Here’s the thing: I HATE fishing. I hate the sitting on a pontoon for hours hoping to catch an animal only to have the hook enter the poor thing in some hideous way other than the mouth and then having to kill, clean and gut it. Or worse, the fish is too small and because the hooks went through the girls or eyes or some such, it has to be killed anyway; just not for food.

However there is something Zen about being in the middle of a lake or river, communing with nature and allowing yourself to be free of society and modern technology. This is probably the reason I have always loved the River King franchise. It’s one of the few video games that teaches patience and you don’t have to feel bad when that perch or sunfish dies a terrible agonizing death. YAY VIDEO GAMES.

This is the fifth game in the River King series to hit US shores and the fourth on a portable system. It’s also the first on the Nintendo DS, so I was quite eager to try the game with the touch pad and stylus controls. With the River King franchise skipping the GBA generation of handhelds in the US, this is Natsume’s first portable River King in seven years. Does the latest entry into the series do it justice, or were we better off with a big thick battery guzzling old school Game Boy?

Let’s Review

1. Story

Hello there nameless mute protagonist! Welcome back from 9 bit and 16 bit RPG’s. It’s now2008, but we missed you!

As the main character you return home one morning to find your little sister Yunna has fallen asleep and is unable to awaken. Your oder friend Sasara, who is a biologist believes Yunna has fallen under a magical curse that can only be broken by a scale from the River King itself. The River King is basically the spirit of fresh water fish. As your main character loves fishing, he sets out on a journey to hook and reel in the River King, and so save his sister.

That’s the whole story in a nutshell. There really isn’t a lot of plot to the game. You just fish, buy new stuff, and fish again until you unlock something that lets you advance to a new area and repeat until after many, many long grueling hours, you catch the River King. Through your travels you’ll meet a lot of new characters and even befriend some monster babies you’ll adopt as your pets. None of them are truly fleshed out to the detail you would expect from a 40+ hour game, but they are charming nonetheless.

If you’re looking for something like Harvest Moon which balances story with simulation, you won’t find it here. 85 percent plus of Mystic Valley is fishing. Flat out nothing but fishing. It’s why this particular River King is classified as a sports title rather than a simulation.

The plot is very shallow and almost an after thought, but the character do have their charms and you’ll grow attached to them far quicker than you imagined you could.

Story Rating: Mediocre

2. Graphics

Obviously there is huge improvement in the graphics when you compare River King Mystic Valley to its Game Boy and Game Boy Colour predecessors. However when compared to other DS titles, this latest River King doesn’t hod up as well.

The character designs are nice and the outworld graphics are decent. The water effects are some of the better that I’ve seen on the DS, but I’ve still seen better (Pokemon D/P for example)..

Where the game really falls apart visually is in the actual fishing graphics. Your top screen shows your character with his pole in the lake and your stamina and line tension gauges. The bottom is a poorly rendered showing of a blob of a fish in some pretty nondescript water. In fact the water doesn’t even look like water. It’s more a blue background that occasionally ripples. I was really disappointed in this as the actual visuals of the fish themselves should have been a huge selling point of the game. Instead it looks like they were ripped out of a Sega Genesis fishing game.

I do think the character designs are very cute, even if your monster babies look like Schmoo from the Herculoids and they grow up to be furries. I loved the forests and waterfalls and all the terrains. It’s just too bad the ugliest part of the game is also the majority of the game.

Graphics Rating: Mediocre

3. Sound

Sound is a bit tricky, because there’s very little noise in the game. In fact, most of the game is eerily silent. The only real music you get is in your house or the game’s title screen. Everything else is pretty silent save for the occasional sound effects, and even those depend on what part of the map you are in. The mountain stream for example sounds exactly like a bubbling brook with a waterfall beside it. It’s quite uncanny. It’s just that that is the ONLY sound you get except for when you meet Ayaha. The quiet fits the fishing nature of the game, but it can be unsettling at times. Especially during the fishing itself where you’re sitting and waiting for a bite. It’s even worse when you are fishing because all you here is the never ending sound of your line being reeled in.

The lack of sound is realistic, but also quite boring. At least the rare bits of music are very well done and quite serene. I really wish the game showed off its score more frequently. Instead you’re stuck with little to no noise save for your line being brought back to shore with a wriggly fish in tow for the majority of the game.

Sound Rating: Mediocre

4. Control and Gameplay

For the most part controls are pretty solid, but there are a few issues that can break the game for the more detail oriented gamer.
The fishing gameplay is pretty simple, and yet it mimics real fishing quite well. You pick your type of rod and either bait, lure, or fly (depending on your rod) and you cast it into the water. Once a fish bites, you press A and you go into battle with the fish! Well, not a battle like you’d see in a RPG or Street Fighter, but it’s man vs. fish nonetheless.

Once you’ve locked in a fish, you take your stylus and make small clockwise circles. Each one brings you a step closer to landing the fish. The fish will struggle and try to break free however, so watch your tension gauge. If it fills up, the fish will break free. In order to empty the bar, you are SUPPOSED to click in the lower right hand part of the screen, but the actual position you are supposed to click in never seems to stay put; either from fish to fish, or even each time you empty the gauge on the same fish. This can be very frustrating as you peck all over the screen trying to fins where the spot is now. Meanwhile the fish is undoing all your reeling in by swimming away. It would have been nice if Marvelous including a specific spot to do this on the screen saying “Tap here.” Instead each time you fish is a game of guess and check once the bar fills up.

When a fish tries to run with your line, you are supposed to tap the opposite side of the screen from where it is running to pull it back in. You can also press the D pad, which actually works much better. IN fact, you can just hold the D pad down and it will work far more efficiently.

When you land a fish you earn points that can be traded it for new items, food, or fishing equipment. The fish you catch can be kept in your basket until you get enough of one type of fish to trade in your fish cards. Fish Cards can then be kept just to have for a collection, or you can trade them in for more points. Personally I keep the cards just to have them. You can also feed the fish to your pet. Each fish fills up their XP bar, although the amount it fills depends on how much the pet likes that particular type of fish. When the XP bar is filled, the pet evolves into a new form and it’s special ability increases. There are a number of pets to earn, each with their own abilities.

There is one other issue I have with the controls. The game really REALLY does not want you to position your character diagonally when you cast your line. I’m not sure why, but it is exceptionally hard to get your character into a diagonal position. As many times, this can be to your advantage instead of straight vertical or horizontal casting, you will find yourself frustrated by this limitation.

