Square Enix sent out some new screens of Dragon Quest IX, along with some information about the early storyline. Apparently, you start the game dead (or just inhuman), in some kind of land of angels, working to acquire some kind of "goddess fruit". Your (custom) character must get Star Auras from completed quests in order to make the World Tree grow this fruit.
At least in the early portion, Dragon Quest IX will have somewhat of an open-ended structure, as you agree to take on quests from townspeople in order to help them out and earn your Star Auras. We are quite certain that the game will have a fairly linear storyline (it is Dragon Quest), but it's interesting to see Square Enix experimenting just a bit with nonlinearity.
NeoGAFfer duckroll spotted a mysterious, and potentially interesting, new DS game listing on Amazon.co.jp: Umihara Kawase Shun Second Edition: Complete Version, due out March 26. In case the name doesn't ring any bells, Umihara Kawase was a Super Famicom platformer similar to Bionic Commando, but with a young girl in the place of the beefy military dude, and a heavier emphasis on self-contained, small levels, technical grappling, and ... fish. We adore the game.
Unfortunately, if this is true, we're unlikely to adore the result. Umihara Kawase was recently released in Japan on the PSP (a US release is planned as well), and it's a mess. Basically, the rope doesn't work right at all, failing to hook when it's supposed to, swing the way it's supposed to, or let go when it's supposed to. And if the PSP port (of the PlayStation version of the Super Famicom game) was so lazily and poorly made, what chance does the DS version have? Not to mention that the DS release is in extra danger of touch screen controls.
Sega crept down Japan's chimney and left a special something in the nation's stocking (apart from Phantasy Star Zero): a March 5 release date for its Etrian-Odyssey-a-like RPG, 7th Dragon. They also distributed new screens (here) and a short battle video (past the jump).
But wait, there's more! Those who pre-order the title (in Japan, natch) can get their hands on the above "Dragon Chronicle" booklet, which comes with a soundtrack CD. It's not the most attractive bonus we've laid eyes on, but it does perform a neat function, aside from containing developer interviews and character sketches. Those who examine this closely enough will be able to find hidden codes within, which in turn unlock concealed items in the game -- a bit like Ni-no-kuni: The Another World's custom spellbook, if not quite as integral to gameplay.
We're slowly being converted into full-on Dragon Questism by the Dragon Quest IX hype, and this trailer from this weekend's Jump Festa event is certainly effective in that respect. It just looks like pure fun in a genre that is often dour and pretentious! We are officially in love with Koichi Sugiyama's Dragon Quest theme now. Square Enix and Level-5 may have been planning changes to the gameplay at one point, but any traces of action-RPG are gone now, and this is absolutely canonical Dragon Quest.
After the break, a trailer for another Square Enix RPG that may not inspire as much adoration in so many: Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Echoes of Time. Your enjoyment of this trailer may hinge upon whether you think Echoes of Time's cross-platform release is innovative or merely cheap.
It was just this month that Enterbrain reported that the DSi had sold over 500,000 units. Now, according to the publisher, Nintendo has almost doubled that feat before the month has even ended. Their weirdly specific estimate puts the DSi at 1,062,416 units sold since the device's launch at the beginning of November.
The DSi is proving to be a worthy addition to the DS lineup for Nintendo, then. Those million sales contributed to a total of 24,859,874 DS systems sold in Japan since the launch of the original DS back in 2004.
When Nintendo launches the Japanese DSiWare store on December 24, Ugoku Memo Chou (Moving Memo Pad) will be available for the price of free. We've already posted a trailer of the software in action, but now we have more examples of what can be done with the program, courtesy of Nintendo and web company Hatena.
The two have combined to create Ugoku Memo Hatena, a site where budding DSi animators can upload their creations to be watched by others the world over. Users will also be able to view uploaded content within Moving Memo Pad itself, and edit and repost videos. Nintendo says it is discussing the possibility of bringing a version of the site to other regions.
We've posted half a dozen of the (Nintendo-made) videos that are currently on the site past the break (they autoplay, so we advise not viewing these anywhere you'll be disturbing the peace). They're only a few seconds long each, but we find some of these to be quite charming and quirky, even if they're not hugely sophisticated.
Nintendo has released a new video advertising the downloadable offerings on the Japanese DSi Shop, which will become available starting December 24. This new trailer gives us a better look at a few of the games we knew about, and introduces a few we didn't.
Thrillingly, we now have names for two of the Art Style games: Aquario and the very cool-looking Decode. There's a brief look at the Brain Age DSiWare games; Utsusu! Made in Wario, the 500-point WarioWare game that uses the DSi camera; and the separate WarioWare minigames like Paper Plane and Bird and Bean.
Awesome new stuff includes Chotto Dr. Mario (A Little Dr. Mario), a 500 Point downloadable Dr. Mario game; single magic tricks from Magic Taisen/Master of Illusion; and Chotto Asobi Taisen Odegaru Trumps, which contains a small variety of card games from Clubhouse Games. Combined with the known offerings, this is the whole launch lineup, and it's all Nintendo!
After the break, you can see a longer trailer for the downloadable Brain Ages, and a really, really cool look at Ugoku Memo-chou, the flipbook/notepad software.
The official Blood of Bahamut site has updated with another character profile, this time covering one of the game's giants, a horned, fire-breathing colossus known as an Ifrit. Ifrits will join Gigants in (a) being very big and (b) looking totally badass.
