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December 26, 2014

Rock Band 3 DS (Part 3)

Read Part 1 here and Part 2 here!

Hello again! Welcome back to the year-end concert on Planned All Along! We've got plenty of famous bands – even some that have ended years ago – to play for you today! Oh, and there's a review of Rock Band 3 DS in the mix. With a lengthy explanation of the story in the game. Where were we at, exactly? Oh, right! Hardcover, our fictional band, had completed three tours around Canada and the U.S. aboard their bus, and now they were ready to go International! They're gonna get free from the vines restraining them to the American continent!


Oh yeah, have I mentioned I was trying to fit the title and band of every song in the paragraphs I write? It's a lot harder than you think! What kind of misery business did I get myself into? I'm doing all this par amour (paramore) of music and reviewing in general... why? Why? Even that last pun was kinda lame!


December 24, 2014

Vlog 5: Cons, Eyes, Magic and Music!


Today, I discuss four games I reviewed in December 2013. I also wear a funny hat with lights and do some kind of magic trick. I was never really talented with magic anyway.

December 23, 2014

80,000 Views


Eeyup. Thanks everyone for 80,000 views!

(In 2013, I ended the year at about 4,500 views. That means I got over 75,000 views this year! And it's still not over!)

December 22, 2014

Rock Band 3 DS (Part 2)

Read Part 1 here!

Hello everyone! Welcome back to this (sadly non-)musical review of Rock Band 3, on the Nintendo DS! I don't mind so much the fact that I couldn't make it into a musical review after all, because I love music nonetheless. My MP3 player (yes. still got one) is almost full. And we're talking 4 gigabytes here! ...What the Hell do you mean, that's not impressive?

Anyway, even if my talent in this type of game is limited, I'll always have a fondness for Guitar Hero-type games. What can I say? I can just agree with Joan Jett and the Blackhearts. It's stronger than me, really; I can't help it. I love rock'n'roll. And metal, and prog metal, and prog rock, and psych rock, and comedy rock, and field rocks... Oh wait, scratch that last one.


So, last week, I stopped just as I was getting around to discuss the “Story Mode”, in which your band does a few tours, upgrades their vehicle, makes a few more tours, upgrades again... When you're on a tour, you can't allow yourself to screw up on a song. Hate to paraphrase bands, but as INXS once said in a song, every night you perform, the people in the audience need you tonight at your best. Don't mess it up. Thankfully it's just a game, so you don't have the pressure of playing real music. But at the very least, you have to try playing music the best you can. Still aim to hit every note! Get 100% on every instrument! Ace that darn song!


And if you do, the public will give you their approval in spades.

December 19, 2014

Rock Band 3 DS (Part 1)


Hello, and welcome to the final review of 2014 on Planned All Along! ...What do you mean, I'm one week too early to say that? Just wait, this review is pretty long. How can I top last year's Just Dance 3 review, entirely made in rhyme?

I can't, and I won't. Yeah, I decided not to do a review on the style of what I did last year. The reasons are... personal. My real life has been rather hectic, so I decided that instead of making things even more complicated for me, I'd just make a regular review and put all the songs from the game around the text.

Anyway, better start now. Do you like rhythm games? I'm not talking DDR or Just Dance, here. I'm not talking about games that demand a lot of energy. Or am I? If you've played an instrument, you know it can get quite physical. Think about your favorite guitarist, and then tell yourself he/she has to hold that guitar and keep playing for a few minutes. For your enjoyment, sure. But it takes some training. Heck, imagine how much energy a drummer needs! No wonder some of them are hyperactive wackos! They need all that energy!

Since music is an important part of our lives (seriously, try to calculate the number of times I've made musical references on the blog – there's a LOT), some game companies soon had the idea of a musical game that involved guitar-shaped controllers with buttons on the handle. For those who haven't guessed yet, I'm talking about Guitar Hero.




