. But, it also meant that I was forced to sit through all the tutorials that went along with them. Every rose has a thorn, or so they say. Anyway, I love this game. This is one of the best uses of 3D effects on the 3DS to date, the puzzles eventually become super challenging but never throw-down-the-3DS type of challenging, and the aesthetics and charm just oozes from this game like you wouldn't believe. The best puzzles to play are the Nintendo themed ones, but unfortunately I didn't get that far into the game. Knowing that I have to recoup all my lost progress, I can foresee myself spending some more time with this little charmer of a game while I am on vacation, especially during travel. That is, if I put Animal Crossing down long enough to play anything else.
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I was going to wait on writing about this game. I do this often with a lot of the newer, bigger games, until I reach a point where I feel comfortable enough writing about it, something interesting happens in the game, or I beat it. Then I realized that I was full fledged addicted to this game, just as I thought I would be, so what exactly would I be waiting for? There is no end game, and besides, this addiction can only go two ways: Get better or get worse. I'll let you decide which direction is which. Anyway, with that being said, allow me to present my write-up for Animal Crossing: New Leaf, a game which I have been playing every single day since I downloaded it from the eShop just one week ago. Compared to the last Animal Crossing on the Wii, this version is leaps and bounds above its predecessor. They didn't really take anything away from the game, just added, as well as make minor tweaks to the game play and the already familiar mechanics and style that gamers have become familiar with in the series. It's just amazing to me how addictive this game is. I am perfectly content sinking 20-30 minutes in at a time, several times a day, if only to do the normal, daily "chores," like pick weeds, check my mailbox, collect fallen bells from shaken trees (bells = the currency in this gaming world), find the daily money rock, chat it up with the villagers, check the store for new items, and pay off some debt. Oh, and let's not forget some fishing, bug catching, fossil excavating and selling/donating my catches and finds. All this stuff is easily doable in short little bursts, especially the fishing, where I can run around and fish until my pockets are full and call it good for the time being. I still have many, many things to do in this game, such as the seemingly endless job of upgrading and paying off my house, decorating my humble abode, and since I am mayor of my town (which I aptly named "Limbo"), there are a lot of public works projects waiting in the wings as well. Oh, and apparently there is this far off tropical island somewhere, that while I haven't figured how to get there yet, will allow me the opportunity to catch new fish and bugs, as well as play some mini games and other fun activities - from what I hear, at least. So yeah, this is Animal Crossing: New Leaf. It's crazy, as no game like this should be this fun or addictive, but it is. Also, I have jumped back on the belief that this game is built for handheld systems as opposed to consoles, especially for its ease-of-play and desire to pick up and play on a whim. And for further proof of the madness of this franchise, Nintendo just announced last week that an "Animal Crossing Villager" will be a brand-new character for the upcoming Super Smash Bros. game. Talk about an addicting game... Today was kind of a big deal in the video game industry. A little thing happened you might have heard of, that seemed fairly popular on the internet, from what I could tell. Day one of the E3 (Electronic Entertainment Expo happened today, headlined by major press conferences by Microsoft, Sony, Ubisoft and EA, just to name a few. While the headlines were dominated by the new consoles (Xbox One and PS4), there was one company that remained quiet all day. But that's pretty par for the course when it comes to Nintendo. Nintendo marches to the beat of their own drummer, as they say. They don't ever do anything out of pressure from the industry, but always because it is what they want to do. Every year, they always do their press conference on Tuesday of E3, but this year, they are going a different route. Instead of the normal big production press conference, they are simply releasing a Nintendo Direct video first thing in the morning, which is something they have gotten very good at over the last year or so. They haven't really said why they are trying this new form of E3 announcements, but if I were a betting man, I would guess that they just realized that it wasn't going to be as efficient in driving whatever point they have to make home - and that a scripted, edited Nintendo Direct video would be more successful. Why am I bringing all this up, you ask? And what does this have to do with the game I played today, which as you can see, is Mario Paint