Welcome to VC Weekly, N-Europe’s guide to the wonderful world of Nintendo’s download service. Written by Sam C Gittins

For anyone with a particular interest in Nintendo's amazing history, this edition should prove to be very interesting indeed as we have a game which contains perhaps the most comprehensive selection of digitally recreated classic Game & Watch handheld devices from the good old Eighties, plus a puzzle game which will make you change polarities in addition to tactics as you play. Anyway enough from me and on with the games!
 
Available for download this week we have...   

Game & Watch Gallery Advance
Polarium Advance

For anyone who isn't incredibly lucky enough to own any Game & Watch handheld games, the Game & Watch Gallery series has provided something of a lifeline as not only did they provide several G&W games faithfully represented in playable form on the relevant Nintendo handheld relative to their times of release, but you also had remakes in a more modern style which would take on the essence of each classic game while overlaying it with various Nintendo characters in addition to some fantastic backgrounds which really served to bring back this excellent era of ingenuity within the company to life in a way which their creator Gunpei Yokoi would surely be proud of. If there is anyone who is unaware of what a Game & Watch is, it's a handheld device created with the intention of providing the user with a simple self-contained game displayed on a small LCD screen which would be played in the simple pursuit of chasing a high-score, it also doubled up as a digital watch or clock with an alarm function; the Game & Watch Gallery series is a carefully curated collection of these wonderful devices which ensures that their legacy is a long lasting one by keeping not only their memory alive but the actual games themselves.

Indeed although these titles were mostly developed by Nintendo they did actually have a significant amount of help in the form of co-development with a company called TOSE which is a fact that has clearly gone over my head as I didn't discover this until recently, it seems this fact wasn't even formally acknowledged until the release of this very piece of software but it transpires that they had a hand in the entire series in addition to working on other titles such as Kid Icarus: Of Myths and Monsters and Kirby's Block Ball on the Game Boy, plus even Super Princess Peach on the Nintendo DS in addition to the Starfy games; so let us take a moment to raise a toast to TOSE who seem to have been a relatively unsung hero in the creation of this series in addition to many others on multiple platforms across formats owned by many different companies, encompassing many quality ports to boot.

Surely one of Bowser's most menacing moments?

Back to the excellent title in hand, from the start you get to choose from six distinctly different G&W titles all of are faithfully recreated in addition to having modern versions available too, these include; Boxing which is a more simplistic version of Punch Out!! before it was even released, Fire where you must catch people jumping out of a burning building by using a trampoline, Donkey Kong Jr. & 3 the former of which is similar to the NES title while the latter is a different, more enjoyable concept involving projectile-based gameplay, Mario's Cement Factory which was one of those famous for being re-released as a Nintendo mini-classic for the industrially themed title and Rain Shower gives you the task of keeping your washing from getting wet! Well at least the subject matter used as inspiration for these titles can be considered as being rather original in many cases, it's also interesting to note that when these original titles were first around, gaming was rather simple and then as time passed things have become more advanced of course yet a lot of people these days seem to play games on the go which are rather simple, costing either a small amount of money or available for free; yet take this superb collection which features in total twenty proper games before you even include the remakes plus all the other additional content for a price which would equate to less than thirty pence per game even in its most basic form... just something to consider as I would call this real value for money as opposed to false economy in the case of so many titles which have become simply disposable entertainment.

In addition to those aforementioned titles you also get to unlock a further five which also have modern modes incluidng Chef, Donkey Kong, Fire Attack, Mario Bros. and what I would consider to be the best version of Octopus I have ever had the pleasure of playing, yes it's true that it has been featured before but never as extravagently as in this instance because the modern version transforms the simple title into something so spectacular - while still retaining its charm - that it makes the whole collection; it features Mario diving to the bottom of the ocean underneath the tentacles of the titular Octopus - while Peach looks unconcerned - in order to grab the treasure, the more of it which is grabbed then makes the bag heavier thus increasing the risk of getting caught as you then move at a slower pace but then when you manage to get your haul back to the boat it's just a feeling of unrivalled accomplishment as the game naturally gets harder the more points you score, especially every one hundred points where it eases up for a moment before speeding up again as with all good G&W titles.

