The Best of DSiWare - Part 4: Games beginning with 'C'

A good selection this week, with at least a couple of absolute bangers for your enjoyment - despite a complete lack of hidden gems.

Quick recap: To facilitate this exercise I played every game made available on the DSiWare service and, once I had weeded out the shovelware, I have divided the remainder into four categories:

Hidden Gems: Games you've probably never heard of that are utterly brilliant

Well Known & Wonderful: Still gems, still potentially brilliant, but perhaps not quite so 'hidden'

Honourable Mentions: Those games that are good, but lack the real spark required to fit into one of the top two categories

Also Rans: Not bad enough to be completely ignored, but probably not quite good enough to warrant higher status

Two caveats: Firstly, I don't enjoy RPGs. Like, at all. So you won't see any of those at any point. And secondly it's very hard to define 'Hidden Gem' on DSiWare, as the service itself was never hugely popular, so please excuse a potential few miss-categorisations along the way!

A good haul of games to plough through today, so lets get on with it!

 

Well Known & Wonderful

Chronos Twin

Enjoy Up games is a name I've seen a lot during my time with DSiWare and, while not every game is great, very few are particularly bad.

Chronos Twin is certainly one of their more polished efforts. But then, considering it began development on the GBA in 2006, was released as a boxed DS game, and then released again digitally on the WiiWare service - all prior to turning up on the DSiWare in 2010... that shouldn't really be a surprise.

There are a couple of sources that claim the GBA version was actually released in the UK. However, I can find no real evidence to support that. Nowhere on the internet could I find so much as a box art image, let alone a rare, potentially very expensive cartridge.

The game itself has the protagonist temporally split so that they then appear on both the top (present) and bottom (past) screens at the same time. From here you must undertake platforming, shooting, and light puzzle solving - along with an abundance of boss fights - to make your way through the levels.

This is a very slick product. The graphics are wonderfully reminiscent of the best of the 16bit era. The backgrounds alone feature a huge amount of detail and embrace that old favourite effect of mine; parallax scrolling. The sprites are impressive too and, while our hero Nec isn't the most agile, the character design and animations are top notch.

Obviously the majority of challenge and fun comes from playing two screens at once, and the game handles this brilliantly. There's a genuine thrill to even something as basic as starting a jump on one screen and landing it on another. Boss fights are a particular joy and consistently do their job of making the player want to see what the next one will be like.

If you missed this in either of its other two guises, I can assure you that it's well worth a look, probably even two.

Code (Art Style Series)

I'm going to confess right away here that maths has never been my strong suit. I only just scraped a 'C' in my GCSEs (at the second time of asking) and can't recite a times table higher than 5 without slowing down to think.

And yet, for the second time in just 4 instalments, I'm here to tell you that a game with maths at its core is brilliantly addictive and deceptively creative. (I'm also here to tell you that despite my scholarly shortcomings I'm doing pretty well for myself, thank you very much for asking - Stay in school, kids!)

This is another game in the reliable Art Style series and, like many of it's stablemates, it has several names dependant on your region. 'Code' is the European name, in Japan it's 'Decode', and in the US they changed it to 'Base10'.

Whatever the name, the game comes with the usual minimalist art, sound, and music you would expect from the series. The screens, held in 'book mode', display a grid of old style LCD numbers and it's up to the player to find pairs and rows that total ten. 

This simple foundation is brilliantly complicated by the ability to swap pairs of numbers that are adjacent either vertically or horizontally - with the act of doing so 'flipping' them and therefore reversing certain numbers.

It will, for example, turn a 5 into 2 if flipped in either direction. But by the same mechanic a 4 flipped in either direction becomes unusable. 

True to form for this series there are a couple of modes available to play. First is 'Puzzle', a mode I find utterly impenetrable even as I write this glowing review. This mode has you aiming to clear a set number of tiles in a preset formation. You might love it, I just can't get the hang of it.

Luckily, Challenge Mode is unstoppably addictive, and the version of the game that has consumed all of my play time so far. It's ostensibly a more recognisable format, with numbers gradually filling the screen and the player working hard to clear them. It's elevated, initially, by all the numbers on the touchscreen side (rather than just a bottom row) being playable. So rather than being maths-tetris, the game feels more like a mix of a word search, sliding block puzzle, Sudoku, and a furiously paced exercise in lateral thinking. You play towards a target in this mode, and the sense of relief and achievement when you reach one and can take a breather is quite extraordinary.

There are two other modes available. 'Endless' plays identically to Challenge but doesn't have the aforementioned targets, so is not as satisfying to play. There's also a versus mode which I, unfortunately, have been unable to experience.

Not that it matters, this would be a great game were it just the one mode, so having a few others to play with, should the fancy take you, is the cherry on top of a lovely digital cake.

 

Honourable Mentions

Cosmos X2

I deliberated for a good while as to whether or not to give this horizontal shooter hidden gem status but, in the end, the good idea at the core couldn't quite outweigh some other issues that I'll get to in a bit.

That good core idea, though, is that rather than choose between two weapon load-outs for your spaceship, you choose two configurations for it to transform into.

This transformation changes not just the fire pattern, but also the function of the shield. Gun types are of the unimaginative spread, homing, etc variety, but shield types are slightly more imaginative. They can only be used for a second or two before recharging and where one may absorb the energy from enemy fire, another might reflect their ordnance back at them. 

The game also borrows the energy mechanic from tag-team fighting games, so whichever configuration you're not using recovers its energy. So far so interesting.

There are a couple of reasons the game doesn't quite sneak a Hidden Gem award. The first is the speed. I'm not a fan of bullet hell games, so that's not the problem here. The problem is that everything moves quite slowly and a lot of enemies are total bullet sponges; so the pace overall is sluggish at best.

