Scottish Prisoners May Get DSes For Brain Training [Ds]

The Sunday Times reports of a plan by the Scottish prison system to raise “literacy” and “numeracy” skills among its prison population by giving the inmates access to Nintendo DS systems. The program would be tested in a small number of prison libraries and would involve literacy experts working with the prisoners. Prison officials note that inmates already have access to PlayStations, so going with the DS is seen as consistent and, perhaps, an improvement: The devices, fitted with “brain training” software, will be put on trial on the advice of Scottish government officials who believe they will reduce the chances of the prisoners reoffending after they have served their sentences by improving their employment prospects. A government study into the education of prisoners, Learning in Custody: Report of the Offender Learning in Custody Workstream, concluded that convicts would benefit from the devices, which are currently being used in many primary schools to raise attainment. “Initial findings suggest it is both motivational and enables less confident learners to close the gap on others,” said the report. A Scottish group representing taxpayers calls the plan “ridiculous,” given that many Sottish citizens can’t even afford DSes for their kids in these tough economic times. Inmates to get Nintendo games [The Sunday Times of London]

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Scottish Prisoners May Get DSes For Brain Training [Ds]

Style Savvy Review: Dressing Miss Michael [Review]

Join Kotaku’s tallest, broadest, and hairiest regular contributor as I explore the world of retail fashion design with Nintendo’s Style Savvy for the Nintendo DS. Style Savvy is a game marketed at girls that’s all about fashion – putting together outfits, running your own boutique, and maybe even making waves on the runway scene. The game was developed by syn Sophia , the developer formerly known as AKI Corporation. As you may or may not know, AKI Corporation was responsible for developing some of the best professional wrestling video games of the late 90’s / early 2000’s, including WWF No Mercy, the first two Def Jam games, and the Japan-only Virtual Pro-Wrestling series. And now they’ve created Style Savvy, which tickles me to no end. Now that I’ve gotten the irony out of the way, let’s talk Style Savvy. Is it strong enough for a man, yet made for a woman? Pull up a chair and let Miss Michael tell you all about it. Loved So Much To Do: I spent the first hour or so of Style Savvy helping customers pick out clothing while working as a clerk at an established fashion outlet. Soon things began to open up, and I found myself ordering new items from suppliers, customizing my outfits, and dressing store mannequins. Then the hair salon opens up. Suddenly I can change my hairstyle, makeup, and even take pictures to share with friends. Once you have your own boutique (which happens ridiculously fast), you’ll have so much to do you’ll find yourself sitting in Starbucks for several hours while your friends watch you, shaking their heads sadly. They just don’t understand how much the fashion show means to you. A Learning Experience: There’s a lot to learn in Style Savvy, particularly for the less style savvy among us. Right off the bat you learn the basics of good customer service, paying attention to what your customers are looking and suggesting outfits accordingly. You learn how to maintain stock at a retail outlet; the difference between running a store with a few select styles and keeping a highly diversified but hard to navigate inventory; and how to manage your money. Do you blow all of your cash on a fancy new hairstyle and makeup, or do you make sure you have enough cardigans in stock for your demanding clientele? After several hours of play you’ll also find yourself assimilating fashion terms you might have no business actually knowing, like boho-chic, or camisole. The World’s Biggest Closet: 10,000 fashions across 16 different brands equals nearly countless clothing combinations in which to dress yourself, your mannequins, and your customers. Shoes, jackets, sweaters, pumps, sunglasses, jewelry – it’s all for sale, and every time you make a new item purchase for your store you get the same item delivered to your personal wardrobe as well. The game uses the Nintendo DS clock to determine what sort of fashions pop up at what times, meaning it’s the sort of title you’ll want to return to on a regular basis. I mean, if you’re into that sort of thing. Online Shopping: The shopping fun doesn’t stop at your own Nintendo DS. Style Savvy players can connect to the internet to shop at other players’ stores or set up an online branch of their very own. It’s an excellent way for you to share your creations with the rest of the world, and the promise of new clothing available periodically through the DSi download service sweetens the game’s online options even further. Mmm, Unlockables: It’s beginning to become an obsession with me. Show me a set of items with placeholders for the things that belong there but aren’t there yet, and I will spend hours doing everything possible to fill those spaces. It doesn’t matter if it’s magical coins, machine guns, or in this case, hair and makeup styles. Hated Not Quite Creating Your Own Fashions: Perhaps this is a guy thing, which I somehow doubt, but when I think of creating my own fashions, I think actually designing clothing for the giant-headed women who come to my store to wear. Instead, Style Savvy is all about putting together a look out of what you have available. There is no design aspect. You are an outfit coordinator. This is not what I expected. Very Girl-Centric: Right from the start, Style Savvy assumes you are female. Your character is female, even if you name her Michael. I’ve spent the better part of 15 hours being referred to as Miss Michael, and I might be developing some sort of complex. I know, I know – the game is targeted at young girls. Still, I shouldn’t have to be called Miss Michael, no matter how adorable my little pink-haired avatar might be. I shouldn’t even have to say it – I wasn’t exactly all that serious about Style Savvy when the rest of the staff decided to volunteer me for the review. I expected to get a few laughs out of the game and maybe get negative bragging rights with my fellow members of the press at the next big industry event I attended. “Oh yeah? Well I had to review Style Savvy,” I would say, and we’d laugh and laugh. I had it all planned out in my head. And then I started enjoying the game. What can I say? On a certain level, Style Savvy really clicked with me. It has several elements that I really enjoy in my games. There’s the collectability aspect, the avatar customization, inventory management, and a fair amount of logic involved in making sure your customer is pleased with the ensemble you put together for them. Change the scenery a bit and you’ve got the formula for the sort of role-playing game I’d spend hours lost in. Sure, I’ve started critiquing my friends’ outfits, and I’ve been saying things like “retro chic” far more often than anyone really should as of late, but isn’t that the sort of immersion and involvement we seek in our more traditional games? If a burly, bearded, six foot, six inches tall man spending countless hours coordinating outfits for virtual women is wrong, then my friends were all right and I should probably not press the point any further. Style Savvy was developed by syn Sophia and published by Nintendo for the DS on November 2nd. Retails for $34.99 USD. A copy of the game was given to us by the publisher for reviewing purposes. Played the game for approximately 20 hours, earning my own boutique and making little Miss Michael the talk of the town. Named my store “Mangina” in protest. Confused by our reviews? Read our review FAQ . NOTE: Throughout the month of December, Kotaku will review some of the games that we missed earlier in the year. We’re catching up.