Waluigi is almost on the ropes! Go on Luigi, finish him!

Of course the fun doesn't end there because you have Bomb Sweeper, Climber, Life Boat, Manhole, Mario's Bombs Away, Parachute, Safebuster, Tropical Fish and best of all Zelda G&W titles to unlock in classic mode only, with the obvious caveat being that some of these titles were originally dual-screened so you are getting both screens shown on just the one but at least with this release if you are playing on a TV screen or on the gamepad then you can at least see what's going on in a way which is bound to be clearer due to increased screen size than an original GBA; unless of course you happen to have access to the original game cartridge, a Gamecube with GBA player and a control pad with a suitable d-pad but this option is clearly cheaper than that plus obviously it's a no-brainer compared to attempting to build up a real collection of actual Game & Watches... the cost of which these days would be astronomical. It is worth noting that for the locked games they are unlocked by collecting stars, which are rewarded every time two-hundred points are scored in a game with the maximum amount of stars that can be earned in each game being five, the last nine titles will be displayed in the museum upon unlocking them but you will need to gain one-hundred-and-sixty stars in order to unlock all titles including Zelda; if you end up using restore points then I'm sure no one would blame you but be careful you don't create one in a sutuation which is difficult to come back from, it's nice to have the option in any case plus of course having access to miiverse is particularly useful for those high-score challenges on Very Hard mode being that you can provide proof using screen captures.

Such a visual upgrade was afforded by the improved hardware leap between the first GBC entries to this GBA title that the modern games feel like new entries in their own right even though you can clearly see where their humble roots came from, Octopus looks so spectacular in its own right with the huge multi-tentacled beast changing colour as you progress while the tentacles themselves now move in a more realistic manner; the animation for seeing Mario get caught is amusing as well plus if you're watching closely while grabbing the treasure you might even notice Mario grab a mini GBA console or two which seem to be worth more points, well they are still worth a bit today so I suppose it makes sense and it's a nice touch regardless. All of the music has been given a significant upgrade too, indeed it all sounds amazing through a set of speakers or even through headphones on the gamepad, using my favourite aforementioned game as an example, I would say it has one of the most enjoyable Nintendo composed pieces of music I have ever had the pleasure of listening to so it's a good thing that you can choose to listen to all of the audio in the Museum as it's really worth hearing as are the subtle audio effects such as when Mario is filling his treasure bag, the fuller it gets the duller the sound... it's a really nice touch.

Back to basics, the original G&W titles still have a timeless style.

However you choose to look at it, Game & Watch Gallery Advance is incredible value for money even in its original cartridge form for the current market value so to have a digital version available for a mere fraction of that makes this an essential purchase which any Nintendo fan would surely be proud to have in their collection; heck I have the original game which I traded with my brother for and I've still bought it again digitally purely because it's that good; so please don't delay buying this as it really is a phenomenal package; even if you can't quite get all of the stars required to see the cast credits which would require 220 stars, I think it's possible to get around 200 stars but you might want to stop at 170 as that seems to be the last obtainable unlockable, it's a shame that due to these technical limitations of having no multiplaer in these instances that we miss out on full completion and it would be nice if Nintendo were to modify the save file to include those "missing" stars from the start but I suppose this is just the one caveat which will annoy completionists. There's just one thing I feel as if I should mention and that is why we haven't seen any further Game & Watch Gallery titles, there are many reasons I suppose but even if the Gallery series has probably covered around two thirds of the G&W titles - if that! - there is still plenty of scope for perhaps another collection for the 3DS encompassing certain missing entries, remakes of other classic titles or even some brand new experiences based on the concept; possibly link them in with amiibo figures - or not - and you have the recipe for another title which would surely sell well, we shall see but in any case at least it looks like Game & Watches are here to stay in one form or another which can only be a good thing.  