For the most part, the gameplay of Mystic Valley is solid and fun, but there is certainly room for improvement. Not a bad first try on the DS though.

Control and Gameplay Rating: Good

5. Replayability

Here’s the thing. River King: Mystic Valley is a long game and it is exceptionally linear. You do a lot of work for little to no reward. It takes some time to evolve your pet, or to move on to the next phase of the story or even to raise your fishing rank. In fact, with fishing rank, you never know when it is going to go up, or why. It just happens. If there was some sort of clue, like an XP gauge, it would be easier. Instead, you just raise rank for no fathomable reason.

Because the game is so long, advancements are nebulous at best, and the only thing that will change on your next playthrough is what fish you catch or what order you buy items in, the game really is a one time play title. Of course, most playthroughs of Mystic Valley will be at least 40 hours long, and even that is low-baling it. With that one playthrough though, you’ll find yourself playing the game quite a bit in order to get cards, gain new pets, or make new friends. It’s a lot of fun, especially with the wi-fi enabled fishing tournaments, but there is absolutely no reason to ever start a second game. Just keep your first character and all your earned items and cards.

There’s a lot of replay value in your one game, but you’d have to be an idiot to start from scratch a second or third time, especially with all the features you’ll lose because of it.

Replayability Rating: Mediocre

6. Balance

River King: Mystic Valley is an incredibly well-balanced game. Each type of fish has their own strengths and weaknesses, as well as their own likes and dislikes for bait. Each of your pets also has their own fish preferences, and no one pet is truly better than another. Tenuki and Tengu help you reach new locations, while Kyubi can refresh your stamina and also helps you catch fish. The first two are the best for advancing the plot or discovering new fish, but for all out fish catching, your fox girl is your best bet.

There are no severe challenges in the game, but advancement is due to luck. You might have the correct rod and bait, and you might be in the right location for the fish you are trying to get, but that doesn’t mean it will bite your hook. You might get a totally different fish altogether, or none at all. Patience and acceptance are the two key factors to succeed at River King since it goes so incredibly slow.

Gamers who can accept both a slow grind and reward scheme will fins an exceptionally made game guaranteed to test you, if not challenge you.

Balance Rating: Unparalelled

7. Originality

Although this is the fifth game in the US, there are over a dozen River King games; even more if you count the salt water (RK is a fresh water series) spin offs that have yet to hit US shores. The only real new things here are the pets (and even that is a gimmick at best) and the new touch screen based controls. I love the new controls save for the occasional detection issue they have, and it makes Mystic Valley the best of the series gameplay wise so far.

Still, the game is like most Natsume titles: a nearly complete and utter rehash squeezing blood from a stone where a face lift could do the series wonders.

Originality Rating: Bad

8. Addictiveness

I had a lot of fun with this game. Whether it was advancing the plot, or catching enough of a particular fish to get a card, I was playing the games for hours at a time. I love the River King series and this is by far the best portable version yet to hit North America. It’s a very simple game in terms of story and gameplay, but that simplicity is what made it so much fun. You don’t have to have extreme hand-eye coordination like you do for bullet hell or joystick mastery like King of Fighters. River King: Mystic Valley is just a wonderful little fishing game where you can enjoy the plot and also drift off as you wait for a bite on your line. Very relaxing and enjoyable game.

Addictiveness Rating: Great

9. Appeal Factor

River King is a truly niche genre. Fishing games on their own are never huge sellers or very popular with mainstream gamers. Heck, besides this series, I think the only other fishing game I remotely enjoyed was Sega Marine Fishing. It’s just not something that transfers well to video games. Marvelous has done a wonderful job by including a fantasy story with your fishing gameplay and weaved it together into a great combination.

The problem still remains getting gamers to try this, much less make them aware the series exists. Fishing combined with Harvest Moon does not equal the type of game most US gamers would want to purchase. More’s the pity, as Mystic Valley is a solid game.

The vast majority of gamers will run from this as if it was the plague. Those of you who like indie games, obscure titles or innovative gameplay will find this title quite enjoyable indeed. I just wish there were more of you out there as it is a bitch trying to find someone to play against online.

Appeal Factor: Bad

10. Miscellaneous

I really had a lot of fun with this game despite its shortcomings. I really haven’t been a fan of the DS, finding the system exceptionally lackluster compares to the GB, GBC and GBA. That said, Mystic Valley is only title in my in my DS collection that doesn’t feature Pokemon or Bub N’ Bob. Everything else gets traded it or I give to another staff member. This should speak volumes to the quality of the title, even if the graphics are a little shabby and the music is only in the rarest of instances.

The game is solid, addicting, and offers some of the best touch screen based controls I’ve played on the system so far. There may not be a lot of extras, but the fishing tournament mode and the card collecting adds a lot of depth to the game, and the characters are very cute. Other Natsume fans can keep their Harvest Moon. Make mine River King

Miscellaneous Rating: Good

The Scores
Story: Mediocre
Graphics: Mediocre
Sound: Mediocre
Control and Gameplay: Good
Replayability: Mediocre
Balance: Unparalelled
Originality: Bad
Addictiveness: Great
Appeal Factor: Bad
Miscellaneous: Good
FINAL SCORE: ABOVE AVERAGE

Short Attention Span Summary

If you’re looking for something oft-kilter and relaxing, River King: Mystic valley just might be up your alley. It’s a fun game to play and it’s great for all ages. You might have issue with the outdated visuals and the lack of music for most of the game, but I hate fishing and I really liked this game, so if you find it, it’s definitely worth trying or renting, if not an instant purchase.

Insecticide
Publisher: Gamecock
Developer: Crackpot Games
Genre: Adventure/Action Platformer
Release Date: March 11, 2008 (more…)

I have to admit, I’ve yet to play a quality Tactical RPG on the DS. The last one I had the misfortune to review was nearly a year ago in Hoshigami: Running Blue Remix. What a stinker that was. So when I heard about Rondo of Swords (Rondo is a musical term that which generally means that the comes back to the original motif. For example the original Rondo period of the Baroque time was ABACADA. See how it comes back to A each time? Congrats, you’ve just learned something new and wacky when you’re supposed to be learning about video games), I was pretty excited. Atlus has a pretty solid track record for publishing quality Tactical RPG’s in the US. Without them we wouldn’t have received the Shining Force remake, nor Disgaea

What also excited me was that the game promised a completely new way of doing tactical RPG’s. The grid system still remains, which is a staple of the genre, but instead of going up to a person and then attacking, or attacking then moving, you character can attack multiple opponents and get allied support by moving through already occupied squares. Now truthfully, anyone with even the slightest knowledge of hand to hand combat can tell you that this would get you killed pretty quickly in real life. Moving through enemy occupied spaces like this also tends to get you heavily penalized in table top RPG’s, as well as some video game RPGs like Dungeons and Dragons Tactics. But so what, right? It’s a video game filled with beat people and magical powers. I think if we can accept a new form of gameplay for a genre that hasn’t really had any significant changes occur to it in a long time.

