Matt: Moving on, when we were talking to Natsume about Rune Factory 3, we also went around and saw Lufia: Curse of the Sinistrals, which I honestly had not paid a whole lot of attention to, since it was another franchise I didn't have a history with, but what I saw was pretty cool. It's done by Neverland, like Rune Factory, and it looked like a pretty interesting action RPG. I don't know if I'll have time to play it this year, but I liked what I initially saw.
Amber: I played it for a bit and it looks like a classic-style action RPG, the sort most people probably remember from the PS1 days. I believe the game is a remake of the original Lufia II from the SNES. It features a party of characters with one character on the field at any time. You fight enemies in realtime. You can also switch characters on the fly, with each having a unique ability that can be used to get past obstacles. I'll be honest though, I'm more looking forward to Rune Factory 3 than Lufia.
Matt: Well, I certainly have the personal investment in the Rune Factory series, so I'm with you there, though I have to say it's not due to a lack of apparent quality on Lufia's side.
Amber: The last DS game I tried was Okamiden. I played Okami on the PS2 and loved it for it's style and unique adventure elements. What I saw of Okamiden showed off a play mechanic very reminiscent of Zelda: Spirit Tracks—namely, there are two characters under the player's control, a wolf and a boy. The wolf is controlled via the D-pad, and the boy uses the same touch screen mechanic that Princess Zelda did in Spirit Tracks. The boy usually rides the wolf, but when he dismounts, you draw a path for him to follow on the touch screen. That was most of what I saw when i briefly played the demo and i wonder if Okamiden will be more puzzle heavy than Okami was.
Matt: I tried that one briefly myself, too. I do confess I have yet to play Okami—it's up there on my shelf waiting for me to do it, I was a late adopter for the PS2—so I knew that I didn't have background to go on. But even given that, I wasn't really sure what to make of that demo either. It seemed... very simple. I know that floor demos are rarely very challenging, but I didn't see anything that grabbed me in that particular game.
Another title that we should perhaps talk about a little bit is Sonic Colors. Now, I did post about this one during the show, based on my time with the producer as well as a little floor time, but then as the show was wrapping up you and I both walked over to play the Wii version again in Nintendo's booth. Going into the show, I was happy about Sonic Colors for DS already just going into the show since it looked spiritually similar to the Sonic Rush series, which I've loved, but Wii was a different animal altogether. It's fair to say console Sonic's reception hasn't been great over the years; but as I played Colors for Wii again, trying out some different paths and powers, I wonder if they might have finally built a game in this franchise that might prove to be rather good.
Amber: I've mentioned to you before my odd relationship with the Sonic series. I grew up a Nintendo kid, so I didn't have any hands on with the series until Sega went third party. I've played Secret Rings, the Heroes demo, Adventure, Unleashed, and Sonic 2 on the virtual console as well as Rush and a couple of the GBA titles. Other than Secret Rings, and to a lesser extent Rush, I thought they were all mediocre to awful. And yet I keep giving the series a chance to really draw me in. Sonic has such a huge fanbase, I figured they couldn't all be wrong, right? All I really have to say about Colors on Wii is, it was actually enjoyable. I didn't run headlong into any spike traps I had no way to see coming. I didn't fall through any glitched-out walls. I didn't homing attack myself off a cliff. What little the demo showed, I actually liked without reservation.
Matt: Yeah, I've got my hopes up. It looks promising. I had one other title that I wanted to mention a few words about since I didn't actually write an article about it, and that was Conduit 2. I sat down early on in the show for a guided tour and was walked through a lot of its multiplayer features—which, to be honest, aren't particularly my cup of tea; the last competitive FPS I played online was Quake, and that was with a keyboard—but also its single-player mode, which looked a little more interesting to me.
They seem to be taking a number of cues from the Metroid Prime series, and it looks like it might be pretty fun to play. One other neat thing that I should mention is the way they use the MotionPlus to enhance the experience: the pointer tracks your aim on-screen, but when you move off, the MotionPlus keeps tracking you. It's simple but cool, and the producer noted that when he made his developers play without it sometimes, they complained loudly until they got it back. High Voltage is really trying hard with this series; I hope it does well for them.
