One of the best value DSiWare titles has to be Ugoku Memo Chou (Flipnote Studio in Europe and America), which is free. It has been a massive hit since it launched last December, and the game got an update on April 27th, adding some minor, but quite cool improvements on the original. As requested by forum member Octogonapus, here is a bit of information about the new update.
First of all, there are extra brushes, and there are also extra shapes with which you can erase things. This is great as you can get a bit more creative in terms of textures.
You now have the ability to edit your animation on two seperate layers, meaning your animations can be more complex, giving you more control over background and foreground sections.
You can also copy specific sections of your animations and paste them elsewhere in your creation.
You can send letters, containing animations to your friends, or ugo-mates, as they are called. Your ugo-mates, as far as I can tell have to be real life friends in order for you to be able to exchange stuff with them.
What really makes this cool though, is the community aspect that Nintendo have managed to integrate into the game, with the help of a company called Hatena. The special website allows you to share and view memos, and write comments. You can see how you rank along with other artists and the site is available anywhere you have access to a browser. I think this is an essential part of the game and something has has to be included when the game comes to other regions.
Also, here is a memo made by Nike. It’s pretty cool.
I set off at about 10:30 this morning with the aim of adding to my 2 pokemon I’d managed to collect through the Nintendo Zones at McDonald’s. I saw last night that someone in Hokkaido had managed to collect 80 in one day. I’m sure this person must be messing with his/her clock or some other skullduggery ‘cos that is an insane amount, especially considering that there must be barely 40 McDonald’s on the whole of the damn island anyway.
I started my journey from Koshigaya city in Saitama and managed to get to just past Minowa in Tokyo. I roughly followed the train line that runs that route and it works out to about 22km (roughly 14 miles). I managed to collect 13 new pokemon on my journey. I didn’t have to go inside any of the stores and I only found one along my route that didn(t offer the DS service. Connecting is kind of slow but not too bad. I noticed a few other people at each restaurant doing the same thing as me, although some of them had dads with cars. I arrived home at about 8:30 after taking a slight detour to enjoy a beer and chat with a lovely barkeep in a local bar. I even maganged to buy some fruit and a dress for my daughter along the way.
I don’t think I’ll make the daily ranking tomorrow and the forecast for the rest of the week is rain so I doubt I’ll be able to get even close to finishing before the deadline of July 16th. Was it fun? In a way, yes. I feel great about doing that much exercise but my behind won’t thank me for it tomorrow I’m sure.
Do you think this kind of thing will take off in your country? Are there enough McDoanald’s to make the whole thing doable in a month? Let me know in the comments or on the forums.
Well, not much to report this “Saturday” seeing as I’ve not really played much this week. Exams are finished and the mountain of marking is getting less and less. So now that the customary waffle is over, let’s get to the point. You might notice that this post is light on photos. I promise to remedy that with a special super edition of Pokemon Scramble Sunday! Am I good to you guys or what?!?
I took a trip to my local McDonald’s (purely in the interests of research) and tried out the new service. In addition to a fully functional Wi-Fi Connection service, download station, and McDonald’s junk, there is an interesting Pokemon Scramble tie up.
Japanese love a good stamp rally, I think it’s in the DNA. I did a Pokemon one myself last year that involved going to every Japan Railways station in the Tokyo metropolitan area and collecting a different pokemon at each one. It was pretty hardcore, I tell you.
The way this one works is pretty cool. You have to go to different McDonald’s, and answer a trivial question to “get” a pokemon. Collect 8 and you get a cheeseburger; collect 16 and get a Big Mac. There are 240 to collect. You can even visit a specially set up website and see how you stack up to other people accross the country. The stats are broken down by prefecture and it’s quite interesting to see how many dedidicated people there are. You can also see the top 5 stores which have been the most popular for downloads.
All the pokemon you collect are in their Pokemon Scramble forms and there is also information about 2 boardgames which are also based on Pokemon Scramble. The whole thing is pretty slick. I’m off out tomorrow to increase my measly collection of 2. You don’t even have to eat anything! Great!
It’s still Saturday somewhere in the world, I’m sure. Anyway, you don’t need to hear how great a job I’ve been doing raising my daughter this weekend, you want to hear more about Pokemon Scramble. Well read on!