As with other creatures in Blood of Bahamut, you'll have to break down an Ifrit's armor, and then locate and attack the weak point. You may even find a friend or two on the backs of these monsters (remember you also reside on the back of a Gigant): friends such as Kamo, who wields a meaty axe. Random, non-essential trivia: Ifrits have appeared in other games before, including the first Devil May Cry, and even Sonic and The Secret Rings! Most famously of all, they make appearances in the Final Fantasy series.
But enough of our factoids: hit up the gallery for nine new shots! They be stunning.
As Phantasy Star Zero's Christmas Day release (in Japan) draws closer, we're being taunted with more and more media. The newest video showcases the excellent Pictochat-style chat system, which comes across as a more flexible, expanded version of the Symbol Chat system from previous games.
As well as simply writing/drawing what you wish to say "live," you'll be able to save a bunch of preset sketches (because drawing stuff like this as a Rappy pecks your face off isn't practical), and simply tap a menu to bring them up. We don't know how many preset speech bubbles you can store in this way, but the player in this video has around twenty in his inventory, so ... at least that many. Also, if somebody sends you a drawing you really like, you can save it and pass it off as your own use it yourself!
According to the latest issue of Shonen Jump magazine in Japan, the DS is set to receive a second Blue Dragongame, which can best be translated as Blue Dragon: Beasts of the Underworld. Unlike Blue Dragon Plus, this new collaboration between Namco and Mistwalker will be a real-time RPG with full 3D graphics, as opposed to the strategic affair Plus is. Instead of focusing on the main characters from the Blue Dragon franchise, you'll instead control a nameless protagonist.
Blue Dragon: Beasts of the Underworld is currently slated for release sometime next year.
Source - Siliconera translation Source - Scan from Shonen Jump
While Nintendo of America has settled on Personal Trainer: (Activity)for DS training games, and Japan takes a more freeform approach (the only constant is really, really long names), Nintendo of Europe's approach for training game titles (with the odd exception of Maths Training) is now (Title): (Question about title activity?) -- as in Cooking Guide: Can't decide what to eat? and Dr Kawashima's Brain Training: How old is your brain?
The latest training game to use this naming convention is Walk with me! Do you know your walking routine?, which we know as Personal Trainer: Walking, the walking trainer that brings Miis to the DS for the first time, and also includes two wireless pedometer accessories. That accessory is known as the Activity Meter for the PAL release. Data collected by the device can be sent to Nintendo via Wi-Fi for use on leaderboards and a total worldwide step count of all users. The press release says that the data is transferred to your DS via infrared signal, but we're a bit skeptical since the DS doesn't have an IR port.
Nintendo of Europe will launch Walk with me! on February 20. You can see English screens in an obtrusive Flash interface at Nintendo's Walk with me page.
Square Enix held a Dragon Quest-related press conference today, the news of which was completely dominated by some offhand remarks by Yuji Horii about something or other. But the other big news, for which there was an official, planned announcement, was the release date for Dragon Quest IX: Protectors of the Starry Sky. Japanese gamers can expect to stand in line on March 28, and hand over a staggering 5,980 yen ($65) to get their copies.
Dragon Quest IX demos were set up at the unit, using DSi systems outfitted with totally sweet Slime-themed Hori Protect Cases. The Slime speaker stands, after the break, are equally wonderful! When can we get some announcements about those?
Time Warp Productions' The Great Giana Sisters is highly regarded as one of the Commodore 64's best platform games. It was also an unsubtle Super Mario Bros. clone, a fact which resulted in the removal of the game from the market. Even handicapped by total retail unavailability, the game propagated enough to become a classic, as did its much more original soundtrack.
Developer Spellbound Entertainment is bringing the sisters back, with a new game on the DS. The graphical style has changed quite a bit, with smooth backgrounds reminiscent of Cave Story, but the Mario influence is still as clear as ever. Publisher dtp Entertainment is planning a June 2009 release (presumably in Europe, where people know what The Great Giana Sisters is).
It's not new, but if you're so inclined, you can play the original Great Giana Sisters on the DS right now in the form of a homebrew remake.
If, for some reason, you haven't been following Phantasy Star Zero, Sonic Team's DS followup to the Phantasy Star Online series, you can catch up with this video. The rest of us can just enjoy another look at the game before its Christmas release (in Japan).
The enthusiastically-narrated clip introduces the three gameplay modes -- solo, wireless multiplayer, and online multiplayer, with a nice helping of gameplay footage of each. We can also get a glimpse at the possibilities for character customization! Jaunty hats, antennae, and huge green afros abound.
We think that there may even be a different story in the single-player mode for Humans, Newmans, and Casts. Combine that with the animated cutscenes, and Phantasy Star Zero may actually have a story mode worth playing!
Nintendo plans to confront the ailing economy head-on ... by making 100 Classic Book Collection really cheap! As with many of its Touch! Generations titles, Nintendo has confirmed a budget price point of £19.99 for the game, and a UK release date of December 26.
If, like us, you've been keeping one eye on the game's Amazon listing (which has had that date for a while, but it's nice to get official confirmation, right?), you'll know you can get it even cheaper: just £14.99 (just over $22). That's under fifteen pence a book! Fifteen pence for portable copies of Sense and Sensibility, Treasure Island, Moby Dick, and a wealth of Shakespeare and Dickens (there's a full list after the break) sounds like a bargain to us.* The pound is currently weak, so anybody thinking of importing?
Square Enix sent out some new screens of Dragon Quest IX, along with some information about the early storyline. Apparently, you start the game dead (or just inhuman), in some kind of land of angels, working to acquire some kind of "goddess fruit". Your (custom) character must get Star Auras from completed quests in order to make the World Tree grow this fruit. 
When Nintendo launches the Japanese 
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