The second issue is the visual design. Uninspired, would be a polite way of putting it. The developers have gone for a sort of 'soft' look, with the three ship designs not possessing a single straight line between them. Another player might feel differently, but to me the design of everything was either generic, or bordering on ugly. 

On balance I think Honourable Mention is the right call. Some of the things it tries to do might not be born out in play, but I'd rather have an ugly game with ideas than a pretty one with none.

Car Jack Streets

Ported from the iPhone original, this is a rather successful clone of the classic top-down, open world, GTA style of old. Unfortunately, the DSiWare version is stripped back in a number of ways, and the intermittent 'real time' play doesn't really work for a device that, in 2021, you're unlikely to have with you every day. 

It's definitely worth a play, as it can be a lot of fun despite the hugely derivative nature. However it's a game out of time, and a poor fit on what is now considered by many to be a retro platform.

Cut the Rope

It's Cut the Rope, what more can I say?

Okay, I'll add a little more, but it feels a bit pointless trying to describe the gameplay of one of the most popular mobile phone games of all time. 

Nevertheless... This is a physics puzzle game. There's a round sweet, or 'candy', at the top of the screen that must be manipulated to fall into the mouth of 'Om Nom', a cute green monster, at the bottom of the screen

Unsurprisingly, DSiWare is not the best way to play this game. It's much better suited to a tablet or any device with a larger screen. The stylus helps it to work better than you may expect, but it's not perfect.

Additionally, While I admit that I haven't played through the 100 levels on the DSi, I know from the mobile version that some later puzzles require a multi-touch screen to solve - so I'm not sure how they're going to work on a device that doesn't have that functionality.

But, to reiterate my original point: It's Cut The Rope; of course it's worth a go, it is (or maybe was) hugely popular for all the right reasons.

Also Rans

Cosmo Fighters
This is an arena brawler with lots to like. It's fast and energetic, well designed, and has a likeable style. Unfortunately it's incredibly limited in single player and, let's face it, the chances of getting together a couple of DSis to play it with a friend are pretty low.

Cosmo Rally
A top down racer where every track is rainbow road. But rather than racing it's a time trial, and rather than plummeting to your death you just lose time. It's a neat idea but, in the end, there's not enough variety or interest here to be worth more than a cursory play.

Conveyor Toy Packaging (G.G. Series) 
This isn't as bad a colour-matching puzzler as its awful title may suggest. But, frustratingly, it takes a fairly unique idea and tries to ruin it with bad implementation. To this end, a fun, interesting take on the format is ruined by progress only being possible until the uncapped speed and entirely random patterns make it impossible to continue.

Well, hope there's something in that selection to keep you entertained until next week when I'll be back with a huge selection for 'D'.

I'll see you then! 

The Best of DSiWare - Part 3: Games beginning with 'B'

Just four games this time, as the letter 'B' holds surprisingly slim pickings for DSiWare - to the extent that I'm listing half of these under AKAs.

Quick recap: To facilitate this exercise I played every game made available on the DSiWare service and, once I had weeded out the mountains of completely rubbish, I have divided the remainder into four categories:

Hidden Gems: Games you've probably never heard of that are utterly brilliant

Well Known & Wonderful: Still gems, still potentially brilliant, but perhaps not quite so 'hidden'

Honourable Mentions: Those games that are good, but lack the real spark required to fit into one of the top two categories

Also Rans: Not bad enough to be completely ignored, but probably not quite good enough to warrant higher status

Two caveats: Firstly, I don't enjoy RPGs. Like, at all. So you won't see any of those at any point. And secondly it's very hard to define 'Hidden Gem' on DSiWare, as the service itself was never hugely popular, so please excuse a potential few miss-categorisations along the way!

So, onward with the selections...

 

Hidden Gems

Bird and Bombs

Known in some territories as Spotto!, this puzzle game leans away from the cerebral and towards the action side of things. The player takes control of a hand-grenade lobbing duck (I think) as he seeks to rid a mansion of it's ghost infestation. 

I'm a big proponent of the idea that a little charm goes a long way, and this is exactly the sort of game that benefits hugely from just that. It's a short game and a simple idea, but the whole thing is so entirely endearing that I had to give it a hidden gem spot.

Played over two screens, your little bird friend stands at the bottom of the screen, bedecked in an army helmet, and armed with five bombs.

Above, a number of ghosts hang in the air, with their gaping maws turned upwards giving them the look of those bizarre deep sea fish.

To aim a bomb a small wheel is rotated on the touchscreen. A small amount of it's flight-path is shown but not enough to make the game too easy. This control choice seemed odd to me at first, but having played other, similar games since that use more a more direct form of touch-screen aiming, I can confirm this is absolutely the better option.

And so you make your way through the levels, rebounding bombs from walls, items, and moving platforms, with the goal of landing them in the mouths of the ghouls. There isn't much more to it than that and, frankly, there doesn't need to be. It's just a small, simple, hugely enjoyable little time-waster.

 

Well Known & Wonderful:

Black x Block (G.G. Series)

I've committed to not listing any of the G.G. Series titles as hidden gems because they were pretty prominent on DSiWare by virtue of their sheer number. They were both frequently released and frequently on sale.

Black x Block is another game that ties stylishly simple design with brutal difficulty. With a stick-person avatar and outlined level components, it has a very similar aesthetic to 10 Second Run, another G.G. Series game that achieved the same status in my 'Numbers' entry.

On this occasion your little person is picking up and rotating Tetris style pieces in order to build their way to the exit. An early level might require you build stairs, for example, but later on you may need to build similar stairs, but then dismantle them to use the pieces to build another climbable platform elsewhere on the stage.

