Finally its time to open the new look PC Gaming Site, a news site that takes over from 3 of our other sites and merges them into one site covering all PC Gaming and PC Homebrew News.

Id like to say thanks to Canvasch for the great logos and to Soully for his excellent design.

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Ever wondered what it was like to be stranded on a desert island? We did, and then we played Survival Kids on Game Boy Color back in 1999. Strangely enough, we liked it. We wanted more, but we never got it. Then the DS came along, and Konami decided that the world was due for another busted cruise ship, and back we were in Lost in Blue; the unofficial sequel to Survival Kids. The game played nearly identical to the older version, with more activities, a second character to watch over, and a crisp new 3D look. Again we had a blast, traversing the island in a truly epic life-saving adventure. Apparently Lost in Blue made a bit of a splash (shipwreck pun definitely intended) in the DS community, and Konami was taking notes, as we're now treated to Lost in Blue 2.

Before getting too far into the game, let's get this out in the open straight-away: Lost in Blue 2 is definitely, undeniably, shamelessly "more of the same" when compared to the original. You run around on what looks like the same island, you eat the same coconuts, you scrape your fingers through the same dirt, and you'll combine stick with rock to make the same sharpened stick just like Lost in Blue. That being said, the game follows a different story arch, follows two new characters (each playable depending on who you select from the beginning), offers multiple endings, more activities, more action, and more freedom. It's more of the same, but the "same" is still really fun.


For anyone who didn't pick up the original, the concept of the Survival Kids/Lost in Blue series is pretty simple. You'll select your player, wake up on an island alone, and have to survive on your own until you make it off the island or are rescued. To survive you'll need to gather supplies, build fires, cook food, hunt animals, combine materials to make tools, and work with your AI counter-part to explore and ultimately conquer the island. Imagine it as the TV show Lost, but you don't have hotties running around in bikinis, and Hurley isn't eating all your freaking peanut butter all the time. When you look at it that way, it sounds more like a vacation.

Just like the original games, you'll constantly have to be upping three major stats, consisting of hunger, thirst, and strength. Spend too long in the sun and you'll get thirsty. Eat the wrong berries (which we'll playfully dub as "Pulling a Ralph Wiggum") and you'll get sick and lose strength. When it comes to hunting and building, you'll have to find items and combine them similar to a Resident Evil game, although the process feels far more free-form than the simple "gun + bullet = zombie death" ends up being. In addition, you'll need to build weapons to hunt with, including sharp sticks, bow & arrow, and if you're especially talented some sort of death-laser (no). Once you spend a few grueling days learning the ropes, you'll be expected to use creativity, speed, and common sense to solve puzzles and thrive on the island.

From what we played at Konami's Gamers' Day event, Lost in Blue 2 might as well have been the same exact game. The only major differences in the current build is the added character portraits from the top screen (instead of silhouettes you get actual pictures of the characters), some improved activities such as fishing, and a couple mini-games. The three mini-games available thus far include fire-starting, goat-milking, and fishing. Each of these games could be played with multiple time limits for an overall score, and will ultimately be featured as a couple of the multiplayer mini-games for the final version. As always, goat-milking was an uncomfortable blast.

For the final version, Konami has thrown out some rough estimates based on the game's current production. The company promises far more action, about double the activities, new challenges including underwater exploration, and a lot more animal-based adventures. There are more beasts to hunt, tougher enemies (such as sharks and alligators), and some interesting microphone puzzles, such as an event where you need to become friends with a testy gorilla by mimicking his grunts with the DS microphone. In any other game we'd be astonished, but when it comes to Lost in Blue we'll just take it in stride. Hey… at least we don't have to milk it.

It's still far too early in production to say whether or not Lost in Blue 2 is going to incorporate enough new content to warrant a second purchase on DS, but from the looks of it the game should include a decent amount of action for the single player experience, and hopefully will add a ton of mini-games for the multiplayer action as well. Unfortunately there's no online support for two players, which sucks, as it would be kind of funny and ironic to play this game over the net with some dude that's actually stuck on an island himself, but there's always hope for a Lost in Blue 3 or Wii sequel that could better make use of Nintendo's online options.

