Nintendo DS One-Two Combo

ChrisReid

Super Soaker Collector / Administrator
Yay! Advance Wars DS and Nintendogs ship Monday, so there's been a flurry of reviews over the last couple days. The place I mainly watch for good reviews in GameSpot, but gamerankings' composite indices show pretty much the same thing the scores below do.


First up.. Advance Wars Dual Strike!
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http://www.gamespot.com/ds/strategy/advancewarsds/review.html
9.2 Superb

Advance Wars: Dual Strike is arguably the first must-have game for the Nintendo DS, and it's a perfect excuse to get the system if you haven't already.

Advance Wars: Dual Strike significantly broadens the scope of this very deep and incredibly fun strategy series while not messing with the fundamentals that made it so great. A large cast of likable characters gives Advance Wars: Dual Strike plenty of charm on top of its near-perfect gameplay.

In short, the latest Advance Wars game somehow succeeds at making a well-worn formula as fresh and exciting as ever. Intelligent Systems, the developer of the series, deserves tremendous credit for crafting such a deep yet approachable gameplay experience. Those who haven't yet played an Advance Wars game shouldn't hesitate to start with this one, while the series' dedicated fans will find that there's lots of great, new stuff here to play around with, get really into, and share with their friends.


And part two.. Nintendogs!

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http://www.gamespot.com/ds/strategy/nintendogsdachshundandfriends/review.html
9.1 Superb

Just about anyone who enjoys the adorable antics, manic activity, and the tender nurturing that is central to raising a happy, healthy puppy should certainly give Nintendogs a look. Its simple interface, appealing subject matter, and its friendliness to multiple short sessions, with plenty of items and animals to unlock, makes it easy to recommend to a wide variety of gamers and nongamers alike.


Advance Wars supports 8 player multiplayer off a single cartridge, and your Nintendogs can sniff out nearby puppies wirelessly. If you don't already have a DS, they drop in price to $129.99 this weekend.
 
Ohhh...A new Advance Wars game.

I would like to buy a DS just for that, but it wouldn't be very frugal of me.

Hell, I can't even get past the eighth mission of the original AW.
 
d3r3k said:
I would like to buy a DS just for that, but it wouldn't be very frugal of me.

Sure it would, Advance Wars games are good for hundreds of hours of value.

d3r3k said:
Hell, I can't even get past the eighth mission of the original AW.

Oh, nevermind.
 
I'm expecting my Dachshund Nintendogs for wednesday. And I want Advance Wars and Meteos. They really rock.
 
I'm surprised that Nintendogs is an actual game, I'm not saying its a bad game, just the marketing and packaging is quite interesting.
 
Just picked up a DS today.. Now I'm waiting for my Chiuahua and friends to get here. Mostly I think it looks fun, but my excuse is that I think my daughter will really like it.
 
Yeah, until recently I had no idea what nintendogs was all about...I had assumed from the way everyone was buzzing about it that it was a reincarnation of those great games: Dogs 1 & 2. Now those were some fun games! :) Since I won my free Sony PSP I decided not to get a DS although the offer and game selection is tempting...
 
Well, you can watch tiny movies. and play generic games... While I'll play with nintendogs, AWDS, Trace Memory, Meteos, oodles of GBA games...
 
Maj.Striker said:
Yeah, until recently I had no idea what nintendogs was all about...I had assumed from the way everyone was buzzing about it that it was a reincarnation of those great games: Dogs 1 & 2. Now those were some fun games! :) Since I won my free Sony PSP I decided not to get a DS although the offer and game selection is tempting...


Honestly, i'm waiting for them to release that extended battery pack they (Sony) was talking about earlier this year before looking at investing in a PSP. For now, they've actually got GAMES coming out for the DS, so I'm happy.
 
Edfilho said:
Well, you can watch tiny movies. and play generic games... While I'll play with nintendogs, AWDS, Trace Memory, Meteos, oodles of GBA games...

I play portable games about as often as I watch reality shows...so it doesn't make sense for me. If I want to play "games" I play them on my xbox.
 
That's PRECISELY why the DS is (nowadays) a better GAMING machine than the PSP, because it offers gaming experiences that you can't find elsewhere.
The PSP just gives you things you can do on a PS2 or Xbox...
 
Edfilho said:
Well, you can watch tiny movies. and play generic games... While I'll play with nintendogs, AWDS, Trace Memory, Meteos, oodles of GBA games...

Eh, DS owners really are in no place to make fun of the PSP's library now that there suddenly are DS games. The PSP is great too, it's got a bigger better screen (so calling it "tiny" in this situation is pretty silly) and is more powerful. It had a much much better launch lineup, but it's just now suffering from the same mysterious drought that the DS went through for ten months after its release. And Striker doesn't care what you say about it, he won a PSP for free.

Edfilho said:
That's PRECISELY why the DS is (nowadays) a better GAMING machine than the PSP, because it offers gaming experiences that you can't find elsewhere.

That's a pretty unfair simplification. The touch screen is a pretty neat novelty, but it's a useless gimmick in most games. So while they are doing some innovative stuff with the system, there's not a whole lot. I mean, there's only a couple of games worth owning on the system, and they mostly could be recreated pretty faithfully on any other system if the developers wanted to.

Edfilho said:
The PSP just gives you things you can do on a PS2 or Xbox...

That's not true at all, but even if it were, that'd be great. The ability to take PS2/XBox quality stuff and go portable is a worthwhile reason to buy a handheld like the PSP. That being said, I put like 40 hours into Metal Gear Acid, which I might describe as a "gaming experiences that I couldn't find elsewhere." I also extensively use the movie, mp3 and photo abilities of the device.
 
ChrisReid said:
But you can play WC1/SM1 SNES.

But not if you want to browse the web, you don't - the 2.0 update kills the ability to run homebrew, at least for now. For that, you have to stay with 1.51 or whatever revision of the firmware it was.

Still, they're different machines - the PSP's conceived more as a multimedia device, and the DS is (at the moment) more designed for gaming with a variety of input methods. I'd like them both, but at the moment can only justify one... so I'm off to play Advance Wars again. :D
 
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