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Style Savvy Review: Dressing Miss Michael [Review]

Style Savvy Review: Dressing Miss Michael [Review]

Join Kotaku’s tallest, broadest, and hairiest regular contributor as I explore the world of retail fashion design with Nintendo’s Style Savvy for the Nintendo DS. Style Savvy is a game marketed at girls that’s all about fashion – putting together outfits, running your own boutique, and maybe even making waves on the runway scene. The game was developed by syn Sophia , the developer formerly known as AKI Corporation. As you may or may not know, AKI Corporation was responsible for developing some of the best professional wrestling video games of the late 90’s / early 2000’s, including WWF No Mercy, the first two Def Jam games, and the Japan-only Virtual Pro-Wrestling series. And now they’ve created Style Savvy, which tickles me to no end. Now that I’ve gotten the irony out of the way, let’s talk Style Savvy. Is it strong enough for a man, yet made for a woman? Pull up a chair and let Miss Michael tell you all about it. Loved So Much To Do: I spent the first hour or so of Style Savvy helping customers pick out clothing while working as a clerk at an established fashion outlet. Soon things began to open up, and I found myself ordering new items from suppliers, customizing my outfits, and dressing store mannequins. Then the hair salon opens up. Suddenly I can change my hairstyle, makeup, and even take pictures to share with friends. Once you have your own boutique (which happens ridiculously fast), you’ll have so much to do you’ll find yourself sitting in Starbucks for several hours while your friends watch you, shaking their heads sadly. They just don’t understand how much the fashion show means to you. A Learning Experience: There’s a lot to learn in Style Savvy, particularly for the less style savvy among us. Right off the bat you learn the basics of good customer service, paying attention to what your customers are looking and suggesting outfits accordingly. You learn how to maintain stock at a retail outlet; the difference between running a store with a few select styles and keeping a highly diversified but hard to navigate inventory; and how to manage your money. Do you blow all of your cash on a fancy new hairstyle and makeup, or do you make sure you have enough cardigans in stock for your demanding clientele? After several hours of play you’ll also find yourself assimilating fashion terms you might have no business actually knowing, like boho-chic, or camisole. The World’s Biggest Closet: 10,000 fashions across 16 different brands equals nearly countless clothing combinations in which to dress yourself, your mannequins, and your customers. Shoes, jackets, sweaters, pumps, sunglasses, jewelry – it’s all for sale, and every time you make a new item purchase for your store you get the same item delivered to your personal wardrobe as well. The game uses the Nintendo DS clock to determine what sort of fashions pop up at what times, meaning it’s the sort of title you’ll want to return to on a regular basis. I mean, if you’re into that sort of thing. Online Shopping: The shopping fun doesn’t stop at your own Nintendo DS. Style Savvy players can connect to the internet to shop at other players’ stores or set up an online branch of their very own. It’s an excellent way for you to share your creations with the rest of the world, and the promise of new clothing available periodically through the DSi download service sweetens the game’s online options even further. Mmm, Unlockables: It’s beginning to become an obsession with me. Show me a set of items with placeholders for the things that belong there but aren’t there yet, and I will spend hours doing everything possible to fill those spaces. It doesn’t matter if it’s magical coins, machine guns, or in this case, hair and makeup styles. Hated Not Quite Creating Your Own Fashions: Perhaps this is a guy thing, which I somehow doubt, but when I think of creating my own fashions, I think actually designing clothing for the giant-headed women who come to my store to wear. Instead, Style Savvy is all about putting together a look out of what you have available. There is no design aspect. You are an outfit coordinator. This is not what I expected. Very Girl-Centric: Right from the start, Style Savvy assumes you are female. Your character is female, even if you name her Michael. I’ve spent the better part of 15 hours being referred to as Miss Michael, and I might be developing some sort of complex. I know, I know – the game is targeted at young girls. Still, I shouldn’t have to be called Miss Michael, no matter how adorable my little pink-haired avatar might be. I shouldn’t even have to say it – I wasn’t exactly all that serious about Style Savvy when the rest of the staff decided to volunteer me for the review. I expected to get a few laughs out of the game and maybe get negative bragging rights with my fellow members of the press at the next big industry event I attended. “Oh yeah? Well I had to review Style Savvy,” I would say, and we’d laugh and laugh. I had it all planned out in my head. And then I started enjoying the game. What can I say? On a certain level, Style Savvy really clicked with me. It has several elements that I really enjoy in my games. There’s the collectability aspect, the avatar customization, inventory management, and a fair amount of logic involved in making sure your customer is pleased with the ensemble you put together for them. Change the scenery a bit and you’ve got the formula for the sort of role-playing game I’d spend hours lost in. Sure, I’ve started critiquing my friends’ outfits, and I’ve been saying things like “retro chic” far more often than anyone really should as of late, but isn’t that the sort of immersion and involvement we seek in our more traditional games? If a burly, bearded, six foot, six inches tall man spending countless hours coordinating outfits for virtual women is wrong, then my friends were all right and I should probably not press the point any further. Style Savvy was developed by syn Sophia and published by Nintendo for the DS on November 2nd. Retails for $34.99 USD. A copy of the game was given to us by the publisher for reviewing purposes. Played the game for approximately 20 hours, earning my own boutique and making little Miss Michael the talk of the town. Named my store “Mangina” in protest. Confused by our reviews? Read our review FAQ . NOTE: Throughout the month of December, Kotaku will review some of the games that we missed earlier in the year. We’re catching up.

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Style Savvy Review: Dressing Miss Michael [Review]

My kids are game addicts… and I’m ok with … [From Comments]

