Mario Golf: World Tour [3DS] - Hands-on preview!

Join Mario as he competes in his very own golfing world tour! Choose to play as one of several characters from the Mario universe, including Princess Peach, Yoshi, Bowser, Luigi and many more. There are thirteen standard characters and a further four characters will be unlocked throughout the game.

The game starts with an interesting tutorial, which teaches the player all about how to correctly power their shot, alter camera angles and switch between auto shot and manual swing, which all becomes very useful as you progress through the game.

There are also several different courses to choose from including:

• The Forest Course
• The Seaside Course
• Yoshi Lake
• Cheep-Cheep Lagoon
• Bowser's Castle
• DK Island
• Wiggler Park

All the courses come with their own colourful environment and different challenges to overcome. For example, Yoshi Lake golf course contains many pools of water, which are difficult to avoid, making it a more difficult course than The Forest Course, which is one of the more realistic type of golf courses in the game.

As with normal golf, the main objective is to get the golf ball onto the Green in the minimum amount of shots. Mario Golf: World Tour allows players to choose whether they play the course using manual swing, or auto shot. Having the auto shot function is great for beginners as it means that the impact timing is preset for them so they only have to work on setting enough power for their shot. Here at Mini Gamers, we found the auto shot to be preferable on some of the more awkward terrains.

Players also have a limited number of Power Shots. Power shots are very useful for when players wish to make the ball travel over long distances. The exact number of power shots available per course will increase over time.

Coins will also be awarded at the end of each game. The higher the player's overall performance, the higher the rewards they will reap. Coins can be used later to purchase upgraded balls, clubs and clothing.

As well as playing a round of golf, more experienced players can attempt several golfing challenges. For example, in the Ring Shot challenge, players must aim to hit the ball through a series of metal rings littered about on the golf course. In order to succeed, the player must hit the ball through every ring without fail. A successful challenge will result in unlockable bonuses and/or coins.

(Having trouble viewing this trailer? CLICK HERE)

In conclusion, Mario Golf: World Tour is a fun game that will excite Mario fans of all ages. The game is quite similar to other golfing games on the market in terms of its overall format, but the colourful graphics, wacky character animations and inventive challenges make it very appealing to avid sports gamers as well. 

The game comes out on the 2nd of May 2014. If you are still unsure whether the game would actually appeal to you, then the demo version is available to try now from the Nintendo 3DS eShop. Overall Mini Gamers rating: 8/10.

One To Watch: Tomodachi Life [3DS]

Nintendo has today revealed an exciting new  Life Simulation game, Tomadachi Life (Tomodachi is the Japanese word for 'friend'), which will be released for the Nintendo 3DS on the 6th June 2014. The game allows players to create Miis of almost anyone they can think of and bring them to life in their own virtual world.

The game takes place on Chin island,  a special place inhabited by various Miis, which the player can import from their 3DS Mii Maker or via the 3DS QR code reader. Miis can also be created by using the 3DS camera or the in-game creation tools.

 Once created, these little avatars can be given their own voice and then players can set about creating a unique personality based on some slider inputs. The game is open-ended and almost anything can happen as new Miis interact together to form their own virtual communities.

Miis can perform various actions, such as eating, trying on different outfits and doing many leisurely activities such as going to the beach or dining at a restaurant, etc. As more Miis are introduced into the game, different interactions will become available and new events will occur. Miis can develop new skills and experience social developments such as friendship, romance, and rivalry, as well as take part in some bizarre musical numbers.

If you are curious about how all these elements work together, then the latest Nintendo Direct broadcast seeks to answer your questions:

  (Having trouble viewing this video? CLICK HERE)

Tomodachi Life  cleverly blends together many core elements from other Life Simulation games. If you have enjoyed games such as The Sims 3, Enchanted Folk or Animal Crossing, then this may be the perfect addition to your collection. Mini Gamers looks forward to bringing you further news about the game as it develops.

One To Watch: Dr. Kawashima's Devilish Brain Training [3DS]

It's finally here! The latest installment of Dr. Kawashima's hugely successful Brain Training franchise is set to arrive on the 3DS in the UK for the very first time. Dr. Kawashima's Devilish Brain Training: Can you stay focused? was first announced back in 2012, but despite several rumours that the game would be scheduled for European release on the 8th March 2013, it failed to appear - until now.

The game, (which is also known as Dr. Kawashima's Concentration Training outside of Europe,) offers another difficult set of mental agility challenges for players to complete, but whereas previous titles in this series have tended to focus more broadly on logic, mathematics comprehension, perception and long-term memory recall, each of the exercises in Dr. Kawashima's Devilish Brain Training: Can you stay focused? have something to do with concentration and training the player's working (short-term) memory to stay focused whilst facing various distractions.

So, what exactly has the game got to offer fans of the series? Well, Dr. Kawashima's Devilish Brain Training: Can you stay focused? offers a total of thirty daily exercises and minigames, including eighteen exercises which have never appeared in the previous Brain Training games. Furthermore, many of the featured core exercises can be uniquely tailored for brain training enthusiasts of all abilities.

