The problem, though, was that Nintendo made absolutely no mention about what the heck Digitylish actually was. The only clues were the video trailer on the E3 press disk as well as the random scattering of these games running in demo mode on Game Boy Micro systems displayed behind impenetrable glass.
One year later, these concepts have shown their faces - in Japan. The series is known in that territory as Bit Generations, a collection of "style vs. substance" games that are simple in look, simple in concept, and surprisingly addictive. These are clearly pet projects from Nintendo designers who have been given free reign to design their own simple game. They're also budget priced at a few hundred yen cheaper than the less expensive Game Boy Advance game, which makes sense considering what you'd get for the same buck in a full-fledged product.
But don't let the cheaper price tag fool you: despite their smaller development budgets and price tags, there's a lot of gaming in each of these cartridges. Even better is that the games come in somewhat stylish, collectible packages that are slightly smaller and sleeker than the standard Game Boy Advance fare.
There will be seven games total in the Bit Generations series. Nintendo has spaced out their releases by shipping three games in the initial launch, with the final four hitting a couple of weeks later. Boundish, Dialhex, and Dotstream are all solid products if you can see past the simplistic presentation.
Boundish initially threw us for a loop when we first plugged in the cart into one of our umpteen Game Boy Advance systems. In fact, we were so blas¿ about the game right from the start we were worried about the entire series. All this game really offers is a small batch of glorified Pong clones. And Pong is unbelievably boring to play solo - the computer A.I. is ridiculously easy to read and score against, so we almost tossed this one to the curb after playing through the challenges undefeated.
But then we decided to try the games in multiplayer. Boundish supports the GBA's wireless adapter and only requires one cartridge for two-player competition - and it's here where the product really comes alive. These Pong-inspired designs are outstanding in competition. "Pool Flower" is a simple paddle vs. paddle challenge, but with globs of goo floating around to cause havoc with the ball's trajectory. "Human League" is a two-on-two Pong competition, and both paddles are in the players' control. The absolute favorite of the office is "Power Slider," a version of the digital tennis game where you can add a little "spin" to the puck to cause it to skew in all sorts of directions. All of these games are brilliantly simple and addictive, with a basic art style that screams "programmer art." Simple as it looks, it works.
Dotstream was the second game we popped in, and we were immediately reminded of the light cycles from Tron. This is a racing game where you're nothing but a single pixel jutting out a line as you traverse the side-scrolling tracks You're in competition with five other dots zooming to the finish line.
Again, simple look, but surprisingly deep in gameplay. Your "vehicle" moves at a steady pace, but will increase its top speed if you "slipstream" close to an opponent's drawn line. You'll slow down if you stray from a straight line, so you'll want to move up and down as conservatively as you can. Occasionally zip strips will pop up to zoom you at the maximum speed for a few seconds, and some power-ups can be scored to help you or hurt others. As fun as the game, we're a bit shocked that this game doesn't feature any sort of multiplayer function. A racing game without head-to-head? Good thing the single player is tough as nails and challenging as all get out.
Finally, we get to Dialhex. The title says exactly what it is: it's a puzzle game where you rotate colored triangle tiles to form a six-sized hexagon, which will disappear and cause the other pieces to settle into place. This mechanic is tough to grasp and you'll find yourself hunting and pecking aimlessly trying to fit the pieces into place. But once you figure out the mechanic, you'll be lost in its mesmerizing gameplay. Hours can be lost in this unique puzzle game, which can be compared to the Xbox 360 freebie Hexic…but it's far, far more enjoyable because of its simplicity.
There are only two real modes in this game: Solo, which challenges you to get six of a specific color before new colors are added to the mix, and Endless, which becomes unlocked once you reach a certain point in Solo mode. There's also a Vs. Mode which, again, supports the Game Boy Advance system's Wireless Adapter, but unfortunately, it doesn't support single cartridge play. And since we only have one copy of Dialhex, we couldn't play this one in the multiplayer competition.
The big question: will these games ever see a release on these shores? We'll be so bold as to say: don't count on it. Nintendo of America is far, far too involved in the success of the Nintendo DS to confuse the market with the release of these overly simplistic GBA games. Nintendo has already received the ESRB rating for each of these games, which has been given the official series name of Digilux, but that's no guarantee that they'll ever rear their heads in the states. We're realists: these games are simple designs with visuals that don't exactly "wow" gamers, and these are original branded products with no familiar names or characters to attract customers to purchase them. And new GBA games retail for 20 bucks at the cheapest - and for that amount, Grandma would rather pick up a Spongebob title or even the Mario games that have recently hit the Player's Choice line-up.
Hopefully, we're wrong. Hopefully, Nintendo of America will be just as experimental with this series as Japan has been, because these games are a surprising treat. We'd love to see these on the market in the US with the same sort of packaging attention as the Bit Generations games have received. At the very least, they're cool collectibles with an enormous amount of gameplay within.
We'll have more on the Bit Generations games when the next four are released. Watch for write-ups of Coloris, Soundvoyager, Digidrive, and Orbital in the next few days.