My kids are game addicts… and I’m ok with that. Perhaps I never should have been a parent because I’m the kind of parent most parents HATE. When my kids were 2 months old I started putting a little cereal in their bottle at night so they would sleep through the night (and they did). At 3 months old I fed them baby food. As soon as they got their first teeth I was feeding them Rice and Beans. I think my oldest had her first slice of Pizza before she turned 1. This attitude spread to other things as they got older. I actively encouraged my kids to watch TV. Barney, The Rugrats, Dora the Explorer, and everything in between on PBS and Nickelodeon as they got older then they added Cartoon Network. I always heard people saying you shouldn’t let your kids watch TV when they are little, and you should read to them every night and blah blah blah. But me, I don’t listen, I let them watch TV, LOTS of TV. My oldest daughter is now 10. When she was 1 she would talk your ear off telling you stories. When she was 2 she would tell EVERYONE she ran into stories (including embarassing ones about grandma needing to go potty, but thats a story for later). One day I was ina a waiting room and my daughter was walking around yapping to anyone and another mom leans over and asks me how old she is. I tell her a little over 2. She looks at me with surprise and says “my goodness, she speaks so well and in full sentences! My daughter is the same age and only says a few basic words like ‘ball’ ‘mama’ and ‘cookie’. I don’t know what the problem is I NEVER let her watch TV and I read to her all the time. How did you teach your daughter so much so fast” I looked at her and said “TV. She watches LOTS of TV.” The mom gave me a tight smile and and then turned away and didn’t speak to me again. What does this have to do with games? I’m getting there. When I was a kid my dad got me a Colecovision followed by an Atari 2600. I played a little here and there but I was more into books and barbie dolls. Eventually my dad bought me an NES and a Sega master System. I still didn’t really care, I was still into barbies and books. When I was 17 I bought myself a gameboy, mostly out of curiousity. I fell in love with Link’s Awakening and Stargate. But It was something I played once ina blue moon, then I forgot about it. When I was 20 I played the N64 for the first time and I finished Mario64 and bought Ocarina of Time when it came out. I tore through Ocarina of Time and bought Majora’s Mask. I hataed it and as quickly as I had started playing I stopped. Life went on, Games came and went, I didn’t care. Then the gamecube came out and new Zelda games. I remembered how much I loved my GB and N64 Zelda games and asked my husband for a Gamecube for Christmas. He had asked me for a PS2 for Christmas. Before meeting me my husband was into playing Resident Evil and Mortal Kombat and football games. So that Christmas He got his PS2 and I got my Gamecube, I was happy with my gamecube and he was happy with his PS2 and neither one touched the others console. Then I saw Prince of Persia Sands of Time. I bought it for the PS2 and the first time I put it in the console, that console became mine…all mine. Games became a huge part of my life, I fell in love and I started collecting and playing A LOT. Being a hoarder I still had every console I had ever owned and their games so I went back and played some old stuff as well. Now I’m 32, I own tons of consoles and hand helds. I collect games and action figures, I write game reviews for the library system’s Teen Blog in my town. And I encourage game play in my family. A few years back Vtech came out with a console for kids, the V-Smile. Gaming and education, sounded good to me. I bought my kids one for christmas and they loved it, they would play for hours. The next Christmas, I got them the V-Flash, it was another learning console, a step up from the V-smile, a sort of educational starter Playstation. By the time I got it though my girls had moved on to PS2 and Gamecube, but my son Loved playing the V-Tech consoles. By the time birthdays rolled around they all wanted GBAs. And there we go. I had turned my kids into gamers. I was so proud! My husband was sort of amused by my glee. I swore up and down that gaming was good for them, he just smiled at me and shook his head slowly. From Gameboys they graduated to DSs and borrowing my PSP. Each one has a clear gaming identity as well. My oldest daughter likes Girly games. makeup, animals, dress up and she also likes JRPGs. My middle child, an 8 year old girl is a bit harder to place. She can play the dress up thing and she loves cooking mama and animal games but she’s not above a little Zombie shooting in House of the Dead. My son…My son… Before I talk about him let me just throw in that I even got my mom into games. She loves Wii sports and good lord you should hear her smack talk while playing Soul Calibur. (Her favorite is SC 3 because she likes the character creation. She has a shirtless Ninja she named Jackie Chan) ok back to my son. My son is a 5 year old MAN. The boy LOVES girls and cars. So I started him with Racing games. (by the way he is quite proficient at Midnight Club 3, except he needs a stack of books to reach the pedals.) From Racing games he moved on to Mario games and His favorite “Drawn to Life Spongebob edition”. Recently Scribblenauts came out and I got it for the girls and myself. I didn’t bother getting it for my son because at 5 he really can’t read very well…actually he’s having a lot of trouble at school. I got their progress reports right before thanksgiving and besides having a fan club of girls, he also likes to throw things at people who annoy him and ignore the teacher, he also has trouble with reading and writing. I have been stressed and worried about it for days. Then it happened…. we were watching Tv and he was a scribblenauts commercial. He said “I wanna play that” I said, “but sweetie you can’t read” He looked so dejected so I figured what the heck, let him try and I’ll help him along. Its been 2 days since he started playing, He’s already learned to spell about 10 words. The first night we sat together and he would tell me what he wanted, I would spell it for him, he’d type it and then he would squeal with glee when his items appeared on screen. Of course, as much as I enjoyed playing it with him, I can’t sit all day doing it so I decided to make hima “cheat sheet” I wrote out in all caps the things he had asked to make the most and I gave it to him. I read each word to him and told him if he needed more words then he could come to me and I’d add them to the list. I started with about 10 words and now I’m on page 2 and he’s spelling words on his own! He doesn’t actually play the game he just stays at the beginning screen making things and seeing what happens when they interact. Brain Age, Style Savvy, Scribblenauts and so many other games are teaching my kids so many things, helping them learn without them even realizing it. Heck even the JRPGs have helped my daughter immensely. Unlike me, my daughter has never cared for reading, what she doesn’t realize is that while playing JRPGs she’s reading so much text her reading has improved immensely and she’s enjoying it. Like me, my kids carry their DSs wherever they go, they play every chance they get. When they aren’t playing DS they’re playing any of the other consoles we own. We play Guitar Hero together and Singstar. We play Champions of Norrath and we teach them how to cooperate, how to share the spoils they pick up, how much money they need for an item, and which weapon is better between the weapon with a high attack and one with a lower attack but +20 Lightning Damage. I encourage their gameplay, I buy them as many games as I can afford. I tech them how to play mine or sit in and watch. Recently my 10yr old started to play Oblivion…I’m so Proud. I don’t know if I’m a good parent or not. I know a lot of people wouldn’t approve of how much TV they watch and Games they play. Maybe they’re right, I don’t know. All I know is that my daughters are both straight A/B students. They have a huge vocabulary, and know Cloud is overrated as a Hero. All three of them also know all the words to “Still Alive” Oh and in the time it took em to type this, I’m on page 3 of words for my son. I think any game can be educational to a certain extent if you talk about it to your kids and encourage them to ask questions (and you answer them honestly). Perceptions and Misconceptions about games runs rampant but slowly people are realizing the good they can do. East Side High in New York has discovered that Beaterator is a wonderful digital music tool and will be implementing it in their music program. The Japanese already use DSs in the classroom and my son is learning to read and spell thanks to Scribblenauts and learning faster than he has learned anything since school started. So my kids game A LOT and I am damn proud of that. The media and people at large attack gaming constantly. It teaches Violence, it makes kids lazy and unhealthy, it causes addiction. I say it teaches hand eye coordination, cooperation, sometimes a touch of history, math, reading, encourages artistic expression, relieves stress and is just plain fun. By the textbook definition I guess they are addicts, sometimes gaming for most of the day. However, I have yet to find how this has impacted them negatively. #speakout

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My kids are game addicts… and I’m ok with … [From Comments]

The Nintendo Download: Bits, Trips, Karts, And Blobs [Nintendo]