So does Rondo of Swords give this genre a much needed boost of innovation, or does the DS continue it’s track record of only having poor to mediocre tactical RPG’s?

Let’s Review

1. Story

Generally the story is an important part of an RPG, if not THE most. When you play a game for 40 or so hours, you want some pretty defined characters. You want a solid engrossing story that is almost as long as the gameplay itself.

Well, you won’t find it here in Rondo of Swords 85-90% of the game is just battles. I mean that. JUST battles. You learn what is going on through the magic of SCROLLING TEXT between battles. Occasionally when you have new dialogue it is basically like this:

Character 1: Oh look. Time for another battle.

Character 2: Indeed

Yes, occasionally there is more story than that, but even then none of the characters truly make it up to even two-dimensional RPG characters. A lot of new characters join your team simply because you run into them or you open a door and out they pop. They get maybe 2-3 lines of dialogue and that’s it until a “major” cut scene in the game. This is really really bad.

It’s a shame too, because the game started off so well with a nice political assassination story mixed with a Tale of Two Cities but then for half the game or so, the game makes only a few glancing references to why the war is occurring or even why your side are the good guys.

Here’s the same, I understand that the game is battle heavy. I also understand the lack of towns or exploration. It’s been done before with Shining Force CD but you know what? That was three complete RPGs in and of themselves that also included a lot of characterization and depth. Story was still a major factor in the game and every little piece of cannon fodder was defined and received story lines for the rest of the game. Rondo of Swords is basically a tactical RPG for people that don’t want plot, but instead want to just have fantasy characters killing each other without much motivation. There is such little depth or personality to any character in the game that you sometimes find yourself not remembering their name and just refer to them as “Healer1″ or “Real awesome guy on a horse that seems to one shot kill things” or even “Real powerful guy that moves way too slow to be useful.”

So here’s what you get for a story: Serdic is the prince of Bretwalde, but the Grand Meir empire attacks and kills Serdic. Bretwalde military commanders Margus and Kay abscond with Serdic in hopes of returning someday to reclaim the kingdom. But wait! Didn’t I just say Serdic is dead? He is. Kay and Margus actually flee with Serdic’s body double, a person who only the prince himself knew about, and he’s dead. So you have someone who is not the prince pretending to be the price as it was the prince’s last command, and yet none of his most trusted followers or even the prince’s own sister realizes it is not really him, even when he asks questions about the most basic knowledge that even the most lowly serf of the land would know. Yes, they eventually find out, but by the time you do, you have to wonder how this combined team of anti-Einsteins can so much as retake a sandcastle, much less a kingdom.

Storywise, this is honestly one of the worst RPG’s I have ever played – IN ANY FORM. Final Fantasy XII had both better stories and characters than this, and that development team admitted they just threw crap at a wall and saw what stuck. Motivation isn’t there. Character development isn’t there. I don’t want to hear the reason for the next battle from a paragraph of scrolling text. I want to see unfold with characterization and dialogue. If you are looking for story of any worth, stay the hell away from Rondo of Swords

Oh hey! I forgot to mention the fact the title is absolutely stupid and there is no actual reference to a musical Rondo in the game. It’s also doesn’t work contextually as a “return to the beginning” because the game tries totally new things gameplay wise rather then RETURNING TO THE SAME OLD THING. Congradulations Rondo of Swords, you win the award for stupidest game name so far of 2008!

Story Rating: Worthless

2. Graphics

Rondo of Swords is a decent looking game. Yes, all the character designs are fairly generic looking but they carry over into chibi battle form pretty well. The characters also look quite nice when they are racing across my across my screen in the battle cut scenes. The backgrounds and action sequences in the action graphics are well rendered and quite pretty. You will find yourself skipping over a lot of them by the time the tenth battle or so rolls around because you’ve seen it all before, but they’re still decently done.
I am annoyed at how bloody text based the game is. When you send your characters out on missions, you get a simple line of text and then an item or two. There’s no visuals for the mission or an indepth report, just a boring line of text and an item. Ugh.

There are far better looking RPG’s out there on the DS, from Pokemon to Magical Starshine, but Rondo of Swords has pleasing enough visuals to keep you entertain while committing battlefield massacres.

Graphics Rating: Above Average

3. Sound

There is a lot of music in Rondo of Swords It’s pretty much the same half dozen tracks repeated throughout the game until you’ve beaten it. The music isn’t bad, in fact the few songs they have set a nice mood for the game, it’s just there’s so little variety, it gets stale fast.

Voice acting is decent for a DS game. You only hear characters speak when they attack or die, but aside from the fact Sedric and Marie have utterly different accents from each other despite being “brother” and sister, all the characters sound decent enough.

Sound effects, like musical tracks, are sparse and repetitive, but well done. I wish the horses made noises though. That’s always a bit odd when they don’t.

Again, everything here is enjoyable, but there is such a sparsity to it that you get bored with the lack of variety in it all.

Sound Rating: Above Average

4. Control and Gameplay

And we’re back to bitching. This game had so much potential. For everything this game does RIGHT, it gets 2-3 things so horribly wrong, one had to wonder where the common sense amongst the development team ran off to.

I love the core idea of the gameplay. The fact that each character has a certain amount of squares on the grid they can move. If they pass through an ally, they get ally benefits. If they pass through an opponent, they get to attack. If the enemy counterattacks (which is rare), then your character’s movement is stopped and they are stuck where they are. It’s a completely new way to do tactically gaming, and it’s a lot of fun.

The problem is, they get basically everything else possible horribly wrong.

