Skip to main content

DS Roundup

Bubble Bobble: Double Shot, Bomberman Land Touch! 2, Fish Tycoon, Bleach, Kira Kira Pop Princess.

Bomberman Land Touch! 2

  • Publisher: Rising Star Game
  • Developer: Hudson Soft

Typical. Here I am putting in all the work required for reviewing this sequel and I find out most of it's been done for me. As seems to be the case with games like this, this sequel's practically identical to the first. The premise: wander a theme park, play mini-games, indulge in cute, nonsensical story. Same poo, different day. There are times when I don't know why I bother. Now excuse me while I point you towards the original review, say the graphics are a little sharper, and scarper with my cheque.

Oh, alright. Unlike some of the stinkers in this roundup, I enjoyed this one. Sort of. That's no doubt due to this being an unpretentiously jubilant adventure through a mini-game strewn story that never really stops for breath. With an assured sense of progression it drops a trail of breadcrumbs from one location to the other and asks you to follow them to the end accomplishing tasks on the way. There's always something to unlock, a token to collect, a mini-game to play, or an item to use, and you run around from one place to the other tackling it all in a play area that's small enough to find your way around but large enough to discover something new every hour or so.

Where next, Bomberman? Karting again? Bomberman Sports? We dread to think.

As for the mini-games, they're your usual bunch of stylus scratchers, tappers and match the x and y affairs you've come to know and love; intuitive, Bomberman-themed, and nothing new - they've even cheekily taken a few from the first game. To successfully go down the saturated mini-game route requires variety and there's a good selection of games to cycle through that don't overstay their welcome. Aside from an air hockey-style game which crops up several times as a boss challenge, each mini-game only ever needs to be completed once or twice for a token, unless you're after a high score or want to replay them individually with other players.

It's none too offensive, then. There's a good day or so's simple, colourful fun in there for those who can stomach Bomberman's sugar-coated world. To fully justify your purchase, though, Hudson knows that you know that there's only one way you'll ever buy a single-player Bomberman game and, yes, Battle Mode is present and correct. Traditional, brilliant multiplayer Bomberman is available over both Wi-Fi and wireless as per usual. As a matter of fact, it's exactly the same game that came bundled with the bland RPG Bomberman Story, reviewed a few months ago. As we said then, it's your choice what bland single-player game you want to accompany the multiplayer goodness. We're not exactly eating our words now, but in this game's case, we're prepared to upgrade the single-player portion from 'bland' to 'alright'.

7/10