It’s a jam-packed Thanksgiving edition of the Nintendo Download, with enough games to leave you comatose on the couch for hours. Where to start? This week is pretty packed, especially in the DSiWare department, with five more Electroplanton to play with at 200 points a pop. There’s also a notepad application called myNotenook Blue from Nnooo (200 points), which allows users to jot down notes and features 18 unlockable paper styles, which is nearly too much excitement for me to stand. Add in Gameloft’s Castle of Magic (500 points), a platform adventure that uses the Nintendo DSi Camera to transform your character into powerful new forms, and you’ve got enough DSiWare goodness to have you in leftovers for weeks. The Virtual Console gets two new old games, and they’re both relatively big ones. Super Mario Kart for the Super Nintendo is still one of the best racing games around, and at 800 Wii points its an absolute steal. It is accompanied by the NES original A Boy and His Blob: Trouble on Blobolonia (500 points), which should be a treat for those who’ve played the recent reimagining without having played its inspiration. Rounding up this week’s Nintendo Download are four new entries to the WiiWare service. We’ve got Bit.Trip Void , another entry in Aksys’ colorful rhythm-centric series (600 points); Harvest Moon: My Little Shop (1,200 points), which allows players to grow and sell things, building their Clover Town store up from nothing; Little Tournament Over Yonder from Gevo Entertainment (800 points), a strategy game for 1-2 players; and Learning with the PooYoos: Episode 1 (500 points), a brain trainer for children aged 3-6. Check out the full list below to see if you spot anything that will keep you occupied once Thanksgiving dinner ends and awkward family time begins. BIT.TRIP VOID Publisher: Aksys Games Players: 1-4 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 600 Wii Points™ Description: The third installment in the retro-arcade BIT.TRIP saga is a synesthetic exploration of rhythm and music as they pertain to our everyday lives and moods. With a control scheme that’s new to the series yet wholly familiar to gamers, players have complete freedom to move about the screen wherever they desire, interacting with the music in brand new ways. The classic game-play aesthetic remains as color – and the absence of color – are explored to the fullest. Trip out in four-player co-op and get lost in the beat with a friend. See if you can survive the onslaught of Beats and further your own BIT.TRIP. Harvest Moon: My Little Shop Publisher: Natsume, Inc. Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 1,200 Wii Points Description: Welcome to Clover Town, where you’ve just taken over your grandparents’ farm and shop. The town has fallen on hard times, though. People are leaving, businesses are struggling and the magic of the Harvest Sprites is gone. Can you turn Clover Town’s fortunes around and restore its missing magic? Raise crops and animals, then use what you farm at your shop. Keep your customers happy by making wild fruit juices, towering ice cream cones and extravagantly decorated eggs in a series of fun and fast-paced activities that use the Wii Remote™ controller to its fullest potential. Chop vegetables in midair, shake your Wii Remote controller to match your cow’s moves, roll eggs through tilting mazes and more. Use your hard-earned money to buy new crops and animals or expand and decorate your shop. Along the way, you’ll meet and befriend lots of new and interesting characters, as well as several familiar faces from the Harvest Moon series. Little Tournament Over Yonder Publisher: Gevo Entertainment Players: 1-2 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) – Mild Cartoon Violence Price: 800 Wii Points Description: In the world of Little Tournament Over Yonder, play as a young Prince or Princess and lead your team through numerous battles. Plan and deploy your units to gain strategic advantages. Launch real-time battles between units and fight hard, fast and smart. Build your team, hire new units with different powers, then groom them with battle experience to gain level. With strategic planning and real-time, fast-paced fighting, this game is for the complete warrior – one who works his mind and his muscles. Go for Single-Player Tournament glory or challenge your friend in a 2-Player Versus match. Learning with the PooYoos: Episode 1 Publisher: Lexis Numérique Players: 1 ESRB Rating: EC (Early Childhood) Price: 500 Wii Points Description: Welcome to the world of the PooYoos, the first fun, poetic brain trainer for children aged 3 to 6. With the PooYoos, a merry band of adorable baby animals, children will have fun while learning the developmental basics: numbers, letters, lateralization, shapes, colors and more. Children get to dance with their new friends and enjoy lovely interactive rewards. There are two levels of interactivity, so children can play according to their age and level. This game has been designed for use by children who have not yet grasped reading. Virtual Console Super Mario Kart Original platform: Super NES™ Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1-2 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 800 Wii Points Description: Get in, sit down, buckle up and experience frantic kart racing in the game that started it all. Select one of eight characters from the Mario series – offering a variety of driving styles – and take on three championship cups in three different kart classes. Win enough and you’ll unlock a fourth circuit: the ultra-tough Special Cup. Crossing the finish line in first place isn’t an easy task, though, as each track has unique obstacles to conquer. Racers can obtain special power-ups that boost them to victory. For a different kind of challenge, take on a friend in multiplayer races or go head-to-head in a Battle Mode arena, where the object is to pop your opponent’s balloons before you lose your own. With more than 15 tracks to master and nearly endless replay value, Super Mario Kart is classic gaming with some banana peels thrown in for good measure. A Boy and His Blob: Trouble on Blobolonia Original platform: NES™ Publisher: Majesco Entertainment Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 500 Wii Points Description: Blob has come from the distant planet Blobolonia in search of an Earth boy to help him save his world. Join him on this fantastic adventure, searching for treasures in mysterious caverns beneath the earth, then traveling to Blobolonia to battle the evil emperor. Discover Blob’s amazing appetite for jellybeans and the different transformations that occur with each flavor. Use these shapes to overcome even the most outrageous obstacles. A Boy and His Blob is a fantastic journey filled with constant surprises and humorous characters. Nintendo DSiWare Castle Of Magic Publisher: Gameloft Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) – Mild Cartoon Violence Price: 500 Nintendo DSi Points™ Description: Be prepared for anything as you try to save your friend from the clutches of the horrifying magician Nefastax. Stand up to wild monsters in environments that directly influence your movement. As you navigate this universe, the ground will make you stick, slide, sink, swim, levitate and even walk on the ceiling when gravity disappears. A never-before-seen use for the Nintendo DSi Camera application lets you transform yourself into powerful new forms. Visit an in-game Photo Cabin and search for a real-life object that matches the color of the character you want to transform into. Take a picture of a blue object with your Nintendo DSi system and…presto, you’re transformed into a swordfish. You can customize game items – from coins to enemies – with pictures of your choice. Our cute hero’s adventure is just too big and immersive for one screen, so he’ll have to jump between the top and bottom screens of your Nintendo DSi system. Ready to dive into the adventure? myNotebook: Blue™ Publisher: Nnooo Players: 1 Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: myNotebook allows you to take notes wherever you are. Just pop open your Nintendo DSi system and jot down your thoughts. Make a list and cross it off or play your favorite pen and paper games (games not included). You can even personalize your notebook by drawing on the cover and changing the paper type with 18 unlockable paper styles. Use the pen or pencil to make notes or doodles, then erase the bits you don’t like. With five ink colors, you’ll always be able to make your notes and doodles look stylish. Electroplankton Luminarrow Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Luminarrow plankton are famous for their habit of perfectly following arrow-shaped formations. The plankton spin as they move, changing directions as soon as they come in contact with an arrow that’s pointing in another direction. The pitch of the sound they make will change depending on where the arrows are positioned. There are four types of Luminarrow: red, yellow, green and blue. Each type floats at a different speed and makes a distinctive musical tone. The four types of Luminarrow drift together to create beautiful melodies. Completely alter the direction of the arrows to change their sound dramatically. Electroplankton Sun-Animalcule Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Sun-Animalcule plankton get their name from their tendency to emit light in a sphere around them. The plankton begin as eggs and gradually grow, emitting light and fascinating sounds throughout their entire life cycle. The sounds they make will change as they grow from infancy to maturity, growing very quickly until they disappear completely. Sun-Animalcule plankton only emerge in the morning, noon and evening. They lose strength as the night wears on; that’s when the crescent-shaped Falcato plankton take their place. The pitch of the plankton changes depending on where they grow. Electroplankton Lumiloop Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Lumiloop plankton are curious, donut-shaped aquatic creatures. While stationary, they have the ability to spin at a very high rate of speed. As they spin, the Lumiloop emit unique sounds and a fascinating ring-shaped glow. Lumiloop plankton seem to always grow in clusters of five. They produce sounds at different pitches as they spin together, creating a beautiful harmony. This is called a pentatonic scale. Depending on where they live, Lumiloop plankton that produce several different sounds have been identified. Electroplankton Marine-Crystals Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Resembling delicate snow crystals, Marine-Crystal plankton float elegantly on the surface of the water. The plankton get their name from their distinctive snowflake shape. They grow in clusters of 35 and line up in very orderly formations. When stimulated, Marine-Crystal plankton spin and produce vibrant sounds. While the plankton do grow in size if they are repeatedly tapped, they gradually return to their original size over time. They are born in four polygonal shapes: triangle, square, pentagon and hexagon. The ends of the crystalline protrusions also take on the same shapes. The tone of the sound they make will change depending on the shape of the Marine-Crystal plankton’s body. Electroplankton Varvoice Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Varvoice plankton memorize the sound of human speech and repeat it over and over. They accomplish this amazing feat by oscillating the long flagellum that extends from their heads. By resonating the vibration with their water-droplet-shaped body, the plankton produce sounds that closely resemble the human voice. The body can expand and contract at will. By changing shape, they can easily manipulate the sound of the voice. Words that the Varvoice memorize and play back in reverse have a particularly strange ring to them. Researchers refer to this phenomenon as Varvoice inversion.