Yeah, yeah. Despite the cost of these games (due in no small part to the price of the mock-guitar), the Guitar Hero franchise has known a massive success. First developed by Harmonix, and later by Neversoft and Activision, the game is simple: You follow the series of notes (AKA "frets") on the screen by hitting the colored buttons on the guitar while strumming, and activate a bonus every once in a while to rack up your score. Fair enough. Plus, the large majority of the songs are actual rock songs, whether they're classics, recent successes, songs that aren't that well-known, or covers. Heck, it expanded to include genres outside of rock.

Sadly, the series has been rather... dead since 2010. However, Harmonix hadn't spoken its last words. In 2007, they released Rock Band, which was Guitar Hero (almost) taken to its logical extreme. Now, you can play just about any part of the band, from the main guitar to bass to drums to even the freaking vocal track. But one thing remains: These frets, the need for a perfect rhythm, and the fact that you're leading just a cover band that can't make its own damn music. Today, I'm looking at Rock Band 3... But not any version. I'm looking at the Nintendo DS version.


How can there be a Nintendo DS version of a game like this?” You ask me. “Aren't these games all about pretending you're really playing music?” You're right, but at the same time, as I've learned recently, money is money, and to many companies, more money is always welcome. Besides, multi-platform ports of the same game are rather common. The true question is rather: How do you adapt this concept to a handheld console? Guitar Hero succeeded by having a fret controller plugged right into the GBA slot of the first Nintendo DS (which also means you can't play that game with a Nintendo 3DS - Whoops). Here? Let me explain.

December 17, 2014

Vlog 4: Incoming Christmas + Projects for 2015... and more!


New vlog! One will be up next week, on December 24th... Yup!

December 13, 2014

Yet Another Updated List Of Games

I bought a lot of games in the past months, so I decided to make another post to show the new games I got since August. (Also includes the very small list of games I reviewed that I don't have... and a special mention for the one game I decided not to keep.)

As usual, you can access all of the reviewed games' reviews through the site's Archive page.

GAME BOY ADVANCE
Games reviewed so far: Crash & Spyro Superpack, Mario Pinball Land, Pokémon FireRed, Garfield: The Search for Pooky, The Simpsons: Road Rage, Rayman: Hoodlum's Revenge, Yu-Gi-Oh! The Sacred Cards
ALL REVIEWED!

NINTENDO DS
Games reviewed so far: Big Brain Academy, Desktop Tower Defense, Thrillville: Off The Rails, Midnight Play Pack, Purr Pals, Flash Focus, Master of Illusion, The Simpsons Game, Puzzler Collection, Cartoon Network Racing, WarioWare: Touched!, Scribblenauts, New Super Mario Bros., WarioWare: D.I.Y..
Games still to be reviewed:
Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney
Fossil Fighters
Grand Theft Auto Chinatown Wars
Hotel Dusk: Room 215
Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded
Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story
Mario Kart DS
Mario Party DS
Picross 3D
Pokémon HeartGold
Pokémon White
Rayman Raving Rabbids 2
Rock Band 3
Super Mario 64 DS
Super Scribblenauts
Rhythm Heaven (NEW!!)

WII
Games reviewed so far: Castle of Shikigami III, How To Train Your Dragon, Wii Sports, Wii Music, Just Dance 3, Kirby's Epic Yarn, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, Bass Pro Shops' The Hunt, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Drawn To Life: The Next Chapter (Wii)
Games still to be reviewed:
Fishing Master World Tour
Mario Super Sluggers
New Super Mario Bros. Wii
Rayman Raving Rabbids
Rayman Raving Rabbids 2
Rayman Raving Rabbids TV Party
Rise of the Guardians (NEW!!)
Sam & Max: Beyond Time and Space
Sonic and the Black Knight
Sonic and the Secret Rings
Sonic Colors
Sonic Unleashed
Super Mario Galaxy
Super Paper Mario
Wii Sports Resort
Yu-Gi-Oh! 5DS: Duel Transer
Just Dance 2015 (NEW!!)
Muramasa the Demon Blade (NEW!!)
No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle (NEW!!)

