This is a very unique, fun and creative game; in it, you control Maxwell a young boy (with a chicken hat) who has a pad which he can use to create anything he wants. Maxwell is given a variety of challenges to do and he uses this magical notebook in order complete them.

This game is controlled entirely with the touch screen. You touch to the right of Maxwell to make him go in that direction, to his left to go in that direction and just above him to make him jump. You also tap objects in order to interact with them. This control scheme is nice and easy to get used to, but unfortunately is occasionally annoyingly flawed sometimes thinking you want to jump when you want to actually walk. This is my only real problem with the game.

The challenges in this game are very varied and there are plenty of them. I’ll give you an example of one of the challenges: there is a starite at the top of a tree (starites are the items you have to collect in order to complete a challenge) and you have to get it down. You could summon a ladder and climb up, summon an axe and cut the tree down, summon rope and lasso it down, summon a UFO and pilot it there or even summon some a dragon, then summon some meat, feed the dragon to tame it, then ride on the dragon as it flies you to the starite, you’ll have a lot more fun with this game if you’re imaginative. If you complete a challenge, you get a star next to it, but if you complete a challenge three times without using the same items, you get a gold star next to it. These challenges can get pretty tricky too.

But the challenges aren’t the only appeal of the game. Funnily enough, hours of fun can be had on the title screen alone, this is the place for you to experiment; you can have God and Satan fight for your amusement, feed sharks to Cthulhu (an ancient alien being from the writing of H. P. Lovecraft, in case you didn’t know), have pirates vs ninja matches, start zombie apocalypses, ride roflcopters, feed babies to lions, feed those lions to dinosaurs and then destroy everyone and everything with a huge tsunami.

So, yes, basically, you can have a lot of fun with this game, but you will eventually reach a point when you can’t think of anything new to create, which is a bit of a downside as are the occasionally poor controls I mentioned. Nonetheless, this is still excellent, so I’d rate it at 8.9/10

Buy it here.

This is a sequel to Ocarina of Time, and while it is really quite different in some respects, it’s very similar in others, giving it a good blend of old and new. In this game you are a new Link and Ocarina of Time happened thousands of years in the past and has become a legend. After Link’s sister is kidnapped by a giant bird he sets out across the seas to rescue her. Unlike most Zelda games, where you have a big world of fields, forests, swamps and mountains to explore, this time you sail across the ocean and visit a variety of islands. I think that the fact that you are exploring the ocean, rather than a carefully mapped out countryside, makes it feel like you have an awful lot of freedom. The sailing side of things is definitely an upside.

But of course, as I said, several things are still the same. You still get to venture through large and interesting temples and dungeons, you still collect lots of items and figure out the ways in which you can use them to reach new areas and there are still a large number of side quests for you to do. They seem to have taken all of the excellent things from past Zelda games and mixed it with original features to make it especially good!

One thing that might bother some people is the change in graphic style that Wind Waker has. When you play previous games in the series, you get the impression that they were trying to be realistic with their graphics, but were just limited by the consoles they were on. In this game, they were clearly not aiming for realism: everything is cell shaded and very bright, the characters all look like cartoon characters. This doesn’t bother me in the slightest, but I know some people might have trouble with it.

On the whole, this is a very good game, but for me, I’m not quite sure why, but it just somehow doesn’t seem as good as Ocarina of Time (or Majora’s Mask.) Perhaps it’s just nostalgia? Though I’d still rate it highly at 9.4/10!

Buy it here.

Donkey Kong 3 is probably one of the lesser known titles in the Donkey Kong series and the third of the arcade games. Donkey Kong was the first, where Donkey Kong kidnaps Mario’s girlfriend Pauline and he has to rescue her, then came Donkey Kong Jr. where Mario kidnapped Donkey Kong as revenge and his son Donkey Kong Jr. had to go and rescue him, this is the third instalment in the Mario/Donkey Kong conflict. The story for this is a little odd actually; we are introduced to Stanley the Bugman a previously unseen relative of Mario’s. Stanley owns a large greenhouse full of plants, and Donkey Kong has decided to invade it along with an army of insects.

In this game, you play as Stanley as he tries to drive Donkey Kong out of his greenhouse. The gameplay is very different to what you might expect, instead of running though levels or jumping over obstacles, you have to shoot Donkey Kong (who’s hanging by vines) and the insects with a bug spray gun. It’s loosely similar to the gameplay of Space Invaders, but the enemies in this game are far more agile.

The game may be a fun way to spend half an hour or so if you get bored, but I can’t imagine it being played for any extended period of time. There are only three levels and after you finish the last one (and defeat Donkey Kong) it just loops back to the first and you play it again. The main appeal seems to be trying to get the highest score you can. Unfortunately, I think the game is a little too hard and while you’ll probably finish the story, you won’t get a very high score. There’s also a multiplayer mode where you both take it in turns to do the exact same thing, it’s not that great. That’s all there is to the game.

On the whole, I’d say curiosity may make Mario or Donkey Kong fans buy the game, but it doesn’t have that much appeal so I would rate it as 5.7/10

Buy it here.

This game is one which is often listed as the greatest video game ever, which is something I would say is a bit of an over exaggeration, but I do agree that is a game which is certainly worthy of very high praise.

In this game, you take on the role of Link, just like you do in every game in The Legend of Zelda series (or, at least, one of the Links, but that’s totally irrelevant to the game), and he’s just a simple forest child living in the woods. Link is different from all the other children because Link does not have a fairy. The enthralling tale begins when he finally gets one… This is the start of a quest which will take him into the belly of giant fish, the centre of volcanoes and even through time! But I shan’t go into any more details because I don’t want to spoil it!

It features very nonlinear gameplay too, which is a nice thing, I think. There is an unchangeable storyline, and the first three main tasks have to be completed in order, but you get more freedom after that. You’re also given a very full world to explore; there are loads of secret areas to be discovered, hidden objects to be found and peculiar people to converse with. There is definitely an awful lot for you to do in this game, even if you get stuck with the main story, you can just fill up on side quests which are also very fun.

I suppose the only downside some people might see, is that the graphics of this Nintendo 64 game are beginning to seem a little dated, but if you have no problem with a game’s graphics (as I don’t) then it wouldn’t matter either way.  The game also has a very nice soundtrack.

A very good game, I would rate it 9.5/10

Buy it here.