Continue reading here:
The Nintendo Download: Bits, Trips, Karts, And Blobs [Nintendo]

The Nintendo Download: Bits, Trips, Karts, And Blobs [Nintendo]

It’s a jam-packed Thanksgiving edition of the Nintendo Download, with enough games to leave you comatose on the couch for hours. Where to start? This week is pretty packed, especially in the DSiWare department, with five more Electroplanton to play with at 200 points a pop. There’s also a notepad application called myNotenook Blue from Nnooo (200 points), which allows users to jot down notes and features 18 unlockable paper styles, which is nearly too much excitement for me to stand. Add in Gameloft’s Castle of Magic (500 points), a platform adventure that uses the Nintendo DSi Camera to transform your character into powerful new forms, and you’ve got enough DSiWare goodness to have you in leftovers for weeks. The Virtual Console gets two new old games, and they’re both relatively big ones. Super Mario Kart for the Super Nintendo is still one of the best racing games around, and at 800 Wii points its an absolute steal. It is accompanied by the NES original A Boy and His Blob: Trouble on Blobolonia (500 points), which should be a treat for those who’ve played the recent reimagining without having played its inspiration. Rounding up this week’s Nintendo Download are four new entries to the WiiWare service. We’ve got Bit.Trip Void , another entry in Aksys’ colorful rhythm-centric series (600 points); Harvest Moon: My Little Shop (1,200 points), which allows players to grow and sell things, building their Clover Town store up from nothing; Little Tournament Over Yonder from Gevo Entertainment (800 points), a strategy game for 1-2 players; and Learning with the PooYoos: Episode 1 (500 points), a brain trainer for children aged 3-6. Check out the full list below to see if you spot anything that will keep you occupied once Thanksgiving dinner ends and awkward family time begins. BIT.TRIP VOID Publisher: Aksys Games Players: 1-4 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 600 Wii Points™ Description: The third installment in the retro-arcade BIT.TRIP saga is a synesthetic exploration of rhythm and music as they pertain to our everyday lives and moods. With a control scheme that’s new to the series yet wholly familiar to gamers, players have complete freedom to move about the screen wherever they desire, interacting with the music in brand new ways. The classic game-play aesthetic remains as color – and the absence of color – are explored to the fullest. Trip out in four-player co-op and get lost in the beat with a friend. See if you can survive the onslaught of Beats and further your own BIT.TRIP. Harvest Moon: My Little Shop Publisher: Natsume, Inc. Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 1,200 Wii Points Description: Welcome to Clover Town, where you’ve just taken over your grandparents’ farm and shop. The town has fallen on hard times, though. People are leaving, businesses are struggling and the magic of the Harvest Sprites is gone. Can you turn Clover Town’s fortunes around and restore its missing magic? Raise crops and animals, then use what you farm at your shop. Keep your customers happy by making wild fruit juices, towering ice cream cones and extravagantly decorated eggs in a series of fun and fast-paced activities that use the Wii Remote™ controller to its fullest potential. Chop vegetables in midair, shake your Wii Remote controller to match your cow’s moves, roll eggs through tilting mazes and more. Use your hard-earned money to buy new crops and animals or expand and decorate your shop. Along the way, you’ll meet and befriend lots of new and interesting characters, as well as several familiar faces from the Harvest Moon series. Little Tournament Over Yonder Publisher: Gevo Entertainment Players: 1-2 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) – Mild Cartoon Violence Price: 800 Wii Points Description: In the world of Little Tournament Over Yonder, play as a young Prince or Princess and lead your team through numerous battles. Plan and deploy your units to gain strategic advantages. Launch real-time battles between units and fight hard, fast and smart. Build your team, hire new units with different powers, then groom them with battle experience to gain level. With strategic planning and real-time, fast-paced fighting, this game is for the complete warrior – one who works his mind and his muscles. Go for Single-Player Tournament glory or challenge your friend in a 2-Player Versus match. Learning with the PooYoos: Episode 1 Publisher: Lexis Numérique Players: 1 ESRB Rating: EC (Early Childhood) Price: 500 Wii Points Description: Welcome to the world of the PooYoos, the first fun, poetic brain trainer for children aged 3 to 6. With the PooYoos, a merry band of adorable baby animals, children will have fun while learning the developmental basics: numbers, letters, lateralization, shapes, colors and more. Children get to dance with their new friends and enjoy lovely interactive rewards. There are two levels of interactivity, so children can play according to their age and level. This game has been designed for use by children who have not yet grasped reading. Virtual Console Super Mario Kart Original platform: Super NES™ Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1-2 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 800 Wii Points Description: Get in, sit down, buckle up and experience frantic kart racing in the game that started it all. Select one of eight characters from the Mario series – offering a variety of driving styles – and take on three championship cups in three different kart classes. Win enough and you’ll unlock a fourth circuit: the ultra-tough Special Cup. Crossing the finish line in first place isn’t an easy task, though, as each track has unique obstacles to conquer. Racers can obtain special power-ups that boost them to victory. For a different kind of challenge, take on a friend in multiplayer races or go head-to-head in a Battle Mode arena, where the object is to pop your opponent’s balloons before you lose your own. With more than 15 tracks to master and nearly endless replay value, Super Mario Kart is classic gaming with some banana peels thrown in for good measure. A Boy and His Blob: Trouble on Blobolonia Original platform: NES™ Publisher: Majesco Entertainment Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 500 Wii Points Description: Blob has come from the distant planet Blobolonia in search of an Earth boy to help him save his world. Join him on this fantastic adventure, searching for treasures in mysterious caverns beneath the earth, then traveling to Blobolonia to battle the evil emperor. Discover Blob’s amazing appetite for jellybeans and the different transformations that occur with each flavor. Use these shapes to overcome even the most outrageous obstacles. A Boy and His Blob is a fantastic journey filled with constant surprises and humorous characters. Nintendo DSiWare Castle Of Magic Publisher: Gameloft Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) – Mild Cartoon Violence Price: 500 Nintendo DSi Points™ Description: Be prepared for anything as you try to save your friend from the clutches of the horrifying magician Nefastax. Stand up to wild monsters in environments that directly influence your movement. As you navigate this universe, the ground will make you stick, slide, sink, swim, levitate and even walk on the ceiling when gravity disappears. A never-before-seen use for the Nintendo DSi Camera application lets you transform yourself into powerful new forms. Visit an in-game Photo Cabin and search for a real-life object that matches the color of the character you want to transform into. Take a picture of a blue object with your Nintendo DSi system and…presto, you’re transformed into a swordfish. You can customize game items – from coins to enemies – with pictures of your choice. Our cute hero’s adventure is just too big and immersive for one screen, so he’ll have to jump between the top and bottom screens of your Nintendo DSi system. Ready to dive into the adventure? myNotebook: Blue™ Publisher: Nnooo Players: 1 Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: myNotebook allows you to take notes wherever you are. Just pop open your Nintendo DSi system and jot down your thoughts. Make a list and cross it off or play your favorite pen and paper games (games not included). You can even personalize your notebook by drawing on the cover and changing the paper type with 18 unlockable paper styles. Use the pen or pencil to make notes or doodles, then erase the bits you don’t like. With five ink colors, you’ll always be able to make your notes and doodles look stylish. Electroplankton Luminarrow Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Luminarrow plankton are famous for their habit of perfectly following arrow-shaped formations. The plankton spin as they move, changing directions as soon as they come in contact with an arrow that’s pointing in another direction. The pitch of the sound they make will change depending on where the arrows are positioned. There are four types of Luminarrow: red, yellow, green and blue. Each type floats at a different speed and makes a distinctive musical tone. The four types of Luminarrow drift together to create beautiful melodies. Completely alter the direction of the arrows to change their sound dramatically. Electroplankton Sun-Animalcule Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Sun-Animalcule plankton get their name from their tendency to emit light in a sphere around them. The plankton begin as eggs and gradually grow, emitting light and fascinating sounds throughout their entire life cycle. The sounds they make will change as they grow from infancy to maturity, growing very quickly until they disappear completely. Sun-Animalcule plankton only emerge in the morning, noon and evening. They lose strength as the night wears on; that’s when the crescent-shaped Falcato plankton take their place. The pitch of the plankton changes depending on where they grow. Electroplankton Lumiloop Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Lumiloop plankton are curious, donut-shaped aquatic creatures. While stationary, they have the ability to spin at a very high rate of speed. As they spin, the Lumiloop emit unique sounds and a fascinating ring-shaped glow. Lumiloop plankton seem to always grow in clusters of five. They produce sounds at different pitches as they spin together, creating a beautiful harmony. This is called a pentatonic scale. Depending on where they live, Lumiloop plankton that produce several different sounds have been identified. Electroplankton Marine-Crystals Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Resembling delicate snow crystals, Marine-Crystal plankton float elegantly on the surface of the water. The plankton get their name from their distinctive snowflake shape. They grow in clusters of 35 and line up in very orderly formations. When stimulated, Marine-Crystal plankton spin and produce vibrant sounds. While the plankton do grow in size if they are repeatedly tapped, they gradually return to their original size over time. They are born in four polygonal shapes: triangle, square, pentagon and hexagon. The ends of the crystalline protrusions also take on the same shapes. The tone of the sound they make will change depending on the shape of the Marine-Crystal plankton’s body. Electroplankton Varvoice Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Varvoice plankton memorize the sound of human speech and repeat it over and over. They accomplish this amazing feat by oscillating the long flagellum that extends from their heads. By resonating the vibration with their water-droplet-shaped body, the plankton produce sounds that closely resemble the human voice. The body can expand and contract at will. By changing shape, they can easily manipulate the sound of the voice. Words that the Varvoice memorize and play back in reverse have a particularly strange ring to them. Researchers refer to this phenomenon as Varvoice inversion.

