Guns N’ Souls Hands-On Impressions: More Chinese Democracy Than Use Your Illusion

Posted 18:09 EST on 21FEB2014 by: tim walker in hands-on » guns n souls, iOS, square enix

Guns N’ Souls: feat. Song Summoner is Square Enix’s latest attempt at the free-to-play model on iOS. Billed as a “Hyper Action RPG” (and as a sequel to the tactical RPG Song Summoner), it’s really more of an endless runner broken into chunks, with plenty of glitz, McGuffins, and numbers thrown in for good measure. It’s far from the worst thing on the platform (and not even the worst Square Enix game on iOS ), but it’s pretty hollow for such a high-profile release from such a high-profile publisher.

Guns N’ Souls aims to wow the player right off the bat with a beautifully-rendered opening sequence set to a song by Japanese pop group Larval Stage Planning. It’s nice to look at and listen to, but once you’ve played the game for some time, you’ll start to wish they’d spent more time working on gameplay and less on razzle-dazzle.

The game starts off with a few brief lines of exposition before putting the player through a tutorial level to learn all of the game’s controls (there are roughly six). Anyone who has played an endless runner on iOS should know the drill by now: Flick left and right to move protagonist Ziggy between the three invisible paths as he runs, up to jump, and down to slide. In addition to running on his own, Ziggy also targets and fires his weapon at enemies automatically; just position him correctly, and he’ll take them down. Though it’s not shown during the tutorial, you can also jump-cancel by flicking down right after jumping.

The main unique control element in Guns N’ Souls is tapping your cards: Certain cards in your deck can be used once per stage to create certain effects (powering up your gun temporarily, restoring HP, etc.). Oh, we didn’t mention the cards yet? Don’t worry: We’re about to reach the point where the game will teach you more about the cards then you’d likely care to know….

Once the tutorial is done, the game designers decided to do everything they possibly could to make you uninterested in playing further. You’ll start off being bombarded with text walls detailing the card system, evolving your cards, and organizing your deck. You’ll then catch a slight reprieve in the form of some cut scenes that fill you in on why exactly Ziggy is doing so much running about. After that, it’s back to your blonde shopkeeper/emcee for some in-depth discussions on crystals, rare card drawing, and the like.

Also, somewhere around this point, the game decides to kick you while you’re down by pausing to download more data. And we mean a lot more data: This download took about 75 minutes on an iPad Air. I started this forced download on my iPhone 5 around the time I started typing up this review, and it’s sitting at around 30%. It’s also notable that closing the app completely sometimes results in the game needing to re-download some data once you load it again, though not for nearly as long.

Gameplay is basically divided into two parts that feed into one another. First, there’s the card management side of things. You begin the game with a few cards in your inventory, and can use them to create custom decks. Each deck can have up to five cards, though each card “costs” a certain amount of points to place in your deck, so you may not be able to equip all of the cards you want right off the bat. Cards basically serve three purposes: 1) They dictate how powerful your gun is, and how many hit points Ziggy has, 2) They allow you to gain both offensive and defensive bonuses if you match their suit with the stage’s suit, and 3) As mentioned above, certain cards grant you special abilities for a limited time once per stage.

Keeping in line with the music-based theme of the game, the three suits of cards are Rock, Pop, and Punk. The action stages are divided up pretty evenly between these three suits, so it’s to your benefit to build at least one custom deck for each suit in order to take advantage of the stat bonuses for particular stages. You can mix and match cards of different suits freely, and sometimes it makes more sense to do so since a powerful Punk card would still be more effective even without the Rock stat boost offered. The names of the cards all allude to album and song titles. The art on the cards themselves is a bit on the risqué side of things, but perfectly in line with the industry to which Guns N’ Souls pays tribute.

The stats of an individual card can be boosted permanently by sacrificing other cards to bond with it. Sacrificing an identically-named card normally offers a larger boost, and has the added bonus of increasing the maximum possible level of the card being boosted.

With this in mind, you would think that the designers would implement a simple way for you to sort your cards to make boosting easier, but sadly, Square Enix appears to have dropped the ball on this one. While you can sort your cards in six different ways, there is no option to place identically-named cards next to one another. So, for example, boosting your Firestarter card by burning up her two twins in your deck basically requires you to hunt through all of the cards you’ve acquired until you’ve located the ones you need. Since you’re limited to 50 cards, it doesn’t take long to find them, but it’s a minor annoyance that could have been corrected with just a little bit of effort on the development side.

