The final two missions were actually pretty easy once I had the right game plan. There are some missions that throw things at you so quickly, it's a struggle to keep up, but these were of the sort where - when I took my time and made surgical attacks and counterattacks with the proper unit types - victory came with ease. This is one of the greatest satisfactions in Battalion Wars, and is evoked powerfully in the final battle, with troops from several nations all marching against Kaiser Vlad's "armed and fully operational battlestation!"

In the original Battalion Wars, earning high grades on missions unlocked bonus missions. In BWii, getting all 'A' grades in a campaign unlocks background info on units, and getting all 'S' grades unlocks concept art galleries; but there are no bonus missions in the campaign. There are bonus missions in each of the online modes, unlocked just by playing a number of matches of the corresponding type.

Visually BWii is really impressive, with the same sort of rounded, cartoonish graphical style as the first, but with more 2007-style detail and glow effects. The sound effects are really good, and it even makes gratuitous use of the remote's built-in speaker, with controller tones indicating reload times and command feedback. The story is pretty lame, but has some cool pre-rendered cutscenes.

All told, with the new units, rebalanced game mechanics (friendly fire no longer harms your own troops - a factor that resulted in my defeat many times in the original), Wii controls, and online multiplayer (which I'll glog more about when I can actually play it), BWii represents exactly what the sequel to Battalion Wars was supposed to be. It doesn't break the mold of its predecessor, but it does fulfill the incremental upgrade requirements very well.

Progress: 100%

The first 60% or so flies by fast - the first missions are more tutorial than anything, and there are even some new game mechanics that make it easier: capturing facilities, like Barracks and a Factory, can replenish lost units as a battle proceeds. These missions get a bit complicated (multiple phases), but aren't terribly difficult.

Then, at about the 75% mark, BWii becomes its predecessor. Facilities are no longer present, and the missions become huge, and tough as nails. I enjoy it, and it's no worse than the first BW, but I feel like they could have done something more interesting.

The controls work out really well for the most part. Naval units are just like land units, but on water. Submarine diving is a snap, with a downward nunchuck shake submerging the sub, and an upward shake surfacing it. The naval units integrate with the rest of the game really well (which, incidentally, feels very well-balanced for the amount of unit types there are now). My only complaint about the controls is that air units, steered by tilting the remote, are a borderline impossibility to pilot.

I managed to find someone to play online earlier, in a Skirmish battle. The map I played put me and my opponent each in command of a small naval blockade, with the winner being the one with the most points (from destroying the other guy's stuff) at the end of a time limit, and units respawning throughout. I got creamed, and I didn't feel like the map was very fun, but the other ones sound much better. What impressed me the most was the network performace - if there was any latency, I wasn't able to notice it at all.

Progress: 90%

My biggest concern: I've only completed the prologue mission and the first campaign (six missions altogether), and the game tells me I'm 30% done. My second-biggest concern: BWii has its own friend codes, unique from your Wii's friend list/codes. At the same time, I am very pleased with how it plays - aim with the pointer to choose targets, and use the D-pad on the remote to select from your battalion (like the C-stick from the original). There are some gesture controls too, for stuff like doing barrel rolls, that I'm still getting used to but are working out okay so far.

The level design is already really impressive. In the fourth mission of the first campaign, I pushed my forces into a jungle to capture a drop point, then took control of a Recon vehicle to do some swift sabotage, hurling off ramps that would make Excite Truck blush. And then I took defensive positions around my recovered base and thwarted an air-dropped onslaught! In the next mission, I had Frigates and a Battleship and it was just awesome.

Comfortingly, the voice acting is just as comedically bad as it was before. The first campaign shows off a duo who are awful at faking an Asian accent, and when they get angry, it's hilarious.

I really want to try out the online play, once anyone else has this game. There are three modes: a flat-out skirmish, a co-operative objective mission, and a counter-operative objective mission, where one player defends and the other tries to capture. Apparently more missions (maps?) in each category are unlocked simply by playing them online, so it sounds like there is considerable variety here. And yes, you can play with anyone, not just your friends.

