Button Mash This

I recently finished playing Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix for the Wii. Of all the Harry Potter games that I’ve played, this version was definitely the most engaging. The thrill for me was the amount of detail put into the game, such as location and character details. You can roam freely around Hogwarts and cast various spells (using your remote like a wand) on a variety of people and things to discover even more extras. Some of the nice touches, included voice work from several characters from the movies, facial scans of the actors and an awesome orchestrated soundtrack. As you discover more things, you are also treated to some great video clips about the making of the game.

If you were to only have one Harry Potter game, this would be the one. It’s a definite must for a gamer who is a fan of the Harry Potter franchise as a whole. They cover off the movie nicely enough, but also add little touches from the previous movies.

I’m not sure about you, but I’m excited about the release of My Sims by EA Games on the Nintendo Wii and DS. Check out the trailer above. So cute. And the game play is supposed to be a breeze and very customizable. Sure it looks a lot like Animal Crossing, but that being said I was a big fan of that franchise. Kill me with cuteness.

The game hits shelves on September 18th.

Nintendo Canada and WestJet have teamed together to provide an in-flight DS gaming experience on random flights until September 30th. Apparently a variety of games will be available in this free service. Note the DS is simply a loaner for the flight, however Westjet is also having a DS giveaway if your register your confirmation number from any WestJet flight purchased between August 15th and September 30th.

Yesterday, I came across the BrainAge 2 / Special Edition DS Lite bundle at HMV. My jaw dropped and lust ensued. It seems from comments on other gaming sites, there is either a love/hate relationship with this new edition of the DS lite which is a Crimson/Black combo. Personally, I love it and am very tempted.

Note to Canadians, EB Games, Future Shop and Best Buy are all selling the bundle for 159.99 while HMV Canada is sells it for 149.99. You decide.

This past Thursday, chelle and I got our pictures taken for this site, by our good friends istoica. In this shot I’m sporting a Wii-mote and nunchuck, while chelle sports a Nintendo tee and a Guitar Hero guitar.

Two of my favorite titles from the Xbox platform were Karaoke Revolution and Karaoke Revolution Party. Needless to say, I’m excited to hear that Disney Intercative studio will be releasing games based on the High School Musical franchise. The titles will be released on the Nintendo DS, Nintendo Wii and Playstation 2 and are slatted for August 2007. The Wii title, “High School Musical: Sing It!” will be one of the first games on the platform to utilize a microphone (hopefully not the last). The game will include approximate 30 songs, which will include songs from the made for TV Movie as well as other Disney favorites. Here’s hoping we’ll get some classics from The Little Mermaid, Alladdin and Beauty and Beast. I feel a song coming on!

The Playstation 2 version should be very much like the Wii version and the DS platform, “High School Musical: Makin’ the Cut!” will feature rhythm type gameplay. Although, I think it would be hilarious if there was a karaoke game for the DS.

More Screenshots after the jump!

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A couple of months ago, I picked up the ASiD Tech Wii Controller Rechargeable Battery. It comes with two battery packs which you can charge via USB, ie like on the back of your wii. It sound ingenious right? Well I must say, I’m not very pleased with this battery pack. Often, I will charge the battery and when plugged into my remote, I find that the battery is not fully charged. I also find that it is also quick run through the charge, getting quite drained after an hour of play. To top it off, the USB powercord plugs into the battery pack on this raised input, which actually maked holding your remote a little bit awkward. Needless to say, I’d skip on this product.

OMG. it looks like the brilliant folk at Ubisoft are at it again. Slatted for a 4th quarter release this year, videos and other peaks into Rayman Raving Rabbids 2 are out on the web. Colour me excited. AHHHHH!

I wish that I could report that I was writing this post via my Nintendo DS and the Nintendo DS Browser, but sadly I’m not. I picked up the Browser last week in hopes of something really good. Unfortunately, I think Nintendo missed the mark on this one and rolled out a Bowser of a browser. The browser is slow, and clunky. It doesn’t render pages well and I can’t seem to log into anything useful. I can’t even check my gmail properly on it. Nevermind the fact that trying to type anything via the sylus is painfully slow and sometimes unresponsive.

It’s sad really, because I think the DS Browser could have revolutioned the way people hop online on the go. But from the few times that I have tried to use it, it’s been more of a headache instead of a god-send.

Here are a handful of suggestions of things I thought could be improved upon.

A) Having tabbed browsing would be nice. Cause people like to open more than one page at a time. We are a multitasking society.
B) Having some sort of graffitii script like on the old Palm pilots would definitely come in handy here, or perhaps a keyboard attachment that would load into the GBA slot. that would also house the extra memory required for the software.
C) Faster load times. perhaps I was on slow connections, but they weren’t THAT slow.
D) WPA compatibility would be nice too. It seems that more secured connections aren’t compatible. Annoying.

Right now, I’m not really hot on this product, but I do intend on trying it out some more hoping I’ll find the golden connection, where this will actually be fast and useful. Would I recommending buying it? I’d save the money for something more fun, like a freaking game. Besides, do you really need to stay connected where ever you go?

Walmart Canada is carrying a variety of Nintendo themed t-shirts. As tempting as they were, I wasn’t really sold by any of them.

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