Along similar lines, you can filter by suit type, but the game ditches these filters whenever you return to card selection, even if you’re in the middle of boosting. Also, though you can filter by suit, you can’t sort by suit, though you can sort by the most recent card to oldest (hooray?).

Cards can also evolve into other, more powerful cards by combining them with bizarre animal mascot cards once the card you’d like to evolve has reached a certain level. The problem is that raising a card high enough to do so takes quite some time, and while you’re waiting for this to happen, those same (otherwise useless) mascot cards sit around in your inventory. Again, this isn’t a deal breaker, but being able to put them elsewhere (so that you don’t have to constantly scroll through them) would have been a smart move.

The other half of gameplay revolves around the endless-runner-style action sequences introduced during the tutorial. Stages are earned one at a time, and you can replay a stage once it’s been beaten (in fact, unless you want to spend real-world money to advance, you will be replaying them. Often.). Once you’ve selected a stage from the menu, the game will allow you to choose a support card, offered either by someone on your Friends’ List, or from a random guest. You’ll then be prompted to choose a deck from the decks you’ve already created.

Stages are about 2-3 minutes in length and do not offer much in the way of variety. While the graphics look nice, there’s little of substance here: Avoid the obstacles, avoid getting shot, shoot down the enemies that appear, and collect the crystals (LUNA) that line the ground. There are also 3 special crystals per stage (SPLUNA) that are pretty much required pick-ups to get a decent grade (and a decent XP bonus) for the stage. Occasionally, you’ll stop running and be whisked away to a boss stage, where the controls remain the same.

Finishing a stage successfully will net you a certain rank, which earns you a certain amount of experience points. Earn enough to level up, and you’ll improve Ziggy’s Stamina (the currency used to play the action stages) and Cost (which allows you to have better cards in your deck). Beating certain enemies in a stage and completing the stage successfully also earns you new cards for your deck, and there are also achievements (collect all LUNA crystals in a stage, don’t jump more than 3 times, etc.) that can be completed to earn more of this in-game currency or that in-game currency. At the end of the day, it all feeds into each other in such a convoluted way that it made me want to shove the game aside and go ram into trees to collect Rupees.

This piling on of rewards and systems illustrates another issue with Guns N’ Souls: Like many modern games, it’s way too busy for its own good. This includes not only the reward structure and card systems, but also the sheer amount of garbage text you’re confronted with constantly throughout the game. Every menu screen is busy, Busy, BUSY, with in-game hints plastered all over the menus, reminders of log-in bonuses, and scrolling text alerting you to ongoing events.

Since I can read Japanese, the menu system is not hard for me to navigate personally, but it would probably be difficult for anyone who doesn’t speak the language to memorize it due to the sheer number of sub-menus and shortcuts crammed in here. Again, it’s just too much.

There are a couple of nice things I can say about the game. First, aside from the opening dialogue section, the story sections of the game are not forced upon you. Instead, you are alerted whenever there is a new portion of the story available, and can read through the scenes (or listen to them: The game allows you to download voiceovers as you wish) at your leisure.

Second, although the game restricts your stage runs through its Stamina meter, it’s rarely drained: Every time you level up, it replenishes completely, and might even grow a bit. (to be fair though, I’ve only spent a few hours with the game, so this could become an issue later on)

Finally, while the game does allow you to purchase McGuffin crystals with real-world money to earn rare cards and purchase Stamina, it doesn’t beat you over the head to make a purchase. The crystals are there to buy if you choose, but the game isn’t going to ask you to cough up your iTunes ID every 5 seconds.

Despite these minor points, Guns N’ Souls is really not something I’d recommend spending time on, even though it’s totally free. It’s 2014, and we’ve suddenly regressed back to a Dragon’s Lair-level of gameplay from a company that was once the darling of the industry (not to mention the developer: Have I mentioned that this was made by the guys who made Devil Dice?). And unfortunately, all the sexy girl cards in the world won’t do a thing to change that.

Guns N’ Souls is a free-to-play app from Square Enix on iOS. It is exclusive to Japan at this time.

