DS Roundup

Bomberman Land Touch! 2

• Publisher: Rising Star Game
• Developer: Hudson Soft

Typical. Here I am putting in all the work required for reviewing this sequel and I find out most of it's been done for me. As seems to be the case with games like this, this sequel's practically identical to the first. The premise: wander a theme park, play mini-games, indulge in cute, nonsensical story. Same poo, different day. There are times when I don't know why I bother. Now excuse me while I point you towards the original review, say the graphics are a little sharper, and scarper with my cheque.

Oh, alright. Unlike some of the stinkers in this roundup, I enjoyed this one. Sort of. That's no doubt due to this being an unpretentiously jubilant adventure through a mini-game strewn story that never really stops for breath. With an assured sense of progression it drops a trail of breadcrumbs from one location to the other and asks you to follow them to the end accomplishing tasks on the way. There's always something to unlock, a token to collect, a mini-game to play, or an item to use, and you run around from one place to the other tackling it all in a play area that's small enough to find your way around but large enough to discover something new every hour or so.

As for the mini-games, they're your usual bunch of stylus scratchers, tappers and match the x and y affairs you've come to know and love; intuitive, Bomberman-themed, and nothing new - they've even cheekily taken a few from the first game. To successfully go down the saturated mini-game route requires variety and there's a good selection of games to cycle through that don't overstay their welcome. Aside from an air hockey-style game which crops up several times as a boss challenge, each mini-game only ever needs to be completed once or twice for a token, unless you're after a high score or want to replay them individually with other players.

It's none too offensive, then. There's a good day or so's simple, colourful fun in there for those who can stomach Bomberman's sugar-coated world. To fully justify your purchase, though, Hudson knows that you know that there's only one way you'll ever buy a single-player Bomberman game and, yes, Battle Mode is present and correct. Traditional, brilliant multiplayer Bomberman is available over both Wi-Fi and wireless as per usual. As a matter of fact, it's exactly the same game that came bundled with the bland RPG Bomberman Story, reviewed a few months ago. As we said then, it's your choice what bland single-player game you want to accompany the multiplayer goodness. We're not exactly eating our words now, but in this game's case, we're prepared to upgrade the single-player portion from 'bland' to 'alright'.

7/10