Nintendo DS
- Brain Age2: More Training in Minutes a Day!
As of this morning, I've gotten the age of my brain down to 31, so, while I'm still not at the "ideal" of 20 (and probably never will be), at least I'm making progress. I was also surprised to discover that this game has a bonus, stylus-controlled version of Dr. Mario (renamed "Virus Attack"), which I really dig, especially on the higher difficulties, where the game presents a new wrinkle on the old gameplay mechanics by dropping 2-3 pills on you simultaneously, instead of increasing the speed (that's something that would never work with a control pad!) I've also successfully completed 58% of the Sudoku puzzles thus far. Filled with confidence, the other day, I grabbed a pencil and tried solving a "real" Sudoku puzzle in the local college newspaper but failed--I guess I better train on Dr. Kawashima's digital ones some more (in my defense, the print one was labelled "very hard" and they weren't kidding).
- LEGO Battles
A LEGO real time strategy game. With six factions (good and evil forces spread over the Castle, Pirate, and Space LEGO themes) comprising ninety missions total, not to mention freeplay and multiplayer modes (where you can mix-and-match any of the units that you've unlocked/purchased to your heart's content), this game offers a lot of value for your money. So far, I've completed all thirty of the Castle levels (King and Wizard), half of the Pirate missions (Captain Brickbeard), and half of the Space campaign (Gemma). At the moment, I'm at about 76% total game completion (your unlockables/collectibles factor into that percentage too, which is why my number is higher than the 66.6% of the levels that I've finished). For the most part, it's not a terribly difficult game, as far as RTS go, but, I have lost a mission here-and-there when I was too wreckless/aggressive or didn't protect my base adequately. Predictably, the game is mostly stylus-controlled, which definitely works better than a control pad and is arguably superior to a mouse as well. The pathfinding of the units is terrible at times, but then, I don't think I've ever played a RTS on any platform, PC or console, where that wasn't a problem to some extent. If you like both LEGO and RTS, you can't go wrong with this one!
PC
- Freecell
- Solitaire