G-pinions

I am fully aware that Nick already wrote about Zoo Keeper a mere four days ago, but now that I got my hands on the game I feel I have to weigh in. Simply put, the game is fantastic. I've said time and time again that the majority of portable games should fall into one of three genres: puzzle, platformer and RPG. It seems like the DS is a utopian platform for puzzle games and, if Kirby is any indication, could be the second coming of platformers. Now we just need an RPG or two released.

Anyway, on to Zoo Keeper. Like Nick said, it's very similar to both Krazy Kreatures and Tetris Attack. In fact, there's almost no difference between the games. I would scold Success (that's the name of a developer? I would chide them for arrogance if it wasn't so lame) for stealing their ideas from previously released games, but ZK is just too fun to worry about little things like intellectual property theft. It seemed like every minute or so, while Nick and I were engaging in a hectic match, I would scream with joy or horror. Who knew lining up three of the same animal in a row could be so exciting? And, while it's actually a pretty obvious idea, the use of the second screen is gold. The bottom screen is where your playing field is located, the top screen lets you look at your opponents'. A few times I would scream "I can't find a match!" only to hear pompous Nick reply "look at the damn giraffes on your lower left!" Adds a whole new dimension to trash talking.

Now that I'm knee-deep in NDS goodness I need to keep the ball rolling. Kirby Canvas Curse, which I'll write about in-depth when I finally defeat the end boss, has been keeping me distracted from my school work for the past two weeks and you already know how much I love Zoo Keeper. I really need to buy Meteos and Advance Wars; I'm only worried they'll end up taking over my life completely.