The easy to understand concept quickly gives rise to some fiendishly difficult levels, with the ability to get stuck behind a construction of your own making a particularly common pitfall.

Thankfully, it's a game rife with revelatory moments and it's these, for the most part, that make the game a lot of fun to play, and prevent it from become console-hurlingly frustrating!

Bird and Beans

As far as I can tell there is no relationship between this game and the above mentioned 'Bird and Bombs'. This effort has actually been re-packaged from one (or is it two?) of the many mini-games in Warioware. What initially appears to be a slightly too simple action game in the vein of Pang!, Bird and Beans (AKA Pyoro) uses brilliantly balanced risk, reward, attack, and defence mechanics and quickly reveal itself as something quite different.

As you may expect, given the games origins, it's a simple affair in which your small avian avatar moves across the the bottom of the top screen trying to capture beans that rain from above, an action performed with it's diagonally protruding tongue. Initially it seems as simple as: The higher up the screen the bean is captured, the more points you earn - but there is more too it than that.

Things are first complicated when a bean hits the floor and leaves a hole you are unable to cross; reducing the play area. Luckily there are different coloured beans that repair small or large gaps and it's this element that moves the game away from simple score chasing by adding an (admittedly simplistic) level of strategy. Rather than simply plucking as many beans from the sky as possible, you have to choose which colour bean grab at the right time. 

If a bean hits you on the head, it's game over. So ensuring you always have enough floorspace available to avoid them is the key to success.

And that's not all. As you progress to a certain point in your score tally (neatly represented by a changing background) a whole new game mode is unlocked that, while ostensibly similar, is in fact completely unique to play.

But I'll leave that part for you to discover for yourself.

 

Boxlife (Art Style series)

Possessing what instantly became one of my favourite theme tunes of all time, this DSiWare exclusive in the well known Art Style series is a puzzle game with two very different modes of play. They are both built on the premise of cutting out patterns from flat squares, which are then folded into cube shaped boxes to make profit. But, while one mode has rigid goals and level by level progression, the other is much more open.

At the beginning you have no choice but to spend some time in the 'R & D' department. In this mode the game teaches you a pattern and then sets a puzzle around cutting a set number of boxes from a sheet of virtual card with zero waste. This mode is fun but pretty limited. It does build your understanding nicely and is useful - as per the moniker - for learning the basics. 

Factory mode is the real meat and gravy of the game. In this version you have an endless ream of card that you call forward as needed. Waste is inevitable here, and will eat into profits, so getting the most boxes for the least card is where you'd think the secret of success would lie.

However, it's not long before explosive canisters start to fall from the sky and your only defence from the devastating impact they have on your 'waste' tally is to box them up ship them elsewhere.

The goal here is to gradually hit larger and larger production targets. As you do this you are rewarded by upgrades to your house, shown in cute pixel art on the title screen with four elements that can swapped out for upgraded versions. It's a neat little touch and a very cute and stylish way to show your progress.

Or. 

Boxlife is an artistic commentary on capitalism in which you play a homeless man lured from your tatty tent by a gang of terrorists who recruit you to work in a bomb factory. You are well rewarded for efforts, and as such can upgrade from a tent, to a shack, and ever upwards until you achieve the dream of a detached house, pets and the white picket fence... just don't look behind the facade!

Whatever the backstory, Boxlife is a fantastic puzzle game. There are times when the touch controls won't do exactly as you like, and it's probably not a game with broad appeal, but I'd urge anyone to give it a go, and pretty much insist on it for puzzle game fans.

 

Quality over quantity very much the theme for the 'B' section, with all these games very much worth a play.

Let's hope the standard remains. The quantity is definitely high for 'C', the other thing though... let's see about that next time.

I hope to see you then! 

The Best of DSiWare - Part 2: Games beginning with 'A'

Having looked at games where the title started with a number last time, we now begin the alphabet proper with games begin with an 'A'.

Quick recap: To facilitate this exercise I played every game made available on the DSiWare service and, after weeding out the shovelware, I have divided the remainder into four categories:

Hidden Gems: Games you've probably never heard of that are utterly brilliant

Well Known & Wonderful: Still gems, still potentially brilliant, but perhaps not quite so 'hidden'

Honourable Mentions: Those games that are good, but lack the real spark required to fit into one of the top two categories

Also Rans: Not bad enough to be completely ignored, but probably not quite good enough to warrant higher status

Two caveats: Firstly, I don't enjoy RPGs. Like, at all. So you won't see any of those at any point. And secondly it's very hard to define 'Hidden Gem' on DSiWare, as the service itself was never hugely popular, so please excuse a potential few miss-categorisations along the way!

So, with all that admin out of the way, we better get on with the games, because there are loads in this letter!

 

Hidden Gems

Ace Mathician

It's always fantastic when, after nearly 40 years of playing games, one discovers an entirely original gameplay concept in the most unusual of places - and let's face it, obscuring a great game behind that utterly awful name and the blandest character design in history is some kind of mad genius. 

Ace Mathacian is a game wherein you must guide a cute bear to some fruit, yes, really. But hear me out. The bear and the fruit are on the top screen along with some large platforms that make up the level. A proportion of these blocks are outlined in red, which means they can be re-positioned to aide the bears traversal of the level and collection of all the fruit.

But it's the method of this platform re-positioning that is the genius of the game. On the lower screen are the elements of an algebraic equation. For example, the sum may be started already as 'y=' and you must add the other elements to this to affect the play area. Simply adding a 4, say, would raise all the red outlined bricks by 4 pixels. Solutions are rarely this simple, however, and often require several different arrangements of the same numbers and symbols to move the platforms to a variety of places so that the bear can reach all the fruit. In a very early  level you need to raise the blocks by 4 initially, but then lower them afterwards by having the equation read 'y=1-9' to reach other goals. 