for the Super Nintendo? Well, it's simple, really. If I could have one wish as to what Nintendo will announce in their Nintendo Direct video, it would be a new addition to the Mario Paint franchise. Ideally, I would love to see it on the Wii U, but a 3DS version would work fantastically as well. A Wii U Mario Paint game seems almost more obvious than it should be, but then again, we are talking about Nintendo. They don't ever do the obvious things when it comes to business models. Playing Mario Paint tonight made me realize how far ahead of the curve Nintendo was with this game - and usually is with most games and ideas they have. Thanks to smartphones and tablets and everything else out on the market now, the concept of Mario Paint seems simplistic, basic and uninspiring in today's marketplace. But seriously, a eShop version of Mario Paint on the Wii U would sell gangbusters, plus it would be the type of game to finally show off properly how great the GamePad is, and what kind of potential it has. The painting in the game is pretty straight forward, but throw in the stamps and textures and patterns, the video recorder and the fly swatting mini-game, and you actually have a well designed Paint game. Also, it's amazing that Nintendo can shameless push out plastic peripheral after peripheral without any qualms from the consumers. Good news with a Wii U version of this game is that everything you would need to make the game work, you would already have. So at least you won't have more plastic Nintendo licensed products sitting around collecting dust ... since that's what your Wii U is doing anyway. So we will see, Nintendo fans! I know what you're thinking before you even get a chance to finish this sentence. "WHY IN THE WORLD IS HE PLAYING THIS GAME AND COUNTING IT AS AN ACTUAL GAME FOR HIS BLOG? DOESN'T HE HAVE ACTUAL GAMES HE COULD BE PLAYING?" So, how close was I? I'm betting pretty darn close, but alas, I'm also a risk taker. Either way, i'm a realist and there is no chance that anyone who clicked on here thought that this was a logical choice. So with that, allow me to enlighten you a bit, my dear, dear readers. Find Mii is a packed-in game with the 3DS system, that utilizes the StreetPass functionality of the device to drive the gameplay and replay value of the mini-game. With every person you pass while out and about who is carrying a 3DS on them, you essentially give each other an in-game high five. You meet all your new visitors at your gate in your system, and from there, you send them into battle for you in the Find Mii game. You can also buy warriors as well using coins you collect from walking around, but that isn't as fun. Sure, buying them for back up is great, but to use people you actually encountered in the real world to fight your battles for you is far more entertaining in my opinion. Through the dungeon battles, you collect treasure chests that contain different hats you can swap in and out on your Mii character, which is a nice incentive too keep playing the game. Avatar awards for playing a game? Yeah, that's a successful strategy on the developers' part. So why did I pick this game to play, you're still wondering? Well, I went up to Seattle today for a baseball game. I took my 3DS along with me, with the intention of sinking some time into the freshly downloaded Animal Crossing: New Leaf. Well, it was such a beautiful day, such a great game and I was enjoying the time with my oldest boy so much that I didn't once feel inclined to pull it out and play. When I got home tonight, however, I flipped it open and my alerts went crazy, flashing to indicate I had StreetPassed with someone. Well, it turns out that I StreetPassed with 10 people. Now, I'm not sure if you can only have 10 at a time or not, but I kind of think that's the case. If someone knows for sure, please enlighten me! ANYWAY... So with my newly acquired 10 StreetPasses, I immediately jumped into Find Mii to dungeon crawl with my newly formed squad of warriors. I managed to take down two dungeons before being stopped by a tough boss-like character, collecting a new Metroid hat along the way. I have plenty of coins banked that I could have used to buy more Wandering Heros, as they are called, but I opted not to. With a game like this, it's not about the destination and it's not a race, it's about the journey, no matter how long it takes. This is by far one of the most underrated features of the 3DS, It's a hard feature to sell and advertise as well, because it's one of those "gotta see it to believe it" type of things. It's something the player has to experience on their own, with their own 3DS, on their own accord. It looses its luster when picking up a demo or a friends, or even reading about it here for that matter. Which lends the question as to why I wrote about it in the first place? Because I can. That's why. Right off the bat, let me explain to you that there is one soul reason I played this game today. Animal Crossing: City Folk was the last addition to the uber-popular Nintendo franchise, but as I write