Peggle Dual Shot – Imperfect Version of a Perfect Game
Written: Jun 02 '09
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Product Rating:
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Pros: one of, if not the, finest casual game ported for the handheld console market
Cons: the most addicting elements of the game are lost in the translation
The Bottom Line: Peggle Dual Shot is sure to delight first time players, but those familiar with the original desktop game may be slightly let down
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| DrFaustus's Full Review: Peggle: Dual Shot for DS |
Amongst casual computer gamers, there are two kinds of players - those who've found themselves completely addicted to Peggle, and those who've never played the game.
If you're in the latter camp, here's a quick rundown of the game that PopCap first released for PC and Mac a few years back, and has since released on a variety of mobile platforms (including the Nintendo DS, which we'll be focusing on in a moment). It's a simple puzzle type game where players are presented with a screen of blue and orange dots (the titular "pegs"). Using a ball that they aim and launch from the top of the screen, the players must remove all of the level's orange pegs by hitting them with the ball before they run out of balls to shoot. As the players progress through level after level, their task grows more and more difficult, with indestructible obstacles that must be shot around, moving pegs that make timing the shots more difficult, and countless shots that require precision aim to get the ball to ricochet just right.
PopCap's programmers designed one heck of a game. The physics for the game are spot on, with every bounce and arc of the balls feeling like it's guided by real-world gravity. There are enough ways to score bonus points and earn extra balls that players have countless options for how to approach a level to earn the highest score possible. Powerups like multiball, pinball flippers, fireballs that destroy all pegs in their path, and more. Challenges that require players to earn a certain minimum score, or clear a level starting with only one reserve ball, or clear 10 levels in a row, and many others. By the time players have made their way through most of the levels, they'll have discovered that any of the game's 55 levels can be beaten in only two or three minutes, but that many of these levels can take dozens and dozens of attempts to clear, especially if you're maximize your score and earn the various medals and trophies that the game dangles tantalizingly in front of you.
The top-notch game play makes the game a lot of fun, but it's the overall look and feel laid over that game play that really makes Peggle a memorable title. Bright, shiny colors and lushly painted backgrounds, along cartoonish unicorns and other animals, make each level a visual feast. Rainbows and shooting stars mark spectacular shots that the player makes. Poppy, hook-heavy music fills out the background of each level, giving way to a spirited chorus of Ode to Joy after clearing out the final orange peg of each level. It all combines to form a glossy sheen for the game that could have easily turned sickeningly cutesy, but thanks to the games tongue-in-cheek aesthetic, creates an delightfully unforgettable player experience.
An addicting casual game like Peggle is a natural fit for the handheld, portable gaming market, and it's actually a little surprising that it's taken PopCap so long to release the game for the Nintendo DS. The long wait is worth it, though, since DS players get not just the original Peggle game, but also its sequel, Peggle Nights (featuring dozens of new levels and plenty of even-more demanding challenge stages), bundled together on the Peggle Dual Shot cartridge.
And while the programmers have done a great job translating the game to the Nintendo DS with minimal alteration. In place of the mouse, players can aim with the stylus or they can use the direction pad or shoulder buttons to aim their shots. Other than that, the basics of the game remain intact. It's just a shame that the limitations of the DS hardware show through for anyone already familiar with the original desktop version of the game, turning a great game into merely a good one.
The very small screen size of the Nintendo DS makes aiming all of the shots a fuzzy approximation of precision accuracy. On a full size computer screen, it's easy to use the mouse to aim the balls with surgical precision, striking the round pegs at just the right spot to get it to ricochet off exactly where it needs to go. Using the stylus on the DS screen, with perhaps a tenth of the screen real estate of the desktop version of the game on a modestly sized computer monitor, is more like trying to re-create a pointillist painting with those big, fat crayons that kindergarteners use. Most levels still aren't too terribly difficult to clear, but players hoping to set up truly elegant bonus shots or clear a level of all pegs, not just the orange ones, will get frustrated at the clunky stylus-based aiming system. Players can get a little more accuracy by using the directional pad to aim, but it takes far longer to set up a shot just right with dozens of presses of the left and right buttons than it does to use a mouse, which slows the game play down and destroys the rapid-fire aspect of the game's addictiveness.
The relatively low screen resolution for the Nintendo DS also hinders the translation from desktop to handheld game play. On a purely aesthetic level, the colors are dull and muted - where they shined with a candy-coated sheen on the computer screen, the pegs on each level are little more than monochromatic dots. And the various cutesy rainbows and showers of stars that shoot across the screen throughout the game feel sluggish and comes just shy of slowing down the game play. More dire, though, is the jaggy, lower resolution on the pegs for each level. As players progress to the highest levels, it becomes essential to be able to ricochet the ball off the colored pegs with absolute precision, something that feels much easier with the perfectly round looking pegs of the desktop version of the game when compared with the blocky looking pegs of the DS version. It makes the handheld game feel more like a game of luck than a game of skill.
Despite my gripes towards the changes made for this handheld version, Peggle Dual Shot is still a very fun game. It's a perfect fit for the casual, pick-up-and-play-in-spare-moments style of play that many DS owners enjoy so much. This version just doesn't seem quite as addictive as the original desktop computer version of the game, which may actually be a plus for some players. I've found myself sucked into Peggle for hours at a time on occasion, trying to get perfect scores on just a few more levels. On the Nintendo DS, though, my sessions have always wrapped up much more quickly, thanks to the slower, less addicting pace of play.
If you're already familiar with Peggle for the PC or Mac, you can probably skip the Nintendo DS version. Newcomers to the game, though, will certainly enjoy themselves, and it's nice to get both the original version of the game and it's sequel in one low-priced package.
Recommended:
Yes
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DrFaustus
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