VIRTUAL CONSOLE
Games reviewed so far: Super Contra, Pokémon Snap, Final Fantasy, Mario Party 2, StarTropics
Games still to be reviewed:
Kirby and the Crystal Shards
The Legend of Zelda; A Link To The Past
Mega Man
Paper Mario
Super Mario RPG
Super Mario World

WIIWARE
Games reviewed so far: Yard Sale: Hidden Treasures Sunnyville, Pokémon Rumble, Reed Fishing: Ocean Challenge, Bit Boy, Pop-Up Pursuit, WarioWare: D.I.Y. Showcase
Games still to be reviewed:
Deer Drive Legends
Play With Birds
Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney

OTHER/NOT ACTUALLY OWNED
Bugs Bunny: Lost In Time, Drawn To Life: The Next Chapter (DS)

Demos still to be reviewed from the Wii Shop Channel: ThruSpace, lilt line, Crazy Racers, Urbanix, Pong Toss Pro, MotoHeroz, LIT, Jett Rocket, Gods VS Humans, Cave Story, Dive, and yet it moves, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as A Dark Lord, BIT.TRIP VOID, BIT.TRIP FATE, Chronos Twins DX, chick chick BOOM, Dart Rage, BIT.TRIP FLUX, Fast Draw Showdown, Aya the Cubes of Light.

GAMES BROUGHT BACK TO THE STORE
Anubis II (AND GOOD FUCKING RIDDANCE)

December 12, 2014

WarioWare: D.I.Y. Showcase

This review of the WiiWare game WarioWare: D.I.Y. Showcase is a follow-up to my review of WarioWare: D.I.Y., which you can read here, here and here.


Here it is, the final part of this mega-review of WarioWare: D.I.Y. and its WiiWare tie-in, Showcase! For those who didn't read the last three posts, this WarioWare game is all about creating your own content and sharing it with other people. One way to do this is from your DS to a friend's DS. A now-defunct way was to use Friend Codes, a feature called the Warehouse, and the possibility to share with people you had never met in your life. The final way to share your games, records or comics? Transfer them to this WiiWare game, which was made just for that.

No, really. All in all, WarioWare D.I.Y. Showcase is just that: An additional sharing tool that also lets you play your microgames on the big screen in your living room! Plus, you will not need an Internet connection to send stuff from your DS to your Wii! It also serves as an expansion to the plot shown in WarioWare: D.I.Y..

It even looks like it's smiling!
In case you don't remember: After a bad dream that involved video game creatures coming out of their world and attacking him (Geez, that sounds an awful lot familiar, doesn't it?), Dr. Crygor makes a machine called the Super MakerMatic 21, which can be used to make microgames, records and comics. Wario instantly smells jackpot (with his big nose, he can also smell truffles, illegal merchandises in suitcases, or the overly-smelly Ax body spray a mile away). He immediately orders the machine be mass-produced. Meanwhile, many of his employees have left WarioWare to create Diamond Software, all because of Wario's greedy ways. As a result, Wario hires the player to make games for him. Quite literally; he doesn't pay you. In fact, all the remaining employees of WarioWare seem absent from the DS game. They created their own company, Diamond Software, probably as revenge since Wario took all the credit for their creations.

Oh, but no worries. Wario seems to have moved his base of operations on an island. Why? No reason. The guy's just a jerk, and he's bitter towards his employees. This doesn't seem to have caused much friction; the only real broken friendship is that of 9-Volt and his ex-buddy 18-Volt; 9-Volt left for Diamond Software, while 18-Volt stayed behind to work for Wario, along with Kat, Ana, Dribble and Spitz. As such, there are four stages in Showcase, a total of 72 new microgames that you can send to your DS. That's awesome? Why, yes. Yes, it is.

December 10, 2014

Planned All Along Vlog 3: Pokémon, Theme Months, and more!


In this vlog, I discuss many things: My admiration for Pokémon, the games I bought after I returned Anubis II to the store, the difficulties of keeping a tight reviewing schedule while being a university student... and more!

