The end comes quickly. White fire screams out of the night, raining destruction down from the heavens. The populace is thrown into chaos, helpless to stop the assault. Five minutes pass. When the dust settles, the world is quiet. The only sound comes from a distance: a single anguished scream as one angry word flashes across the sky.
That white fire? Call it Meteos, colorful symbols constantly plummeting towards the planet. The populace? Over thirty different alien races, each with its own unique world. And those five minutes? That, uh, isn't really a storyline element. No, it's a reflection of my skill, which typically dooms a planet to utter annihilation in the time it takes those poor aliens to start freaking out and hiding under tables.
Welcome to Gaming to Go, a shiny new feature devoted to the games best suited for our increasingly busy lifestyles. Only have a few minutes to spare on your daily commute? Bored with thinking deep thoughts whenever you're on the toilet? Read on to hear why one of the DS's oldest titles is still one of the best to spend your precious scant time with.
eBay seller putermcgee's batch of DS games really isn't that different from other used DS games up for sale. The current bids are commensurate with other auctions for the same games, even. But these launch-era DS games are somewhat rarer (and more awesome) because they're all promo copies.
How much would you pay for a copy of Pac-Pix or Meteos that was once used as a store demo? Because right now they're at $7.50 and $3.25 respectively. Kirby Canvas Curse and Nintendogs (with special Bark Mode gifts!) are at similar prices, as is a European version of WarioWare: Touched! These are the best kind of collectibles: cheap and not ridiculously impractical.
Gamers like download play. Hardly a shocking statement. But it seems that of all of the DS' amenities, the ability to share your games with nearby friends gets less attention than, maybe, it should.
Aeropause's George Walker discovered this while in line for the Transformers movie (the new one, not the good one), when he broke out his DS to ameliorate his 2+ hour wait and found himself accosted by kids begging for some downloadable games. He suggested some Meteos, they agreed, and an impromptu fun-having event occurred.
What can we learn from this event? First off, that Meteos is pretty great. We can also take away the notion that people like it when you can give them free games-- so much so, that they may even elect to play those free games with you. Try it next time you're in line for hours! Which we hope isn't soon. That sounds tortuous, even with a DS.
All week, we've been sharing our favorite games with you, as well as snippets of our personalities outside the fanboy sphere. Now you know that some of us weren't really huge handheld fans before the DS, that at least one of us is terribly silly, and most of us seem to dig cats, in some way or another. But forget the trivial details -- how do our favorite games stack up against the critical darlings? We offer this side-by-side comparison to wrap up Fanboy Favorites week, and we hope you've enjoyed this closer look at not only the DS Fanboy staff, but some of the best that the DS has to offer.
All this week, the DS Fanboy staff is letting you in on a few of their favorite titles. Each day, a different member of the staff will present their personal top five DS games along with a snapshot of their gaming paraphernalia and habits, in an effort to provide our readers with a little more information on the tastes and personalities of our writers.
As the lead blogger of PSP Fanboy, one might be questioning why I'm here. It's true: I love my PSP and take it everywhere (except the shower). But that doesn't mean I can't enjoy Nintendo's handheld. I've grown up with Nintendo handhelds, owning every iteration of the Game Boy ever. My stash of Nintendo valuables would make any Nintendork jealous. Now that I'm older and spending less time arguing in message boards, I've learned that true gaming bliss comes from having access to all the games I can get. Hopefully, you feel the same way too.
So please, take my "top five" list as an olive branch to end the bickering between the two Fanboy sites.
All this week, the DS Fanboy staff is letting you in on a few of their favorite titles. Each day, a different member of the staff will present their personal top five DS games, along with a snapshot of their gaming paraphernalia and habits, in an effort to provide our readers with a little more information on the tastes and personalities of our writers.
I am absolutely the target market for a handheld system. I'm busy all the time, and I have weeks where the only times I really get to play games are when I can't possibly do anything else-- like when I'm on a plane, or waiting to pick my wife up from school. So I tend to carry my DS around waiting for opportune moments. Of course, with such concentrated play sessions, I want the most out of my game time. That's not to say that I want simplified games that I can always jump right into, but I need games that are basically going to be awesome every time I play them. I need games that are going to reaffirm my passion for gaming while I'm waiting for a bus.