The Girl From Gunma Hands-On Impressions: Short, But MSXcellent

Posted 18:08 EST on 17FEB2014 by: tim walker in hands-on » girl from gunma, iOS, MSX, shmup, shooter

Anyone paying attention to the indie game scene over the past few years has probably come across more than a few stylistic homages to games of yore. While many of these act more as broad tributes to 8- and 16-bit titles from yesteryear, occasionally you’ll come across a game where the authors have gone out of their way to tip their hats to a more specific target. The Girl From Gunma, a recent free-to-play iOS release from the PHP Institute, is one such case of pinpoint homage: From start to finish, the game invites players to journey back to the era of the MSX.

Originally released in 1983, MSX-based PCs never caught on in the United States, but sold well in other parts of the world, including Japan. Somewhat close in technical specifications to the ColecoVision, the original MSX hardware was powered by a Zilog Z80 processor, had 16KB of video RAM, and was capable of displaying 16 colors onscreen at once.

Beyond the tech. specs., the system was also notable at the time (along with the Famicom) for having quite a few great games. Konami in particular was a big supporter of this platform, which is where a couple of their notable franchises (Metal Gear, Parodius) made their debuts.

While nostalgia for this platform is not prevelant in the United States (few of us here grew up playing games on the platform, after all), it’s definitely strong in Japan. The creators of The Girl From Gunma have fully embraced this by creating a game that looks, sounds and plays like a lost relic from the mid-80′s.

Players control the heroine of the game, Koyotoru, as she battles to retrieve the lost spirit of Gunma Prefecture and restore peace to her homeland (or something like that: The throwback plot is explained in the “recovered” and scanned manual for the game, shown in the photos above). Controls are pretty standard fare: Hold your finger anywhere on the screen to make Koyotoru fire at the enemies, and move it around to move her around the screen.

You have five lives available to make it through three levels (it’s pretty short), and you also have an energy shield that can take a hit or two before you’re vulnerable to enemy fire. There are six hidden power-ups to find total (which just happen to be types of food that Gunma Prefecture is famous for); any of these will boost your firepower once, but more importantly, you’ll need to collect them all to get the best ending of the game.

The little touches are what makes The Girl From Gunma truly shine. From the boot-up screen with the DSX logo (which proudly proclaims, “This game was made using the latest in Gunma scientific technology!”) to the faux manual and cartridge artwork, from the stilted scrolling of the backgrounds to the black pixelated borders around the bosses, the creators have done an excellent job of recreating the aesthetics of the MSX platform.

The Girl From Gunma is over pretty quickly (it probably won’t take you more than 10 minutes to blaze through it if you’re good at shooters), but it’s still a nice trip down memory lane for those with a love for the MSX.

The Girl From Gunma is a free-to-play app available now on iOS. It is available for download in the U.S. App Store, though the game is untranslated at this time. (do a search for “PHP Institute” to find it; as of this writing, it is the second app that appears in the results)

100 Turn Hero Hands-On Impressions: Turning a Genre On Its Ear

Posted 10:16 EST on 23JAN2014 by: tim walker in hands-on » 100 turn hero, half minute hero, iOS, kotaro yoshida, ritterz, RPG

100 Turn Hero is one of the best games I’ve ever played on iOS. Yes, that’s a pretty bold statement to make. But on a platform where a dollar spent is often a dollar wasted, Kotaro Yoshida’s wonderful deconstruction of the RPG genre is not only an amazing value, it’s an incredibly fun and addictive game as well.

100 Turn Hero (or 100Turn Yusha if you prefer) has visuals that evoke memories of classic 8-bit RPGs like Final Fantasy or Dragon Quest, but it plays considerably differently from traditional RPGs. The player controls Fandele, a heroine who begins the game facing down the legions of Hell (don’t worry, they’re much cuter than they sound!) a year after the Demon Lord led them to ravage the land. Their numbers are too much for her to take down alone, but fortunately, a nice little bit of Deus ex Machina arrives to save the day in the form of Shadow, a ninja with the mysterious ability to stop the fiends dead in their tracks!

There’s a catch though: Shadow’s secret technique will only keep them frozen for 100 “turns” of combat. If Fandele can’t clear a stage within a hundred swings of her weapon, the monsters will reawaken, and the game will end.