For example, Devilish Calculations challenges players to recall the answer to a previous mathematical problem while paying attention to the next one in line. The questions come thick and fast and it will take all of a player's concentration skills to successfully remember all of the required information without making any mistakes.

Meanwhile, Devilish Mice,  challenges players to simultaneously track the path of some mice while they are being chased by cats. It sounds simple but it's a lot harder than it might first appear.

However, this is where the game usefully adapts itself to the player's performance and understanding. If players struggle during the exercise and seem to perform badly, then the game dynamically adjusts the difficulty based on the player's real-time results. By offering a difficult challenge from the start and shifting the difficulty to match the player's individual performance, Dr. Kawashima's Devilish Brain Training: Can you stay focused? constantly pushes players to attain new high scores, helping them to stay alert, engaged and to use their short-term memory to its fullest.

As well as putting themselves to the test with the daily challenges on offer, players can also build up their concentration skills via the Training Supplements mode, which seeks to further train the brain using other exercises from those that are completed during the daily challenges. Players who are feeling confident in their short-term memory capabilities may also wish to complete the difficult Concentration Challenge

Furthermore, Dr. Kawashima's Devilish Brain Training: Can you stay focused? has now made it even easier for players to compete against friends and family by using multiple save slots to keep different profiles on a single Game Cartridge.

Like many other 3DS games, Dr. Kawashima's Devilish Brain Training: Can you stay focused? will now use the 3DS' StreetPass to trade data with other users of the game and allows players the chance to compete against one another to attain the best brain training challenge scores.

 The actual UK release date for the game is yet to be confirmed, but with more screenshots and a newly-designed European boxshot cover design slowly emerging on the Internet, it would seem that Dr. Kawashima's Brain Training days are far from over. 

The following video presentation from Nintendo Direct (originally filmed in December 2012) helps to give an idea of the gameplay and challenges that players can expect to see during the game. If you are having trouble viewing the video on your device, please CLICK HERE.

As with the previous games in the series, Dr. Kawashima's Devilish Brain Training: Can you stay focused?  has a nice 'adult' feel to it, whilst still remaining entertaining and accessible enough to appeal to slightly younger gamers as well, making it a very good family game. 

If you enjoyed the previous Brain Training games but are looking for a new challenge, or if you just feel that your short-term memory could do with a work-out, then this is definitely the perfect game for you. Overall rating: 9/10.

Keep checking in with the Mini Gamers blogsite for more release date and gameplay information on this game as it arrives!

Monster Hunter 4G WILL get Western Release Date...

Capcom has confirmed that the latest Monster Hunter title, known as Monster Hunter 4G, which has recently been announced for development in Japan,  WILL also be released in Europe some time in Spring 2015 under the slightly different name of Monster Hunter 4: Ultimate.

 As well as promising that the new game would stay true to the successful format of previous Monster Hunter games, producer Ryozo Tsujimoto has promised that Monster Hunter 4: Ultimate will include lots of new game mechanics that should entice new fans to the series.

 Among those changes mentioned were: more vertical and lateral movement than in the previous games, as well as more multiplayer options, including the ability to hunt monsters with friends via online multiplayer, which is now being offered alongside the usual local wireless connection.

This is good news for all European Monster Hunter fans, although no doubt the news will come as a slight disappointment to those of you who had expected a 'late 2014' release date.

The game will be exclusive to Nintendo's 3DS and 2DS handheld consoles. Unlike last year, with the release of Monster Hunter 3: Ultimate, no Wii U version of the game has yet been mentioned. A video of the Capcom announcement can be viewed below:

* if you are having trouble viewing this video, please click HERE

Free Youtube App Comes to the 3DS

YouTube has finally reached the 3DS. Now users can enjoy browsing the latest game trailers and video walkthrough directly on their 3DS console.

Mini Gamers checked out the nifty little application, and found that the videos were surprisingly clear to view. The application can be downloaded from the Nintendo eShop for FREE, and has easy to navigate menus and buttons, which made the overall browsing experience quite pleasant.

However, those of you who were expecting to watch and download the latest batch of 3D videos on offer, are sure to be disappointed. The 3DS version of YouTube has no 3D support whatsoever, and any attempt to watch a 3D video resulted in some unsightly double-vision, as the 3D images are merely displayed as two identical screens (designed to be viewed with 3D glasses) rather than as a whole 3D image.

For those of you who just wish to browse videos as you would normally do on the PC or home consoles etc., this is a very handy application. However, the lack of 3D support on a console which so heavily on 3D as its unique selling-point seems like a gross oversight, and it also fails to make the 3DS version of YouTube any more interesting than the thousands of YouTube applications that can be found on various smartphones across the country, which is just such a shame.

Game of the Week: The Legend Of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds [3DS]

 

The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds was finally released in the UK today. The game marks the seventeenth title in the very popular gaming series The Legend of Zelda, and is the first game in the series to be developed specifically for the 3DS.

Link

For those of you who are unfamiliar with this fantasy epic, the series centres primarily on Link, who is the only playable character within the game. Link is best known for his rescue of a fair maiden called  Princess Zelda, the leader of the world of Hyrule, from Ganon, a Gerudo thief who is the primary enemy in the series.