First up is the fact that character movement rates are wildly unbalanced. It makes perfect sense that a man on a horse has the fastest movement. But when the man on the horse is also one of the best attackers in the game, can heal himself completely when he levels up and is fast enough to pick someone off and return back to the other character who can then move through him and heal themselves? Well that’s a bit whacked out. Same too with the characters who are slow and have no attack or defensive skills to balance themselves out. It’s a straight up matter of reall poor design of characters that we will see even more of in balance.
Second, when a character is knocked out of a battle they receive the “Hurt” Status. Now, one would think that a hurt character would not be allowed to battle and could instead run one of the multiple side missions in the game. You would be wrong. The only option you can do with a hurt character is leave them on the bench…or send them into battle. This is one of the stupidest things I encountered in the game and there is such a lack of common sense here, I beg of someone at Success to explain why they think it was a better idea to throw a wounded combatant back into battle instead of say shopping or training. Oy.

Speaking of side missions, they are all absolute crap. You have a myriad of options, but as you don’t get to see anything actually happen with these missions, they are all kind of a gyp. You can send characters on quests, but it’s back to that one line of dialogue and an item as your reward. Goody. You can train your characters to get slightly better stats in one of three areas, or you can specialize in one particular area for a larger bonus. However, as your character gets next to no experience points for doing this, it’s again fundamentally worthless to do this unless your team is totally full. You can take characters on a quest to class change if you have them at a hgh enough level, but the game doesn’t tell you what items you need until you try to promote them, and then you need multiple items to do so. Because items are random in the game as quest rewards, you could have a character ready to class change but not get the chance until multiple battles later when you finaly have the right items or enough of the right items. Extra lame.

Finally, there is shopping. Shopping in Rondo of Swords has to be the stupidest form of item buying/selling I have ever seen in a role playing game. You see, it’s all completely random. You pick a character to go shopping and you get a very vague idea of what the character is going to buy. After the battle they come back with items that may or may not be something you can use. Seriously, who the hell even remotely thought this was a good idea. “Oh good, I sent you in with a ton of money as we have a boss fight next and you’ve come back with a ton of items that would have been helpful to us at level 1, not level 40! Thanks you douche!”

Okay, let’s go take a look at the other good thing this game does before we go into the rest of what’s so god awful about this game.

You can move any of your characters in any order you want. There is no moving characters base on speed or agility. This allows you to move Sedric and Kay first and ensure one is in front of the other, and then run your injured characters through both of them, hopefully restoring everyone to full health. Yay. That’s it Now back to being mean.

Okay, according to the manual, your characters should get allied bonuses every time you run through someone. This is in fact a complete lie, and sometimes character bonuses don’t work at all. This is especially vexing with the HEALING powers.

Another huge problem is that you have to take all your action at once. Let’s look at the archer. You can move him and then attack, but you can’t attack and then move him. He is the only character where fighting and movement are two separate actions. Yet if you say, move your cursor off the archer to see what is in range, oops! You lose your attacking turn. Of course, the game also lacks the ability to take a movement back which is something most other SRPG’s have. Well, you can take the movement back by RESTARTING the entire battle, but that tends to be a bit f overkill, don’t you think?

Finally there is magic. Magic users are arguably the worst troop in the entire game. 99% of the time they die from a single hit, physical OR magical. They have the lowest movement points out of any class, and they can either cast or move, but not both. Considering that this means you have to move a mage into where they can be attacked before they cast a spell, it makes the characters fundamentally worthless unless you hang back and wait for those rare occasions where the enemy is stupid enough to come to you. Thankfully this same level of uselessness occurs with enemy mages as well. The tenth battle or so saw me in a town full of nothing but magic users. Using my archer and calvary, I picked off the entire army with just those two character. Oh and occasionally some healing magic from Marie. Again, simply awful.

I loved the attack style in this game. I really truly did. The problem is that this one piece of greatness is overshadowed by some of the biggest mistakes and worst gameplay decisions every made in the history of this genre. It’s not Hoshigami bad, but it’s pretty darn close.

Control and Gameplay Rating: Dreadful

5. Replayability

There are a few hidden stages, and there are a lot of hidden characters that you can have join your team if the right character talks to them or you perform the right action. There’s also a lot of customization in your characters because you are given 2 skill points per level you increase. You can spend these points on various skills, mixing and matching your characters in many different ways. Each skills is useful in various ways, but obviously the healing skills come first.

Because there are so many troops (even though a good portion of them are worthless) and a great deal of skills for each character to choose from, there is a lot of replay value in Rondo of Swords, even if the game’s huge flaws discourage many from beaten the game once, much less several times.

Replayability Rating: Mediocre

6. Balance

First off, I can’t believe there are people that even remotely consider this game hard. This is one of the easiest tactical RPG’s I have ever played. Unless you are running in guns blazing without taking into account terrain affects or looking at your enemies movement points and range, you should not be losing more than a single warrior per battle.

This is mainly due to how insanely unbalanced characters are. Explain to me how the mage who has no armour or bulky weapons is the slowest class in the game? Last I checked an Olympic runner with plate mail on is going to be slower than an average guy without only pants and a shirt on. Don’t believe Pit the two in a race with an angry rabid bear and see who wins.

Te computer has no AI whatsoever. It’ s extremely predictable and will go for the same tactics with the same characters each time. The only way to mix this up is by raising or lowering your Momentum Points, which takes a full actions if you have the ability and prevents you from moving that turn. Again, unbalanced.

Mages (save for healers) are fundamentally worthless due to the movement issues. So use them only when you HAVE to. Archers should be used as often as possibly because they are far overpowered in RoS compared to any other SRPG ever made. Just keep using them and you’ll be shocked at how broken they are. Calvary are the same, especially your first knight due to his skills. If you make him up right, he is nigh unstoppable.

Characters are broken, the enemy AI is retarded and predictable, the AI for people on your side that show up in battles is even more retarded as they will charge into battle even if like Fox, they are less than half the level of the opponents in the game. Seriously? How stupid can an SRPG get? Not much more than Rondo of Swords that’s for sure.

As long as you have played an SRPG before and you’ve figured out the nuances of the engine, you should walk through this game without any trouble at all.

If you’re still having trouble, there is a super easy catch al that I am loathe to expose. At any time during a battle you can select the option “Retry with the same team.” Do this and the battle starts over, but your characters keep all the XP and levels they gained in your last attempt. If you really suck at this game, just level grind the hell up until you are either super powerful or you’ll finally figured out the enemy patterns.

Like everything else about Rondo of Swords, balance is a broken disgraceful mess. I have a hard time believing this game was play tested with all the insane balance issues within the title.