These examples are among the earliest in the game, things get devilishly creative as you progress through the levels - and it's this that is the final piece of the games own equation, and the thing that makes it a stand-out puzzle game on a platform that has no shortage of them.

AlphaBounce

From the developers who went on to create Dead Cells, and beginning life as a free Flash game, AlphaBounce takes the humble brick-breaker to a brave new world of excess. With literally thousands of levels, dozens of brick types and at least twenty different power-ups (and power-downs, of course) this mantra of this game is clearly 'more is more' - and boy does it ever pay off. 

The central conceit is that you are an prisoner who must make their escape by navigating across the game's map one square at a time - with each square being a level of the game. Both your bat and your balls are customisable, adding an interesting, almost RPGesque factor to proceedings.

But obviously the real fun is in the levels themselves, where success can litter the screen with power-ups by the bucketload, raining down the screens at an incredible rate, and in which, through use of the stylus, control is afforded in the most perfectly direct and accurate way possible. The bat - or 'Envelope' as they are called here - even warps to wherever you next touch should you lift it from the screen, meaning that it never, ever, lags behind your direction as I've seen in other games of this type.

AlphaBounce is one of those games where there's often so much going that you're not sure if you're winning or losing, but the chaos is so intoxicating that you don't really care. The Flash version is sadly no longer functional, as you might imagine, but thanks to the tightest possible controls and despite some limitations of the small screens, DSiWare was always the best way to play this game anyway.

Antipole

This is an action platform game built around a single mechanic; the ability to reverse gravity for about two seconds at a time.

Armed with this ability, and a pistol of some kind, our hero, Johnny Hurricane, must make his way through the level, collecting three green coins on the way and, optionally, doing so under the set target time. 

There are definitely echoes of VVVVVV in this, but Antipole's use of short bursts of the anti-grav ability for platforming and enemy manipulation set it apart. The soundtrack is another area where the game excels, as is the amount of content. The campaign is fun and varied, but very short. Luckily there are a great many challenge levels available from the start and more available to unlock as you play.

It's not a game that looks like much, the bare bones visuals don't have quite enough design flair to be considered minimalist, but Johnny himself has a basic kind of swagger and there are a few bosses along the way add that some character.

Antipole's singular focus on it's key mechanic is what makes it a stand-out game, everything else ensures it wears the badge of Hidden Gem with pride.

 

Well Known & Wonderful:

Aquite (Art Style Series)

Whenever a game is part of a 'series' (of which there are many on DSiWare for some reason) I'll be listing it under the actual title, not that of the overarching banner; in this case, A is for Aquite, not Art Style. The whole Art Style brand was originally born from a GBA concept called Bit Generations. This was 6 games that were released at roughly the same time as the Game Boy Micro and later ported, and added to, as Art Style on WiiWare. They are all hyper stylised, stripped back, pure gameplay experiences that are usually, but not always, puzzle orientated. Aquite (AKA Aquia/Aquario) is very much of this ilk. 

Ostensibly we're matching 3+ coloured blocks in time honoured fashion, but the here the colours are pushed in pairs into a central column, with the pair on the opposite side being ejected as a result (think of it like one of those executive ball-toys you see on desks in eighties movies). As usual for Bit Generations/Art Style games the sound design is a highlight, but the ever evolving gameplay is the real star, with the total lack of a built in guide really helping to lend a feeling of discovery to proceedings.

AiRace

Horrible title sylisation aside, this is a fun and very playable flight racing game that became pretty well know due to the dearth of any kind decent racing game on the DS (let alone DSiWare). The limitations of the platform only really rear their head in the low track count and naff music. This notwithstanding, the courses on offer are varied and fun and the power ups, though basic, add an extra level of fun to proceedings.

And speaking of the power-ups, they're actually a pretty good encapsulation of the game as a whole. They aren't particularly original and lack a little in flair - but they are very satisfying. AiRace has the look of an early PlayStation game, a small number of circuits, and even fewer planes to choose form - but it's just so much fun to play that all of these flaws are easily forgiven.

All Breaker and Assault Buster (G.G. Series)

The G.G. Series was pretty prominent on DSiWare by virtue of the sheer number of games released under it's banner (albeit only in the NA region). I've lumped these two together both for the sake of brevity and because they are both fantastic for similar reasons.

All Breaker is an action puzzle game where you control a girl called Rebecca who runs around typical platform levels trying to smash orange target blocks with her massive hammer, while additionally avoiding contact with deadly robots and environmental hazards. The game is a masterclass in how to introduce a simple concept and then gradually evolve both it and the core gameplay. 

As the game advances new block types appear that can be manipulated in specific ways, or combined with others to present new platforming or robot-killing opportunities. Like most of the G.G. games it's pretty short, but it's  beautifully presented and a ton of fun to play.

Assault Buster is a tad more complex. Here your player character doesn't have a name but she does have a huge gun that she may or may not have stolen from the guy in Space Harrier. Gameplay is of 2D action-shooter variety with enemies appearing all over the screen (but mainly above you) which you obliterate with the ability to shoot in the four main directions. The hook this time is a 'boost' mechanic, the use of which allows you to fly around the screen in 8 directions and, crucially, grants temporary invincibility. 

What starts as a very simple concept quickly builds a brilliantly chaotic momentum, the intuitive controls ensuring you feel like a bad-ass at all times.

This is exactly the kind of tight arcade-action that is a perfect fit for DSiWare, and should be high on everyone's list of games to play.

