dsblog: a Nintendo DS weblog

Old news: Tokyo Game Show edition

As asided moments ago, the remote controller for the Revolution has been revealed at the Tokyo Game Show 2005. You can catch all IGN's DS game updates from TGS in a handy chart, including a preview of Treasure's adaptation of the anime Bleach to a side-view fighting game.

The Gameboy Micro launched in Japan, in several colors including Famicom. Amazon offers preordering for black and silver; oddly enough their product images show variant skins over the faceplate as well. What does this mean??

There's also a special Play-Yan Micro that turns your Gameboy Micro into an MP3 player. It also plays MPEG-4/ASF video, but if you wanted video, you'd probably get a PSP.

If you haven't been reading The Escapist, you must not read any other gaming blogs whatsoever. Or you have a tiny screen.

I kept to myself and, every now and then, joined in the banter going on in Guild Chat.

That's when my guild mates just got creative. They'd send me what I affectionately refer to as Care Packages of a few gold or some healing potions. Or they'd "bump into me" somewhere in game, build a cozy fire next to a lake in dangerous territory, catch a fish and cook it, giving me a chance to restore some health and reapply potions and magic spells of protection. —

Past issues have featured articles on Halo-precursor Marathon, the reality of licensed titles, Second Life as Disneyland with adult themes, Sega Derby Owner's Club, and many, many articles on the possibility and nature of innovation in the game industry, including a whole issue on the future of the industry (with a compelling piece of speculative fiction) and Greg Costikyan's Death to the Industry: Long Live Games parts 1 and 2. I haven't even read the newest issue yet and, having found all these examples, I'm finding it hard not to read them again. Maybe I shouldn't've mentioned it. (Firefox users: remember it's F11 to go full screen, and The Escapist has set it up so page up and page down will switch pages. Beware of that when switching tabs with the keyboard.)

Did I mention that Animal Crossing: Wild World may have voice chat? Or that it's now "Animal Crossing: Wild World?"

Speaking of doctors and lawyers, I forgot to mention Tendo Dokuta, a previous doctor sim for the DS. (That's probably the one in the launch promo mashup video, actually.) Meanwhile creators Spike announced a sequel, Kenshuui Tendou Dokuta 2: Inochi no Tenbin ("Balance of Life").

Lastly, Marvel Comics' case against NCSoft alleging contributory infringement for allowing players of City of Heroes to create Marvel characters progresses. Eric Goldman writes:

NCSoft, the game operator, sued Marvel under 17 USC 512(f) for sending bogus takedown notices. The takedown notices specified 2 character names, but did not specify what servers those characters resided in. Accordingly, NCSoft removed those characters across all of its servers, leading to some very bummed users whose characters were killed off. In response, NCSoft alleged... damages of lost goodwill, lost subscriptions and investigation expenses. These facts were enough to survive a motion to dismiss.

NCSoft has also gone on the offensive by claiming that Marvel infringed its trademark in "City of Heroes" based on Marvel's use of the term "City of Heroes" in some promotional copy on some comic books.

Now, back to The Escapist...

GP2X / GPX2: alternative handheld gaming

Update: As of 4 October, Play-Asia now offers preorders on the GPX2.

Old school emulator hax0r and friendquaintance Neill Corlett writes about the GP2X, Gamepark's sequel to their GP32, a completely open Korean handheld. The system's getting some beefy hardware in its second generation:

As far as applications go, it looks like they're aiming to make full-speed SNES emulation a reality. Also MAME is probably going to have an increased presence. It's definitely also geared towards video playing; the idea being you don't have to specially encode stuff before copying it to your GP2X [it has hardware DivX/XviD support]....

The GP2X also runs Linux out of the box. Play-Asia and Lik-sang both list the GP32 system and accessories, but neither has them in stock, and neither has any GP2X goodies yet. GP2X.co.uk is taking preorders (only £125!).

While it doesn't have a touch screen (or a fancy handwavey remote control thing), the platform has emulators out the wazoo and uses commodity card media. Despite being Korean instead of Finnish, it's the perfect open source runner in the handheld race. It would be the ideal system to create an indie handheld game market if only anyone on this side of the planet would buy one.

Daigasso! Band Brothers Request Selection

The expansion pack for Daigasso! Band Brothers is available for preorder from Play-Asia. It doesn't feature the Ted Leo + the Pharmacists song. In fact, as expected, all the songs are Japanese... except Dragostea Din Tei by O-Zone. Maybe the US version will include All Your Base, then.

Doctors and lawyers

Surely we can admit that, if a game in which you take care of a pretend puppy of your choice is--shall we say--original, the same can be said of a game in which you take on the occupational responsibilities of a professional. Not a professional assassin, that is, but someone from "the professions." Oddly enough such entertainments are also coming to the DS (as you might already know) in the forms of Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney and Trauma Center: Under the Knife.

As one might trot out the technicalities and say Nintendogs is just a much better Tamagotchi or PC dog sim, neither is Capcom's Phoenix Wright strictly original: it's a port of the Game Boy Advance game Gyakuten Saiban 3. While the DS version doesn't come out until later this month in Japan and October in the US, you can read Tim Rogers' Insert Credit review of Gyakuten Saiban 3 for GBA from a year and a half ago. Ivan Sulic for IGN best describes how Gyakuten Saiban DS is played, reviewing the E3 2005 edition:

As Wright, players need to carefully scrutinize the testimonies of other NPCs within the game (the conversation aspect of the title) and then look for discrepancies between testimonies and provided evidence (the menu aspect of the title). It's basically a game about catching people in their lies, but it works.

The game itself sounds like a typical TV court drama, only with a little Harvey Birdman thrown in. Or more like Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan, I suppose, in that the humor is the way it heavily references the grammar of Japanese comics, games, and anime that we're increasingly exposed to. ("Yes, lawyers have life meters in Japan.") Besides, any game that comes with its own themed stylus can't be serious.

The most interesting hearsay is that the Japanese version will include the full English translation (according to game magazine Famitsu, by way of Kotaku and some web board). That's understandable: if all the casefiles are the same as the original Gyakuten Saiban (3), it's already available for translation while the porting work is done, so why not? It is a text heavy game, so it's extra cool that you can still import it if you want it a month early. However if you reeeeally want that stylus, you need the special edition, which also has a poster, soundtrack CD, and "OBJECTION!" screen cleaner. (See 1up's page about the game, too.)

If law isn't your thing, or you fondly remember the Life & Death series of PC games, watch for Trauma Center: Under the Knife from Atlus. It's not coming out until "Winter," so there's less buzz about it so far, other than its apparent inclusion in the original scattershot ads for the DS. Like Phoenix Wright, it includes story around and about the cases; but unlike law, a story isn't exactly necessary for performing surgery, is it? Jeremy Parish writes for 1up:

The cartoon soap opera serves as an odd counterpoint to the rather unflinching realism of the meat of the game (so to speak): Operating room challenges that require a deft hand and a fairly iron-cast stomach. Trauma Center is hardly the goriest game on the market, maintaining a largely bloodless, stylized appearance, but the subject matter is certainly not for the squeamish. Players will be slicing into bodies, sticking organs with needles, plucking foreign objects from gaping wounds and more.

Whether you feel at home in the courtroom or the operating theater, there's a sim coming just for you. I'm sure the game based on the Animation Runner Kuromi license is coming soon enough. Now we just need a software development sim.