Modern Geekery

If you hate graphics, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed for the Nintendo DS is your game.  Not only are the visuals horrible and antiquated, even by handheld standards, but you’ll spend most of your time looking down at the second screen anyway, choosing what you want your pixely Jedi to do. Read the rest of this entry »

Final Fantasy makers Square Enix will both delight and confuse their fans with “The World Ends With You” for Nintendo DS.  The company expands on their Kingdom Hearts portable “Chain of Memories,” and abandons their usual pseudo-medieval characters and backdrop for a more modern spin this time around.  Neku - reassuringly imprinted with the prototypical Square Enix brooding, loner hero personality – wakes up in a strange city.  He’s immediately thrust into a city-wide “game” wherein the players are forced to fight monsters and complete specific missions or face “erasure.”

“The World Ends With You” may be the best game so far to utilize the touch screen feature of the DS.  While an unfortunately large number of DS games feel like touch screen capabilities have been either added as an lazy afterthought or shoehorned in to the detriment of gameplay, this game hits the nail right on the head.  You only ever use the directional pad and the stylus for the duration of the game and it feels natural. Read the rest of this entry »