Yoshida used a slightly different premise for his most famous project, Half-Minute Hero , where the player had a mere 30 seconds (with a few twists to extend the clock) to save the world. 100 Turn Hero boils down the RPG genre to its core elements in a similar, yet unique manner.

The player begins each stage at Level 1 in terms of their stats, though weapons and their stats are carried over from previous levels (more on this in a bit). The object of each stage is to destroy the boss monster in as few turns as possible, though the path to getting there is delightfully intricate. A “turn” in this case refers only to a round of combat, so players are free to move about the map, manage equipment, and enter buildings without needing to worry about exhausting their limited number of moves (prominently displayed at the top of the screen).

This might sound pretty straightforward, but the twists and nods to traditional RPG elements are what gives the game its depth. For starters, since your character starts out at Level 1, it’s often not very effective to just make a beeline straight for the boss (you can–in many cases–but you may find your turns used up in rapid succession as you fail to carve through his hide with your puny stats). Instead, you’re often better off spending some turns to take out the weaker enemies on the sidelines first, increasing Fandele’s levels to make the final battle cost fewer turns (and ultimately clearing the stage in fewer turns as well). Groups of enemies also often blockade shops selling items that can boost your stats through the roof, though they’re far from required to clear the stage. It’s up to the player to decide how to proceed in the fewest number of moves possible.

The unique properties of weapons also come into play, and often make the game feel rooted as firmly in the Puzzle genre as it is in the RPG one. New weapons are acquired by beating stages, and up to three can be carried with you into battle at once. Basic weapon stats include Attack Power, Charge Rate (how quickly your weapon charges up to deal critical damage), and Guard Chipping (which allows you to deal more damage with each successive blow to a single enemy). Certain weapons also offer damage bonuses when fighting certain enemy types.

An even more important characteristic of a weapon is its hit radius: While some only strike enemies in front, others will also do slightly less damage to an adjacent enemy, allowing you to chip away at a secondary foe while walloping the guy in front of you. These ranges also have their own fun little quirks: Axes, for example, are swung from left to right, so they can only be used to damage enemies positioned to the right of your main target. Hot-swapping weapons between turns can be done with a single tap, and is actually critical to making it through the stages efficiently.

Finish a stage within the 100-turn limit, and any remaining turns are converted into experience points, boosting your Hero Level and allowing you to increase the damage that your weapons deal. You can replay completed stages at any time, and any turns you save on your next time out will get converted into XP (for example, clearing a stage the first time in 60 turns would net you 40 XP; clear it again in just 50, and you’ll earn another 10 XP). In short: Beating stages helps you increase your weapon stats, which helps you beat stages quicker, which helps you increase your weapon stats further, and so on. You’ll hit a wall on this eventually (your sword can only kill a finite number of enemies per turn, after all), but it’s definitely a lot of fun to go back and breeze through a stage in 20 turns that once took you 70 to clear.

The control system in 100 Turn Hero works perfectly. Touching the screen causes an arrow to pop up that indicates your character’s current orientation, and sliding your finger back and forth moves them effortlessly around the screen. There are large icon buttons at the bottom that allow you to pause, attack, or cycle through your weapons. When your character is not moving, red squares around them indicate your attack range with your current weapon.

While the graphics might be going for the retro look, the music is fully orchestrated, and complements the game quite well. Character voice samples add to the experience and are frequently hilarious. (the text of the game itself is delightfully casual, something we’re hoping to capture in our upcoming text guides for the game)

While the game is not as text-heavy as a typical RPG, there is a storyline here (albeit in more compact form), so comprehension of the Japanese language is a must if you want to fully enjoy the game. That said, the core game itself does not require a significant knowledge of the language, so it’s worth giving it a try even if you can’t read every element of what’s going on. (and of course we’ll be happy to walk you through the setup and first couple of stages; check back in the next few days for the first part of our text translation!)

About the only negative thing I can find to say about the game is that it’s not available in the U.S. yet (I’ll give it time: It’s been out less than a week in Japan). At 100 Yen (roughly $1 U.S.), it’s a complete steal for the amount of content offered (there are a total of 30 stages to conquer). The game does offer in-app purchases of the in-game currency (used for upgrading your weapons), but the ability to replay levels and earn money that way makes this is a luxury, not a necessity.

