Mere weeks after LEGO City Undercover debuted on the Wii U to deserved acclaim, Traveler’s Tales has dropped a prequel onto Nintendo’s other system the 3DS. It seems somewhat odd given that the game could so easily have been released alongside its console buddy as cross-platform cross-promotion. However, after spending many hours with the 3D prequel, it’s all too easy to see why there was a delay. The LEGO...

If you’ve been living in a dark world of Japanese-free gaming, you’ve been sadly missing out on the magic that is Monster Hunter. This franchise has been huge in Japan for years, but has been given only brief moments of North American glory through small PSP and Wii releases. Well all that changes now with a massive blockbuster release of an updated Monster Hunter 3 available on both...

Oh Luigi, you’re one of the most famous faces in Nintendo’s cast of characters and yet you remain a perpetual second banana. Sure, you’ve gotten a couple of solo ventures like the disastrous Mario Is Missing (seriously, what were they thinking?) and the underrated Gamecube cult classic Luigi’s Mansion, but you’ve never really been allowed to be the star thanks to the overshadowing princess-saving exploits of your brother. Well,...

For players who can remember a time when their gaming kicks came exclusively on cartridges rather than shiny, spinning discs of magic, the Castlevania series will always hold a special place in our hearts. It’s hard to call it the first horror game since I can’t imagine anyone but the most overprotected of children being frightened by a Castlevania experience, but along with Ghosts N’ Goblins it introduced gothic...

First party knockouts like Fire Emblem are something that Nintendo really needs to concentrate on. While we’re drowning in near weekly Nintendo Direct conferences - which promise big and apologise for letdowns - the real answer to Nintendo’s now self-admitted problem is sitting in the 3DS of gamers everywhere. Awakening, like its franchise predecessors, is an example of a game that moves platforms. Not everything is right in the...

With freshly pressed discs of Epic Mickey 2 currently spinning in every platform known to man, Mickey’s first side-scrolling platformer since the ancient 16-bit days has slipped onto shelves with little notice. Since it’s also got Epic Mickey in the title, I’m sure most people assume that it’s a 3DS port. Well, not so fast folks. You are severely underestimating what the good people at DreamRift have whipped up...

Back in ye olde days of the N64, Nintendo decided to bring Mario and his Mushroom Kingdom buddies back to RPG-land following the instant classic that was Super Mario RPG. However, what those coin-chugging programmers whipped up was not merely a straight sequel to their SNES title. Nope, it was a completely new game called Paper Mario that turned Mario and co. into 2D cardboard cutouts in a world...

The Professor Layton series has already carved out a place in handheld gaming as one of the premiere puzzle solving franchises, so the series debuting on 3DS is something special for fans of the genre. Well, I’ve got some good news for those folks who like to give their brain a tickle while doing their gaming. Professor Layton And The Miracle Mask captures everything that devoted fans have come...

It was a bit of a shocker when Nintendo pulled New Super Mario Brothers 2 out of their hat right before E3 this year and planned on launching it within a few months. New entries in the plucky plumber’s ongoing battles with Bowser are usually teased out for a least a year. Yet all of a sudden here was the first sidescrolling Mario adventure for Nintendo’s new handheld system....

Disney and Final Fantasy. A combination of the most accessible icons of children’s entertainment with possibly the first franchise that required gamers to sacrifice most of their life to properly complete the controller-driven quest. Let’s face it, that’s an odd combination that really shouldn’t work. First off, this is an absolutely gorgeous 3DS title with some fantastic level and character designs playing off of classic Disney...

The lovable little 3DS has been given grey cartridges containing games of nearly every conceivable genre in its short lifespan, with the notable exception of RPGs and first person shooters. Well, we shouldn’t hold our breath on a portable shoot em’ up coming out on the 3DS anytime soon (a shame because it would look glorious in 3D), however Square Enix just dropped a title onto the 3DS, so...

If ever there was a movie destined to get a tie in game, it’s Battleship. After all the turn-based board game on which that terrible, terrible blockbuster is based is better suited to a videogame translation than a narrative feature. So, it should come as no surprise that the folks at Activision have gone and whipped up a wee adaptation for the 3DS. The similarities to the movie are...

For a visibly chunky plumber, Mario is one hell of an athlete. Between bouts of rescuing princesses from giant lizard kings, the guy has been known to play in the Olympics, baseball, and virtually ever other pro sport (often involving the princess and lizard king, who seem to get along surprisingly well when they are playing sports). Weirdly, the sport that Mario and his buddies keep coming back to...

When the 3DS launched, the most impressive games came with the system. Of course, I’m talking about those fancy “Augmented Reality” games that filled your room with floating faces and made dragons pop out of desks. It was a pretty incredible showcase for Nintendo’s new technology and despite the fact that those games were all anyone talked about when the 3DS was released, there have practically been no applications...

The 3DS has been swimming in top tear titles lately from Resident Evil to Metal Gear Solid and even Kid Icarus’ unexpected return. They were all pretty solid games, but if there was one problem that they all share it’s that they didn’t really take advantage of the unique 3D display. Sure, having monsters pop out of the screen is fun and some of the epic Kid Icarus levels...

In general, Nintendo treats their franchise stars well. You never have to wait long to bounce Mario around on a fresh set of goombas, send Link off on his latest magical quest, or blast your way through space as Samus. However, one little guy in their back catalogue hasn’t gotten a hell of a lot of attention from the big N. It’s been decades since Pit went on his...

In the summer, Capcom released Resident Evil: Mercenaries 3D during the 3DS’ sadly soft launch. It was a nice showcase for the new hardware, but always felt more like a beta testing ground than an actual game. Resident Evil Revelations is the eye-popping follow through on that soft-toss practice round. The game is so huge that it actually features a bonus mode that plays like a bigger, better, and...

Much like they did with the successful Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time 3D, Nintendo has dipped back into the well to provide some glitzy new software for their 3DS. While it would have been nice if we’d gotten an all new space adventure for Nintendo’s lovable little Fox, there’s a good chance that people would have just complained that the new Star Fox game wasn’t...