December 8, 2014

WarioWare: D.I.Y. (Part 3)

Thanks everyone! Planned All Along has officially reached 70,000 views!

Read Part 1 of this review here and Part 2 here.

So much stuff to do... Oh, hello again! Today, we finish discussing one of the WarioWare games with the best gimmick of all: You make your own microgames! In the past posts, I took a good look at the Tutorials, the Studio and the Shop. We're getting close to the end of this review of the DS game. This Friday, I will discuss the WiiWare game that “completes” WarioWare D.I.Y., titled Showcase. But for now, we still have to check the Distribution Center and the Option Garage. Shouldn't be too long, right?

A center that looks like a pile of cheap carton boxes.
...Makes sense to me!
When you enter the Distribution Center (which I won't shorten to DC even though you can manufacture comics), you get three options: Wii, DS or WFC. When you select Wii, the game will seek out any nearby Wii on which WarioWare D.I.Y. Showcase is being played. From there on, you're allowed to ship games, records or comics. There are shelves in Showcase, which can contain up to 72 items each. If you want to fill everything, you need to create no less than 162 items for each section! That is a LOT.

All you have to do is select the item you want to send (one at a time – yeah, it sucks. What do you want to do, nothing's perfect), then send it. You'll see a diver sending a package to the little island in WarioWare D.I.Y. Showcase. ...Oh yeah, it's an island. I forgot to mention that? No worries, I will explain in greater detail in the next post. You can also receive stuff from Showcase. As if that wasn't enough, you are not limited to one WarioWare D.I.Y. Showcase to send the products to, either. You can ship your products to any D.I.Y. Showcase around. That's pretty cool. A friend of yours could buy the WiiWare game and then you could send him/her most of the games you've created. Oh, and the records and comics, too.

Which kind of genius builds a game company on a FRIGGIN' ISLAND?
The stupid kind, that's which.

As for a trade between 2 DS, obviously both consoles need to have WarioWare D.I.Y.. And while one is the host, the others will join the group for trading. ...If you've ever played a wireless multiplayer DS game, you know the drill. As I said earlier, I never got a chance to try that, which is pretty sad... Though I imagine it's fun.

Then there's the Wi-Fi Connection portion, which contains a few more options. First of all, like many DS games, you could input Friend Codes. When you connected to the Warehouse, it was them possible for you to get the games, records and comics released by the owners of those friend codes. (Note how everything was in the past tense for this paragraph. Take a guess why...) There's also a place to check your WFC Settings.

The other sections include the Warehouse, in which you could store some games, records and comics you've made. People with your Friend Code could then log on to your Warehouse and download the stuff you've made available. That's a pretty neat feature, considering it saves the trouble of connecting to every single person, one by one, to send the same items. You could also pick up the products created by those who gave you their Friend Code.

I just went around gaming forums and included in my game all of the WarioWare D.I.Y. Friend Codes I could find. What? I needed them for some missions! You can say it's an easy excuse and... yeah, it is. Whatever. I never got a chance to truly experiment with the Wi-Fi Connection! Heck, when I bought the game, a lot of gamers had stopped using it anyway! (Again, we have the Pokémon Trade Rule: Only Pokémon is a game famous enough that you'll pretty much always find someone to trade stuff with. Any other game will have much smaller odds of a trade happening, if ever.)

The final section is called the NinSoft Store. It's in there that you could access a design challenge. These Challenges took place in North America between March 28th, 2010 and April 6th, 2011. There were 17 contests in America, while there were 32 in Japan and 15 in Europe. All contests were themed: Sports, Creatures, the four seasons, cute stuff... and so on. The reward for each contests winner? His/her game was featured in the NinSoft Store and could be downloaded by anyone. Again, the WFC was shut down for the DS, so...

