StarTropics (Part 1)

Vacation is almost over. For many students, school has begun, or is about to begin. How about I close August with the ultimate vacation adventure, courtesy of Nintendo?

Anyone remembers StarTropics? No? Well... On one hand, it IS one of Nintendo's most forgotten series. Created by Nintendo of America, the series is little known in Japan. And since most Nintendo games are made in Japan, let's say this small franchise doesn't get much attention. It was barely mentioned in Super Smash Bros. Brawl's Chronicle mode and received no trophy whatsoever. Not even stickers! It's kind of sad for Mike Jokes, the hero of this story. And since I grew up with the game (it was in my collection of NES games, and it was one of my favorites), I told myself that I HAD to review it at some point. Give it a bit of the spotlight for once.

The game is fairly simple: Mike Jones walks around on the overworld screen, enters villages, speaks to people, solves puzzles. When he enters a dungeon, the perspective shifts; now we follow Mike one room after the other, as he battles enemies, finds switches to open doors, jumps on pads and avoids the dozens of hazards. On the way, he gains upgrades to his main weapon, and also finds all sorts of additional weapons and items in the dungeons, which help him fight the dangerous enemies and the creative bosses on his way.

How about we start now? This is StarTropics, everyone, a game that definitely deserves a better place in Nintendo's large library of games.

Demo Review 23: PooYoos 2

When you turn on the PooYoos 2 demo, you're welcomed by a turtle PooYoo. Oh, something new! The world is even more musical than before, too. He's soon joined by a rabbit and an elephant. Three instruments appear, one for each animal, and they start playing. The child's job when playing is to shake the Wii remote when one of the animals is falling asleep; this will cause a bell to be heard, the PooYoo will wake up, and resume playing music.

This mini-game requires a lot less intelligence than the one in PooYoos 1; but to be fair, here, the child has to look at three characters, see if some of them is asleep, and shake the Wiimote. What makes it a no-brainer, even for children, is that whenever one PooYoo falls asleep, the Wiimote icon appears on the top right of the screen to tell him to shake the remote. No need to think for this one! That's in Small PooYoo mode, In Big PooYoo mode, the child will have to point at the sleeping animal with the cursor and press A to wake it up. Already a little more diffcult for young kids.

Afterward, the turtle flies up and reaches three microphones. The narrator asks the kid to shake the Wiimote to test the microphone, and then starts singing the alphabet song. Two little turtles come on the screen and join the third one to sing. Like in PooYoos 1, there isn't much to do in that section, as the game doesn't score points. It just expects the child to sing along and learn at the same time. I should add that during the song, the child can press buttons on the Wiimote to have different things happen on the screen. It's all cutesy and adorable.

And really, I doubt anything else would have been expected from PooYoos 2. It follows the same formula as the first one, it's an entertaining teaching tool, and it's really alright for young children. Maybe the mini-game requires less thinking, but by the end, I must keep in mind that this is just a demo. Like the demo ending screen says, there's always a few more mini-games in the full version, and sadly, I can't review those, since I'm not buying the full version. Why would I?

A Look Back On: Yard Sale: Hidden Treasures Sunnyville

The review can be accessed here.

There is a lot of choice in the WiiWare games, but for some odd reason, not many of them look interesting enough for me. I've bought a few simpler games, partly for me, but also for my parents. They are not exactly video game players, so they can only play simple games with easy controls and goals. It's either that or I spend another 30 minutes explaining the game every time I play with them.

The fun with Yard Sale: Hidden Treasures Sunnyville is that it can be played by everyone. It's accessible to everyone, and it gives hours of fun.

Now, there's a problem I have with the content I downloaded from the Wii Shop Channel: Each time I'm reviewing one of those games, I have to decide whether to review a Virtual Console game or a WiiWare game. I started with a WiiWare game and decided to alternate between VC and WW games. But since I have downloaded only a few WiiWare games, and many Virtual Console games, I might have to find another way to do things...

Demo Review 22: PooYoos 1

First time I review a game targeted at preschoolers. Well, I can understand, after all I am an adult, so... Whatever. Like any game for preschoolers, this is a little innocent game with cute characters, with simple goals: Increase their vocabulary, and make them think. There are two difficulty levels: Small PooYoo and Big PooYoo.

It starts off as we meet the first PooYoo, a rabbit.

Something I've got to address now. The 3D models are okay, but there's a little something odd with the facial expressions. I don't know, maybe there's that feeling that the PooYoos are not quite animals. Their eyes hardly ever close.

Anyway, the first mini-game asks the child to select which PooYoo fits into the shape in the clouds. There's only two PooYoos each time, so it's easy. You press the control pad to select the left one and A to select the right one. Afterwards, a bunny PooYoo lands to the ground. You help him free a small windmill from rocks, and then he dances.

What if you select Big PooYoo? Well, it's the exact same thing. There's only one difference: Instead of selecting the PooYoos in the cloud mini-game with the buttons, instead the kid must select the PooYoo by pointing the cursor on it.

Look, I'm not gonna get into the whole debate over whether or not young children need smart entertainment so that they can, well, grow smart. It sounds kind of obvious. I won't discuss the controversy around products like Baby Einstein because I lack the educational background to do so. What I could see in this game was innocent enough, and the only actual mini-game was the one with the clouds, which already requires some intelligence from the child playing. The shape of the hole in the cloud will often be different from both animals' current positions, so the child has to guess depending on each animal's characteristics (pointy ears for cats, long ears for rabbits, large ears for elephants, and so on). The dance mini-game doesn't do anything, the kid could just shake the Wiimote and press buttons to have fun. For pretty obvious reasons, I won't buy the full version, unless I someday have kids. If you do have young children, download the demo, and if they have fun with it, maybe consider buying the game.

I have two more of those to review... *sigh* Better get that over with.

New Super Mario Bros. (Part 2)

Hello, and welcome back to this review of New Super Mario Bros.! Now that every aspect of the game has been explained, I suppose I just have to explain the plot and the Mini-Game mode, and then I'll be done. So let's-a go!

When we left, Mario had just defeated the Mummipokey and made his way to either World 3 or World 4, if you were talented enough to unlock that one.

World 3 takes place on an island and looks calm. It's all very pretty. Once again, Mario chases Bowser Jr. to the Fortress, and then to the Castle. This time, our red plumber battles a giant fish, the Cheepskipper, in the Castle's last room. The only real problem with the Cheepskipper is that it's protected by the floor, but it keeps jumping towards you. Boss arena idiocy for the win! After that, Bowser Jr. takes Peach to World 5, but if you unlock World 4, somehow the Bowser kid makes a detour and passes by there, just to nag you.

World 4 is a forest world, with toxic purple water in most places. Mario can't even touch those waters, it's like acid or lava! So he uses Dorrie to travel around. Somehow, the large water dragon isn't hurt by it. Wait, you don't know who Dorrie is? It was in Super Mario 64, and in the DS remake, too! ….Anyway, by now every world has the same pattern: Levels, Fortress, Bowser Jr., levels, Castle, boss. Who's the boss in World 4? A... Goomba? A teeny-weeny Goomba enters the room! Hah! Hilarious! Like it can stand a fight! I'm in Fire Mario form right now, you don't stand a chance!