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The Nintendo Download: Bits, Trips, Karts, And Blobs [Nintendo]

The Nintendo Download: Bits, Trips, Karts, And Blobs [Nintendo]

It’s a jam-packed Thanksgiving edition of the Nintendo Download, with enough games to leave you comatose on the couch for hours. Where to start? This week is pretty packed, especially in the DSiWare department, with five more Electroplanton to play with at 200 points a pop. There’s also a notepad application called myNotenook Blue from Nnooo (200 points), which allows users to jot down notes and features 18 unlockable paper styles, which is nearly too much excitement for me to stand. Add in Gameloft’s Castle of Magic (500 points), a platform adventure that uses the Nintendo DSi Camera to transform your character into powerful new forms, and you’ve got enough DSiWare goodness to have you in leftovers for weeks. The Virtual Console gets two new old games, and they’re both relatively big ones. Super Mario Kart for the Super Nintendo is still one of the best racing games around, and at 800 Wii points its an absolute steal. It is accompanied by the NES original A Boy and His Blob: Trouble on Blobolonia (500 points), which should be a treat for those who’ve played the recent reimagining without having played its inspiration. Rounding up this week’s Nintendo Download are four new entries to the WiiWare service. We’ve got Bit.Trip Void , another entry in Aksys’ colorful rhythm-centric series (600 points); Harvest Moon: My Little Shop (1,200 points), which allows players to grow and sell things, building their Clover Town store up from nothing; Little Tournament Over Yonder from Gevo Entertainment (800 points), a strategy game for 1-2 players; and Learning with the PooYoos: Episode 1 (500 points), a brain trainer for children aged 3-6. Check out the full list below to see if you spot anything that will keep you occupied once Thanksgiving dinner ends and awkward family time begins. BIT.TRIP VOID Publisher: Aksys Games Players: 1-4 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 600 Wii Points™ Description: The third installment in the retro-arcade BIT.TRIP saga is a synesthetic exploration of rhythm and music as they pertain to our everyday lives and moods. With a control scheme that’s new to the series yet wholly familiar to gamers, players have complete freedom to move about the screen wherever they desire, interacting with the music in brand new ways. The classic game-play aesthetic remains as color – and the absence of color – are explored to the fullest. Trip out in four-player co-op and get lost in the beat with a friend. See if you can survive the onslaught of Beats and further your own BIT.TRIP. Harvest Moon: My Little Shop Publisher: Natsume, Inc. Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 1,200 Wii Points Description: Welcome to Clover Town, where you’ve just taken over your grandparents’ farm and shop. The town has fallen on hard times, though. People are leaving, businesses are struggling and the magic of the Harvest Sprites is gone. Can you turn Clover Town’s fortunes around and restore its missing magic? Raise crops and animals, then use what you farm at your shop. Keep your customers happy by making wild fruit juices, towering ice cream cones and extravagantly decorated eggs in a series of fun and fast-paced activities that use the Wii Remote™ controller to its fullest potential. Chop vegetables in midair, shake your Wii Remote controller to match your cow’s moves, roll eggs through tilting mazes and more. Use your hard-earned money to buy new crops and animals or expand and decorate your shop. Along the way, you’ll meet and befriend lots of new and interesting characters, as well as several familiar faces from the Harvest Moon series. Little Tournament Over Yonder Publisher: Gevo Entertainment Players: 1-2 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) – Mild Cartoon Violence Price: 800 Wii Points Description: In the world of Little Tournament Over Yonder, play as a young Prince or Princess and lead your team through numerous battles. Plan and deploy your units to gain strategic advantages. Launch real-time battles between units and fight hard, fast and smart. Build your team, hire new units with different powers, then groom them with battle experience to gain level. With strategic planning and real-time, fast-paced fighting, this game is for the complete warrior – one who works his mind and his muscles. Go for Single-Player Tournament glory or challenge your friend in a 2-Player Versus match. Learning with the PooYoos: Episode 1 Publisher: Lexis Numérique Players: 1 ESRB Rating: EC (Early Childhood) Price: 500 Wii Points Description: Welcome to the world of the PooYoos, the first fun, poetic brain trainer for children aged 3 to 6. With the PooYoos, a merry band of adorable baby animals, children will have fun while learning the developmental basics: numbers, letters, lateralization, shapes, colors and more. Children get to dance with their new friends and enjoy lovely interactive rewards. There are two levels of interactivity, so children can play according to their age and level. This game has been designed for use by children who have not yet grasped reading. Virtual Console Super Mario Kart Original platform: Super NES™ Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1-2 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 800 Wii Points Description: Get in, sit down, buckle up and experience frantic kart racing in the game that started it all. Select one of eight characters from the Mario series – offering a variety of driving styles – and take on three championship cups in three different kart classes. Win enough and you’ll unlock a fourth circuit: the ultra-tough Special Cup. Crossing the finish line in first place isn’t an easy task, though, as each track has unique obstacles to conquer. Racers can obtain special power-ups that boost them to victory. For a different kind of challenge, take on a friend in multiplayer races or go head-to-head in a Battle Mode arena, where the object is to pop your opponent’s balloons before you lose your own. With more than 15 tracks to master and nearly endless replay value, Super Mario Kart is classic gaming with some banana peels thrown in for good measure. A Boy and His Blob: Trouble on Blobolonia Original platform: NES™ Publisher: Majesco Entertainment Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 500 Wii Points Description: Blob has come from the distant planet Blobolonia in search of an Earth boy to help him save his world. Join him on this fantastic adventure, searching for treasures in mysterious caverns beneath the earth, then traveling to Blobolonia to battle the evil emperor. Discover Blob’s amazing appetite for jellybeans