This game here was made by Masahiro Sakurai.
It's REALLY hard. Personally, I dislike it.
Another cool thing in the NinSoft Store: There's a section with even more microgames that could be downloaded. For a while, there were 2 new microgames per week with releases starting on March 29, 2010 and ending on March 7, 2011 (for North America, of course). As a result, over a hundred microgames were released. Oh, but wait, that's still not all! There was a section called Big Name Games. Each region had a different set of Big Name Games. The particularity of those is that these microgames were all made by people from the gaming industry, either journalists, mangakas, developers, and so on. Even Masahiro Sakurai made one! They even got some developers outside of Nintendo's main offices (but from companies that released games for Nintendo consoles, especially for the WiiWare). A few examples of developers who made a microgame: Ron Carmel (2D Boy, World of Goo), Daisuke Amaya (Cave Story), Alex Neuse (The BIT.TRIP Series), Matt Bozon (Shantae, A Boy and His Blob Wii), Edmund McMillen (Super Meat Boy, Gish), Todd Lewis (Scribblenauts, Lock's Quest), Bo Strandby (Max & the Magic Marker), Manfred Linzer (Jett Rocket) and Felix Bohatsch (And Yet It Moves). You'll notice many of those titles are available in the WiiWare section of the Wii Shop Channel, and I covered some of these games' demos in my Demo Reviews series. I've been plugging lots of people in the last paragraph, I guessed I was better off plugging myself too.

There was also a great amount of Big Name designers for Japan, and a much smaller number of the European release of WarioWare D.I.Y.. I downloaded a few of these games back when I could access the WFC, but even then, I couldn't download too many; my games shelf was almost full at the time. Scratch that; it WAS full. I had to delete the microgames I made that I didn't like in order to add any of those to my shelves.

Now, the final part of the game: The Options menu! There are only six options, so let's get this over with.
-Change your in-game name (for free!);
-Change your microgame enterprise's name;
-Change the sound settings;
-Test the microphone (even though its only use is the Humming mode in Record-making);
-Delete all your data. This includes all the medals you've collected, all the scores you've achieved in the Game Blender, all the microgames, records and comics you've made. Seriously, you'll spend dozens of hours playing this game, I don't think you want to erase your entire save file unless you make a serious mistake;
-View the credits. Yeah, there's no ending to this game, so there's no other way to view those. The credits are arranged as a microgame in which you must destroy UFOs located above the developers' names. Pretty fun. As it progresses, the ships start moving or changing in size. When you get to Satoru Iwata's credit, you have to defeat a larger ship with a core made of a nose. Ah, I knew it was weird! A WarioWare game without a nose minigame? That's unheard of!

And that covers everything, I guess. There's nothing else to add... Unless...

Objects appear or disappear when
her nose twitches.
Oh, I know! I think I'll cover the characters' stories in the D.I.Y. Shop's Game Blender! As usual for WarioWare games, each developer has a “storyline” with his/her microgames. It's not always a complex story (if you want examples, check my preceding review of WarioWare: Touched). Here are the five storylines.
-Mona becomes a temple explorer and ventures inside a temple with Manager Joe, her... manager, who has become her cameraman for this adventure. Huh. When you lose, Mona and Joe run out of the temple. (As usual, she has strange games.)
-Jimmy T. now has an aerobics show and trains with women. We see him from behind, and I swear, he reminds me of pre-1999 Weird Al Yankovic, except with blue hair and an exaggerated afro. Also, the music during that level is pretty fun. (He specializes in sport games, in case it wasn't obvious.)
-Ashley is just looking at the moonlight. ...Yeah, that's all. I thought she was gonna make a potion or something. Nope, just looking at the moon. (Also, all her microgames are about food. Yum?)
-Orbulon was flying around in his piggy ship when he gets hit by thunder (again????) and falls into a spaceship about to launch. With his head still poking out. The ship launches and he has to find a way to get out. (All of his games revolve around intelligence. He claims he has an IQ of 300; why doesn't he make his piggy ship thunder-proof??? It's the second time – that we know of – that it gets stricken by thunder!)
-9-Volt is still a huge Nintendo nerd. He made a game resembling the first Super Mario Bros.'s graphics, except he is the main character and he's on his skateboard. Each microgame you win lets him go a little further. (As always, his games are bout Nintendo classics.) By the way, he has split up with 18-Volt.
Also to note: Each stage has a Boss microgame which you cannot access in the Shop. Because they're too long, I guess. These can't be viewed in the MakerMatic.