this, the newest game in the series is currently downloading on my 3DS - Animal Crossing: New Leaf. So the soul reason for playing the older version is simple: I wanted a comparison for the two games, so I can truly appreciate the changes made to the series. When this game came out a few years back, I received it for my birthday from the family. I hadn't played an Animal Crossing game since the GameCube version, as I completely passed on the DS game. With the Wii version, I was hooked from day one. I knew the moment I started playing that I would be investing lots and lots of time into the game, for better or for worse. And I was completely right, too. I played that game every single day for well over a year. Every single day. The game itself is set up to punish you for missing days, such as weeds growing all over your town and people in town moving out because they are sad that you aren't around as much as they would like. So when you don't play the game, it is a chore and half to get back into normal operation of your town once you get back to playing. The game is hard to describe to people that don't already know about it. I've tried explaining it to my buddy a few times, and it just doesn't sound right ever. The premise is simple, though. It's like the Sims, but with less realism and more chores. I know, it doesn't sound like a game that the more hardcore gamer crowd would ever be into, but oddly enough, there is enough charm and entertainment to win over even the biggest of "hardcore" players. Because the game runs hand-in-hand with real time, every holiday and special day of the year is celebrated in game. Also, the seasons are highlighted, with certain fish and bugs to catch and collect only available in certain seasons. This led to many people "time traveling," or setting their internal clocks on their Wiis to whatever season or holiday they wanted to check out. I am purist, however, and never once time traveled, for the sake of playing the way it was intended. After playing it day after day, like a ritual or addiction, all of a sudden, I stopped. One day went by. Two days. A week. And I always meant to go back and get back in it, but I didn't. My town turned into a ghost town. When I opened it up today, I was sad and embarrassed. It is the exact reason why I could never drag myself back to town. With that being said, I am excited to embark on this new Animal Crossing adventure. I don't know how long it will last, how much time I will put into it, but I am looking forward to the daily chores. Hopefully, I can keep it going like a certain other daily commitment I have. As I alluded to on last night's blog, today I sat down and spent some quality time with Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D, for the Nintendo 3DS of course. I realize that I wrote about this game - albeit the Wii version - yesterday, but I wanted to finish this Week Of... Donkey Kong as strong as possible. With all the DK games I either didn't want to play or couldn't play, this newest addition to the franchise was the obvious choice to end my week. Besides, if I wrote about Donkey Kong Country Returns, I just had to write about the superior version of the game, right? That's right. As great and awesome as the original game was, this version for the 3DS is the epitome of Donkey Kong games. Not only does it take the the amazing game that graced the Wii a few years back, but it adds a few different things to make this version even more enjoyable and easier to embrace by the masses. Most noticeably, they made the game a little easier. Everyone complained about the first version and how hard it was, so Nintendo did something about it, and allows the player to chose the regular mode, or the "new" mode before you start a save file. The new mode adds an extra heart to your life bar, allowing a little bit more leniency to your romp through the jungle. Also, the 3D effects in the game are remarkable. The backgrounds and environments are already vibrant, lively and exciting, but coupled with the 3D technology of the Little System That Could, they look even that much more amazing. There is a slight hangup when using the 3D, which most games encounter at some point or another, where you have to manage to keep the screen in the "sweet spot" in order to maintain the effects properly without distorting the game at all. It can get very frustrating at times, especially if you are notoriously lazy with your hand placement, but remember, the 3D effects are an option. You can always turn the slider bar all the way down and call it good, and the details will still be as good as ever. So that's that, my week of Donkey Kong has completed. I have taken a few things away from this week, as I hoped I would. For one, Donkey Kong is an iconic figurehead in the Nintendo universe, but it took a while to actually establish him as an icon. Nintendo has also made a few mistakes with the big ape over the years, mainly when they kept swapping him out for other characters, and then when they thought that banging on fake drums was the right choice of