Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Game almost meets expectations...., January 9, 2009
Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars
The games are fun and you can waste hours playing them! It took a while to get used to how small everything is on the screen and in some cases it seems like they could have made it bigger. Also, the instructions for the games are not very detailed so you sort of have to work out how to play as you go along. Pretty fun overall though.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Brainium: Nice game, strange interface, July 17, 2009
Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars
Nice game(s), strange interface
Amongst the games included in this N.DS title, Go was the one that caught my attention, but the others are a welcome addition to it.
Sudoku: Standard Sudoku (1-9) rules, but the interface isn't as good as those of the Brain Age games. You don't have the small number ability to track "possible" numbers for each square. For this, you have to use a little "scratch pad" if you want to use only the DS interface (or break out a pad and pencil). High score table is only a time for the difficulty level, not for each unique puzzle. [3/5]
Mahjongg: Standard left-right open tile matching rules. Common complaint I'm reading is that the interface makes the graphics too small to read the tiles. I have played on all of the difficulty levels and didn't have any problems reading most of the tiles. The problem I came across was that on some of the tile layouts, the tiles in extreme corner positions are covered by interface controls. For those, the "zoom" (Y button or magnifying glass in the lower right corner) was *required* to see what the tiles were and in some cases even to select. I find the time limit for the medium (5 min) and hard (3:00) a little too aggressive for the interface. [3/5]
Mind Bender: aka Mastermind. Standard color/sequence matching rules of Mastermind and other similar games. The stylus drag of the balls was a nice touch, but I occasionally found myself "dropping" the ball in a position other than I had in mind. The interface does not forgive this, no undo or moving the ball once placed. Green pegs show count correctly selected and placed balls; red pegs count correctly selected and mis-placed balls. [4/5]
Cross Sums: aka Kakuro. Standard row/column addition with no number duplication in same row/column rules. This isn't one that I've seen yet in the N.DS titles at which I've looked, so I count that as good. The interface here is similar in constraints to the Sudoku section, but not quite as critical until the hard difficulty. [4/5]
Go: Standard Go (Japanese, I believe) rules. Black moves first, but no komi. Unfortunately, there is no difficulty setting on this one (I would have liked to see this). The AI for this can not be stronger than 18kyu, so it's fairly easy to beat once you have some concept of shape, life/death, and attack. I do, however, really like the interface they chose for this: Full board on top screen and zoomed section on bottom. Multiple methods of stone placement (control pad and "A" or stylus). The challenge for this one for me is simply "How horribly can I beat the AI?", but kudos for having Go; haven't seen enough of it yet for N.DS. [4/5]
Multiplayer: *Multi-card* and 2 players max. Go, Mahjongg, and Mind Bender only. Considering the low overhead for these games, this should be single-card and all games. [2/5]
Missing option: Ability to reset "high scores".
Overall presentation of the games and instructions for them is done well, but there are some areas that should have been focused on a little more. [4/5]
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2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Disappointed, January 21, 2009
Fun:1.0 out of 5 stars
I love puzzle games, and was looking forward to many hours of cerebral challenges. I was sorely disappointed. The directions are hard to read and the graphics are way too small to be enjoyable. In addition, the controls could be more user-friendly. For example, if you enjoy the Sudoku puzzles in Brain Age and are looking for more of the same, you too will be disappointed in the graphics and controls. I love the portability and user-interface of the Nintendo DS. I currently have 18 games, and this is the only one I wish I had not purchased.
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