Progress: 30%

According to the game's data record, my last accomplishment was in January of '02, when I beat Event Match 51 with no falls. Back when SSBM came out I played the hell out of it - I got everything unlocked, including the totally impossible Diskun trophy. I wasn't one of those die-hards who plays the game competitively and keeps track of move counters and priorities and crap, but I was very competent; now, realizing I haven't played in forever, I'm coming back like an elderly Sylvester Stallone.

I told myself I wouldn't start "training," and I still don't intend to, if for no other reason than because Brawl is still four months away. But now that I've got a taste of Smashing again I'm really tempted. It was a perfect game then, and my memories of it are beginning to return.

Progress: 290 trophies, everything

The demo had a ten-minute time limit, which included 7-ish minutes of opening cutscene material (which is awesome). My timer ran out just as the space-princess started explaining that I need to gather something and be a hero or whatever crap. But of the time I actually played, I can sum it up in one word: impossible.

Maybe I'm missing something, since there was no instruction manual and I was in a semi-panic to do as much as I could with the time limit. But controlling Mario as he ran across a small floating globe was one of the most difficult things I've ever tried to do. The controls are the most disorienting I've ever seen; if there's a manual camera control, that might have helped, because one minute it was overhead and the next it was following Mario as he juked and jived along the perimeter of this tiny little planetoid, changing direction relative to the planet's center and rotating and revolving and Jesus Christ! I've never been so confused.

Of course, I still cling to fanboy hope, and trust that the game's real and/or final control scheme will be more playable.

Using the Wii Remote kind of sucks. It's nice that the option is there, I guess, but it has all the problems you would expect - doing a Smash attack is inconvenient, not having a Jump button is irritating, and Dashing is a pain. That said, it will probably work out as a good option for the family of four who has never heard of Smash Bros before, and has somehow fallen upon a copy of the game.

So I wish I had had a real controller, and I wish there was less control latency (this can probably be attributed to the early game build, or might also have something to do with there being a dozen other Wiimotes within 15 feet, causing an assload of Bluetooth collisions). Another thing I wish is that I wasn't so damn excited for this game; the website's daily updates form an unstoppable hype train, but really, underneath the extra characters and new modes, it's still the same Smash that you've already played. That's a good thing, though.

P.S. Ike is a tank.

Finally, after being interrupted by an avalanche of schoolwork and a real Zelda game, I can put Ōkami to rest.

People have accused Ōkami of being too slow or too long, and there's some validity to these, but the truth is slightly more complicated. The big-picture direction of Ōkami is pretty unique - in some ways, it's more like a sandbox game than a traditional adventure game. There are significant in-game goals and subgoals that drive the player toward them, but a very big part of the game (I don't hesitate to say a majority of it) is in "optional" content.

This seems like an intentional choice on the part of the game's director to give the player a godlike feeling: you've got to take care of the little things, too. Feed the animals, banish evil from cursed ground, solve people's personal problems. Doing these minor tasks earns you Praise, which is spent incrementally in upgrading your character, that is, earning a higher max HP, more ink wells, extra "Astral Pouches" (think bottled fairies, though I never used one throughout the entire game), and a bigger wallet. You might theoretically get through the game without earning extra Praise, but it would be pretty difficult; plus, the opportunities to earn it are all over the goddamn place, you can barely take a step without tripping over some.

So while Ōkami's world is full of fine detail, at the same time I feel like the big picture is fuzzy. There's a fake ending at the game's halfway point, and the dramatic buildup in general is fairly muddled. There's the game's mix of comedy in dramatic scenes, which is one thing (which sometimes works and sometimes doesn't), but it's just difficult to see the forest for the trees.

Anyway, while the directorial issues can mess with the immersiveness of the game (as can the technical issues I've already mentioned), and while combat and dungeon play isn't nearly as good as an actual Zelda, there is a lot of fun to be had in Ōkami. It's very unique, as I said, and much of its appeal comes just from that; though it resembles Wind Waker in a striking number of ways, there is enough in Ōkami that's all its own for it to be a really interesting play-through.