GET ME OUT OF THIS ROCKET,
PUNY EARTHLINGS!

And... yeah, I guess that's all I had to talk about. Time for the final thoughts, then?

Laugh all you want, but Penny is a
great teacher for microgames class.
This game is very good. Games that require creativity are always a lot of fun, if only because they give the tools required to make whatever it is they want you to make. I used to have a game-making program for my computer. It doesn't work anymore, technology marches on, but it was fun to make my own stuff (though depending on the amount of effort I put into it, the game was either meh or plain awful). Here, you're limited to microgames, but you literally create everything: The graphics, the music, the background, the programming. You can do anything, as long as it fits in 8 seconds or within the limit of the number of objects. Being given full creative freedom over those tiny projects is great, and it might spark an interest in game development among many gamers who never thought they'd have any talent.

And the Tutorials do a mighty fine job at telling us what we need to know. Once you've completed all the Tutorials, you're set and ready to make your own games. There's still some things that you'll need to learn (after all, practice makes pudding- Perfect. I meant Perfect), but in the end, Penny's tutorials and the 32 lessons from the Assembly Dojo are more than enough. There are lessons among those that you'll hardly ever use. Personally, I'm a big fan of randomness switches that change how the game is played depending on which switch is on and which is off. It's a really cool feature. Removing such a feature would take away a lot of the fun of game-making.

The graphics also take some time getting used to, but after a while you learn to live with the limitations (The biggest objects you can create are 32X32 pixels, each object's phase has a maximum of four pictures, and each object has a maximum of four different such animations). The drawing canvas reminds of Mario Paint and is very easy to use. Plus, you can create your own color palettes to give some of your creations a special style. It's all pretty fun.


The only problem is that the only commands you can input in the microgames you create involve tapping the screen (no sliding the stylus, no rubbing, no blowing in the microphone... nothing except tapping). Yeah, I would say it decreases the amount of things that can be done, but at the same time, game-making is already very complex as it is, and it would be even more complicated if there were different types of commands for the games you create. This really is a WarioWare-style "Game Programming For Dummies"; it would be too difficult to add more command styles. I'm happy with what we got.

While I absolutely love the game maker, I'm not a fan of the music and comic makers. I love music, but I suck at making music. There are ways to make good songs (and the 90 songs made by developers are good examples), but there are other problems with the music: There are 40 instruments and 8 sets of drums, but none of those can be tuned so you'll get the sound you really want. As an example, the electric guitar always sounds the same. Your creativity is a lot more limited with this. Thankfully, you can just import full songs from the D.I.Y. Shop and edit them. But making a fully original song? Tough luck. (I remixed Orbulon's Boss Time song and the result was damn awesome, though. Here's the original.)

Wish it was. I'm kinda broke.
Same for comics. I really dislike making comics for this game. A maximum of 4 panels, solely black and white (not even gray! It's lacking GRAY!), with nothing but you and your drawing tools. Oh, and a whole bunch of stamps (speech bubbles, simple symbols, some slightly more complex environment pictures, and then a B&W sprite of every WarioWare developer so far). Even with all those, your creativity is still very limited. You probably can't do as well as some of the comics made by official artists. So yeah, a huge fan of the Game MakerMatic, not a big fan of the Record MakerMatic, and I hate the Comic MakerMatic. My bad. Thankfully the existing comics are pretty funny.

On to my other points of criticism: The shop charts are really random. Like I said in Part 2 of this review, the established developers will always rack in the sales, while you will take a while to get "popular" by the in-game standards. If you try really hard, you could wind up selling more, but even then it's unlikely. The result is a flawed system that doesn't work quite right. The sales of most microgames will stop after a couple days, too; there will even be a point when you don't sell anything anymore. I would have preferred some realism on that side, but eh, they already implemented that thing even though they had no reason to, so I guess I can't complain that we have more than we were asking for.

