::A Geek in Korea::

Seeing as there were so many Nintendo DS games I had purchased in the last year or so, there was a time where my Gameboy slot on the console was hardly getting any use at all other than a dust cover. I carried around the same GBA game in the slot for close to a year without firing it up once. While there are plenty of great Gameboy Advance games, the ones I’ve been playing recently, like Wario Ware Twisted, are oversized and don’t leave themselves to traveling well. However, while I was back in the States, I picked up a handful of Gameboy Advanced titles that I wouldn’t be able to find in Korea easily. Since I’ve gotten back, it’s my Gameboy that’s been seeing more play than my DS. I’ll give a rundown of what I’ve been playing for the past week.

Dr. Mario and Puzzle League.

I paid for Puzzle League back when it was called "Pokemon Puzzle League"  for the Game Boy Color. It was essentially Tetris Attack with a Pokemon face lift. Tetris Attack, in my humble opinion, is one of the best, if not the best, falling block puzzle game ever. I very seldom "repurchase" games, but I’ll make an exception for a portable Tetris Attack I can play on my DS. Everything else is just a bonus. Dr. Mario is good, but I absolutely suck at it. I can’t keep the rotation mechanics in mind when I try to squeeze a pill between a virus or two. I used to play a really good version of Dr. Mario for Texas Instruments graphics calculators back in High school, which killed more batteries than anything else in study hall.

Riviera: The Promised Land

This is an odd little game. It’s an "angels bringing upon the apocalypse", cliched sort of RPG. It’s utterly linear, as you have no choice where to go other than a few branching paths. There is little to no free exploration. It’s got rythm based action segments. The leveling system is entirely item focused and can lead to heavy repetition.

However, I really dig it for some reason. To be honest, I usually never finish RPG games because they usually drag out the plot by making you traverse across lots of empty territory or are filled with lots of random encounters. Riviera doesn’t do this. You can level up by practicing against monsters, or challenge yourself by playing with less abilties. You get points to "explore" the environment depending on how well you perform in battle. You can only carry four items into battle which enable all your abilities, so you must choose wisely to avoid being defeated. The best thing about Riviera is the artwork. I adore all the characters and monsters attacks. I’m willing to look past some of it’s flaws (small inventory, plot) to see more of what lies ahead.

Rebelstar Tactical Command

 I never played X-com back in the day, but squad based tactical fights against aliens seems like a formula that can’t miss. Squeeze the basics into a Gameboy cart, and you’ve got Rebelstar. You control a group of troops as they go level to level clearing out aliens. The action is AP based, meaning it’s strategic instead of twitch based. Everything requires planning and a little luck to get the bad guys before they get you. The learning curve is a bit steep, but the tutorials let you start out slowly before dropping mutliple characters in your control at the same time. Still, it’s hard. Trying to position everyone without getting surprised by some creature hiding behing a window with a sniper rifle will lead you to restarting a few (dozen) times. The cut scenes before the battles are typical cheesy anime style "Young punk with mysterious powers rises to fame fighting aliens", but the game is still holding my attention a few hours in.

Gunstar Super Heroes

Gunstar Super Heroes was a bit of a gamble on my part. It’s made by Treasure, which is a sign of quality. It’s an action shooter, a genre which I haven’t really played much of since the NES or early PC days (Commander Keen anyone?). I liked Astroboy for the GBA, but I never ended up buying it due to varying difficulty. There is a chance that I’ll really like it, but as of yet, the other games have been taking up too much of my time to give this title a fair shake. It’s well made and technical, and it’s got some replay in the form of speed runs and high scores, but I rarely play games for either reason. It’s got some intense action and some interesting enemies, but some of the levels seem frustraiting until you memorize attack patterns.

All of the games were purchased cheaper than I could in Korea. The four games cost me what two DS games in Korea would be. Considering I’ll be playing them for a few more weeks barring a replay or two later, I think I’ve already got my money out of them.