Ōkami is a pretty charming game, even on top of its awesome aesthetics. If you've got the time for it (I took a bit over 30 hours), I'd really recommend giving it a shot.

Progress: Complete

At the end of the game, I still don't like the touch movement. It's something you get used to - not in a "learn how to take advantage of it" way, more in a "learn how to make it less inconvenient" way - but it's never a really enjoyable system. To be fair, they didn't have much in the way of alternatives; the game requires analog movement (different walking speeds), among other things, which would be perhaps even more cumbersome using the DS's digital buttons. Anyway, as I've said, the rest of the game is good enough for you to get past the control hassles.

The presentation is something I haven't really mentioned. Being a handheld game, and trying to emulate the flawless presentation of Wind Waker, naturally I had my doubts, but Phantom Hourglass delivered fairly well. The graphics are of course rough in some places, but I found myself appreciating the visual style even before the intro cutscene was over. There are some cases where the audio is sketchy, but for the most part, the game's sounds and soundtrack have been architected to sound impeccable. Several themes, like the fairy music for instance, are aurally indistinguishable from the modern, home-console compositions.

One of my favorite things about the game in general is the comical cutscenes: almost every animated scene in the game has a dialog joke and/or slapstick. Where Wind Waker might be seen through its cutscenes as lighthearted and innocent, Phantom Hourglass is genuinely humorous.

I haven't mentioned the multiplayer or wireless modes, and that's because I haven't even touched them. There is a multiplayer game of hide-and-seek that sounds kind of fun, but I haven't really been motivated to try it (since the same mechanics are joyfully implemented in two dungeons of the single-player game). There are also some methods of trading certain in-game items (like ship parts) with other players, including a passive Tag Mode. If you're interested in fully customizing the ship, this seems like the only way to go, but it's in no way necessary for beating the game.

I don't have an exact time, but if I had to guess, I'd say I finished in somewhere shy of 20 gameplay hours. There are more extras for me to collect, too, including some sunken treasure and some mystical items of power to charge up my stuff, but right now there's little in the way of a good guide to show me where what I've missed might be - in any event, a completionist could probably squeeze more out of it. There are eight dungeons all-told, if you're interested in those numerics.

Something I didn't even notice until I was most of the way through the game was how many of the fundamental Zelda laws were changed in Phantom Hourglass. I mentioned the lack of heart pieces before, but then there's also how the Dungeon Map has been totally reworked; there's no Compass (although there are magic statues that can show you where chests are); the Big Key is an item Link physically carries to the boss door. The whole 'Zelda' thing was really revamped for the DS, and yet, I didn't even really notice the changes as I was playing through them because of how intuitive it was within the game formula.

To make a long story short, this is a superb game. Learn to live with the controls and you've got yourself a real gem.

Progress: Saved the Ocean King

I've been pouring myself into Phantom Hourglass at every available opportunity. I really, really like this game. It's damn fun to play - the dungeons are pure genius. Sprinkle in island puzzles - in the form of cartography challenges and treasure hunts - and it's just awesome. The story isn't as compelling as Wind Waker's or Twilight Princess's, but moreso than Minish Cap's; for a handheld-sized presentation, it's really remarkable. But I still, still don't like the controls.

Navigating the ship is something I thought would turn out very poorly, but it's actually one of the cooler features of the game. When you're at sea, you bring up your sea chart and plot out your course using the stylus. More often than not, you'll simply draw a line (avoiding obstacles in the way) between yourself and your destination. Sometimes you'll need to bring up the chart again and readjust, such as to evade or chase another vessel, but fortunately this juggling act doesn't come up very often.

The first upgrade your ship gets is a cannon, which operates similarly to Wind Waker's, except that it doesn't use your bombs; the cannon's ammo is infinite. Once you get it you'll start running into enemies at sea that need to be blasted to kingdom come, and firing on them is a simple matter of tapping them on the screen.