100 Turn Hero is a perfect example of how to do a game right on iOS for those of us who want to see the legacy of 8 and 16-bit-style games continue on mobile platforms. Mr. Yoshida continues to have a fine eye for evoking feelings of nostalgia while delivering an experience that is anything but orthodox.

(100 Turn Hero is published by ritterz Inc., and is available on iOS in Japan only at this time. It retails for 100 Yen, and includes in-app purchases.)

Hands-On Impressions: CROSSxBEATS: Waiting Is The Hardest Part

Posted 17:04 EST on 17JAN2014 by: tim walker in hands-on » capcom, CROSSxBEATS, naoki maeda

“Man, have I got a deal for you! How would you like a brand-new Xbox One or PlayStation 4 for absolutely free? That’s right, zero, zip, nada! We’ll even sweeten the deal: Here, take your console of choice’s entire launch lineup as well! That’s a lot of games, huh? How’s that sound? Oh, good? Fantastic! Give me just a minute and I’ll get your console all wired up for you. Oh, the combination lock? Riiight; I forgot to mention that. Allow me to explain…”

“The lock is just there to make sure you don’t have too much fun! It’ll be unlocked for around 10 minutes a day, during which time you can play to your heart’s content! Oh, you want to play longer? Well, there are a couple of options available to you. First, the good news is that you can play for more 10-minute increments per day. You just need to wait around 3 hours, and you’ll get another 10 minutes of bliss! Oh, that’s not enough time, you say? Well, I could sell you a temporary password that would allow you to play for around 3 minutes. See that lockbox over there? Yes, just put a quarter in there, and it’s all yours….”

If you grew up during the era of arcades, the above scenario (minus the free play) is probably nothing new to you: Put a quarter or two into the slot, and enjoy a few minutes of gameplay. This business model was not necessarily unfair to the consumer: Arcade machines often cost thousands of dollars when brand-new, and even renting cost arcade owners a fair amount of green. The logistics of buying an arcade machine for private use in the 80′s were absurd, so a quarter did not seem too high a price to pony up. Also, with many games, a skilled player could last for hours on a single quarter, a fair reward for players who probably spent more than most to reach that level of expertise. And finally, while quality could vary considerably, there were always home conversions for those who would rather shell out $40-50 to play as much as they pleased without ever having to spend a cent ever again (aside from on their electric bills).

Which brings us to Capcom’s CROSSxBEATS, a fun game for iOS (Japan only at this time) that uses this pay-as-you-go model to its detriment. It’s hard to knock a game that looks, sounds and plays great, but it gets easier when a lot of that greatness is buried behind pay walls.

Developed by Naoki Maeda, a former Konami composer known for his work on Beatmania and Dance Dance Revolution, CROSSxBEATS is a rhythm action game well-crafted for touchscreen-based devices. Gameplay works along the lines of Maeda’s earlier work: Choose a music track (some of which were composed in-house, some of which come from Japanese bands like Glay), and hit the notes as they appear in time to the rhythm of the track.

Even though the selection of tracks available contributes significantly to enjoyment of a rhythm game or lack thereof (see the U.S. track lists for Donkey Konga), visual presentation is equally important: In a genre that places emphasis on playing songs correctly, you need to be able to “read” the notes that appear quickly and efficiently. CROSSxBEATS excels at this: The overall visually aesthetic of the game is reminiscent of early Harmonix release Frequency, with lots of blacks and faint neon colors, giving the game a futuristic look and feel. The notes themselves appear as pairs of crisp arrows of light that travel down paths of convergence; hit the convergence point at just the right instant (just a little bit before they actually touch), and you’ll receive a “Flawless!” rating. There’s some pretty neat visual flair that accompanies hitting notes accurately that provides just the right level of eye candy without distracting you to the point of missing notes.

A few other variations on the basic note theme exist as well: Some notes require you to tap two locations at once (indicated by neon circles around the convergence points), some require you to hold down on the screen for a bit (indicated by four arrows converging in a visually-distinctive pattern), and some require you to flick your finger in a certain direction rather than tapping (indicated by a pointer at the convergence point). All four types are visually distinctive enough to make it easy to train your brain what to do and when. The trail system is easy to read and follow, and a combination of visual flash (the paths of the notes popping out at you) and careful note placement help to avoid the “fat finger syndrome” that plagues many touchscreen-based games (the game definitely works best on an iPad though).