We'll keep you posted on new ...

via ign

We've been promised more DS content in 2007 by Nintendo, and it seems as though the rush is already underway, with Konami showing nearly a dozen titles at its Gamers' Day event alone. As the newest addicting touch-puzzler for DS, Hudson's Honeycomb Beat is a mix of simple innovation and basic touch screen usage. In what could best be described as a mix between Tetris and Othello, the game's focus centers around a combination of hexagonal tiles that make up a two-colored honeycomb. With the touch of the bottom screen, players can switch any tile on the grid from one color to the other, with the ultimate goal of completing designs, flipping tiles in combos, or making an entire horizontal line of all the same color. The catch: Any time you flip a tile all neighboring tiles will flip along with it.

Though Honeycomb Beat was shown off only in demo form, the current build gave us a good sense of things to come. The basic presentation centers around - you guessed it - a honeycomb theme, with all interface featuring a slick, hexagonal look. All interface is handled on the touch screen, with descriptions of events and game tips taking up the top screen. From the get-go Honeycomb Beat asks that you design a profile for stat-tracking, and then allows you to either immediately get into the action, or check out the simple (and surprisingly quick) tutorial mode. Tutorial sections include lessons in panel flipping, vector labels (which are basically different types of panels), and advanced flipping techniques. Each tutorial presents itself very well, with all explanation on the top screen and a user-controlled touch tutorial on the bottom screen. After about five minutes of panel-flipping we were ready to dive into the main game.


Honeycomb Beat is comprised of two different modes; puzzle, and evolution. In puzzle mode, players are required to take a specific layout of panels on the bottom screen and create patterns by flipping them from one color to the other. Some of these puzzles demand that all panels on the screen are the same color, whereas others will result in two-tone patterns or pictures. There are 20 puzzle areas, each with 10 puzzles for a total of 200 different brain-teasers. Just like in the main game, whenever a puzzle is completed the actual interface will flip new available puzzles over in a branching, honeycomb style. It's simple, but it has a really cool look as you begin to tunnel your way through each mission.

When it comes to evolution mode, Honeycomb Beat takes a note from Tetris, as players can jump into one of 10 different difficultly levels in an attempt to clear lines. A huge mass of Honeycomb will begin to rise from the bottom of the screen, and players will need to flip an entire horizontal line to clear it away. With a little trickery (and some smart planning) combos can be created by setting up multiple lines and then eliminating them all at once. Once the mass of honeycomb reaches the top of the bottom screen, it's game over. Adding to the replay value of evolution mode is a profile ranking system, which takes into account how long you lasted, how many points you achieved, and the complexity of combos to rank your performance. Like in Brain Age, you'll be assigned a "Brain Evolution" rating which you can work to raise over multiple play sessions.

So what's the point of the game? Well, aside from adding more wrinkles to your brain as you twist it in knots, Honeycomb Beat also offers a few unlockables, though they're primarily cosmetic. As you venture through puzzle and evolution modes you'll continue to unlock new panel colors, different backgrounds, more music, and different visuals for the top screen during play. It's basic, but it's still a reason to go back and kick the crap out of any shameful puzzle attempts you may have done. From the demo we were able to select from 10 different panel colors, three background themes (a space theme, a "warm" theme, and a girly "fancy" theme), six different songs titled simply "Music1-6", and digital or wave visual animations. It is all extremely basic, but every little bit helps in a puzzle game, and staring at the same two colors for hours on end is grounds for much "head-explode-ification" in our book, so it's a good addition to the package.