The second ship upgrade is the grabber arm, which you use like Wind Waker's maritime clawshot to retrieve sunken treasure. The difference here is that the grabber has HP, and bringing up chests invokes a minigame that requires you to avoid mines. Repairing the grabber arm costs rupees, and you can only repair it at the main port, so there's a strong motivation to take it slow and avoid mines rather than try to barrel through the minigame.

Lastly, you can get a fishing rod. Yes, fishing! Chase a fish shadow on the sea chart, and use the rod to engage the fishing minigame. It's a simple gesture-oriented affair, and in the end, you get... well, a fish.

On top of all the deep-sea activities, there is a ton of stuff to do in the world of Phantom Hourglass. It strongly embraces the Zelda philosophy of a litany of background quests, while at the same time making it surprisingly easy to skip it all and move right on to the next part of the main quest.

Something that's been bugging me throughout is that there are no heart pieces. Bosses give up full heart containers, and I actually just bought another full container off a ship merchant (the only one I've seen so far), but in general my HP is being capped at a relatively low level. This has the net effect of making the game more challenging than most Zeldas, as the amount of enemies you encounter and the damage they deal actually scale proportionally with the amount of health you have.

Progress: Looking for more Sea Charts

I may as well just say it - I don't like the controls. I knew I wouldn't, going in; controlling a character with a stylus just isn't something I take to. For its part, I will say that they're not as bad as I anticipated, but after spending an hour and a half with the game I'm still liable to accidentally swing the sword, roll around, or leap to my death. And of course, there's the little matter of the hand getting in the way of the action screen. The other touchscreen uses, thus far including puzzles and the super-cool boomerang, are excellent; but I'm just not a fan of using it to walk and run.

Nevertheless, Phantom Hourglass has engaged my full attention in short order. The introduction is little more than a cute little throwback to Wind Waker, but the real adventure wastes no time in presenting itself. It all begins very mysteriously, ala landing on Koholint in Link's Awakening, and I am compelled to drive through the game and figure things out.

In the prologue of the game, after recapping the defeat of the Evil King by Link and the "handsome pirates," Tetra boards a ghost ship to keel-haul its treasure. A scream lets out, and Link attempts to come to her rescue, but plunges into the sea and eventually washes up on Mercay Island, where a fairy (of the "HEY HEY HEY LISTEN" variety) named Ciela offers to help Link in his quest. Curiously, she says she doesn't remember anything about her life from before she came to the island.

The first real dungeon of the game, on the Isle of Ember, is marked at first on the map with the emblem of Din's Pearl from Wind Waker. This emblem recurs at the end of the dungeon, and defeating the boss frees a red fairy who calls himself the Spirit of Power. Here it is revealed that two more such spirits - of Wisdom, demarcated by Nayru's Pearl, and of Courage, by Farore's Pearl - must be rescued in order to catch up with the dreaded Ghost Ship.

The dungeon design, just as I've come to expect from a 2D Zelda, is magnificent. The puzzles are already becoming really interesting, as the stylus-guided boomerang is the first item (other than sword and shield) Link comes across, and even the first dungeon requires some crafty boomerang-ing.

The multiplayer mode has been public knowledge since some of the earliest previews of the game: Link must find Force Gems and bring them to safe spots, all the while evading Phantom guards, using Metal Gear Solid-style map radar. What hasn't been talked about as much, is that the game's recurring quasi-hub dungeon, the Temple of the Ocean King, has this same mechanic, and not instead of typical dungeon puzzles, but in addition to them. Also, there is a limit on how much time Link can spend in non-safe spots within the Temple! As the game goes on, he must venture deeper into the sublevels of the dungeon to recover more treasure, but even the first few are delightfully challenging.

I'll talk more about charting and driving the ship next time, but I must mention that you can customize the ship with special parts, which appear to be able to affect its performance and resilience. Awesome.

Progress: Found the second Sea Chart