(The picture doesn't have anything to do with the theme of my little essay. My cat Indiana Jones is just adorable.)
All this week, the DS Fanboy staff is letting you in on a few of their favorite titles. Each day, a different member of the staff will present their personal top five DS games along with a snapshot of their gaming paraphernalia and habits, in an effort to provide our readers with a little more information on the tastes and personalities of our writers.
I own a total of 19 DS games. Yes, just 19 games. I've never been too crazy about handheld systems, mostly because I'm the type of gamer that enjoys the escape of playing something more immersive, like console games. That's not to say the DS isn't capable of presenting games that allow me to escape, even some of which are in my collection, but gaming lends itself a bit more to pick-up-and-play, quicker gaming sessions on a handheld when compared with a console.
With that in mind, let me show you my top five DS games.
If you are the kind of person who might have a few euros in your pocket, then you might want to break out a calendar and that special red pen, because the latest list of upcoming DS releases is full of stars. Even better? The next two months are pretty packed. Makes up for a few of those lackluster weeks, eh?
Hit the jump if you wish to grok the list in fullness, and remember, this is by no means complete. Do we need to mention also that it's subject to change? In fact, since it's a European list, we're pretty sure it will change, and probably often.
If you were concerned about having to love the new Disney version of Meteos because you're a huge Q Entertainment/Tetsuya Mizuguchi fanboy, well, now you can take a second, more critical look at it. As it turns out, Q outsourced their game to two companies: Platinum Egg, who did a Harvest Moon puzzle game, and Aspect Digital Entertainment, who are professional game ghostwriters, like Tose. This fact may be obvious from the title screen, but we hadn't seen any investigation about it until today.
This is news only because it's about Q-- this kind of thing happens all the time, but we thought that Mizuguchi's studio was kind of a "boutique" operation that only worked on games they wanted to. Why, then, would they take on a project that interested them little enough to outsource it? Oh, right.
For U.S. gamers, nothing new released for our favorite handheld this week, leaving us all in a state of despair and wanting. For those of you outside the U.S., you guys get a couple of different games to choose from. And, what with it being Friday and all, we've got to ask: what are you playing? How will you be spending your weekend, what games will you be playing?
Our DS Lite sits at the ready, as we plan on venturing out into the real world (keeping our eye out for bears, of course) to acquire our puzzle fix. If we can't find it at retail (supposedly it's kind of scarce), we'll undoubtedly have to order the title online and will spend our weekend cuddled up with our Wii. We supposed, either way, we win ...
We're puzzle junkies. Yes, we love the genre and are always keeping our eyes out for new and interesting puzzle games. Tetris, Puzzle Fighter and Lumines are some of our most favorite games of all time. That's how even with the Disney theme stamped all over this title, we're still interested in Meteos: Disney Magic. Sure, we kept a realistic head about us and kept thinking of how it wouldn't be better than its predecessor. But then they changed how the game would be played and we became interested again. Then we forgot about it for a bit, but Mizuguchi's interview came and our interest was renewed yet again.
Now, the game has released and although many of the reviewing outlets haven't made their determination on the game's worth, we wanted to start this topic in the hopes that anyone who has gotten their hands on the game would speak up and let us know how it compares to the original. So, without further delay:
IGN (80/100) says the game improves on the original: "Meteos: Disney Magic does a really good job moving the design forward. Now let's bring back the alien worlds and take this sucker online."