All in all Honeycomb Beat is a pretty entertaining experience, although it isn't an astonishingly deep endeavor. Puzzles can be extremely tricky (and not being a huge puzzle nut like Craig I was made to look like a fool on a few of the brain-teasers), and the amount of depth is decent for what we hope is a game that fits in the lower DS price range (around $20 seems about right). Konami maintains that the game is "beat-based", though from the demo we didn't see any real advantage in playing with the sound on or off, aside from having a driving tempo to flip to. The game also offers some special panels that can be brought into play at the user's digression, which consist of tiles that ...

via ign

During the video reel at Konami's event on Thursday night, we were intrigued by the few glimpses shown of the new aerial combat game heading to the DS, Time Ace. The game has the protagonist piloting different planes in an attempt to travel through time and stop a maniacal adversary. Needless to say, the brief introduction of the game left us itching to get our hands on it as soon as the videos ended and the demo stations were brought in.

Time Ace starts off with some stylized cut scenes explaining the game's back story. Apparently, way back in 1914, a scientist named Dr. Clock (very clever, Konami) invented a time machine and traveled to the future to see what was in store for mankind. When he got there and learned of the senseless battles of World War I, he decided to use his time machine to prevent the war from ever occurring. Unfortunately for our hero, nothing can ever be easy; Dr. Clock's assistant, Dr. Scythe, happens to have his own evil machinations in place regarding the time machine. Unbeknownst to Dr. Clock, Dr. Scythe jumped into the future on a stolen time machine in an attempt to secure a massive stockpile of powerful weapons (obviously a misguided bid at world domination). Ever the forward thinker, Dr. Clock foresaw this contingency and kept a backup time machine awaiting just such an occurance. The game begins as Dr. Clock takes off in his makeshift biplane/time machine fast in pursuit of Dr. Scythe.

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Last night, Konami held its annual Winter Gaming Event in San Francisco, and amidst the maelstrom of bright lights and booze, we managed to find a demo station running the final retail version of Lunar Knights. Previously, we had only been able to go through demo levels, so we were pretty excited to dig our teeth into the vampire slaying adventure. The first DS game from Kojima Productions and the spiritual successor to Boktai Lunar Knights certianly has a lot to live up to.

The game starts off (like so many games do these days) with a lengthy cut scene involving random story elements that were completely unintelligible in the context of a gaming event like this. Apparently, the game's malevolent vampires are plotting to blot out the sun with a device called paraSOL, a mechanism designed to control the weather. Of course, this would give the bloodsucking monsters free reign to roam the earth and gorge themselves on the blood of any mortals unlucky enough to get in the way.

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Backbone Entertainment's been spoiling PSP owners. Not only did the development studio kick off the system's launch with its original IP Death Jr., but it also gave the handheld a sequel late last year. The Nintendo DS version took a backseat to the PSP sequel -- the dual-screen game made a brief, behind-closed-doors appearance at the Electronic Entertainment Expo last summer, but it was so early that it was nearly unplayable...and almost impossible to gauge the direction Backbone's Vancouver team was taking with the project.

At last night's corporate event in San Francisco, Konami showed off a close-to-finished version of Death Jr. and the Science Fair of Doom. The game ran well and showed off a hybrid 3D action game with tons of 2D platforming elements that put heavy emphasis on touch screen control.

So, in the Nintendo DS game, Death Jr., the son of the Grim Reaper, is still in high school, and now has to deal with the horrors of a science fair gone completely bonkers. Players take control of both Death Jr. and his friend Pandora in a very Lost Vikings sort of way, having them work together in order to fix all the evil that's run amok through the school hallways.

We only got a chance to tinker with the early portions of Death Jr. on the DS, which included a whole lot of tutorial that showed off the game's touch screen control. Using the D-pad, players maneuver Death Jr. in the 3D world, and attack enemies simply by tapping on the touch screen with the stylus. There's a combo system in place that requires double tapping on the D-pad or stroking the touch screen in different fashions...a technique which will clearly come handy later in the game when more and stronger enemies enter the fray.

At some portions of the game the camera will swoop in tight for a side-view of the action, and the controls change somewhat to give players a bit more of an old-school platform-style design. Because the game focuses on a control that requires the D-pad in one hand and the stylus in the other, jumping is handled by the shoulder button.

