At first, when we saw these shots, we were confused and even a little alarmed. Hadn't this game already come out in Japan, or had we hallucinated the entire thing? Was it pushed back over a year? What happened? Then we remembered that it's a Romance of the Three Kingdoms title, which is probably why the screenshots for the sequel look almost exactly like the screenshots from the first game for the DS. It all makes sense now.
After some in-depth study, we noticed brighter colors and some cleaner lines, but the differences are subtle. Verdict? If you enjoyed the first one (which was not released outside Japan), then the sequel is probably right up your alley. It does feature online play, which makes us a little jealous, considering we love online games.
The sequel is set to hit in Japan November 1, and you can check out the screenshots at Dengeki Online.
Who knew that a simple concept like the Shooting Watch, a controller that measures how many times you can tap a button in 10 seconds, would go on to sell over a million units? This year marks the 20th anniversary of the yellow device's debut, and to celebrate, the Hudson Caravan has been touring Japan, selling limited edition merchandise and hosting button-tapping contests. Takahashi Meijin's 16 presses per second set the pace.
Hudson manufactured a commemorative batch of 10,000 Shooting Watch systems earlier this year, but they were all sold almost immediately. Upset that he wasn't able to grab one, homebrew developer Retrohead created his own Shooting Watch game for the DS. Just like the real thing, it counts the number of times you can push the A button in ten seconds. If you're fast enough, the on-screen watermelon will explode!
Shooting Watch DS has four other diversions -- clock, stop watch, three slots, and four slots -- all of which are significantly less fun than the titular mode. Keep your thumb rigid and tap past the post break for screenshots of the homebrew game. We've also embedded videos of Takahashi Meijin using his button-pressing skills to blow up watermelons and battle beatboxers!
505 Games has announced their intentions to bring back the mama, as they get set to publish a sequel to Cooking Mama on both the DS and Wii next year.
The new game hopes to satisfy cooks that checked out the first game, offering up new recipes, minigames and more of that adorable mama herself. If you've got a friend that won't shut up about how expensive their kitchen cutlery is (and how great they are at using it), then take them on in a new head-to-head multiplayer mode.
Any aspiring cooks looking to take another go at this early next year?
The awesome (and yet disturbing) Kirby cake we showed you a few weeks ago inspired reader Ricky to send in his own bit of sugary birthday gaming goodness, and does it ever make our mouths water. His girlfriend put this together for a 20th birthday celebration that we wish had been ours -- and from the care that obviously went into this cake, Ricky's princess is probably not in another castle. We're certain he's found her. It's not just pretty on the outside, either; beneath the super-sweet recreation of a classic gaming screen lie layers of chocolate cake, strawberries, and chocolate mousse. Ricky reports that, while it hurt a little, deep inside, to munch on his beloved Mario, the cake was totally worth it. If only he'd sent us a piece.
Has someone put together a unique gift for your special day? Are you sitting atop a throne made of NES carts as you read this? Maybe you just own a particularly cool gaming shirt or two, or are proud of how your gaming set-up looks. If you have something you want to show off, snap some pics and send them over to us at showmeit at dsfanboy dot com. We'll take care of the rest.
In a 1up interview, Atari's Tavit Geudelekian described the level-sharing capabilities of the DS and PSP versions of N+: "the DS and PSP [versions] will support a full level editor that will allow players to build their own stages and share them locally via ad hoc connection or upload them through an infrastructure connection to a database of user-created levels online."
Unfortunately, because the DS lacks any kind of permanent storage, you'll only be able to download a few levels at a time, and they'll be lost when you turn the system off. We'd love to see the interface for designing levels, but none of the three new screens of the DS version highlight that feature.
N+ features a Pure mode, which is a direct port of the PC version, and a Plus mode, with new graphics and enemies. Also new to the handheld remakes: multiplayer, in both cooperative and competitive modes!
While we're pretty much of the mind that there is only one side-scrolling, running-and-gunning game you all should care about here at DS Fanboy, Lexicon Entertainment's recent announcement involving 07 Commando had us doubting ourselves for just a second. Then, we realized we don't live in the UK, breathed a sigh of relief and stared down at our hands, only to see all of our fingernails had been chewed into oblivion.
The game looks to take inspiration from Metal Slug, which is a very good thing. Taking up the role of Storm, you'll attempt to thwart the nefarious plans of the evil Rattlesnake organization. The final product is also said to include several touch-screen based minigames, should the mood strike you.
Look for 07 Commando to release in the UK in Q1 of 2008.
Posted Aug 9th 2007 12:20PM by JC Fletcher
Filed under: News
Everyone's favorite vintage anime show about a teenage boy driving the world's most expensive car is set to become a movie in May of 2008. A movie that features Lost's Matthew Fox as Racer X, opening the door to Party of Mach V jokes.
As often happens with movie licenses, the Wachowski brothers' latest effort is getting thrown onto game consoles. Speed Racer is planned for release on Wii, DS, and PS2 in May. The bad news is that licensed games are already shaky ground, and a licensed game based on an "updated" version of a popular cartoon is potentially noxious. The good news is that there is no way the DS version of Speed Racer, or any other version, will be the worst licensed racing game ever made, because that honor belongs to Hooters Road Trip in perpetuity.
There is a lot going on in this world, and throwing down with multiple characters at the same time is pretty much our exact idea of "wonderful." Certainly we like the art style, but it's the seeming challenge of controlling two characters with two distinct control schemes that has us peeking around for more word on a localization timeframe, because we're not ready to attempt that language barrier, despite how intrigued we are.
