In Handhelds

Majesco is publishing a new title for the DS, one that's not a gimmicky touch-screen piece of junk, something that might actually get me interested in the DS if they pull it off right.



has anyone else heard anything about this game? or have plans to buy it?

'Nanostray' is by far the best looking DS game so far. I like how smoothly the background scrolls (reminds me of 'Ikaruga').
The selection of weapons looks great too. Being able to switch them on the fly would make for very intriguing game play.

I heard a rumor though, that Majesco (the developer) just went bankrupt, and that 'Nanostray' is in extreme limited edition. Of course that's just a rumor that will be dispelled as soon as I find a source that confirms it. However if it's true, this one could be a collector's item.

2-D game play will never die!

It was actually due to the bankruptcy rumour that I discovered the game and became interested, but that rumour was discredited

As for my comments about the controls... I've been hearing that it does in fact make use of the touch screen. Which makes me much less interested. Especially since the function of changing weapons could have easily been mapped to some actual physical buttons.

I'm told the control scheme is like this:

D-pad = move ship

Left shoulder button = fire

Touch screen = weapon change, etc...

Personally I feel that's a downright stupid setup, the lower screen (or the upper one, it could have been selectable) would have been great for listing ship health, score, combo multipliers, or other such stats. Firing could have been mapped to one of the other buttons. Not that I have a problem with it being the shoulder button, but if it were mapped to one of the face buttons, then the shoulder buttons could be used to scroll through weapons back and forward.

Of course this news about bad controls is just based on what I've been told, it could be entirely false.

As for my comments about the controls... I've been hearing that it does in fact make use of the touch screen. Which makes me much less interested. Especially since the function of changing weapons could have easily been mapped to some actual physical buttons.
Well that's good news (about Majesco).

The touch screen controls should have been "optional". It's somewhat difficult to use the left shoulder button for anything, especially as the main fire button (since it's the same hand used to control the ship).

You might as well get use to the "touch screen". Developers are going to take advantage of it no matter how unnecessary it is.
.

Actually, this sounds very similar to the control set up on Metroid Prime Hunters. If that's the case, then the controls will be beautiful. They work wonders for the demo I've been playing, and I can't wait for the full release.

Keep in mind, utilizing the touch screen doesn't make it gimmicky. The reason the DS has the touch screen is to take gaming to the next level. Sure, games where you just draw a line are pretty lame, but it's really cool that you can even do that in the first place. As long as the touch screen makes progress, I don't see any problem with making it a major part of any game released for it. Hell, if they don't utilize the touch screen at all, why would they put it on the DS in the first place?

Keep in mind, utilizing the touch screen doesn't make it gimmicky. The reason the DS has the touch screen is to take gaming to the next level. Sure, games where you just draw a line are pretty lame, but it's really cool that you can even do that in the first place. As long as the touch screen makes progress, I don't see any problem with making it a major part of any game released for it. Hell, if they don't utilize the touch screen at all, why would they put it on the DS in the first place?

Everything I've seen to use it up until now has been gimmicky. No matter how you look at it the touch screen is not a suitable sustitute for real analog input. Which is about the only thing it's been used for, that, or drawing lines...

I'd be much more accepting of the thing if developers stopped "taking advantage" of it by having it used for functions that would suit the actual buttons much more.

An example of what I'm talking about would be how Blizzard was gauging the interest in Starcraft, or Diablo games for the DS, personally, I feel that would be just about the perfect use for the thing. used in RTS, or point-and-click games.

I thikn Lunar Dragon Song is By Far the Best or Castlevania Dawn Of SOrrow.

but Lunar is Lunar to me and I can't ARgue.