The game clearly isn't keeping up with the visuals pulled off on the PlayStation Portable, but considering the horsepower under each systems' hoods it's not surprising that the DS game doesn't look quite as good. But even with its limitations Death Jr. and the Science Fair of Doom is no slouch in the graphics territory. The game plays relatively fast and smooth with some nice detail in the environments. The cutscenes, detailed but still frames, show off the game's weird and bizarre art style.

The final product, due this spring, will feature wireless two player support for some of the mini-games that you'll encounter in the package. ...

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Later this year Konami will release its first classic arcade compilation for the Nintendo DS: Konami Classics Series: Arcade Hits. This is in no way the first time Konami's created a collection of its old-school arcade games on a handheld -- the Game Boy Advance has a fair share of remade old-school titles from Konami. But where programmers recreated the experience on the GBA platform by reprogramming each game, the developers of the DS collection pull off perfect emulation on the dual-screen handheld, and it allows for the team to pull off some really awesome features that true hardcore arcade collectors will love.

First of all, you get 15 Konami games of various levels of "classic" status. Games like Contra, Circus Charlie, Time Pilot, Yie Ar Kung Fu, Gradius and Track & Field are well worth the price of admission. But you'll also get little-remembered games like Road Fighter, Shao-Lin's Road, and Rainbow Bell (a game that's featured in the better-known Parodius series). Other games include Roc'n Rope, Scramble, Horror Maze, Basketball, and Pooyan. Each game played exactly as they originally did in the arcades, which shows the strength of the programmers' emulation abilities.

Each game plays on one screen, with the other display showing off the arcade artwork's "how to play" imagery -- you can swap the two screens in the configuration menu, but since the touch screen is used for menu functions it's best keeping it this way. Because the DS screens offer less pixel resolution than many of the arcade games' resolutions, there will be some pixelated gaps in the display -- you can turn on filtering to make it look a little nicer, but it'll never look quite as sharp as the original arcade titles. Many Konami games utilized the "tall" vertical orientation, and you can definitely recreate this by rotating the image on the screen and play the DS tipped 90 degrees clockwise or counterclockwise. This function can be changed on the fly via an easy to use touch-screen interface.

It's quite possibly the most ambitious classic arcade game compilation simply due to one factor: the ability to tweak the settings exactly as arcade operators did back when the games were originally available. Each game has a visual representation of both the title's original motherboard as well as the dip switches -- dip switches were how arcade operators manually adjusted elements such as how many lives a player earned on a quarter, how many points a game required before they earned an additional life or free game. Using the DS system's touch screen, players adjust these settings by sliding the dip switches on or off in relation to the specific setting listed on the upper screen. It's a real down-and-dirty way of changing things within the game, but for arcade purists this is absolutely a way cool way of doing it. It shows that the development team really loved and appreciated the games in their original arcade configuration.

Also for the arcade purists is the addition of a library where you can check out all sorts of artwork and detailed information related to all the games in the package. You can zoom in and out of the scanned pamphlets to check out all of the wonderful typos that made it into the original print.

Konami Classics Series: Arcade Hits might not support the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection, but multiplayer is a huge focus for this product. Not only can you wirelessly transmit a copy of the game to any DS and play competitively, you can also record a high-score earning run and transmit that "replay" to other systems so your buddies can see just how you pulled off that record.

Fifteen games isn't anywhere close to the library of old-school games within Konami's line-up. We're still missing awesome classics like Gyruss, Lifeforce Double Dribble, Blades of Steel...and yes, Frogger. So if this game sells well, it wouldn't hurt to expect a Volume II in the future. ...

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As the platform of choice for all the Megamen and Pokemons out there, the DS has no shortage of adventure games with anime-style characters, creatures, cards, and things to collect. It's reasonable that you might have skipped right past Spectrobes when look at the list of upcoming DS releases (it's coming out in March, by the way). Well we're here to suggest that you take another look.

Spectrobes appears to be a special game for Buena Vista Games. In addition to being the first title out of the studio to carry the Walt Disney label on its packaging, it's also the first title that the division has produced on its own. And, as producer Kintaro Hisai shared with us when we visited Japan to sample a final version of the game, it's also the first BVG game to feature an all original cast of characters.

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