It's a Wonderful World is currently out in Japan, and hovering near the top of weekly sales charts.
For some reason, the iced tea in our glass tastes sweeter, the air seems crisper and we're in a wonderful mood. We wonder why that is? Oh, right, it's Thursday. That means we get to play some games with you all tonight! Awesome!
One of the best examples of the Mysterious Dungeon subgenre of roguelike RPGs appears to be on its way, one step per turn, to the US. Fushigi no Dungeon 2: Furai no Shiren (Mystery Dungeon 2: Shiren the Wanderer) was one of the few entries in Chunsoft's series that didn't carry a license-- it's actually numbered as a sequel to a Dragon Quest spinoff game, despite the total change in setting. It's been ported from the SNES to the DS, and was released in Japan in 1995. If, as Gamestop says, Sega is releasing it in February, it'll be the first American release for the game, which also recently came out on the Japanese Virtual Console.
The DS has some experience with the genre: Chunsoft is working on their second Pokemon Mystery Dungeon, and Izuna: Legend of the Unemployed Ninja is similar in gameplay. So if you've played those, you have an idea of what to expect. If you like random dungeons, unknown items, and permanent character death (and, really, who doesn't love permanent death), you'll probably enjoy Shiren the Wanderer. If you're a normal person, you'll probably cry a lot. Still not sure? Check out this exhaustive two-part writeup of the SNES version!
When it comes to your stylus of choice, do you prefer a regular-sized model, or something with a little more length? Does it depend on the game, or is the comfort and usability the same for you with any touchscreen-enabled title? If you prefer extendable, did you purchase your solution or simply rig something up?
The DS Life is a weekly feature in which we scour the known world for narrative images of Nintendo's handheld and handheld gamers. If you have a photo and a story to match it with, send both to thedslife at dsfanboy dot com.
Every July, over a million visitors flock to Osaka's Tenjin Matsuri, a thousand-year-old tradition and one of Japan's three biggest festivals. The city's streets are choked with wandering crowds, food vendors, and parading pageants; police officers struggle just to keep the flood of people in order. At the chaotic celebration's edges, though, quiet, romantic moments can still be found.
The homebrew browser OKiwi is a step closer to competing with the official DS browser and other homebrew offerings -- it can now go online! Which is a pretty important feature for a browser, no? And there's more good news to boot: creator Pedro J. Estébanez promises that now, updates should be more frequent. Considering the number of requests in the comments on this latest release, he's got his work cut out for him, but it looks like we're not the only ones excited by this project. Next up, we'll guess, is text box functionality, since search engines are a pretty big part of navigating the internet.
The rumor that Chibi-Robo: Park Patrol was cancelled is totally false. Well, mostly totally false. Gamespot contacted a Nintendo rep in order to verify the rumor, and got a surprising response.
"Chibi Robo: Park Patrol will launch October 2. The game, which features an adorable miniature robot who wants to clean up the environment, will be available exclusively at Wal-Mart stores nationwide."
We have to wonder why Nintendo has such little faith in one of their own first-party franchises that they're limiting its distribution so sharply. Sure, Wal-Mart is the second-largest game retailer in the US, but do you know who's bigger? All game retailers.
What's this? New video of a Nibris game? And it looks like somebody's really playing it? We're cautiously optimistic. Despite our skepticism, we can't deny the visual evidence of at least one level of their vertical shooter Raid Over the River. And we doubt that Nibris would stoop to faking gameplay for a demonstration. So that's two real-looking gameplay videos for this game.
Nibris's other hypothetical DS game, DoubleBloob, exists in a similar state of having some gameplay footage. The major update with Double Bloob is that it's no longer a total Pang clone, but also, alternately, a total Bust a Move/Puzzle Bobble clone. Which is apparently fine for casual games!
At first, when we saw these shots, we were confused and even a little alarmed. Hadn't this game already come out in Japan, or had we hallucinated the entire thing? Was it pushed back over a year? What happened? Then we remembered that it's a Romance of the Three Kingdoms title, which is probably why the screenshots for the sequel look almost exactly like the screenshots from the first game for the DS. It all makes sense now.
Who knew that a simple concept like the Shooting Watch, a controller that measures how many times you can tap a button in 10 seconds, would go on to sell over a million units? This year marks the 20th anniversary of the yellow device's debut, and to celebrate, the Hudson Caravan has been touring Japan, selling limited edition merchandise and hosting button-tapping contests. Takahashi Meijin's 16 presses per second set the pace.
505 Games has announced their intentions to bring back the mama, as they get set to publish a sequel to Cooking Mama on both the DS and Wii next year.
In a 1up interview, 
While we're pretty much of the mind that there is 
One of the best examples of the Mysterious Dungeon subgenre of roguelike RPGs appears to be on its way, one step per turn, to the US. Fushigi no Dungeon 2: Furai no Shiren (Mystery Dungeon 2: Shiren the Wanderer) was one of the few entries in Chunsoft's series that didn't carry a license-- it's actually numbered as a sequel to a Dragon Quest spinoff game, despite the total change in setting. It's been ported from the SNES to the DS, and was released in Japan in 1995. If, as Gamestop says, Sega is releasing it in February, it'll be the first American release for the game, which also recently came out on the Japanese Virtual Console.
When it comes to your stylus of choice, do you prefer a regular-sized model, or something with a little more length? Does it depend on the game, or is the comfort and usability the same for you with any touchscreen-enabled title? If you prefer extendable, did you purchase your solution or simply rig something up?
The rumor that 