Amber: Aye, I'm not an FPS fan and I did not play the original Conduit, but I like High Voltage's approach to the Wii and it's oft... uh... vocal fan base. I hope Conduit 2 turns out well for the Wii fans looking for a great shooter.
Amber: I played it for a bit and it looks like a classic-style action RPG, the sort most people probably remember from the PS1 days. I believe the game is a remake of the original Lufia II from the SNES. It features a party of characters with one character on the field at any time. You fight enemies in realtime. You can also switch characters on the fly, with each having a unique ability that can be used to get past obstacles. I'll be honest though, I'm more looking forward to Rune Factory 3 than Lufia.
Matt: Well, I certainly have the personal investment in the Rune Factory series, so I'm with you there, though I have to say it's not due to a lack of apparent quality on Lufia's side.
Amber: The last DS game I tried was Okamiden. I played Okami on the PS2 and loved it for it's style and unique adventure elements. What I saw of Okamiden showed off a play mechanic very reminiscent of Zelda: Spirit Tracks—namely, there are two characters under the player's control, a wolf and a boy. The wolf is controlled via the D-pad, and the boy uses the same touch screen mechanic that Princess Zelda did in Spirit Tracks. The boy usually rides the wolf, but when he dismounts, you draw a path for him to follow on the touch screen. That was most of what I saw when i briefly played the demo and i wonder if Okamiden will be more puzzle heavy than Okami was.
Matt: I tried that one briefly myself, too. I do confess I have yet to play Okami—it's up there on my shelf waiting for me to do it, I was a late adopter for the PS2—so I knew that I didn't have background to go on. But even given that, I wasn't really sure what to make of that demo either. It seemed... very simple. I know that floor demos are rarely very challenging, but I didn't see anything that grabbed me in that particular game.
Another title that we should perhaps talk about a little bit is Sonic Colors. Now, I did post about this one during the show, based on my time with the producer as well as a little floor time, but then as the show was wrapping up you and I both walked over to play the Wii version again in Nintendo's booth. Going into the show, I was happy about Sonic Colors for DS already just going into the show since it looked spiritually similar to the Sonic Rush series, which I've loved, but Wii was a different animal altogether. It's fair to say console Sonic's reception hasn't been great over the years; but as I played Colors for Wii again, trying out some different paths and powers, I wonder if they might have finally built a game in this franchise that might prove to be rather good.
Amber: I've mentioned to you before my odd relationship with the Sonic series. I grew up a Nintendo kid, so I didn't have any hands on with the series until Sega went third party. I've played Secret Rings, the Heroes demo, Adventure, Unleashed, and Sonic 2 on the virtual console as well as Rush and a couple of the GBA titles. Other than Secret Rings, and to a lesser extent Rush, I thought they were all mediocre to awful. And yet I keep giving the series a chance to really draw me in. Sonic has such a huge fanbase, I figured they couldn't all be wrong, right? All I really have to say about Colors on Wii is, it was actually enjoyable. I didn't run headlong into any spike traps I had no way to see coming. I didn't fall through any glitched-out walls. I didn't homing attack myself off a cliff. What little the demo showed, I actually liked without reservation.
Matt: Yeah, I've got my hopes up. It looks promising. I had one other title that I wanted to mention a few words about since I didn't actually write an article about it, and that was Conduit 2. I sat down early on in the show for a guided tour and was walked through a lot of its multiplayer features—which, to be honest, aren't particularly my cup of tea; the last competitive FPS I played online was Quake, and that was with a keyboard—but also its single-player mode, which looked a little more interesting to me.
They seem to be taking a number of cues from the Metroid Prime series, and it looks like it might be pretty fun to play. One other neat thing that I should mention is the way they use the MotionPlus to enhance the experience: the pointer tracks your aim on-screen, but when you move off, the MotionPlus keeps tracking you. It's simple but cool, and the producer noted that when he made his developers play without it sometimes, they complained loudly until they got it back. High Voltage is really trying hard with this series; I hope it does well for them.
Amber: Aye, I'm not an FPS fan and I did not play the original Conduit, but I like High Voltage's approach to the Wii and it's oft... uh... vocal fan base. I hope Conduit 2 turns out well for the Wii fans looking for a great shooter.