 

Honourable mentions:

Abyss

EnjoyUp Games are going to feature a few times as we work through this catalogue. They have a knack with very simple games nicely presented with decent personality. Abyss is one such game and if you, like me, have a fondness for 'Gravitar' or 'Thrust' style inertial controls, then this is well worth a few moments of your time. You guide a cycloptic creature around a cavern using the aforementioned control style and hunt for collectable orbs, and that's really all there is to it, but it has a nice style and a good level of challenge that will keep you entertained a fair while before the repetition eventually sets in.

Aura Aura Climber

Nintendo published this cheerful effort that, initially at least, puts one in mind of mobile classic Doodle Jump. Here you control a little sun-shaped being that latches onto grapple points and flings itself on the quest ever upwards in search of other glowing things to collect. What elevates the game out of 'Also ran' status is the simple mechanic that when a grapple point has been used it is then not able to be used again for a few seconds. This brings a risk vs reward element to the game that's essential for the 'just one more go' factor to creep in.

Art of Ink

I don't really agree with the concept of 'guilty pleasures', but if I did then Art of Ink would probably be the sort of game that would be classified as such. Reminiscent of WiiWare classic 'Bonsai Barber', Art of Ink has you take the role of a new artist in a tattoo studio where you first question a client to ascertain what design they want, and then apply the design using the touch screen. In each part of the play there are factors that will effect your eventual score/payout; such as how many guesses it takes you to choose the perfect design, or how much pain you cause the customer while applying it. It's fairly straightforward stuff, but is done with enough personality to earn it's place here. 

Altered Weapon (G.G. Series)

Not quite up to the standard of the other two G.G. efforts listed above, Altered Weapon sees you controlling a mech that can transform into a speedy battle tank. The mech offers precision and directional shooting, the tank offers speed and the ability to pass under low ceilings. Through flipping between the two configurations you navigate left-to-right as you run and gun (technically walk and gun) through missions shooting enemies and traversing platforms. It's all good fun, but the level design is lacking and it doesn't have any real 'x' factor to make it worthy of stronger recommendation.

 

Also rans:

I had a bit of a soft spot for Alien Puzzle Adventure; a very simple mashup of Tempest controls with Puzzle Bobble gameplay - but I couldn't, in good conscience, recommend it because it doesn't do enough with either of those ideas. The same could be said, only moreso, in the case of Astro, which aims to update Asteroids, but somehow makes the simple concept worse in the process. Finally, Army Defender, is simple 'shoot the waves of enemies' effort, that has a neat Ikaruga colour swapping gimmick and effective use of 'book mode'. The core gameplay though, is a little too limited.

And that is that for the letter 'A' marathon. 6 games you definitely need to check out and six more that might tickle your fancy if you're in the mood.

'B', obviously, is up next time. I'll see you then! 

The Best of DSiWare - Part 1: Games beginning with 'Numbers'

So here we are with part one of a series where I'll be playing games from the DSiWare catalogue and writing a short review.

First, a quick recap: To facilitate this exercise I played every game made available on the DSiWare service and, after first weeding out the mountains of complete rubbish, I'm play the rest alphabetically, doing a short write up on each, and will be assigning them to one of these four categories:

Hidden Gems: Games you've probably never heard of that are utterly brilliant

Well known & worthwhile: I'm not in love with this name, so it may change in the future. This is for those games that are still gems, still potentially brilliant, but perhaps not quite so 'hidden'

Honourable Mentions: Those games that are good, but lack the real spark required to fit into one of the top two categories

Also Rans: Not bad enough to be completely ignored, but probably not quite good enough to warrant higher status

Two caveats: Firstly, I don't enjoy RPGs. Like, at all. So you won't see any of those at any point. And secondly it's very hard to define 'Hidden Gem' and 'Well known' on DSiWare, as the service itself was never hugely popular, so please excuse a few potential miss-categorisations along the way!

So lets get cracking with part one: Numbers.

 

Hidden Gems

10 Second Run (Go Series)

The idea behind the 'Go Series' was to bring games that had previously been exclusive to Japan to a wider audience. The fact that the games selected in this 'Numbers' bracket are dominated by titles in this series is entirely coincidental, there just happens to a fair few that are numerically labelled.

10 Second Run is a very 2010s game. This was the era that gave rise to the likes of Super Meat Boy; games that were designed with very small, very fast, very difficult levels. As you might imagine, 10 Second Run is built around the concept of completing each of it's fifty levels in just 10 seconds - and it has a minimalist audio/visual design to go with the minimalist gameplay. This is a purist platforming affair with a stark white aesthetic and the simplest possible representation for every block, hazard, or character you see. It may be too basic for some, but to me the commitment to this design makes it very stylish, much along the lines of Nintendo's own BoxBoxBoy series.

As with all games of this type, it's success is born of the balance between fiendish difficulty and an ultra fast turn-around between your inevitable failures. As the difficulty increases so does the compulsion to overcome the challenge, and thus, this quickly becomes a game that will happily eat up several hours of your life, 10 seconds at a time.

99 Bullets (Go Series)

I don’t think EnjoyUp games, were you able to ask them, would even try to deny that the three “99” prefixed games they released on DSiWare were heavily inspired by the adventures of Commander Video in Gaijun’s excellent Bit.Trip series. You'll read more about 99 Seconds and 99 Moves later on, but 99 Bullets is the best of the three and the only one I feel worthy of the 'Hidden Gem' accolade. 

99 Bullets may look like it was compiled using assets built in 3D Paint, but I found myself thoroughly enjoying its stripped back vertical shooter x puzzle game action. 