direction to move the franchise towards. With the latest two games, however, it gives me hope that Nintendo may have learned from the past and know how to keep Donkey Kong in the hearts and on the minds of gamers everywhere. If anything, they at least proved that creating a character to lead a franchise isn't that hard, but that's only if it's done right. Good luck, Nintendo. You will need it, I'm sure. The follow up to the iconic Donkey Kong was a legit sequel, not just a rehashing of the same game as before, which is all too common in sequels, both back and then and in today's market as well. The second game wasn't called Donkey Kong 2, but rather Donkey Kong Jr., naturally. And it was awesome. And dare I say maybe even better? Maybe I am a little bit biased towards Jr. because it was the first Donkey Kong game I remember playing in an arcade. Because of that, I always associate Donkey Kong games as being a duo of characters, with the big ape and Junior. It's hard for me to associate Donkey Kong as a villain as he was in his first game, or acting alone in his adventures. It's just the way it is in my mind. Conversely, despite this being the only game ever where Mario is the bad guy, I refuse to accept that reality. Sure, he was actually named Mario, but let's be real here. This isn't the heroic plumber we know and love. This character is just a pissed off zookeeper who is trying to keep sanity and order while an escaped monkey is trying to breakout a father-figure of an ape. Frankly, I'm glad this direction was one-and-done for the Mario character. Anyway, tonight I played this on my 3DS. It was a free download from the Ambassador Program that Nintendo did when sales of the 3DS were abysmal. They wanted to thank all early adopters of the handheld system by giving us twenty free downloadable titles for our handhelds, which is one of the coolest things to come from a company in a long time. The game is hard once we get to level three. Having to jump over those sparks that the stupid "Mario" is throwing my way. Once you beat that monstrosity of a level, the last level awaits where you have to unlock all the locks in order to free DK. Once you do, you can start the game over, but the difficulty ramps up. The thing that makes this game hard is that it's not all based around your hand/eye coordination, but rather your patience level. You see, the game requires a lot of patience to beat it. You don't have to just make precise jumps, but you have to wait for the exact right time to do it. And sometimes that means you have to wait quite a while. I'm noticing one thing in this series so far. It is soooooooo hard, overall. Sure, with enough practice you can get very good at it, but if you just start playing the game without much time invested to it already, it would be easy to be scared away from it. But that's sort of what makes this series great - the surprising difficulty. More on that to come, I promise. So is Donkey Kong Jr. better than the original one? No, probably not. It's just different, well-done and an important game that pushed the series into something that could (and would) go on for many, many years. Besides, any game where Mario is a bad guy can't be that great, can it? Puzzle games are perfect for the 3DS, and any handheld gaming system for that matter. Sure, they work decently on consoles, but most true puzzle games focus more on making the puzzles challenging and fun than then they do on a storyline, graphics or additional features. It's just the nature of the beast an the main backbone for the genre as a whole. This was all true up until Mario and Donkey Kong: Minis on the Move was released on the 3DS this week in the eShop. And I am happy to report that the tried and true formula remains consistent throughout this game as well. For those of you who played the original BioShock and hacked anything in the game (honestly, is it possible to play the game at all without hacking something?), you will be very familiar with the type of puzzles in this game. Mario is poking his head out of a warp pipe, and his only goal in life is to get to the star on the other side of a block obstacle coarse. There are missing blocks along this path, and you have to fill them in with blocks that fall off to the right in another warp pipe, by dragging the correct ones into place. Trick is, they have to have the correct direction of path on the block you place in order for Mario to continue his journey. A poorly placed block or too much hesitation in your decision making process will lead to Mario's demise. And that, my friends, is a bad thing. Unless your sadomasochistic, or just really hate Mario. Don't worry, though. The game isn't too hard right off the bat. The first world has 10 stages in it, and at the start of each level, they introduce a new ability, challenge or gameplay mechanic to the mix. It feels daunting to remember each one as they keep piling up it seems, but honestly, I would rather ease into the cold pool than jump in all at once. That might just be me, though. So the pipe mechanic from