Balance Rating: Bad

7. Originality

Rondo of Swords is highly original. The problem is, most of the changes its made are for the worse. Generally I am the champion of risk taking and new engines or style of gameplay in a video game. Especially if the series has been around for a while. As you can see from the review so far, practically every change Success made is a huge failure. I love the idea of the engine, but it just couldn’t get a single thing right. I liked the variety of submissions, but you received no visual reward so no one will care about those. You have a ton of characters, but none have any personality and a few troops are so over the top in power that trying the others is just a foolish way to go.

I appreciate the attempt, but when all is said and done, Rondo of Swords will be remembered as an innovative little title that will serve as a warning for developers not to make change simply for the sake of change alone.

Originality Rating: Above Average

8. Addictiveness

Wow. Consider the facts. RPG gamers like story. Rondo of Swords have a minimal amount of plot. RPG gamers like well balanced engines. MI>Rondo of Swords is one of the most unbalanced RPG’s I have ever played. RPG gamers like to see or playthrough rewards. Rondo of Swords gives you a line of text.

I know a half dozen other tactical RPG fans that have this game and the nicest thing I have heard so far is that “It’s okay.” Note that this is the NICEST.

I enjoyed the first couple battles. By the sixth or so, you can really start to see how unrewarding and broken the game is. I kept playing because I was hoping for some more plot or something interesting to happen. It never did. There are things on paper that sound interesting. Like when “Sedric” became a “Cold Emperor” I was like “Okay, this is going to be kick ass. It wasn’t. It was more of the same. The game has its moments but only if you play RPG’s for the battles. Even then most of the time you’ll find the game lackluster.

Addictiveness Rating: Poor

9. Appeal Factor

Every SRPG fan I know either hates this game or is apathetic to it. It lacks everything that generally makes a tactics game fun or interesting. The only people I can see enjoying this are people that are so hard up for an SRPG that this is their only option, Atlus fanboy zealots, or people who like to label themselves HARDCORE without realizing what a sad joke doing so makes one.

I can’t think of anyone I would recommend this game to, nor anyone that would truly go “Wow! This game is awesome.” besides those aforementioned categories. People, most tactics fanboys are the least discerning gamers I know. And THEY hate this game. That’s a red flag right there.

Appeal Factor: Bad

10. Miscellaneous

I do appreciate the extras put into the game. New Game+ is an option although it gives you nothing truly interesting. I like the hidden stages but most of them have requirements the average person playing this game won’t have the slightest inkling about. There was so much potential in this game, but none of it was realized. That’s really depressing and it makes me worry for the level of quality in Operation Darkness as it is the same team.

I’m highly disappointed that success seems to have made Rondo of Swords without putting any thought into what makes a tactical RPG popular in the first place. They ignored the obvious basics and instead threw a broken game together without even realizing the myriad of issues contained within.

At least there are four different endings. See? Ending on a positive. Whoo!

Miscellaneous Rating: Poor

The Scores
Story: Worthless
Graphics: Above Average
Sound: Above Average
Control and Gameplay: Dreadful
Replayability: Mediocre
Balance: Bad
Originality: Above Average
Addictiveness: Poor
Appeal Factor: Bad
Miscellaneous: Poor
FINAL SCORE: (POOR GAME)

Short Attention Span Summary
Rondo of Swords is easily the worst RPG I have played this year, and if it wasn’t for the Hoshigami remake from last year, it would be the worst SRPG I have played on either of the current generations of portable systems. If yo really want some SRPG goodness right now you’re stuck with the PSP as your only real bastion of quality thanks to Disgaea, D&D Tactics, and Final Fantasy Ogre Tactics. Considering two of those games are remakes, that says something about the state of this genre in 2008. Ick.

I have something of a love-hate relationship with the Pokemon franchise; on one hand, adorable animal-like things are fantastic and the AWWWW factor of characters like Charmander and Pikachu is undeniable, but on the other hand the games themselves are functionally uninteresting to me because, sadly, they generally encompass the exact same thing each and every time: catch Pokemon, fill in your Pokedex, be the best, yadda yadda. The games are certainly not bad by any means so much as they’re generally the same formula ad infinitum; in an action-oriented context this can be done without the player noticing so much, but in an RPG-oriented product, it’s more noticeable.

On the other hand, I have more of an acceptance for Fushigi Dungeon games; from Izuna to Shiren the Wanderer to Chocobo’s Dungeon to Torenko, I’m generally okay with all of the various attempts at the genre (yes, even Nightmare of Druaga, which would have been perfectly fine if not for the monsters five levels your better chasing you down and brutalizing you all the time). The CONCEPT is certainly one that takes some getting used to; what sort of a person would want to play a game where when you die, you lose all your stuff and go back to level one, right? But after a while, you just learn to, well, not die, or find ways to keep the stuff that matters most to you. Different games have different rules, of course; in Izuna, you don’t lose your levels, in Chochbo’s Dungeon you don’t lose anything, Shiren is really more of a throwback game, and so on, but most of the games have the core gameplay in common: square movement grids, turn-based combat, deep dungeons, lots of battle.

So the idea behind Pokemon Mystery Dungeon is pretty sound, I’ll give them that much: take the ideas and concepts in Pokemon and stick them into a Fushigi Dungeon world? Sounds like solid gold, yeah? Well, apparently so, because the first series of PMD titles sold rather well, both because of the name attached and because, frankly, they were less “hardcore” than your typical dungeon crawling excursions; you don’t restart at level one when you kick off, sorry, faint, and items aren’t as useful and unrecoverable as they are in other FD style games, essentially making this “My First Dungeon Crawl”, more or less. And while Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Masters of Darkness essentially continues the tradition of being accessible to the Pokemon crowd, it also does enough that it’s worth a look, even if you played the first games to death.

The story, such as it is, starts off in a similar fashion to the first game: after answering a series of personality-test questions and pressing your finger to the DS screen (which actually took several attempts for me to get right, sadly), you’re dumped into the game as whatever Pokemon your personality matches (or whatever Pokemon you provided the proper answers to get, if you’re cheating). From there, you’re given the hook: your Pokemon is, presumably, YOU; a human who’s been turned into a Pokemon, somehow, but you can’t remember much beyond your name and the fact that you’re a human (or were, in any event). From here, however, the games go in wildly different directions: the previous game saw you and your partner (in my case, Charizard and Pikachu) start your very own Rescue Squad to help out other Pokemon; this time you and the Pokemon you meet when you first wake up (in my case, Torchic and Pikachu; I like fire and electric Pokemon so I tend to stick to what works) opt to join an Exploration League, which is essentially a GIANT-SIZED version of the original Rescue Squads. The core storyline basically combines a number of different elements together, including helping your ally overcome his/her fears and become confident in themselves, dealing with a deceitful and selfish group of rival Pokemon, getting back your memories, finding out what’s happening with the Time Gears (as one would imagine, gears that control time in the areas they reside within) that are being stolen, and figuring out the weird powers your character has that allow you to see events in the past and/or future by touching things.

