Good Game Get! Shantae: Risky’s Revenge

I’ve spent the week with Shantae: Risky’s Revenge and have enjoyed every minute of this charming and engaging DSiware gem. I won’t go into great detail, NintendoLife has already done a good job of that in their super enthusiastic 10-star review and follow-up interview with the lead designer. But, I too give it high marks for game play, art style and the delightful musical score, and agree it’s a must buy for DSi platformer fans.

It’s not the hardest platformer you’ve ever played — a little patience goes a long way in this game — though the difficulty does ramp up in a slow and satisfying way. Other nice touches, including the need to collect jars of “Magic Jam” scattered around Sequin Land before you can purchase the more powerful weapons, encourages exploration and prevents you from becoming too over-powered, too early. Shantae’s belly-dancing, animal-transformation powers are both cute and clever, and add a pleasant depth to the game.

I think what struck me the most is that Shantae: Risky’s Revenge could easily be packaged and sold retail and still be totally worth it — it is that good. The 1200 point price tag might be a little high for some, but the splurge will get you, as NintendoLife puts it “hands-down the best title available on DSiWare and quite possibly the best 12 bucks you’ll ever spend on a video game”. The best 12 bucks? Not sure about that one, but I can’t argue that the DSiware service has grown up a little with the release of this game.

-Andy

Shantae: Risky’s Revenge Out Today!

Its no secret that games on DSiware have been, let’s say, a little underwhelming. Sure there’s been some bright spots along the way like Aura-Aura Climber, Maestro! Green Groove, AlphaBounce and the Art Style games, but for the most part the service, with the minimal publicity it receives from Nintendo (did you get their email?), has not struck the right chord with gamers.

But one of the best-looking platformers to be announced for DSiware is out today and hopefully it can catch the attention of Nintendo DSi owners. Shantae: Risky’s Revenge from WayForward Technologies (the developers behind the recent Batman: The Brave & The Bold on Wii & DS) hits the North American DSiware store this morning. A sequel to 2002’s popular Shantae for the Game Boy Color, Risky’s Revenge looks to have surprising depth for a downloadable and adds something special to the platform.

On top of that, fans of video game music will be happy to hear that the new Shantae soundtrack is available for free and worth the download!

Good Game Get! Face Pilot

I miss Pilotwings.

I haven’t played a new Pilotwings since a day before my birthday in 1996 on September 26th.

Fourteen years have passed and I’m pretty sure that HAL Laboratory of Kirby and Super Smash Bros. fame should handle all development of a new title if one were to exist.

Supposedly Factor 5 was working on a GameCube sequel but Nintendo wasn’t comfortable with it so they didn’t release it,

Next Level Games has also shown interest in making a new Pilotwings after their Punch-Out reboot, but again, nothing really has come of it.

Why should HAL Laboratory make it?

Face Pilot rules, and it feels like a hang glider section of a brand new Pilotwings game, which is such a good thing. It has a ton of stuff to do, including various locales to fly in, lots of different hang gliders, and of course many things to collect and unlock.

The game utilizes the player facing DSi camera to snap a photo of you to map to your character, and to track your face which turns your DSi into a fancy camera powered accelerometer controller. You tilt the DSi to fly your hang glider throughout a stage to fly through star rings, collect balloons, find hidden medals, etc. The result is surprisingly good and awesomely accurate.



Face Pilot actually has two play styles though - the one I described above, and a different one in which you set the DSi on a table and try to play while moving your head around. While I’ve read other accounts of this working really well, it didn’t work well for me. With two options though, I can’t imagine that someone couldn’t get either one to work for them so I think it’s a safe bet to not let camera/face-tracking issue fears sway you from the rad five dollar price tag.

Face Pilot gets me stoked to play motion oriented 3DS games once the system drops, and while I feel it can sometimes be a gimmick, nothing beats a flying game and moving an object with both hands instead of twiddling a thumb stick.

Nintendo you should get HAL Laboratory working on Pilotwings 3DS immediately.

- Kyle

My Dogs Personified in Dragon Quest IX

Behold my two faithful companions as loyal comrades against evil.



Awesome, I know.

- Kyle