In a brand new regular slot, I’ll be telling you a bit more about my experiences with the fab new WiiWare game, Pokemon Scramble. It costs 1500 points which puts it in the top tier of games. In my opinion it’s worth it because it is a lot of fun, quite deep if you want it to be, easy to play in shorts bursts, and has multiplayer options, though (of course) not online.
I won’t go into the storyline, or talk about gameplay in detail all in one post. I’ll just let you know what I’m up to every week so you can decide if the game is for you before it comes to your region.
The excellent screenshot-almost-anywhere feature is great, so I’ll be posting quite a few shots of the game as I go along. You can take a look at my screenshots so far by clicking on any of the shots in this post.
If I figure out how to do the funny e, then this slot will be much more credible in the eyes of many. Maybe next time. You’ll just have to tune in to the first exciting edition of Pokemon Scramble Saturday!
That’ll be here on Saturday for those of you who haven’t trained your brains lately.
No one likes to be teased, but when it comes to brain teasers, there is a huge market full of people that like nothing better than to put their brain through the wringer so to speak. From sudoku to Sherlock Holmes, crosswords to countdown, many of us love having our minds put to the test.
Lateral thinking puzzle books are just one of many things that Paul Sloane and Des Machale earn a crust from. Now they’ve teamed up with Level 5 to put a new spin on some classic and not so well known brain busters. This game has been on sale in Japan since May 21st and I just picked it up last week. It isn’t available in English yet so this is very much an import review.
I should say before I go on, that if you have any intention of importing this game then you really ought to have a fair degree of competence with the Japanese language. You have to clearly understand the situation, as well as the questions you’ll be asking about them. The good thing is that all the kanji have furigana which you can just about make out although it’s pretty small. Having said that, you’re goping to get pretty frustrated having to check every single kanji and wrestle with grammar too. If you’re studying Japanese, this is probably a good idea, and If you’re studying with other people, then it’s a great way to study in a group.
Each story is told using 3 or 4 pictures and 6 or 7 sentences. You can touch certain words or phrases to find out more about the situation, forming questions which will be answered YES, NO, or IT DOESN’T MATTER. Certain questions are key and will lead to bigger hints which will help you figure out the mystery in each episode.
There are no animations or cool cut scenes, and I don’t think this game would really benefit from them. The pictures convey enough information about the stories without giving too much away. Each story is nicely told by a very intelligent sounding man, who doesn’t mock when you ask inane questions in desperation.Read more »
Reading James’ blog post about the Vitality Sensor got me thinking about what else it could be used for. I liked the ideas he mentioned about using it for shooters and racing games, but I still think it should be used in ’software’ rather than ‘games’. And I think I’ve thought of the Killer App. A game that is not only provides entertainment, but may also be your path to enlightenment.*
Destination Nirvana
Buddha described nirvana as the perfect peace of a mind that is free from craving, anger and other afflictive states. You are at peace with the world, have compassion for all and give up obsessions and fixations. In Nirvana the root causes of craving and aversion have been extinguished such that one is no longer subject to human suffering or further states of rebirth.
The software uses both the balance board and the Vitality Sensor to allow the user to reach a state of pure meditative bliss. A world leaderboard of lowest heart rate and longest time meditating would be accessible through Wi-Fi Connection. The longer you meditate, and the more constant and rested your heart rate becomes, the closer you and your Mii will become to achieving nirvana.Read more »
OK, I know this is a little self indulgent but, hey that’s what the Internet is all about, right? You may have seen my Gamecube mode on this very site and I’ve just finished a very minor addition to my setup. A 4-port USB hub cleverly blatantly masquerading as an orange Gameboy Advance. More pics (and controversy) after the jump!
So you have a Dsi and want to put some music on it and check out the new functionality. If you are one of the millions of people who listen to music in MP3 format then you ‘ll have to jump through some hoops before you can listen to Girls Aloud or Vanessa Hudgens on Nintendo’s latest. The Dsi only has eyes for AAC.
So what is this AAC thing and is it kid safe? Read more »
I’ve had my DSi for just under a week now and I’ve tried out almost all of the features. My last post in this series will let you have a look at what you can, and can’t do with the camera. I haven’t really delved that deeply into the Sound Channel, but I plan to do that in the next week or so. Of course the new features have their limitations and minor annoyances but on the whole I’m more impressed with them than I thought I’d be, especially with the camera.
Blog, Preview, Video | Alex@WiiDS | 
July 20, 2009 6:46 pm | 
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