Forum Overview :: Nintendogs

3DS by Rafiki 03/13/2014, 3:26pm PDT I picked up a 3DS a few days ago because I'm on the road and dying of boredom. After I bought it I found out that if you buy one between now and the end of March and buy one of 6 possible games (including Mario Kart or Mario 3D Land), sign up for a Club Nintendo account, register the system and your games, fill out a few surveys, sign over your kidneys, and enter a blood pact, you can get a free copy of either Pokémon X or Y. I've never played a Pokémon game and haven't been particularly interested in them, but I subscribe to the Church of Whorebach and its tenet of "Hey, free game." I can't believe auto-correct adds the accented e to Pokémon. In addition to free Pokémon, there's also 3DS systems that come preloaded with a game. I grabbed one with Mario Dream Team (RPG) because it was the only one in the store (and I think that's the only one still available), although a system with the new Yoshi's Island comes out tomorrow but the reviews say it's kind of bad. Anyway, if you wanted to pick up a 3DS you can get 2 free games if you find one with a preloaded game and do it by the end of March. FIRST IMPRESSIONS LIGHTNING ROUND 3DS The 3D is certainly.....something. It works pretty well, surprisingly, but I could take it or leave it mostly. It really depends on the game. I have to turn it off in Bravely Default, Link Between Worlds and Mario Dream Team aren't anything special in 3D, but with Mario 3D Land it feels very, very appropriate. I imagine games in that perspective work a lot better. Levels in Mario 3D Land are also deliberately designed for the 3D effect as well, compared to other games which just seem to be regular games but with the 3D effect enabled. I do feel my eyes strain a little with the 3D effect on at first, but I get used to it and I haven't felt nauseous. I kind of want to see an Occulus Rift in 1080p with the 3D effect now. Like every website ever reported, there's a sweet spot for the 3D. I don't like that I can't rest the system in my lap and have to hold it up, but I do hold it up in a way that's comfortable and feels natural. After using a mobile phone with HD resolution, I really wish the 3DS was HD but games look fine. It also has a 3D CAMERA. It is the world's shittiest camera. You'll use it once for the novelty of seeing someone's fat ugly face in 3D and to see that it makes a more natural looking picture, but the awful camera and the low resolution means you'll never ever use it for anything ever. The E-Shop works fine. Buy an SD card, the system only comes with a 4GB one. I don't know what the average game size is, I think most are only a few hundred MB tops, but if you're interested in Bravely Default it's a couple GB. All I had on the default card was the preloaded Mario Dream Team and the preloaded apps and demos, and there wasn't enough room to download it from the shop. Other games might be as big. Plus, I think there's some hacked card you can buy with emulators for like every Nintendo system ever so you can buy that and load it up with roms as well. The system gets shockingly good sound with headphones. Really impressed. Mario & Luigi Dream Team I stopped playing this because the tutorial stuff was taking FOR-FUCKING-EVER. Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds Did you like Link to the Past? You'll probably like this. I've only done 2 dungeons. The 2D/3D transitions are pretty clever. Most shocking change from the default Zelda formula: I'm not finding new items in each dungeon. Instead, (at least at the beginning, this might change as the game goes on) you "rent" items from a vendor and you have access to like 8 items right off the bat. You can get them all and use them as much as you want. The only catch is that you have to buy them (they're cheap), they run on magic, and if you die you lose them all and have to repurchase them. It's a little refreshing to have access to a ton of items right from the start, but thus far the 2 dungeons I've done are still centered around one specifically. Having access to them all does open up the world map a little more, though. Super Mario 3D Land Excellent, but short. 3D World for the Wii-U is an obvious improvement in almost every way, and this definitely feels like a prototype for it. This lacks the online features of the Wii-U version and has fewer levels, but the levels that are there are still fun. I actually like the Bowser levels in this one more than the Wii-U. They're a throwback to the original Super Mario Bros. in that you have to get behind Bowser to collapse the bridge, whereas in the Wii-U version you just had to dodge fireballs and kick soccer bombs Bowser lobbed from the back of his dragula. Definitely play this with 3D turned on. Bravely Default The writing is SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO BAD. IT IS SO BAD. I can't overstate how bad it is. And there's so much voice acting and so many cutscenes. Jesus Christ, you can't walk 3 feet without it turning into a fucking cutscene. I can't check Youtube right now because it's down, but I wanted to link one of the early scenes with Edea. Look it up to hear the actress reading "Mrgrgr." It's supposed to be some sort of angry grunt or growl, but the actress sounds it all out. MURRGURRGURR! It's hilarious. There's 5 or 6 occasions where this happens. Gameplay-wise, it's a turn-based JRPG with a job system. You can also save (DEFAULT) or queue up (BRAVE) up to 4 turns. So, for example, if your party is at good health, your white mages will probably be useless in the first round of attacks. Rather than have them attack to do 5 damage or just defend, you can have them Default to save up an extra turn. That way if you need it, they can take two turns in one round. Another example would be enemies that you know you can just roll, but their health is too high to take out in a single round of attacks. You can just have everyone queue up 4 attacks and roll them that way. You can also get an advance on the number of turns you have, but if you go negative you have to wait until you return to zero. So say it's your turn and you also have 1 saved. If you queue up 4, you'll go to -3. So you'll have to wait 3 rounds of that character doing nothing before they get another turn again. I'm not far enough in to really judge the risk/reward system it's going for, but it has both helped me and fucked me over on two bosses. I'm playing on hard, and when I finally get bosses to low health I'm low on magic and items, so I've tried to go for a hail mary and have everyone queue up 4 attacks. One time it worked, another time I whiffed a bunch so my entire party was exposed without healing for 4 rounds and I died. Whoops! Definitely play this with 3D turned off. If you shift the 3DS a micrometer off of the center of your vision, your eyes will die.

3DS by Rafiki 03/13/2014, 3:26pm PDT     Bravely Default: Oh Japan, you so crazy by Rafiki 03/15/2014, 8:16am PDT     Rafiki! Have you had good times with other 3DS games since then? NT by Ice Cream Jonsey 09/29/2015, 7:48am PDT         Not really! I haven't bought but one, because I only use it when I travel by Rafiki 09/29/2015, 10:05am PDT