Now, the medals. Many of those are fun and easy to get, and then there are some that are very difficult. Spending 40 hours with the Game MakerMatic? Sure, after 90 games you'll have reached that. Doing the same, or even half of that, with the Record or Comic MakerMatic is more difficult, especially if you have less talent in those two. Then there's all the medals that require you to ship products to another friend's DS game (hard to do if you don't have friends with the game) or D.I.Y. Showcase, on the Wii (already simpler, as you can do it all by yourself if you own both a DS and a Wii). Then there's the medals that require getting into the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection. Those medals are lost forever. Don't get me started on the three medals that demand you enter a design contest! Urgh. ...It's still possible to get all the music from Diamond Records, but it's a pain nonetheless.

As for the Distribution Center, it lost a big part of its appeal when the connection was terminated in May 2014. So many microgames that we can't download ever again! That's sad. Also, it means that now you must seek out someone else with a Nintendo DS and this game. Thankfully, the DS-to-DS option and the DS-to-Wii options aren't closed, so there's still a possibility to share. That's alright. The challenge is to find someone who owns WarioWare D.I.Y..

One of Mona's games.
No fair, it looks better than mine!
Overall, a solid game for creative spirits. For whoever likes microgames, too. It is definitely fun. Sure, it's got problems, all the problems I described in the preceding paragraphs. What doesn't? Thankfully, the material given to you compensates, maybe not in entirety, but in good part, that's for sure. Love the music in Diamond Records, love the microgames that I've played and the ones I've made. Games like these really help one become more creative. It's also great to learn some bits of programming, and to learn to solve problems at the same time. All in all, a good game. If you want to make your own things, buy it. But don't expect to be able to trade much.

Talking about trades, now I have to discuss WarioWare D.I.Y. Showcase, the companion WiiWare title with which you can share games, records and comics. I covered almost everything in the past three parts, so I guess I have very little left to say. Still, it has to be done, so tune in next time. It's Showtime! ...Wait, I meant to say Showcase. Oh well. Bye!

December 5, 2014

WarioWare: D.I.Y. (Part 2)

Read Part 1 here!

Hello, and welcome back to this review of WaroWare: Do It Yourself! In which you... do your games yourself. Yeah. We've got a game that requires creativity here! Oh, the horror!

So, we've been through the tutorials, then we saw Wario's jobs, and then we met Mantis and Cricket in the Assembly Dojo. Now, we see what happens next... That is, when you start creating. Once you're ready, head to the D.I.Y. Studio.

Or... just tap it with the stylus and then tap OK, that works too.

In the Studio, there are three options: The Super MakerMatic 21, the D.I.Y. Forum, and the D.I.Y. Data. The Super MakerMatic is where you'll make all your microgames, records and comics. It's where you go to create. I mean, this is the studio, right? This is where you create, right? Well, yeah, obviously.

Oh hey, an old computer!
Aside from this machine, there's a computer on which you can access the D.I.Y. Forums. Before you ask, no, these are not real forums. A bunch of in-game developers got together on a forum to discuss game-making techniques. Some of the threads are funny, others are just meh. However, many of the threads actually give some pretty cool advice. Heck, some of that advice is not given to you in the Assembly Dojo! One new thread appears every day starting when you begin the game. What I find funny about this feature is that every developer has a personality, even though they're just forum names and avatars. There's AAAaaah, who keeps screaming in rage at the difficulties of game-making, blobmob really likes to say “lol”, KAGE always hands out useful advice, D.I.Why stats off saying smart stuff but devolves after some point to trolling, Javier gives out helpful advice but he's got Phonee, a forum stalker constantly praising him, yogaguy approaches game-making (and forum-posting) wisely, there is a trio of users who almost always talk about WarioWare D.I.Y. Showcase for the Wii...