DS games I'm playing

Got a flashcard for christmas, hooray! an ez-flash v plus. not the best card, but far from the worst.


anyways, getting it and slogging through the ds's 4-year history of games to find the best has really been an enlightening experience. for starters, did you know there's over a thousand ds games? that may not really seem like a lot, but it's easily the largest games-to-system life ratio. i think. didn't really run the numbers on that, and i couldn't get an precise number on how many titles there actually are. on top of that is all the homebrew, and all the old systems i can emulate on it.

but, most of it is shovelware. i can disregard all of that, besides the stuff i take particular interest in. cutting it down to the cream of the crop is a challenge, and even when you think you've been as judgemental as possible, there's still tons of games to play. there is a disgusting, truly disgusting amount of rpgs and tactical games and dungeon crawlers for the ds. and the problem with these genres are that, assuming you like the story enough, they're usually all pretty good, worth playing games, and they all take huge amounts of time to beat. here's the ones i'm working on now:

Luminous Arc
this one is fun but has some flaws. it's a tactical rpg. i like it because it's a much more lighthearted affair than some other rpgs, and the story, while simple, is fairly easy to get into. you have a set party, no recruiting from an infinite bank of units, but there's a nice variety and you can find a niche for everyone. also interesting is the ability to form relationships with your party members to get items and ability boosts. it isn't quite harvest moon (another game i should get) but it gives the characters more personality. it's got some technical problems, though. most noticible is improper layering on many of the sprites. it makes some movements and animations look completely ridiculous. also, there isn't all too much on the way of sidequests, and the levelling and ability system is linear compared to final fantasy tactics. i'm told the sequel fixes most of these issues, but i don't want to start it until i beat this. i'd give it maybe an 7.5/10.

Disgaea DS
another tactical rpg. this one is infamously deep and complicated, with levelling up items and bribing senates and exploding penguins and everything. appreciatably wacky, but it almost gets too much sometimes. i feel like i'm missing out on a lot of stuff, playing this game. for starters, i've been assured that it's an infinitely worse version than the ps2 original, but c'mon, i can only play these sort of games because they're portable. it's a huge timesink. also, i really think there's a lot going over my head. i mean, i'm beating missions and stuff, but i know there's ways i can mess with geopanels to get better items, or do some sort of magic grind to increase my levels by a thousand, or somehow unlock more recruitable characters, or level up magic or restock the stores or something. the game even reminds me that the game can be beaten with minimal knowledge, which seems to be what i'm going for. looking back and realizing there were tons of things i missed doing will be frustrating, though. oh well. 8.4/10

Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker
initially i planned on playing through a pokemon, but i've already beaten diamond/pearl twice, and i didn't feel like struggling through japanese platnium. really enjoying this game, though. the graphics are wonderful, i think. some don't like the late-ps1 quality type of graphics that squareenix has been using for this, the final fantasy remakes and chocobo tales, for instance. but i do. i think square are the real masters of this graphical level. look at final fantasy vii-ix. sure, they look dated, but i still think they're beautiful games, in their own way. i'd love to see pokemon done this way. the game is great, lots of cool monsters and environments. hate the main character's design, but aside from that, everything is great. i wish the battles had a bit more strategy, like, pokemon-level. 8.5/10

Final Fantasy IV
this one's going slow, mainly because i've already beaten it and that sort of sucks the drive to continue the story away. but my original playthrough was on an emulator, and was done quite awhile ago, so that and the new graphics will spice things up. i guess i ought to play final fantasy iii instead, because i played that the first time even earlier, and i can't even remember if i beat it. oh well, though, IV is one of my favorite in the series, and i'm looking forward to some of my favorite parts in the glorious new visuals. 9.3/10

Jump Ultimate Stars
pretty much the only non-rpg i'm playing right now. really fun, and with the english translation, i can actually get pretty good at it. most times i'm playing ds, though, i'm kind of doing it as a mindless activity to accentuate another more mindless activity. rpgs are excellent for this. fighting games, not so much. really well designed game, though, and you can play as luffy. 8.6/10