As you may expect, each stage must be completed using no more than 99 bullets, which is a nice twist in itself, but add to this the ability to fire in any of four directions, with each assigned to the corresponding face button, and you have a bit of a low-fi winner on your hands.

 

Well known and worthwhile:

3D Space Tank

Later in the alphabet I may regret not listing this under it's US or Japanese name, both which are references to the fact that this is a belated sequel. The original ‘X’ was the Gameboy game (hence the title of X-Scape and X Returns in various territories) that first brought Argonaut Software, who went on to develop Star Fox, to the attention of Nintendo, so it’s no real surprise that this sequel has similarities to both that game and it's N64 follow up. 

Played from first person view, there are both on rail shooter and ‘all range’ style levels, with each coming in a new and vibrant colour palette. The Space Tank itself can also fly for long periods, which adds a more dynamic nature to proceedings than merely trundling about at ground level. 

As you may expect there’s a high level of polish here, with challenging and addictive gameplay that belies the limitations of DSiWare. The involvement of Nintendo has prompted me to not award 'Hidden Gem' status, but I think to a lot of people, this game would be an excellent example of exactly that.

 

Honourable mentions:

99 Moves (Go Series)

Whereas 99 Bullets was a vertical shooter, 99 Moves is a maze game that never quite elevates itself above that status. The 'moves' in question are the changes of direction required to navigate the labyrinthine levels. Your avatar flies forwards automatically with player input only required at a junction or to avoid an enemy. There really isn't anything more to it than that, which is why it's down here among the honourable mentions.

99 Seconds (Go Series)

Also not really bringing enough to the table is 99 Seconds. This time the game has you in full avoid-em-up mode, again travelling up the screen while avoiding patterns and shapes through the use of a time slowing/reversing gimmick. The visuals are even more minimalist than the other two '99' games, and much like 99 Moves, it hangs it's hat on a single concept. You must reach the end of the level in 99 Seconds, but to avoid being crushed between malevolent shapes you will have to slow, or even reverse time. Had the game taken this idea and gradually developed and evolved it over it's course then it could have been so much more. As it is, the concept works well, and there's some fun to be had, but it won't hold your attention for long.

 

Also rans:

3 Heroes: Crystal Soul is not a very good game, but it's at least decently made and, while simple, it has a good hook. 

The game has you moving around a hex grid, with each move having both positive and negative effects on the surrounding tiles and therefore impeding or aiding your progression. I could go into more detail but that’s the hook of the gameplay that I found diverting enough to play for a few levels. It’s not going to rock your world, and it’s one of those games that you can’t help but see done on a mobile phone, but it might be worth a look nonetheless.

 

That's numbers done, next time we start the alphabet proper with games that begin with 'A'. 

I hope to see you then! 

The Best of DSiWare - Introduction

I have a tendency to climb aboard my horse on the subject of piracy. I've yet to hear a believable reason for denying a developer reward for their time and effort that isn't 'I wanted it but didn't want to pay for it' it not so many words. 

I’m less inclined, however, to moralise on the subject of emulation.

To me, when a system is no longer ‘current’ and it’s catalogue of games are no longer available to buy new, then emulation is not only a convenient option, but often a necessary one for game preservation. As highlight by Sony's recent u-turn on PSN, this is particularly true of games only available on digital platforms.

Conversely, and sadly, emulation often leads to games not connecting with the player as they would under the original circumstances. There are many reasons for this; playing on PC is a different experience to that of a console or handheld, for one, certain systems have controls or visual styles that can never be properly captured through emulation, for another. But to me the most important difference is that the player is potentially not ‘invested' in the game.

And by 'invested' I’m not talking about the cash outlay (although that can be a factor) I’m talking about all kinds of other investment; emotional, intellectual, or just good old fashioned time and effort. These are all completely missing from the gaming experience when you download a rom-pack and pick games that have fun sounding names, or that you saw someone on YouTube play.

Another factor is that the vast majority of people firing up an emulator will be doing so to play a game they have nostalgia for. This is certainly what I did all those years ago when I first discovered emulation, and it’s absolutely a great place to start - but given the vast resource available - I believe it’s a bit of a waste.

The DSi and particularly it’s DSiWare catalogue are as prone to this as any system, with (the unquestionably excellent) Shantae: Risky’s Revenge being responsible for a huge number of people interested in emulation for the system and this library.

Having recently acquired a DSi for the first time, and finding meagre online resource for recommendations, I decided to get set about discovering the best of the DSiWare in the same way I did for MAME some sixteen years ago: 

I would download everything I could, play them all, and decide for myself.

Through this method 'investment' is built into the process through my time and effort, but additionally the thrill of discovery is a fantastic motivator.

Interestingly, Wikipedia states that the entire DSiWare catalogue is just 366 games and, after playing through every single one for a few minutes, I only deleted about half of them. This is a lot less shovelware than I expected, and a good sign of some quality games to come.

Weeding out the 50% mountain of complete rubbish was step one. Step two is to revisit what's left, play them properly and write about them. As part of the writing bit I will also be assigning them one of four categories:

Hidden Gems: Games you've probably never heard of that are utterly brilliant

Well known & worthwhile: I'm not in love with this name, so it may change if I think of something better. But these are games that are still gems, still potentially brilliant, but perhaps not quite so 'hidden'

Honourable Mentions: Those games that are good, but lack the real spark required to fit into one of the top two categories

Also Rans: Not bad enough to be completely ignored, but not quite good enough to warrant higher status

I'll be playing through the games in alphabetical order and writing an entry for each letter (where applicable) with the aim of posting once a week, probably on a Thursday.