In general, the story is about what you would expect from a Pokemon title; it’s cute and amusing and does what it needs to do in order to keep you interested while still maintaining the Saturday Morning Cartoon dynamic. If you’re a fan of the Pokemon world, you’ll find the story adorable and endearing, but if you’re in this for the dungeon crawling you won’t find the story to be off-putting or anything; occasionally there are segments where you’ll be reading through ten minutes of plot or so, but mostly the plot stays out of the way of the gameplay, so FD fans who aren’t looking for talking won’t be put off either.

Visually, PMD:MOD is bright, colorful, and absolutely adorable. The character sprites are easily discernable, animate well, and are generally pleasant to look at, and the dungeons, while Spartan, are detailed well enough that their names appropriately describe what you’ll be seeing within them. The various talking head segments of the game are lively thanks to the character portraits popping up as your characters talk (and when they level up), which helps to add personality, and the various cutscenes you see as you play are generally pretty and vibrant. The in-game tunes are also pretty fitting to the game; they’re cute and work very well with the presentation of the product, if nothing else. There’s no voice acting, so everyone talks in the “pipipipipipipipipi” style we’ve come to expect from non-disc titles, and the sound effects are mostly relegated to the smacking sounds of combat and various sounds for the special effects of laying into someone with Ember or Thundershock or what have you; in both respects, these work about as well as expected.

Gameplay-wise, PMD:MOD is exceptionally simple to play, which works well in its favor. Simply put, most of the time all you’re really doing is puttering around a dungeon smacking the heck out of other Pokemon, which is easy to do with either the stylus or the D-pad and buttons. The entirety of the experience in dungeons is turn-based, meaning that every time you move, regardless of what the move is, everything else on the same floor moves more or less simultaneously, in a “You-Allies-Enemies” order. Attacking foes is as simple as pressing a button or tapping on them with the stylus, though you can also throw held items or use Pokemon special moves on them, either by going to your battle menu and doing so or by setting a move as the default special move, which can be used with a simple button combination/stylus motion. In other words: movement and combat are easy as can be, thus making the majority of the game a snap.

You’re also equipped with a Treasure Bag, which is meant to store all of the odds and ends you need for exploration or find down in the dungeon, of which there are many. Pokemon fans will recognize most of the tools of the trade almost immediately; there are various seeds and berries, each of which have different effects (healing, resurrection, curing status ailments, causing sleep, etc), training machines to teach your allies new moves, accessories that raise different stats or enable various effects, and elixirs to refill your special moves to maximum (as all special moves have limits of how much they may be used before you run out). Some items are specific to the PMD universe, however, though they may seem familiar to FD fans, such as Orbs that can be used for a number of different effects (making foes afraid of you, revealing the entire map, revealing traps in the dungeons, etc), Sticks/Thorns/Rocks that act as ranged combat weaponry to deal damage from a distance, Gummies, which increase the IQ of the Pokemon eating it (each of a type matching the types of Pokemon, so feeding a Red Gummie to your Charmander is better than feeding it a Blue Gummie, you see) which in turn learns it various special abilities, and Apples, which fill your Belly.

See, in almost every FD game ever made, your characters have some sort of declining stamina bar that is replenished by eating stuff (like Gauntlet, “Wizard needs food badly”, that sort of thing); while the bar is full your health replenishes, but if it empties you start taking damage, IE starving to death, until you eat. Generally, anything consumable fills SOME of your Belly, but Apples (and Gummies to a lesser extent) fill your belly considerably. Think of them as rations and it makes more sense.

The various dungeons are also set up in the Sorting Algorithm fashion, meaning that the dungeons you face next are enough of a challenge to earn you major Experience to level up, while dungeons prior end up being a cakewalk later, thus balancing the game nicely. The ten to fifteen hours it’ll take you to blow through the story will give you a reasonable challenge, but for those who are looking for the hardcore FD experience, PMD:MOD has your hookup in the form of a ton of extra dungeons and quests that have you facing off against all sorts of Legendary Pokemon in tough dungeons and such. You’re also offered a lot of nifty tools to help you out in reverse; aside from the various items and equipment you can find, you can store items and weapons in Treasure Town (as you lose these if you bite it in the dungeon) as well as shop for more useful items, and you can Link special moves together (like, say, Focus Energy and Ember) to make heavy-damaging combos that only take up one action (and make moves like the aforementioned Focus Energy way more useful than they are on their own). You can also recruit the various Pokemon you save/battle onto your team to help you out in dungeon exploration (you have up to four spaces for team members, though larger Pokemon take up more space on your team and thus allow for less actual members), and if you happen to pass out in a dungeon, you’re not totally beat; you can send out an SOS, either by Wi-fi connection (to E-mail, locak friends, or even cell-phone text messages) or by Wonder Mail passwords (which you could dump onto a forum or into an E-mail) that allow friendly players to brave the depths of the dungeon to save you from your defeat.

In short, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Darkness is a pretty beefy experience. Everything gone over above is really only scratching the surface of the game; there is a lot more to the game than one would first expect, and you’ll find a lot to do with the game for many, many hours.

Buuuuuut… there are some problems. The biggest one is that, even though your allies are generally customizable in their behaviors, they’re still not very bright. See, your allies can be directed in a very general customization sense; you can dictate what moves they can use and how they behave, but you can’t dictate, for instance, that the level five escort generate common sense enough to RUN AWAY FROM ENEMIES TEN LEVELS HIS BETTER, and thus he’ll end up confronting a foe that smites him on one hit because you couldn’t move your lead Pokemon fast enough to intercede in the battle. Your allies may also wander off at certain junctions in the paths you take, meaning that if you’re using the option to move quickly through the dungeons, you might come to an intersection only to find out one of your party members took a wrong turn and is now surrounded by hostile Pokemon in an entirely different room. Sorry you just got smeared, Machop, but you should have been following everyone else! See you back at the guild hall!