Princess Zelda

The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds indirectly follows on from the 1991 Super NES title, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, in this game, the usual villian, Ganon, has long since been sealed away by a group known as the Seven Sages, and peace has seemingly returned to the land of Hyrule.

However, an evil wizard called Yuga has recently begun tracking down the descendants of the Seven Sages and turning them into paintings, in order to use the power of the Triforce for himself. It is up to Link to locate Yuga and find a way to rescue those sages who have been turned into paintings before it is too late...

 

Although The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds takes place in the same world as The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, there are lots of new exciting elements which help to mark a clear distinction between the two games. For example,  although the game environment is largely the same as that featured in A Link to the Past, all the dungeons are totally new, and the game features several new puzzles to solve.

The game's magic meter now refills automatically instead of requiring the player to collect potions in order to refill it. Furthermore, the magic meter now replaces the previous ammunition system for Link's bow and bombs, as well as being used to power other items and special abilities, such as the magic hammer attack.

Several items from A Link to the Past do return in this game, however, including Link's trusty bow and arrow for shooting enemies long distance, his projectile-shooting sword and his shield, as well as the mallet which allows Link to knock down pegs in the ground, and the Fire Rod which helps to create a firestorm.

Furthermore, these weapons can now be rented for a small amount of Rupees (the in-game currency) from Rovio's Shop, which gives Link a much better chance of defeating enemies earlier in the game.

 There is one catch, however, if Link gets defeated in a dungeon, he loses all of his rented items. nevertheless, these items are available for purchase later, assuming that players have enough rupees to do this.

A major new power for Link in this game is the ability to enter walls and become a painting himself in order to move along certain walls and passages and to reach new areas. This ability also allows Link to enter cracks in walls to move between the world of Hyrule and a mysterious alternative universe, known as Lorule, which has its own princess (Princess Hilda) for Link to rescue from the evil Yuga.
Drawings of hearts and rupees can also be found on these walls, but can only be collected when Link is transformed into a painting himself. Using any of these abilities or items will also cause Link's meter to deplete over time.

The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds also takes advantage of the 3DS' StreePass abilities. Once StreetPass is enabled, other players will appear in your game as Shadow Links. When you approach a Shadow Link, you can do battle with the character and reap special in-game rewards if you win.

In conclusion, The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds is a really interesting game. The stereoscopic 3D really does add new depth to the game's environments, especially when exploring the dungeons.

The game will be instantly familiar to fans of A Link to the Past, but has enough new content to make it enjoyable to both old and new fans alike.

The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds is available to purchase now from most videogame outlets, or as a digital download from the Nintendo eShop,  and even as a special bundle with the Legendary Gold Nintendo 3DS XL. If you liked the previous Legend of Zelda games, then this is definitely a must-have for your collection. Overall rating:10/10.

Nintendo Announces the 2DS...

 

Nintendo has announced that it will be releasing its latest dual-screen console on October the 12th 2013. The 2DS is supposed to be a new take on the 3DS model, which allows users to take advantage of the latest 3DS titles, without  actually having to play them in 3D.

The introduction of a 2D model of the 3DS is a strange one. For a start, the 3DS already comes equipped with a 3D depth-slider, which allows users to lower and turn off the 3D effect if they so wish, which makes the notion of a 2D console rather obsolete.

Nevertheless, one of the advantages of this latest addition to the Nintendo dual-screen range, is that it will come with a lower price tag than its predecessor. Nintendo claims that the 2DS will come with a recommended retail price of £109.99 when it is released in the UK, at least £50 cheaper than the current 3DS prices. Nintendo also claim that the 2DS will be fully backwards compatible with older Nintendo DS titles as well, meaning that gamers will get more value for their money.

Although the 2DS is an exact replica of the 3DS in terms of its gaming  functionality, the outer design of the new console is very different. For the first time, the 2DS will not have the clam-like feature that has been prevalent in the other DS consoles. Nintendo have removed the hinge between the upper and lower screens, and have instead opted for a block design which is very reminiscent of one of  the earlier Nintendo Gameboy consoles.

A further advantage of the 2DS is that it may also help to quell the fears of those who claim to experience bad side-effects from viewing the 3D images on the 3DS console, or those with eyesight problems that prohibit them from enjoying auto-stereoscopic 3D, at last giving those affected another way of enjoying the latest gaming titles.

Nevertheless, despite having a few basic advantages, the 2DS console does seem rather retrograde. Mini Gamers is doubtful whether the ability to display 3D images in a 2D format is the USP that most gamers will be looking for when deciding what console to put at the top of their list this Christmas. The question remains: Is 2D now the new 3D?

 

HAVE YOUR SAY...

 

 

What do YOU think about the new 2DS console?

 

Had you decided against a 3DS console, and if so, has the 2DS inspired you to try the latest 3DS titles in a 2D format?

 

Whatever your opinion on Nintendo's latest console, why not share it with us by commenting in our Comments Box below. We'd love to here from you.

 

 

 

Still undecided about the 2DS? Watch the latest trailer here.