I'll be as thorough as I can but just to be clear: I fundamentally don't believe objectivity, so every word will be my own beautiful opinion - and for this reason there are also two notable caveats: 

Firstly, I don't enjoy RPGs. Like, at all. So you won't see any of those at any point. And secondly, it's very hard to define 'Hidden Gem' on DSiWare, as the service itself was never hugely popular, so please excuse a potential few miss-categorisations along the way!

And that's where I'll leave it for now. I'll be posting the first entry very soon, I hope to see you there and would love your comments and feedback.

An A-Z of great PlayStation games - Part 8: W, X, Y, and Z

And so we reach the end. A bittersweet day as this is the final part of this series. Which today, obviously, means I'm looking at W, X, Y, and Z.

My PlayStation collection has grown slowly over years to well over 120 games and while I do, and in fact just did, call it a ‘collection’, every one of my games was bought to be played and kept because it was enjoyed.

With this in mind I'm allowing myself the caveat of honourable mentions - something I’ve always resisted before.

I’m splitting these up into bite-sized chunks of three or four at a time, so on with the latest, and final, batch. 

Three big franchises in 'W', with multiple entries from Worms, WWF/E, and Wipeout. But it didn't take much deliberation to settle on Wipeout 2097. 

It could be convincingly argued that the 5th generation was when the games industry got really hooked on sequels. I'm not saying that they didn't exist previously, but there weren't a huge number of series achieving trilogy status before this time, let alone stretching on into having more instalments than you can count on one hand. To this end, unlike today, it was usually worth being excited when your favourite game got a sequel because, as with WipeOut, they were usually genuine improvements over the original. 

Developers knew that they could never make the same impact as they had with their first game, so they compensated by improving as many aspects of the game as possible, starting, or at least it seems to me, with the gameplay as the core factor.

WipeOut 2097 fits this ethos beautifully. I doubt I need to explain anything about this weapon enhanced, techno infused, future racer to anyone reading this. But if you inexplicably stopped after the original you should know that 2097 offers everything that was great about the first outing, with none of the nostalgia of disappointment that hangs around the later games in the series, all while bringing a little bit 'more' to the table besides. 

It feels faster, looks prettier, and sounds louder. It has more racers, more tracks, more weapons, and is, to put it bluntly, just plain more fun to play.

I'm not going to deny that there were slim pickings for the letter 'X'. Nor will I deny that my eventual choice, X-Men vs Street Fighter, is far from the best version of this classic game. However, and this is often something that is lost in the noise that surrounds the hobby of retro gaming, just because something isn't the best version, that doesn't necessarily make it bad. 

It's absolutely true that X-Men vs Street Fighter on the PlayStation isn't as good as the arcade or Saturn versions, but playing these iconic comic characters against these iconic fighting game characters is still hugely entertaining, and should not be missed if the yation is your only option.

So, do you remember the letter 'Q'? No? I don't blame you. There was some embarrassing goings on about Quake II, a game I've never played. But at least I wouldn't let that happen again... right?

I've played a good amount of You Don't Know Jack... on the Wii...  a series all about the style of question and where the irreverent host really does make the whole quiz-game standard more entertaining than it has any right to be. But, fess up time, I've never played this game, which you'd have to assume started the whole 'Jack Box' franchise way back in 1999. I guess, given the age of the pop-culture questions this game (probably) contains it would make a fun diversion at a retro themed party.

Anyway. Next time I do an A-Z (Spoiler: I've already started) I'm just skipping the letters where I don't have a good option.

I went on at length about the raft of quality, but short lived, 3D fighters that emerged in the PlayStation era last time out (in reference to the sublime Tobal No. 1), and Zero Divide, with two entries on Sony's machine and a further one for it's Sega rival, is another example of this.

With a style that falls somewhere between the visuals of Fighting Vipers and the moves of the Virtua Fighter series, Zero Divide 2 (the first game is but a shadow cast by it's successor) features an entourage of android combatants in a variety of guises.

One more cynical than I may suggest that, so varied and often animalistic are many of these characters, that the only reason they're androids at all is to keep the polygon count down - but there's no denying the clean look this approach provides. An additional bonus is that the game runs at a silky 60 frames a second and, while usually this kind of thing doesn't excite me, in fighting games it makes a genuine difference to the play.

There are some nice additional features in the mix too. For example it (let's say) 'borrows' from Fighting Vipers with an armour damage system and walled arenas, and there's a neat replay save system that shows off that smooth frame-rate wonderfully.

Zero Divide 2 arrived late in the PlayStations lifecycle, something evident from the palpable fighter-burnout you'll read in most reviews of the game. Re-visit it now, however, and it's hard to see what this game does wrong, had it been earlier to the party, it might be another series that was still around today.

 

And that's it for this miniseries!

I may have made a rod for my own back on occasion but it was to great to rediscover some games I've not thought about for a long time.

I hope you enjoyed reading as much as I did writing.

The next series is underway and will be looking at the obscure library of DSiWare - I've only just started researching it and it been fascinating already. 

It will be up next Thursday, hope to see you then!

An A-Z of great PlayStation games - Part 7: S, T, U, and V

Penultimate part of this series as I'm upping the count to four games for this last couple of brackets. Which today means I'm looking at S, T, U, and V.

My PlayStation collection has grown slowly over years to well over 120 games and while I do, and in fact just did, call it a ‘collection’, every one of my games was bought to be played and kept because it was enjoyed.

With this in mind I'm allowing myself the caveat of honourable mentions - something I’ve always resisted before.

I’m splitting these up into bite-sized chunks of three or four at a time, so on with the latest batch... 

How many times does a 'hidden' gem need to be labelled such before it's no longer hidden?

