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Radioactive IT Hands On: Zelda Spirit Tracks and New Super Mario Bros Wii
Radioactive IT Hands On: Zelda Spirit Tracks and New Super Mario Bros Wii | Hands On: Zelda Spirit Tracks and New Super Mario Bros Wii |
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| by Mike Bantick | |
| Saturday, 17 October 2009 | |
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A couple of games for the hand-held DS and DSi kicked off the evening. First to leave the station was the latest iteration of the Zelda franchise. The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks is the ‘spirtual’ successor to the much acclaimed 2007 release Phantom Hourglass. I never got a chance to spend much time with Phantom Hourglass, but it was pretty clear from this early run with Spirit Tracks that whilst the concept is rock solid, there is still some polish work needed before this games release date. Conceptually, our hero, Link, has been joined by a new companion as he ventures into the many dungeons. In fact it is the titular Phantom from the earlier game. Link is able to guide the hulking armoured Phantom through corridors using the stylus. Being mostly ethereal, the Phantom can navigate dungeon areas inaccessible to Link, this is used as a puzzle solving mechanism, allowing progress through the labyrinth. Link is also has an arsenal of new powers and items at his disposal, one of these we were able to use, the Whirlwind, after many attempts to fruitlessly jump across a small gap in the dungeon floor, obviously the Whirlwind was the actual answer to tripping a bridge-building switch on the far side of the room.  Link also gets some train driving during Spirit Tracks. Controlling the speed of the loco, letting loose on the horn to gently move friendly creatures from the tracks or letting loose on the not so gentle cannon to move (and destroy) non friendly’s worked ok. There is an element of puzzle solving during the train sequence, selecting track junctions, and controlling speed are part of the on-rails section of Spirit Tracks. Graphically this was a mixed bag, but this is typical of the review code we were looking at. The landscape was somewhat bland with flat textures that, at this point are obviously not complete. MORE GAMES FROM PAGE 2 |
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