BioShock... I know most people hated it, and that's why I brought it up. While this has more to it than just fitting pipes together, it's essentially the same thing. So if you hated it, stay away from this game. Don't say I didn't warn you. Of all the Mario/Donkey Kong games in the series (this is officially the fourth), this might be the funnest. Well, to me it is, because I absolutely loved the pipe game mechanic. Oh, and I love Mario, and the whole universe he comes from. I guess I am slightly biased when it comes to things of this nature, but hey - Mario can do no wrong in my book. Ok, all you Nintendo haters out there. After today, you have exactly ZERO negative things you can say about the once-struggling 3DS, because Nintendo came out with another epic Nintendo direct conference, completely spotlighting the handheld system with never-before-announced games and news. Now, the Wii U on the other hand - you have free reign to badmouth it some more, as Pikmin 3 was pushed back AGAIN, this time to August 4. Yes, the once "release window" game will now come out 9 months after the release of the system. Yay... Anyway, because of all the 3DS hoopla today, I found it only fitting that I play a game on the system. Plus, there is a sequel coming out soon to the 3DS eShop that was talked more about in today's conference, so it's not a total random game. Now technically, this isn't a 3DS game, but rather just a DSiWare game that you can download to your 3DS. I think I got this game for free from a promotion or something from Club Nintendo ... but I'm not really sure, to be honest. We'll go with it for argument's sake, however. In Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Minis March Again! (and the whole series, really), the game plays like and clearly was inspired by Lemmings. You lead your wind-up group of Mini-Marios to the end of each level, with a lot of puzzle solving and quick-thinking required. The game features, of course, Mario, Donkey Kong, Toad, Princess Peach and the often forgotten Pauline, the original princess before there was a princess to look for in another castle. All in all, it's a fun little game. The creation mode is cool, and works good, but honestly, level creation has never been my cup of tea. For others though? Yeah, it could possibly be the selling point of the game. So, I'm excited for what this year will bring for the 3DS. It looks like an amazing year so far, and we still haven't even gotten to E3. Now, maybe they can start working on that Wii U? Please? When I upgraded to my new, beautiful Nintendo 3DS Xl a couple weeks back, I also got a pretty cool reward for doing so. You see, Nintendo, the company that loves its customers, started a promotion that if you register your new 3DS or XL on their Club Nintendo website, along with either Luigi's mansion of Pokemon Rumble Blast as well, you would receive a free download voucher for one of a handful of games from the eShop. I'm not talking about the little titles, but rather full retail games, just in a downloadable version. The game I selected, based on what games I already had and what games actually interested me, was Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask. This weekend has been completely inundated with BioShock Infinite, but we did head over to the in-laws for dinner this afternoon, meaning it was portable handheld gaming time. Usually I bring along my Vita, but because I am no longer on my 3DS protest, I brought my XL instead. I played some more of Luigi's Mansion, which is getting better with every level I get to, but I also fired up Professor Layton for the first time. I've played a Layton game before, and I really enjoyed it because of it's puzzles. Today, I rediscovered my love for the game's puzzles - and that's about it. Sure, it looks beautiful. The characters and charming and engaging. But honestly, I just couldn't get into the story at all. I tried and tried, and maybe it seemed drawn out and lengthy because it was the start of the game, but I found myself skipping through the text dialogue just to get to the game play. In Layton, the puzzles pop up as you encounter characters in the game. The puzzles range in difficulty, but they are all challenging and force you to actually think, even the easiest ones. I got through several puzzles today in my play time, which were very satisfying. I wish I could tell you what the actual story was about, but I can't I think it might have something to do with a Miracle Mask ... but that's just a shot in the dark. In short, I kind of just wish they would make a Professor Layton game of just puzzles. Market it as a daily brain trainer or something like that, and I would bite hard on that (since my Smart As... game didn't hold my interest as long as I hoped it would). The Professor Layton games are wonderfully perfect for gaming on the go. Especially when you can't stop thinking about the BioShock Infinite storyline. Now THAT'S a puzzle! |
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February 2014
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