Taste in music is subjective, so I’ll leave it up to you to determine whether or not you like the tracks presented here (I enjoyed them myself). The important thing to note though is that there are a lot of tracks available: Though you start out with only 6 tracks, there are several ways to unlock more. After only a few hours of gameplay, I already have over a dozen tracks available to me, and plenty more are there for unlocking (the game only lets you see objectives for obtaining certain tracks once earlier objectives have been met, so it’s unclear at this point in time exactly how many tracks can be obtained in total). Track data is downloaded from the server each time you play (presumably to save on memory), but the amount of downtime is not unreasonable.

Language is not really a barrier to the game itself, but understanding of Japanese is definitely a must for understanding how all of the reward systems work. The tutorial at the beginning is pretty text-heavy, though the game provides enough visual cues that you can probably muddle through it even if you can’t read what’s on the screen. (Fortunately, we’ll be providing our readers with a couple of translated walkthroughs shortly so that you won’t have to muddle through!)

Despite all it has going for it in terms of audio, graphics, presentation, and gameplay, CROSSxBEATS definitely stumbles in terms of its pay-to-play model. The game is free to download and play, but–as alluded to at the start of this review–your play time is limited. The credits system in place is based on tickets, and is rather convoluted, but the basics are as follows: You start off with 10 tickets, and tracks cost 3-5 tickets per play. Once your tickets are all gone, you can either wait for them to recharge (20 minutes per ticket, with a maximum stock of 10 tickets), or you can spend Premium Tickets. PTs can be earned here and there by clearing certain requirements for certain tracks, though of course you’ve got to spend tickets to begin with in order to earn these. If you happen to run out of both types of tickets, you can purchase more at the store in packs, which works out to roughly 6 cents per ticket in U.S. dollars. In other words: Be patient, or pay an average of 24 cents per track to play (getting the quarter analogy yet?).

CROSSxBEATS is a good game with a giant albatross around its neck draining away some of the fun. It would have benefited tremendously from a different pricing scheme (either selling users track packs, or perhaps allowing them to buy the whole game outright for a certain amount). Here’s hoping that this underlying system is rethought and retooled should Capcom decide to release it outside of Japan.

(Note: We’ll be uploading the first part of our translated walkthrough shortly to help you get through the tutorial and start playing. Check back here soon for a link!)

Pop’n Rhythmin Hands-On Impressions: Pop’n Music Makes Beautiful Music on iOS

Posted 11:09 EST on 03JAN2014 by: tim walker in hands-on » iOS, konami, pop'n music, pop'n rhythmin

Pop’n Music is one of those series of games that, for whatever reason, was just never given a fair shake outside of Japan. Originally released in arcades in 1998 (around the same timeframe as Dance Dance Revolution and Beatmania), it’s a cartoony rhythm game with a method of interface (see below) that feels more like Simon than Guitar Hero. It has received an astonishing 20 sequels in the arcade, as well as a handful of spin-offs. The first four arcade releases showed up on both the Dreamcast and original PlayStation; 5-6 were PlayStation exclusive, and 7-14 were released on the PS2. The catch here, of course, is that all of these releases were exclusive to Japan.

Konami tried to bring Pop’n to the U.S. once, and then again the following year, and the results were pretty lousy both times. It’s not hard to see why: Those familiar with Pop’n Music know that it’s not meant to be played with an Xbox 360 pad, and it’s certainly not designed to be played with a Wii Remote (the Wii version actually had the gall to put you in control of an on-screen character hitting a virtual arcade Pop’n controller in time to your waggle motions).

No, Pop’n Music is meant to be played with this:

Or at least with this:

Like many rhythm games out there, Pop’n Music is a game that relies heavily on the “instrument” designed for it. Kill that interface, and you’ll risk alienating your fanbase.

Naturally, Pop’n Rhythmin, the first incarnation of Pop’n Music for iOS (available only on the Japanese App Store, but far from unplayable in the U.S.), lacks a table-sized, nine-button controller for slamming along to the music. Fortunately though, the game has been redesigned to take advantage of the touchpad interface, resulting in a respectable attempt at reimagining the core concept of the game.