It’s also not very original. What elements aren’t aped from other FD titles are aped from the original two PMD titles; aside from a fourth party member and the ability to connect to other players over Wi-fi for rescue missions, everything done in PMD:MOD has been done elsewhere. Some of the game elements are also kind of annoying as well, even in the context of the sort of game this is; while it’s absolutely fantastic that you can save at any time (all handheld games should do this) it is not fantastic that you only have one save slot (And while it’s a good game, it’s a hard game to recommend; if you’re into Pokemon, you might not be looking for the sort of dungeon crawling experience that a PMD title gives you, and if you’re into FD titles you might not be looking for a cute, cuddly-wuddly Pokemon-filled game as opposed to something with swords and shields and a loss of everything the exact second you pass on. It’s a good introduction to the FD series of games, and it has a decent amount of challenge for those looking for such a thing, but it’s generally most appealing to a fairly narrow audience, which is kind of a shame.

If you’re a fan of Fushigi Dungeon-esque titles and a fan of Pokemon, you will most likely have run out and grabbed yourself a copy of one of the two new Pokemon Mystery Dungeon games, but if not, they may well still be worth an investment. The games are generally simple to play and challenging enough to give you a fun challenge without completely beating you into submission. Casual players will have a lot of fun with the story, and hardcore players have hundreds of hours of exploration in hardcore dungeons to look forward to, so both camps can have a good amount of fun with this. It’s different from its counterparts in a lot of ways, and may be too easy/hard for some types of players, but as an interesting novelty product it’s one of the most enjoyable DS titles you can pick up this year.

The Scores:
Story: ABOVE AVERAGE
Graphics: GOOD
Sound: ABOVE AVERAGE
Control/Gameplay: GREAT
Replayability: CLASSIC
Balance: GREAT
Originality: POOR
Addictiveness: GOOD
Appeal: ABOVE AVERAGE
Miscellaneous: GOOD

Final Score: GOOD.

Short Attention Span Summary:
Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Darkness is a worthy follow-up to the original Red and Blue Rescue Team titles released in 2006, and a fun and enjoyable standalone game in its own right. It’s absolutely adorable and cute for those who are looking for that sort of thing, and it’s very easy to play and enjoy if you’re a Pokemon fan, while still offering optional hardcore challenges for the Fushigi Dungeon veteran. It’s not very unique, there are some issues with the AI at times, and the game plays by rules that might put off certain gamers, but if you are the sort of person who enjoys all things Pokemon/Fushigi Dungeon, or just someone looking for an ascending challenge, Explorers of Darkness is definitely something you’ll want to check out.

It’s been a long time since I played Lost Vikings, but it was good enough that I still remember it to this day; so much so that when I heard about Teenage Zombies, I instantly made a connection between the two in my head. Here we have 2d platformers with three playable characters; each with strengths and weaknesses that allow them to go places and perform actions that the others can’t. Using these characters, you had to make your way through fun environmental puzzles and fight off enemies. If that doesn’t sound like a good time, then you’ve been playing far too much Halo.

Of course, now that Teenage Zombies has been released, and I’ve had my chance to play through it, I can tell you that it is not an exact copy of Lost Vikings. It has its own unique premise and gameplay styles. Just how good is the game? Let us take a look.

Story

Teenage Zombies goes for two kinds of aesthetics at once. From the beginning cinematic, it becomes clear the game is going for a pulp fiction horror feel. The main menu even has a feaux comic’s code authority seal of approval. This continues on throughout the game as all story sequences are told through comic book like storyboards that require you to hold the DS on its side while you read them. The game also sports a Saturday morning cartoon presence, as despite the sheet gruesome nature of the subject matter, the whole thing plays off in fun and light hearted matter. People even die only after spouting off one last comical line.

The story itself goes as such; Earth has been invaded by aliens! (You might have guessed that from the title of the game.) Using mind control devices and laser beams, these glass encased extraterrestrial brains have either enslaved or killed the entire world! Earth is just about to become the latest in the Big Brain’s snow globe collection of conquered planets, when his number 1 informs him that their forces are under attack by three beings that are impervious to all conventional forms of destruction. These would of course be the teenage zombies; Fins, Lefty, and Half-Pipe. All three have risen from the dead thanks to the smell of countless alien brains circling up above. One by one they start a warpath of destruction and gluttony, all in hopes of eventually getting to the largest entree of all…..the Big Brain himself!

The whole thing ends up being as funny as it sounds from scenes where Big Brain exclaims his horror after seeing Grand General Blinky devoured to trying to convince his mother that global domination is indeed a real job. All of the story sequences really involve him and Number 1, his miniscule yes man. Being zombies, the teens only mutter the word “brains”. That’s the extent of their vocabulary. Still, the solid comedic presence of the brains manages to keep the story light and fun, if nothing deep. Don’t expect any character development here.

Graphics

This game isn’t going to blow you away in visuals department. Most of the animations in this game could use some serious overhauling. Lefty, for example, feels like she’s only got two different frames when you play as her. She moves awkwardly, even for a zombie. When you turn, it just feels like the sprite has been flipped, and there’s no sense of any real change. Characters in the game tend to have a flat appearance compared to the rest of the environment, which considering the comic book like feel, is kind of weird. You’d expect some consistency there.

On the flip side, the artistic style is pretty damn good. The environments in the game are nicely varied and often feature a good amount of detail. There are plenty of nice touches all around, such as Fins’ body seeming lax, while his fins are active. One of Lefty’s feet is even inverted!

There’s nothing spectacular here, but it does what it needs to.

Audio

Like a lot of DS games, the audio can sound a bit tinny at times, but that’s the only bad thing I can say here. The music is well suited and dynamic. It’s perfect for what’s going on at all times. It would have been easy to just slap on a horresque theme to the proceedings and call it a day, but the dev team didn’t take that shortcut here. The music manages to convey a Halloween-like tone that helps keep things both dark and light at the same time. (Think “Monster Mash”) It may not be anything special on its own, but it fits the game like a glove. And that’s all that really matters.

There are only a few cases of voice acting in the game, but they’re surprisingly good. Again, there’s the tinny factor, but the voice acting for both the Big Brain and Number 1 are amusing. They certainly fit the cartoon vibe.

Sound effects are a bit weak. Killing aliens generally results in a generic crash sound when the glass shatters, and slurping brains sounds too much like yogurt for comfort. They may not have phoned in the music, but the sound effects just might have been.