Nintendo Power (75/100) sees the experience as being improved also: "Meteos: Disney Magic does more than provide a Mouseketeer-friendly facelift to one of the DS's best puzzle games; thanks to the ability to move blocks horizontally, the sequel has a thoroughly different dynamic than the original block launcher." [Apr 2007, p.85]
This brisk Gamevideos interview with Rez, Space Channel 5, Lumines, and now Meteos: Disney Magic creator Tetsuya Mizuguchi is perfect for you if:
You're a huge Miz fanboy, and want to bask in his calm awesomeness
You don't know how Meteos works, or
You want to see some really great close-up videos of the new version in action
Mizuguchi discusses basic Meteos gameplay, the Brain Age/"hot dog" style orientation used in the Disney edition, and his own Disney love with an interviewer who doesn't seem to have ever heard of him and may not actually be that interested. At least she keeps her composure, which we would not be able to do, at all. Seriously, we love love love Mizuguchi and his work at Sega, UGA, and Q? Entertainment. The video is after the post break.
[Via GoNintendo]
A lot of gaming goodness is about to be unleashed this week -- if we had to name this week for releases, we'd go with something clever, like Simbacube: Legend of the Unemployed-OMG Sim City DS in Japan!
How's that for a name? Bit of a mouthful, but it's accurate. While we're struggling to decide where to spend cash this week, we'll surely have new Sim City DS info to tide us over, and that always makes for a good time.
It's been well documented here at DS Fanboy how much we absolutely love Meteos, as well as puzzle games in general. When the announcement hit that there would be a Disney-themed edition of the game, we almost literally blew up with excitement. Regardless of the Disney theme, more Meteos was just what the doctor ordered for our bad case of needing to solve puzzles. IGN recently got their hands on an early build of the game and there has been a few changes to the already-beloved experience, causing us to wonder if this updated dose of Meteos is going to cure our ailment.
First of all, the DS now needs to be held like a book as if the player is playing Brain Age. Supposedly, this is to maximize visual space, but we'd be lying if we said the change was something we supported. Another change is that now on Easy and Medium difficulty, you can move blocks horizontally, as long as they're surrounded by at least one block on its left and right. We're anxious to get our hands on the final product, but for now we're choosing to remain skeptical. How about you, anxious or angry?
Turns out Q Entertainment has plans to take the near-perfect gameplay of one of DS Fanboy's best DS games, Meteos, and bring it online. The only problem is that this new and improved formula of Meteos is currently set to grace the PC and not the DS.
This is when the person listening to all of this would ask why this is being posted to DS Fanboy, a one-stop-shop for all the DS news big or small and the only reliable place on the inter tubes for such factual information as well as objective, intellectual views on said information. We'd then call this person Timmy and ask that they kindly shut their mouth, unless they wanted us to shut it for them. Permanently.
No, we bring this up because we know you're as passionate about the puzzling action of Meteos as we are and would love to see the game be available for play over Wi-Fi. That's why we call on you, fanboys and fangirls, asking that you make this desire known to one and all by sending electronic mails to the game's support address of support-meteosonline [at] qentertainment [dot] com. Together we can make it happen.
eBay seller putermcgee's batch of DS games really isn't that different from other used DS games up for sale. The current bids are commensurate with other auctions for the same games, even. But these launch-era DS games are somewhat rarer (and more awesome) because they're all promo copies.
Gamers like download play. Hardly a shocking statement. But it seems that of all of the DS' amenities, the ability to share your games with nearby friends gets less attention than, maybe, it should.
If you are the kind of person who might have a few euros in your pocket, then you might want to break out a calendar and that special red pen, because the latest list of upcoming DS releases is full of stars. Even better? The next two months are pretty packed. Makes up for a few of those 
If you were concerned about having to love the new Disney version of 
For U.S. gamers, nothing new 
We're puzzle junkies. Yes, we love the genre and are always keeping our eyes out for new and interesting puzzle games. Tetris, Puzzle Fighter and Lumines are some of our most favorite games of all time. That's how even with the Disney theme stamped all over this title, we're still interested in Meteos: Disney Magic. Sure, we kept a realistic head about us and kept thinking of how it wouldn't be better than its predecessor. But then they changed how the game would be 
This brisk Gamevideos interview with Rez, Space Channel 5, Lumines, and now 
A lot of gaming goodness is about to be unleashed this week -- if we had to name this week for releases, we'd go with something clever, like 
It's been well 
_thumbnail.jpg "Prince of Persia: The Fallen King")
