NDS Game Recommendations | mariteaux

[#] Geometry Wars: Galaxies (Vivendi, 2007)

Studying your many many shapes on the go.

Geometry Wars has had one of the strangest arcs to prominence in gaming history. It was once a simple hidden minigame in the old Xbox racer Project Gotham Racing 2, became hugely popular once Xbox Live Arcade got ahold of it, and now is still a semi-regular concern while its parent racer hasn't seen a new entry since 2009. Imagine you take Robotron and replace each of the robots with glowing vector-like shapes that move around the playfield in recognizably quirky ways, and now mob the player with hundreds of them. It's awe inspiring twin stick goodness, and thoroughly earns its subtitle of Retro Evolved.

Galaxies tries to inject a campaign into the experience with mixed results. Levels are separated into planets that introduce gravity wells, strange level layouts, and tinker with your lives and smartbomb counts. Defeating enemies gives you "geoms" that add to your multiplier (up to 150x) and act as currency for new planets. Each planet has three score goals, though this is either annoyingly difficult to manage on one life or boringly easy to blow past 50,000,000 on. You have a helper droid you can upgrade as well, but all told, none of it makes things all that much more addicting.

There is good news, however. Retro Evolved is included, and it is still the aggressively good time it was on the Wii and Xbox 360. It's well-built, with only a bit of slowdown at its absolutely most hectic. For this DS version, you can shoot with the touchscreen or face buttons, and while the latter is the obviously nicer choice, buyer beware on heavier DS models like my 3DS XL, because holding and manipulating both sides of the console at the same time gets downright painful. My advice? Stick this on a multicart or TWiLight Menu solely for the Retro Evolved mode, and then go play the Wii version with a Classic Controller instead.

[#] Madden NFL 2005 (Electronic Arts, 2004)

A strong, satisfying core of pigskin, but with little adornment.

It's blocky, the audio is minimal, the touch screen is barely used, but this DS launch title has kept me pretty well entertained over the past few weeks. Madden 2005 majorly benefits from EA's realization that the DS is very similar to a PS1 in capabilities—and they just so happened to have a PS1 engine for Madden still knocking around (2005 was the last edition released for it). This is effectively a port of that PS1 version, right down to the UI, sound effects, summaries after each play, and camera angles, and that was a very smart move given how nicely PS1 Madden had matured by the early 2000s.

It's really easy to dismiss at first glance, because Madden 2005 is visually and audibly not brilliant. The players are chunky and have little more than eyes peeking from their helmets, but their animations are pretty smooth, and there's even some nice little touches like different field surfaces and the chain measurements for debated first downs. Audio is understandably poor, with only a loop of Earshot's "Wait" remaining from the soundtrack for the menus and almost no game commentary outside of Al Michaels' occasional first down and point after comments. John himself only ever seems to chime in to tell us that a two yard loss is "what football's all about"!

While there's certainly a lot of nitpicks (no Mini Camp, no weather, no scrolling menus with the touch screen, though picking plays with it is very fun), the core of Madden is still here, and it's hella solid. The lack of load times on a cartridge mean you get into a flow of first downs and pass attempts really quickly, and I find the running game especially satisfying in this version. The AI is decent, even cheeky, running down the clock by delaying the game or kneeing for touchbacks, and there's a lot to customize for rosters, penalties, and injuries. I'm sure you can do better for on-the-go handegg now, but I still felt compelled to play through a season here. Just remember to turn off those constant instant replays.

[#] Peggle Dual Shot (PopCap Games, 2009)

The occasionally-frustrating addiction, now portable!

I had a friend in high school needle me for putting off playing the admittedly-excellent Bastion because I was too busy with Peggle. Brenden, firstly, I still think about that time you had me over with a bunch of people to smoke weed in your backyard and your dad threw that shit on the campfire we had going and it turned green and I passed out on your futon, that was fun. Second, I stand by my decision. Bastion is thrilling, great visual style, really memorable music and narration—and Peggle has once again claimed a half hour of my day, every day, especially now that, like all good addictions, Dual Shot puts it always within reach.

If you've seriously never played Peggle, you launch balls from the top of the playfield, aiming to clear the screen of orange pegs. Each stage is themed after one of the game's ten Masters, who lend you some kind of power (multiball, pinball flippers, automatic shots) to aid in clearing the level. It sounds simple, but it's the doinky physics, as you make bank shots to clear one hard to reach peg, and the sounds and how quick it all goes that it becomes habit-forming. With this port, I had my reservations about some initial visual choppiness, but aiming with the touch screen is ace, and the charm of the cast and quirky music is still very much here.

Peggle: Dual Shot isn't just a cute play on the DS' name. You're actually getting two campaigns here, the original Peggle and sequel Nights, along with the PC's challenge levels and some new ones. In addition, the score bonus purple pegs have been given a new benefit, that of a satisfying underground bonus level which can award you extra balls (and yes, everything helps when the levels get tough, so use them). About my only complaint with Dual Shot is that Nights is gated behind completing the original's campaign, so that one fucking puzzle at the end can lock you out of half the content. That oversight aside, this could just be all the Peggle you need.