The Pop’n series has always played similarly to former plastic instrument mainstays Guitar Hero and Rock Band: Hit the colored buttons that correspond to the on-screen “notes” (in this case, normally anthropomorphic colored blobs called Pop-kuns; I’ll call them “notes” here to keep things simple) in time to the music playing in the background. The original arcade incarnation and its sequels had these notes falling downward towards the bottom of the screen.

The new version forgoes this placement and gets a bit wackier: The colored notes now start off from two points onscreen and travel towards one another, merging together right when the beat hits (and when you, in turn, should be hitting them with your finger). With the old controller interface a thing of the past, color is now a moot point, and the different shades are merely there for variety (grey blobs though, Konami? Really? Surely there’s another tint you could have tossed in there instead!).

Though color is no longer a factor, Konami has added a few new note types to keep you on your toes: Long Notes require you to tap a note and hold it for an exact duration (indicated by lines on either side of the note that disappear gradually), Number Notes require you to tap them multiple times in a row, and Star Notes are used when you’re required to hit multiple notes at the same time. The higher difficulty rankings not only combine these notes (Long Star Notes, for example), but also dump a lot of regular notes onto the field while you’re holding a Long Note down.

As you may have surmised, the game is best played with two hands, with your iOS device placed on a flat surface (like many iOS games, the game will only show up on the iPhone list in the App Store, but functions perfectly on the iPad as well). The songs I tried on Normal difficulty can be done pretty easily with one hand, but Hyper and EX are best done with two.

And unfortunately, as is the case with many mobile conversions, herein lies the problem: Your fat fingers will likely obscure part of the playing field, causing you to miss notes. Much like the arcade Pop’n, missing a note or two does not necessarily mean failure, but missing one will likely cause you to drop four or five in a row until you can pick up the rhythm again. As someone who has played Pop’n Music and its sequels for years at all levels of difficulty (I own both of the controllers pictured above and most of the home conversions), I found the Normal levels in Pop’n Rhythmin to be enjoyable and completely playable, the Hyper levels to be doable with practice, and the EX levels to be kind of messy due to too many misses for the reason detailed above.

That said, I’ve amended this review a bit from my original assessment thanks to an epiphany I had this weekend: It took me a week to learn to play Pop’n Music correctly on the Dreamcast. The reason for this was that my brain had trouble “reading” the notes and getting my fingers to remember where the corresponding buttons were. Once I learned the game, I had no trouble taking down the Disco King. Pop’n Rhythmin has its own unique controls and visual coding to learn, and after spending a few more hours of the game, I found it quite a bit more enjoyable.

Adhering firmly to current mobile business practices, Pop’n Rhythmin is free to download and play, but you only get three tracks right off the bat. An online store sells various track packs (four tunes per pack) at 500 Yen (around $5 U.S.) each. At $1.25 per song, that’s actually not far off from past console releases, which retailed for around $60-70 and included anywhere from 30 tracks to upwards of 90. There are 18 different packs available, and the store allows you to listen to samples from each. While there’s a good selection of music available, I was a bit disappointed to find very little in terms of earlier Pop’n content, and no Konami legacy tunes to speak of (the Contra remix in Konami’s U.S. release of Jukebeat is a fantastic track, and it’s totally free).

In addition to the main gameplay mode, there’s also Treasure Mode, which allows you to use points earned in the main game to play a board game in order to unlock more music tracks and characters. Each present you land on represents only a shard of a track or character though, so be prepared to play for a while. The game also includes modes for locating arcades in Japan with Pop’n Music machines, and a way to link the mobile game up to arcade machines.

Though I would still have preferred an option to go with a more orthodox approach for the notes and controls (virtual buttons at the bottom of the screen matching the arcade layout, for example), Pop’n Rhythmin is a fun diversion if you’re willing to put in a little bit of time and learn its visual coding. Long-time fans will probably still prefer to stick with their conventional controllers, but as a free game, it’s a good introduction to the world of Pop’n Music for those who have always been curious about the series.

(Note: The language requirements for Pop’n Rhythmin are fairly minimal, but we’ll be happy to guide you through the process if you don’t happen to read Japanese. Go here for Part I of our in-game text walkthrough!)

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