A patent running couldn't have been more awesome for the NES/SNES gaming systems. I had no idea the FCMobile 2 was out, or even in version "2". If we start taking trips up north with our son this summer, I'll definetly keep an eye out for one of these to help pass the time and relive all those old, crappy, hard as hell NES games.
Japan always gets the craziest, most interesting games. Stuff we'll never see here. It's almost like Nintendo doesn't think we'd enjoy a vision training game. But with Brain Age having sold so well and the Nintendo DS the highest selling console right now, maybe Japan will change it's ways. These games always look fun.
Here's the scenario: I'm a ex-detective turned traveling salesman. I'm moonlighting as a detective.
I get a list of things to find in a hotel: a magazine and a red box. I stumble into a room with someone I arrested from my past working at the hotel reading a magazine in a closet. What's are the first things I think to ask him? 1) Did you finish cleaning the hotel and 2) why did you lie to the cook about cleaning the hotel.
Jesus. Welcome to Hotel Dusk: stopping point for the detectively inept.
I love the controls of the game. I love the art style. I love all the text. I like all the characters that have stories to delve into. What I don't like are the half witted questions that my character, the ex-detective, finds interesting when talking to characters. When you're only interaction with characters in the game are by asking them questions based of of things they say (also scripted), you'd like the questions to be a little more probing. In fact, most of the pairs of questions you get to choose from are either the same are have little to do with the main story or even the character backgrounds. It's trying to hard to give user interaction when they should just script it and move on. I feel like the game is treating me like an 8-year-old and I doubt 8-year-olds have the patience to play a game like this.
So I moved on past it and got to solve my first "puzzle". I couldn't open my briefcase so I needed to find some wire to pick it. I found a paper-clip, but the wire wasn't thick enough. Then I found some tools to cut up a coat hanger. So when I tried to cut off a section as big as a the paper clip, it wasn't enough. I tired cutting off sections that were all bent up too, thinking I needed something to twist the lock with. But no. I needed a section of wire literally 5 times longer than the paper clip. Ahh..those big old meat hands of mine.
So after two hours, I feel a little underwhelmed. This game got about zero hype. No advertising in the store. Just a hunch from an IGN article and the opening to last weeks 1up Show; some guy giving the entire 1up staff crap for not playing Hotel Dusk on their DS(i?).
I'd have to walk over to him after these first two hours and demand an explanation. He'd better damn well offer up a "no, seriously, it gets better" or he might get smacked in the back of the head.
If there was ever a reason to buy a DS, this would have to be it. I'm not saying that games like Hotel Dusk don't want to make strut into GameStop and belly up to the checkout counter and drop $40, but SimCity is one of those games that makes portable gaming fun AND sensible.
There are a couple of features that I just feel are necessary to the success of a portable game: easy controls and unlimited quick saving. The DS complicates that by involving the touch screen. I love it, but it makes the system less fun as a portable gaming device. It takes a special hand and a smooth-as-glass road to play games like Yoshi Touch and Go or Pac-Pix in a car, where I like to do most of DS gaming. Otherwise, sitting at home on a couch or in bed playing a DS is just saying that your bored with your real consoles. Or if your out of town, if you were to lazy to pack up your 360, the DS is what you would bring.
I want more games like SimCity on the DS. No realtime games like Animal Crossing or Nintendogs. I don't want a game I'll feel guilty about not playing because it's more work to play when I do. SimCity or Roller Coaster Tycoon. Those are two games I'd love to have be mobile.
When we first got our DSs, Nicole and I used to fight about who drove on long road trips. We loved Wario Ware and Nintendogs, even though the frustrations of concentrating on Yoshi's Touch and Go. We haven't done that in a really long time. SimCity DS is a game I think could spark an argument or two. That's all I'm sayin'.