I ask because I genuinely believe every list of PlayStation hidden gems ever created includes Silent Bomber. There's absolutely no doubt that this game is a gem - I'm listing here after all, despite extremely strong competition from the likes of Soul Reaver: Legacy of Kain, SoulBlade, Street Fighter Alpha 3, Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo, and Syphon Filter - but can it really still be considered hidden?

No matter. What's more important is just how good this game is, and it is, to put it mildly, exceptional. Easily one of the best on the system and very likely inside my personal GOAT30, Silent Bomber is arcade action done to near perfection.

It's played in large open areas from a kind of isometric, but actually full 3D, perspective (Apocalypse is the closest thing I can think to it offhand) and your character, Jutah, runs around in these environments blowing up mechs and baddies by the hundred. Of course there are bosses with patterns to be learnt and a story to which no attention need be paid. This is an action game par excellence with the twin pillars of 'running' and 'gunning' supporting nuances of combo's and chains that keep the gameplay fresh and exciting even when it gets brutally hard. 

I'm a bit too old-school to spend much of my time watching other people play video games, but it really hits home when you watch someone play Silent Bomber, that this is a game where you constantly need to be on the move. Enemies track you, targets are often in motion, and your own bombs, which can be laid on the ground or fired directly at enemies, also damage you. This all combines into a game where you're constantly running, constantly gunning (well, bombing), and constantly having the absolute time of your life.

With a trio of Tekkens, a brace each of Time Crisis' and Tenchus, and the opening trilogy of the Tomb Raider series (the first of which is easily one of five favourite games ever), you may be surprised not to see a screen-shot for any of those games aligned with this text.

But, honestly, most of those games aren't better than Tobal No.1, and for those that are, what more could I possibly tell you about them that you don't already know?

The fifth generation was when 3D fighting games really came into their own. The mid nineties was when now-long-running series like DoA, Tekken, Virtua Fighter, and Soul Calibur first came home from the arcades to land on the PlayStation and Saturn. There were also lesser-known others but, often unfortunately, these didn't have the success or longevity of those that have since become household names. Blood Roar scraped into gen 6 before fading away, but Fighting Vipers and Rival Schools managed just one sequel each - a fate which also befell the stunning Tobal.

Something a lot of arcade ports had in common, from before the internet was really a thing, was the introduction of extensive single player modes. In Japan, Rival Schools had an almost fully featured RPG attached, Soul Blade (AKA Soul Edge), the pre-cursor to the Soul Calibur series, had a story mode for every character that included unlocking 8 weapons each. In Tobal No.1 the console specific mode was - what would today be called - a rogue-like dungeon crawler.

In 'Quest' mode, you ran down simplistic tunnels fighting both basic placeholder enemies and characters from the game. There are items to collect and use also, but the real hook is that you have only one life and cannot save progress. Where the similarity with more modern rogue-likes comes continues is that when certain characters are met and bested in this mode, they become playable in the main game - which is both ingenious and makes the whole effort a lot more worthwhile.

All the other standard fighting game modes are here, and a cast of interesting and bizarre characters populate them. The game runs at a beautiful 60fps, and this really highlights the smooth animations, particularly in complex throws and holds. 

Whether measured by the standards of today or those of 1997, Tobal No.1 is an incredible package of original features and top notch presentation. It may seem a little sad that we're not eagerly awaiting Tobal No.7 for the PS5, but this first game and it's sequel hold up so well that it's unlikely that any further entries would have bettered them.

As Parappa the Rappa didn't quite sneak the choice for 'P', it's only right and fair that Um Jammer Lammy (a 'pseudo-sequel', set in the same universe but featuring different characters) should get the nod in the much less hotly contested battleground of the letter 'U'.

Don't get me wrong, this is no 'default' pick, Lammy may not have had the same impact as Parappa, but everything great about that game is present here; from the paper thin cartoon art and the rhythm-matching 'simon-says' gameplay, to the crazy characters , bonkers story, and infectious tunes.

Also of note: As much as this game's similarity to the original generated some disinterest back in the 90's, re-visiting either Parappa or Um Jammer Lammy today will bring about equal levels of pure cartoon joy - and with a two player mode and more songs, it could even be argued that Um Jammer Lammy is actually the better game.

Twisted Metal may have done it first, but Vigilante 8 does it best.  Set in a Pseudo-seventies world with big afros, big flares, big glasses, and big guns,Vigilante 8 elevates itself above the competition through implementation of fantastically fun special moves, entertaining physics, and a hugely varied cast of characters (and their vehicles) to choose from.

Chassey Blues 'Rattler', clearly inspired by the Shelby Cobra Daytona, is my personal favourite. Not only was it fast and agile, but paired with Chassey's 'Gridock' it was a combo machine! It was so lightweight that you could really feel the effect of firing off the more powerful special moves like the mortar-esque 'Crater Maker' or shotgun-on-steroids 'Cow Puncher'.

Alongside the cars and characters, V8 also features brilliant environments to charge around in. Most have secret areas to discover and traps to trip. For me, along with the sense of fun, it's the environments that push Vigilante 8 ahead of the competition. The Twisted Metal series' levels were small, dark and blocky, whereas here the spaces are as wide open as the desert, as bright as the sun, and more fun than a disco ball that fires lasers.

While I have no qualms about given the 'V' spot to Vigilante 8, I have to give an honourable mention the brilliant Vib-Ribbon, a fantastically minimalist rhythm-action game that generates levels from any cd you put in your PlayStation. It's scratchy, chalk-board inspired art is wonderfully unique, and the whole games is loaded with idiosyncrasy and style.

Last one of these next time, as I try to find good entries for W, X, Y, and Z.

I hope to see you then!