and the different transformations that occur with each flavor. Use these shapes to overcome even the most outrageous obstacles. A Boy and His Blob is a fantastic journey filled with constant surprises and humorous characters. Nintendo DSiWare Castle Of Magic Publisher: Gameloft Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) – Mild Cartoon Violence Price: 500 Nintendo DSi Points™ Description: Be prepared for anything as you try to save your friend from the clutches of the horrifying magician Nefastax. Stand up to wild monsters in environments that directly influence your movement. As you navigate this universe, the ground will make you stick, slide, sink, swim, levitate and even walk on the ceiling when gravity disappears. A never-before-seen use for the Nintendo DSi Camera application lets you transform yourself into powerful new forms. Visit an in-game Photo Cabin and search for a real-life object that matches the color of the character you want to transform into. Take a picture of a blue object with your Nintendo DSi system and…presto, you’re transformed into a swordfish. You can customize game items – from coins to enemies – with pictures of your choice. Our cute hero’s adventure is just too big and immersive for one screen, so he’ll have to jump between the top and bottom screens of your Nintendo DSi system. Ready to dive into the adventure? myNotebook: Blue™ Publisher: Nnooo Players: 1 Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: myNotebook allows you to take notes wherever you are. Just pop open your Nintendo DSi system and jot down your thoughts. Make a list and cross it off or play your favorite pen and paper games (games not included). You can even personalize your notebook by drawing on the cover and changing the paper type with 18 unlockable paper styles. Use the pen or pencil to make notes or doodles, then erase the bits you don’t like. With five ink colors, you’ll always be able to make your notes and doodles look stylish. Electroplankton Luminarrow Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Luminarrow plankton are famous for their habit of perfectly following arrow-shaped formations. The plankton spin as they move, changing directions as soon as they come in contact with an arrow that’s pointing in another direction. The pitch of the sound they make will change depending on where the arrows are positioned. There are four types of Luminarrow: red, yellow, green and blue. Each type floats at a different speed and makes a distinctive musical tone. The four types of Luminarrow drift together to create beautiful melodies. Completely alter the direction of the arrows to change their sound dramatically. Electroplankton Sun-Animalcule Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Sun-Animalcule plankton get their name from their tendency to emit light in a sphere around them. The plankton begin as eggs and gradually grow, emitting light and fascinating sounds throughout their entire life cycle. The sounds they make will change as they grow from infancy to maturity, growing very quickly until they disappear completely. Sun-Animalcule plankton only emerge in the morning, noon and evening. They lose strength as the night wears on; that’s when the crescent-shaped Falcato plankton take their place. The pitch of the plankton changes depending on where they grow. Electroplankton Lumiloop Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Lumiloop plankton are curious, donut-shaped aquatic creatures. While stationary, they have the ability to spin at a very high rate of speed. As they spin, the Lumiloop emit unique sounds and a fascinating ring-shaped glow. Lumiloop plankton seem to always grow in clusters of five. They produce sounds at different pitches as they spin together, creating a beautiful harmony. This is called a pentatonic scale. Depending on where they live, Lumiloop plankton that produce several different sounds have been identified. Electroplankton Marine-Crystals Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Resembling delicate snow crystals, Marine-Crystal plankton float elegantly on the surface of the water. The plankton get their name from their distinctive snowflake shape. They grow in clusters of 35 and line up in very orderly formations. When stimulated, Marine-Crystal plankton spin and produce vibrant sounds. While the plankton do grow in size if they are repeatedly tapped, they gradually return to their original size over time. They are born in four polygonal shapes: triangle, square, pentagon and hexagon. The ends of the crystalline protrusions also take on the same shapes. The tone of the sound they make will change depending on the shape of the Marine-Crystal plankton’s body. Electroplankton Varvoice Publisher: Nintendo Players: 1 ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points Description: Varvoice plankton memorize the sound of human speech and repeat it over and over. They accomplish this amazing feat by oscillating the long flagellum that extends from their heads. By resonating the vibration with their water-droplet-shaped body, the plankton produce sounds that closely resemble the human voice. The body can expand and contract at will. By changing shape, they can easily manipulate the sound of the voice. Words that the Varvoice memorize and play back in reverse have a particularly strange ring to them. Researchers refer to this phenomenon as Varvoice inversion.

Read the original here:
The Nintendo Download: Bits, Trips, Karts, And Blobs [Nintendo]

Capcom Gets A- For Sticking To Theme [Swag Report]

I go to a lot of preview events every year and not many of them have the wherewithal to establish a theme, let alone stick to one so well as Capcom did last night at Monster Hunter Tri University. Not only were there an obscene amount of chalkboards, pennants and people in school kid uniforms — there was an actual lecture from Monster Hunter Tri Producer Ryozo Tsujimoto, complete with pointing stick and warnings about getting kicked out of class for sleeping. The only thing about the event that didn’t smack of school was the theme drink list — hence the A- instead of a perfect score. I must’ve been to a hundred pep rallies between being student body president in high school and president of the anime club in college — and not once did any of my institutions of higher learning shell out for drinks. You can check out the cocktail list below. Here’s the swag report (all of which will be up for grabs at Ümloud! ): 1 Ginormous sweatshirt I will never wear 1 Fancy-looking notebook 1 Monster Hunter “Field Guide” 1 Set of pins, featuring cutesy character Cha Cha 1 Backpack of significant sturdiness

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Capcom Gets A- For Sticking To Theme [Swag Report]

K9 [Kotaku Reader]