Gameplay

Here’s a basic rundown of the controls. You have an attack button, a jump button (Lefty and Fins have the same layout here, but Half Pipe has these buttons flipped for some reason.) Y will activate your various powerups and x will activate elevator switches. You’ll be able to switch between the three zombies on the fly by tapping the r and l buttons, or by using the stylus to select each character. I’d recommend using the shoulder buttons, as they make control the game much more streamlined, and any one zombie is only one button press away. (You will have to use the stylus to activate the corpse assembling minigame though. It’s the only basic mechanic that requires this, which is pretty strange.)

The controls feel pretty sluggish to be honest. (They are zombies. It might have been on purpose) You’ll plod along while enemy brains will fly around you and zap your health away. Jumping in particular, is handled pretty poorly. Lefty has the ability to grab on to ledges, but three are some serious hit detection issues here, as you’ll often find yourself failing to grab onto the ledge, despite being able to see that you’ve touched it. This can cause you to get hit more times than you’d like. Once you’ve defeated a brain though, you’ll be able to eat it and regain a substantial amount of health, so the small advantage they have over you is quickly lost.

Teenage Zombies may look like an action game at first, what with its wealth of enemies and combat, but it’s actually a puzzle game at heart. You’ll spend most of your time in the game exploring the levels and figuring out what powers/characters you’ll need to advance. Each character has his or her own strengths and weaknesses. Fins is slow and can’t jump, but he is able to climb walls and has the most useful attack. Lefty has no range with her attacks, but can jump really high and grab on to ledges. Finally, Half Pipe can crawl into tight spaces and jump off ramps due to his lower torso being replaced by a skateboard.

You’ll be constantly switching between the three characters to advance. In addition to the abilities I listed above, each character will be able to hold one powerup at a time. Collecting these and using them at the right moment is paramount to your success. You’ll be able to switch characters on the fly, meaning you’ll never have to worry about one character getting stuck behind. Of course, this is balanced by having one shared health meter for all three zombies, so you won’t be able to just switch out when health runs low.

There are occasional stylus mini games that pop up from time to time, such as a Robotron-like zombie shooter and anther where you need to slingshot brains into Fin’s gaping mouth. These are all nice distractions when they pop up at random during the levels. You’re forced to play them once, and then you can play them whenever you want to get more points, which are only used for unlocking a Warioware clone of sorts where you face off against Big Brain in a series of quick minigames. There is also a minigame that actually affects the main game itself. Throughout levels you’ll find various body parts. When you have all the limbs and the torso, you’ll be able to assemble them to create a whole corpse, and he’ll reward you by refilling your health meter.

Replayability
Teenage Zombies is not a long game. There are about 35 “chapters” to play through which only take a few minutes or more to complete each. Count the times when you end up stuck or dead, and you’re still looking at a five to six hour playing experience.

Once you’ve finished the story, you’ll have the option of completing it again on hard mode, or playing the stylus mini games again. These are amusing, but none of them are good enough to keep you entertained for more than a few minutes. You might feel like playing through again to earn enough points to unlock the hardest Big Brain challenge, but more likely than not this will be a one and done game for most people.

Balance

Balance is a fairly solid strength for the game. Throughout your journey to the Big Brain, you’ll slowly be introduced to new enemies and powerups until you get near the end, where the game will challenge you to combine various powerups and skills to progress, as well as enemies to conquer.

That being said, the game never gets too frustrating or difficult. You have unlimited lives from the outset, and you’ll respawn only a few minutes behind. The only real penalty you’ll suffer is a loss of a barely noticeable amount of points, which again, only unlock a minigame for you to play. No big loss. You won’t find yourself punching the wall or throwing your shoe at the dog over this game.

Originality

While I was able to compare this game to Lost Vikings at a glance, it doesn’t mean the game is a clone by any means. Its not often you find a game like this on the market. Most 2D platformers are either action or exploration based. It isn’t too common that you find one in the puzzle genre. Still, it must be said that the core gameplay isn’t particularly new.

What is new, at least as far as I know, is the subject matter. I can’t think of too many games that have you playing as a zombie, let alone having the zombie be the “good” guy. It takes a pretty special game with a unique premise to pull that off, and Teenage Zombies most assuredly has that.

So while there are games like Patapon or Echo Chrome out there for people who’re looking for truly original games, Teenage Zombies is definitely not too familiar.

Addictiveness

I’ll be honest, as fun as the game can be, I didn’t find myself too addicted to it. In fact, the gameplay can feel a bit monotonous after a while, so it’s best to take short breaks in-between sessions.

There really isn’t too much variety to be had, and since the zombies move so slowly, there’s a chance of you ending up bored, although it’s not prevalent. This is not one of those games where you’ll be shouting “one more level” when someone asks you to take out the trash.

Appeal Factor

This isn’t a game for everyone, but anyone should be able to enjoy it, at least for a little while. It harkens back to the days on the SNES and Genesis with its 2d graphics and gameplay. Old school gamers should definitely give it a try (although they’ll probably want to put it on hard mode for nostalgia purposes), while newer gamers who haven’t experienced this kind of game will be sucked in by the funny story, and charming atmosphere. Seriously, who doesn’t like games with zombies AND aliens?

Miscellaneous

There are some nice touches in this game worth mentioning.

For one, to keep up with the comic book feel, you’ll often come across narrator boxes in the middle of a level. These will offer up some hint like “press b twice to double jump” or “Half-Pipe’s big wheel powerup can go across electrified floors”. This is cool to begin with, but they are actually part of the level design and can be used as platforms! That is just cool.

The game also has an ending that leaves it wide open for a sequel, and believe me when I say the premise of that sequel is well worth exploring. I look forward to any future games that come out under the Teenage Zombie name, and I’ll go on record saying that I’d throw down my hard earned dollars to play some more of this.

The Scores

Story: GOOD
Graphics: DECENT
Sound: GOOD
Control and Gameplay: VERY GOOD
Replayability: BAD
Balance: VERY GOOD
Originality: GOOD
Addictiveness: MEDIOCRE
Appeal Factor: ENJOYABLE
Miscellaneous: AVOVE AVERAGE
FINAL SCORE: GOOD GAME!

Short Attention Span Summary

Teenage Zombies isn’t a game that is going to blow you away, but it can be some solid fun until it last. You won’t find too many games like this out there, so those with a DS and a penchant puzzles and/or platformers should feel more than welcome to give it a shot. It’s got some good gameplay, a fun story and great music. All in all it’s a pretty damn good game.