My wife doesn’t play many games — maybe 2-3 per year, if that. When she does, she prefers the DS. Here are some of the games she’s most enjoyed in recent years:

• Picross 3D
• Bejeweled
• Tetris/Dr. Mario
• Sudoku
• Phoenix Wright (although her interest in that waned)

As you can see, she likes puzzle games. But she doesn’t like Professor Layton. I suspect she doesn’t care for story-driven games. She just likes to jump in and immediately start solving puzzles.

That said, what games would you recommend she play?

The credits roll, you watch the epilogue, then you close your DS and stare into space for a moment, your head swimming with thoughts of loved ones, partings, and things you’d do differently in life if you had a second chance. All you can say is, “Wow.”

Professor Layton and the Unwound Future is that kind of game—A surprising, emotion-grabbing, one-hundred-percent satisfying work of wonder. I can’t believe something so epic just took place on my Ol’ Fat Blue’s tiny little DS screens.

Most of the game is an entertaining romp through crazy encounters, amazing locales and preposterous action sequences intertwined with an onslaught of maddening puzzles.

And that would have been enough…

But, in its final chapters, Unwound Future soars through many great plot twists, leading to a final bombshell that—in terms of emotional punch—ranks right up there with the finales of FF X, Wind Waker, Kingdom Hearts and FF VII’s first disc. You don’t need to have played the first two Layton games: If you’re new to the series, you’ll only miss out on a few minor in-jokes. (more…)

Professor Layton and the Unwound Future may be one of my favorite games this year: Polished, spectacular, classy, funny and intriguing.

But it’s sure not helping my self-esteem. Seriously, either this series has gotten more difficult since its first tale or I’m getting dumber. Maybe both. I don’t recall spending hint coins so early or so often seeing that look of disappointment on Layton’s face when I screw up. At least he doesn’t point and guffaw (although, that would be a great addition for Part 4!)

I’m only six hours and sixty puzzles in. But I can already recommend this game whole-heartedly. (more…)

At Comic Con a week or so ago I had the chance to play Twisted Towers and Roogoo Attack with one of the developers from SouthPeak Games. To be honest I thought the puzzle genre was dead, you could only rehash Tetris and Line clearing so many different ways, but the guys at SouthPeak have managed to create a very unique and fun game.

Twisted Towers and Roogoo Attack, for the Wii and DS respectively, are a game that relies on stacking objects and pushing them through similar shaped slots. You might remember having a toy like that as a child where you would pushed colored shapes through a wood block, that had holes for those shapes and only those shapes could go through. This game is exactly like that except hard core to the max, and timing is key to actually successfully completing this game.

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