Believe it! There was a time when I was highly versed in the Naruto manga, due to my younger son’s obsessive passion for the stories and characters. I remember the issue of Shonen Jump magazine hailing the new teenaged Naruto would be arriving as the scene of the new series shifted to the Shippuden region. Since then my kids have somewhat drifted away, at least to the point that I’m not constantly inundated with Naruto factoids and had to get more info about the various goings-on in terms of plot and characters.
Naruto Shippuden is the continuation of the Naruto manga wherein the youth with the nine-tail fox sealed within him returns from his two and a half year training away from his friends after Sasuke departs. All of the other original characters are present in the new manga, and everyone is older and more skilled. This opens up a realm of possibilities for more intense combat and more variety of battles between different characters.
So I was immediately disappointed with how much this game was like the earlier Ninja Council games in pretty much every way. Technically I’m not surprised: the graphics and sounds work very nicely for the DS. You run around in real time in an isometric viewed world representing Konoha and other towns from the manga, taking on quests, eating raman, and battling enemies. There is occasional voice acting, but since the first time I played a Naruto game I’ve generally played in silence because the voices replicate those from the anime: annoyingly over the top.
The next disappointment was the story itself – earlier games had issues with trying to cram too much of the manga into a relatively short video game, but they actually felt like they contained passion for the subject material, as if actual choices were made as to what they should include and remove. Here it feels like they just wrapped up a quick story from the beginning of the new Shippuden manga and wrapped it around the same game as before.
The other Ninja Council games were pretty easy for a more seasoned gamer, but were fairly challenging for younger kids. My kids found them pretty easy but fun enough to keep them engaged. When this arrived I gave my younger son the option to play and review, but he kept losing interest in playing and eventually just returned the game to me for good. It wasn’t that it was too hard – quite the opposite: the game was too easy, with nothing about the story or combat to captivate him.
Worse yet, there is very little else to do other than the short single player game – the only other option is a multi-cart versus mode. Given that my kids had no interest in the single player game, I certainly wasn’t going to buy a second copy to see how the competitive game was – it is unfortunate that there was no single cart download play to get the kids enticed and potentially get them more interested in the main game.
As it is, Naruto Shippuden: Ninja Council 4 feels like a sad money grab from little kids who love Naruto and always want whatever is newest from the series. They will undoubtedly sell plenty of copies of this just because of the Naruto name and Shippuden subtitle, which is unfortunate since this is not just a lousy game, it is the worst Naruto game I’ve ever played.
Believe it!
Pros:
+ First game in the new setting
+ Retells some of the manga
+ Uses same basic systems as before
Cons:
– Very little content
– Unoriginal and boring
Game Info:
Platform: DS
Publisher: TOMY Corporation
Developer: Takara Tomy
Release Date: 6/2/09
Genre: Action
ESRB Rating: E10+
Players: 1-4
Pangya: Fantasy Golf ships this June for PSP. Check out the first trailer below.
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You might call me a PDA junkie … no, not ‘public displays of affection’ though I have no problem smooching my wife in public regardless of how embarrassed our kids might become. I’m talking about ‘Personal Digital Assistants’. I have used an electronic system of maintaining calendar and contacts and notes for nearly twenty years now since getting a HP200LX when they first came out. Since then I have been involved in beta test programs for various PDA’s and other forms of ‘pocket computers’. Beyond just being accustomed to using an electronic system to keep myself organized, I have been evaluating and critiquing them for two decades, so the ability to transform my DS into a mini PDA was something I jumped at immediately!
Unfortunately, it turns out that My DoItAll is more of a kid-centric bunch of semi-useful applets with as many games as productivity apps. That isn’t so bad in itself, as this would be an excellent way to introduce kids to an organizational system that is easy to use and also fun. Because as most teachers would tell you and I can attest – kids are a mess when it comes to organizational skills! However, a number of technical issues and a general sense of ‘poor focus’ makes this one an easy analysis – Skip It!
There are three main areas encompassed by the fifteen apps in My DoItAll: organization, utilities, and games. I will look at each one separately. Technically the game has some fundamental problems that would make it hard to recommend regardless of the quality or completeness of the apps. First off, the transitions between apps use a sort of ‘lens closing’ effect common in games and some movies. This is fine for Animal Crossing, but when you are trying to quickly switch between your Calendar and Notes, the last thing you need is a silly effect to take an extra few seconds getting you there! Also, text entry and general selection is handled using the touch screen using a virtual keyboard, however this doesn’t work nearly as well as the default keyboard. I had frequent issues with misread taps, non-entries and so on.
The organizer consists of a calendar, notebook, and friend card collector. The friend-card collector is somewhat of an address book, but lacks adequate functionality. The calendar allows you to do basic scheduling and even share your events wirelessly with friends (who would need their own copy of the software, of course).
Utilities include some of the cooler things here, such as a periodic table, conversion utility, calculator, and world map. These are all straightforward versions with basic functionality but are all very accessible.
Surprisingly, most of the apps here are games or game-like activities. There are sound-based activities such as Rhythm Machine, Voice Changer and Sound Effects; games such as ninety-eight and crazy eights and ‘boxes of doom’; and other stuff like a dice-roller, a spinner (like in Twister) and a custom poll maker. These are all interesting novelties but nothing that will hold anyone’s attention for any significant stretch of time.
You can also customize the look and feel of the interface, and also build a personal avatar (or mini-Mii if you prefer) for your online interactions. The utilities for doing this are also fairly limited, with the same rudimentary controls and graphics found throughout.
Here is my bottom line – with a touch screen and two display screens, the Nintendo DS should be an excellent organizer. And perhaps when the DSi comes along in a few weeks it will be – but that will have nothing to do with My DoItAll. This is an utter throwaway – which is too bad because it has some potential and there is definitely an opportunity here to put better organizational skills at the fingertips of millions of elementary and middle school kids. For now, they will have to stick with their paper agendas and cell phones.
Pros:
+ Includes basic functionality
+ Utilities are useful
Cons:
– Not enough organizer features
– Games are too simplistic to be appealing
– Any cell phone can do this … better
Game Info:
Platform: DS
Publisher: Tomy Corporation
Developer: Rocket Studios
Release Date: 02/10/09
Genre: Lifestyle
ESRB Rating: Everyone
Players: 1-6
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