TABLE OF CONTENTS November 2009 Massage Games Don’t Always Have Happy Endings The Xbox Massage-Makers: Money, Sex Toys & Indie Backlash by Stephen Totilo Intervention I Kept Playing – The Costs Of My Gaming Addiction by Mike Fahey Meet The FAQers For Little Money And In Many Words, These Gamers Help You by Owen Good Gaming’s Gamblers I Can Kick Your Butt, Wanna Bet? by Brian Ashcraft The Lone Gamer Is Single-Player Gaming In Danger Of Extinction? by Michael McWhertor Frighteners What Makes A Video Game Scary by A.J. Glasser REVIEWS Dead Space Extraction Review: Frighteningly Good PSP: Attack of the Minis Heroes Over Europe Review: A Flying Shame FIFA 10 Review: 30-Yard Screamer MySims Agents Review: Sherlock Holmes Didn’t Have To Deal With This $#@% NHL 2K10 Review: Thin-Ice Capades Spyborgs Review: Not-So-Heavy Metal Gran Turismo PSP Review: Steady As A Pace Car Wii Fit Plus Review: Now I’m A Believer MotorStorm: Arctic Edge Review: Big Game, Big Fun Katamari Forever Review: Nothing More, Nothing Less South Park Let’s Go Tower Defense Play! Review: Throwing Snowballs Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days Review: Crisis Hearts NBA 2K10 Review: Ball, You – Man! NBA Live 10 Review: Amen for a Revival Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising Review: Boom Headshot! Brutal Legend Review: Testing Its Metal Lucidity Micro-Review: Beauty Is Only Skin-Deep Ju-on: The Grudge Review: Curse Of The Movie Game Half-Minute Hero Review: A Good Risk Zombie Apocalypse Micro-Review: Paint the Town Red Axel & Pixel Micro-Review: A Puzzling Combination Borderlands Review: Guns! Guns! Guns! Critter Crunch Micro Review: Gross In a Cute Way Bakugan Battle Brawlers Review: Almost There A Boy And His Blob Review: The Zero Nostalgia Version Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games Review: Going Through the Motions Ratchet & Clank Future: A Crack In Time Review: The Leap, At Last Marvel Super Hero Squad Review: This One Is For The Brats Dungeon Hunter Review: Pocketful of Diablo Rock Band Micro Review: iPhone Joins the Band Forza Motorsport 3 Review: Definitively Maybe DJ Hero Review: You Spin Me Right Round GTA: The Ballad Of Gay Tony Review: Out With A Bang Tekken 6 Review: The Lag of Iron Fist Saw Review: Do You Want to Play This Game? LostWinds: Winter of the Melodias Micro Review: A Pleasant Gust of Fun PREVIEWS Eliminate Preview: Transitive Verbs Are Cooler Than Nouns Sims 3 World Adventures: Chopsticks, Mummies & the French – Oh My! New Super Mario Bros. Wii Preview: All The Modes, All The Chaos Global Conflicts: Child Soldiers Preview: Show Me, Don’t Tell Me FATALE Preview: Alluring, Alarming and Totally Ambiguous Left 4 Dead 2 Scavenge Mode Preview: Giving Multiplayer The Gas Jam Sessions 2 Preview: I Fought The Law And Nobody Won Dark Void Preview: Learning To Fall With Style Sign Up To Test Zune, Facebook, And Twitter On Your 360 Star Wars Battlefront: Elite Squadron Preview: I’m A Total Space Case Army of Two: The 40th Day Multiplayer Preview: Extract Some Fun Avatar Wii Preview: Environmentalism Commando Dementium II Preview: A Mature DS Game With “Hell Moments” MAG Preview: Come Back Here With My Tank! Dawn of War II: Chaos Rising Preview: The Darker Side Of Dawn COLUMNS Well Played Why Everyone Should Be Watching the PSPgo When the Going Gets Tough… Let the Game Play Itself Windows 7: What Happened to Gaming? Video Game Speakeasy Slips Into Soho for a Night of Raucous Fun Can Bigger Screens Save a Shrinking Market? Stick Jockey A Virtual Golfer Looks Back On – and Ahead to – His Tournament Career It’s Not in the Game – Should it Be? Re-Creating a Stadium Before Its First Pitch is Thrown With NCAA 10, EA Guns for Two Shining Moments Leigh Alexander In Praise Of Hard Games tim rogers i’ve been shot! COVER Designed by Michael McWhertor

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K9 [Kotaku Reader]

NBA Live Micro-Review: More than Pick-Up Hoops [Review]

EA Sports continues its full-court press into the mobile games space with NBA Live . Madden and FIFA delivered enjoyable football and soccer experiences, can the iPhone and iPod Touch hope to contain five-on-five basketball? Loved Under control: Honestly thought I’d hate the controls, considering this is five-on-five basketball with not a joystick in sight. But getting the hang of them – specifically knowing how much space your juke moves take up, so you can finish a dunk or pull-up jumper – you can run some entertaining, mostly arcade ball with occasional flourishes of realism. (Though, dunks and drives to the basic seemed to be a little too easy, allowing you to brute-force your way out of trouble most of the time.) A blue ball button controls both quick passing and your jukes (by flicking it in one of four directions) and so sometimes, you’ll make a crossover when you want to kick out to the nearest man. But the offensive setup capably handles the most difficult part of video game basketball – ball distribution. Pressing and holding the blue button allows you to select a player to receive a pass, in case you have a man free on the wing and the AI isn’t highlighting him. And a clipboard icon allows you to call basic plays, like a pick-and-roll or isolation. Defense, I didn’t like how your man instantly became a step slower as soon as you switched over to control him. It made defending in transition – and the computer is much better running and gunning than running set plays – a total crapshoot. After a while you learn how to play a guy off the ball, get him in position, and pick up easy steals and blocks, which are your main forms of active defense as the rest is handled by AI. The Full Package: Like Madden, EA Sports shoehorns as much of its full console experience into this device as possible. You have a season, playoffs and a quick game mode at three levels of difficulty, for both AI and how fouls and penalties are called. At the easy level, backcourt violations, going out of bounds and three-second violations are nonexistent, and they give you breathing room to run your game without turning your learning process into nonstop punishment. In season mode you can go right up to 12 minute quarters and 82 games if your commute is that long. Trades and roster management are enabled, but the former is more like “move players as you wish,” because there is no trade AI. (Hello, Dwight Howard-for-Nene trade!) Three-minute quarters for me produced enough results in the 30-40 point range to be satisfying. Hated Some Inconsistencies: My wi-fi access is on by default, and I was struggling with some bad framerate drops until I switched it off on a hunch. That seemed to help but there are still some inexplicable lags that make this finesse game feel a little clumsy. Although this is a device and not a game limitation, it feels very cramped playing on an NBA halfcourt with 10 guys on this size of a screen, from the broadcast angle. You can switch to a baseline view that magnifies things but I found the constant camera zooming and movement to be a little dizzying. Contesting shots and going for rebounds, especially in traffic, left me wondering whether I’d grabbed the miss or recovered the ball after a block. Marv Albert’s commentary isn’t helpful in telling me, either, as misses are either “Comes up short!” or “Off the mark!” or “Rejected emphatically!” His presence lends authenticity but is very, very repetitive. And finally, there were some puzzling AI sequences at the lower difficulties, especially in the final possessions of a quarter, where the opposing team would do things like pass the ball between two guys, repeatedly, or hold the ball until a 24-second violation sounded the horn. NBA Live has enough of a learning curve, and a large enough price, to be a serious purchase and not an impulse buy. Those who enjoy video game basketball can pick it up easy enough. But you should have a lot of time or desire to play it on your mobile for you to see value in the title, because it requires exploration. It’s clear NBA Live on the iPhone is also meant as an entry product to get you to think about its larger sibling. Ultimately, it succeeds, and does so without resorting to fun-size cop-outs like three-on-three, or dumbed-down controls. NBA Live by EA Sports was developed by EA Mobile published by Electronic Arts for the iPhone and iPod Touch on Oct. 23. Retails for $9.99 USD. A copy of the game was given to us by the publisher for reviewing purposes. Played all game types and difficulties.) Confused by our reviews? Read our review FAQ .

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NBA Live Micro-Review: More than Pick-Up Hoops [Review]

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