Kidzworld's Official Blog

Next week, Pokemon HeartGold & SoulSilver are storming North America, immediately after selling like (no, even better than) hotcakes in Japan.  For a remake, the game is getting unbelievably good reviews, too, so I’m collecting the ones that have been published so far right here.

• GamesRadar: 8 out of 10 – Believe it or not, this is the lowest score the game will get, and people were actually pretty mad that it was this low. Wow.
• IGN: 8.5 out of 10
• Nintendo Power: 9.5 out of 10
• Famitsu (Japanese magazine): 37 out of 40
• Games Master UK: 88 out of 100

Add to that the fact that the game’s sold over 3 million copies in Japan already, and, whoa… Sometimes I forget the awesome power of Pokemon.

Level-5 is the developer of our latest featured game, White Knight Chronicles. They’re an often overlooked RPG dev, with some amazing games for Sony systems in particular over the years. Here’s a quick rundown of them, and why you should pick them up if you see them for $5 in a bargain bin somewhere.

• Dark Cloud (2000) – PS2. Actually very similar to White Knight Chronicles in that it’s a regular RPG with city-building elements. A real under-recognized gem.
• Dark Chronicle (2002) – PS2. Sometimes it’s called Dark Cloud 2. It has the same city-building stuff combined with RPG stuff, and then adds in this odd photography system. It has awesome, stylish graphics.
• Dragon Quest VIII (2004) – PS2. Again, great cel-shaded graphics. Japanese magazine Famitsu called it the fourth best game of all time at one point.
• Rogue Galaxy (2005) – PS2. It’s pretty unfair to say it’s a sci-fi version of Dark Cloud 2, but I don’t have a lot of room to talk about it here, so I’m just going to say it’s like a sci-fi version of Dark Cloud 2.
• Jeanne d’Arc (2006) – PSP. A tactical turn-based RPG instead of an action one like the others, plus it’s (loosely) based on the story of Joan of Arc. One of my favorite PSP games.
• The Professor Layton series (2007-today) – DS. Not an RPG, but rather a game of puzzles set around a storyline, with some adventure-y elements. Definitely a must-have for DS owners, unless you’re really ticked off by brain teasers.

This week’s game release post only had three games, all for the DS, but there was a big one: The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks. The last DS Zelda game, Phantom Hourglass, let you steer a ship, and this one lets you drive a train, which was kind of unexpected for a medieval-fantasy-type game. So, based on that pattern of each DS Zelda game having a new type of transportation in it, here are my best guesses at what the next Zelda game’s title might be:

• The Legend of Zelda: Mysterious Biplane
• The Legend of Zelda: The Forest Halfpipe
• The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Pneumatic Tube
• The Legend of Zelda: Rally Car Rumble
• The Legend of Zelda: Segway of Truth