My first encounter with Polarium was on the Nintendo DS so I must admit that up until now my knowledge of the Game Boy Advance version was relatively hazey at best, I'm sure I had seen a boxed copy of it on the shelves of a game store many years ago but I must have dismissed it at the time but only because I had already played the game, or so I thought. It turns out that actually Mitchell Corp originally made the game for the GBA but they were then approached by Nintendo via Capcom and it seems that there was a lot of interest in Polarium except the developer was asked to develop it for the then unannounced DS system because the controls seemed to fit really well, so it came out for the launch of the system with the original GBA version only then releasing afterwards; as and aside if you put the original cartridge into the GBA slot on a DS lite while you have the DS game Actionloop inserted it will modify your Polarium save file to unlock more levels... which if I'm understanding this correctly is effectively the opposite of what the GBA/DS slots were normally used for early on in the life of the dual-screened system, which is a fairly unique feature.

Conceptually a game such as Polarium can seem to be simple, for the most part it is as you are presented with a puzzle made up of black & white tiles on which you must pick a starting point, then continue in a line which will flip the tiles over to reveal the opposite colour, if you can make a row all the same colour then they will disappear off the board then you just repeat until you've made all of the rows disappear which will complete the puzzle. For anyone like myself who has played the DS version first with its touch-screen based controls and might be concerned about going back to buttons, don't be as the controls feel completely natural probably owing to it being the primary version so a lot of time must have been put into making it feel just right, you move around the board with the D-pad then when you find a spot to start just press the "A" button to highlight your selection, then when you've finished drawing your line you simply press the same button again - or the left shoulder button - to flip the tiles which should clear the puzzle providing you've thought it out carefully enough; you can just go back a step in your tracks if you think you've messed it up or just press the "B" button to redo it completely, also worth noting is that as the puzzles become larger they are displayed in a zoomed out fashion to fit in on the original small screen, so you can press the right shoulder button to zoom in but really on a TV screen this is almost made redundant though I suppose it still might be used on the gamepad if you're having any difficulty seeing the action but at the very least either screen is a step-up from the original GBA at any rate!

Initially when you load up Daily Polarium you are asked to set the date which then prompts the game to give you a puzzle every day for an entire year, at least it seems that was the original idea perhaps for people who liked to apply a Sudoku feel to things, but you aren't restricted by this, indeed there are a few puzzles to work through at the start and completing these will then provide you with more to test your skills on. As you progress the difficulty does go up a bit as tiles outside the grey border are introduced which like the tiles in the border can be transitioned over as part of your line without being altered, however they will change to the same colour as your line providing the rest of them match; then just to mess with your routine even further there is a tile which upon completion of a row makes tiles which were above then fall down below which adds an extra dynamic to how a puzzle can play out just in case you had happened to become complacent.

Yep... this is Polarium Advance! It plays better than it looks.

As if having over three-hundred-and-fifty puzzles wasn't enough you can opt to play puzzles from the main mode in a different way by taking on the Time Attack which will either give you ten Easy ones or five of the Hard puzzles to beat in the fastest time you can muster without making any mistakes lest you accept a penalty for each uncleared row, this can be fun as there's a local leaderboard so perhaps a fun mode to pass the controller around in if anyone else wants a go. Then there is also a Creation mode which allows you to make and save your own puzzles up to a maximum of one hundred using a simple, intuitive editor then once you've proved that your puzzle can be beaten - almost Super Mario Maker style - you are given a password which gives you an easy way to share your unique puzzles, especially over miiverse which adds another element to this particular release; but that's not all as you can get puzzles from the DS version of Polarium - via password - to add yet even more puzzles to your game, so it would seem that overall far from being an inferior version of what many - including myself up until now - considered to be a well-rounded puzzle game with an intuitive interface, this is indeed the truest form of this fantastic underrated puzzle game.

Outside of the main play area you'll be able to make out some faint muted backgrounds featuring some rather simplistic sketches, some of which seem to have Eastern inspiration to them which makes me think of Nintendo's unique style used on their Hanafuda cards, of course the resemblance is only a passing one and only on certain designs, probably not intentional either but it's just more of a passing observation; overall the backgrounds do what they are supposed to plus there are different coloured tile sets should you tire of simple black & white ones, it's nice to have options I suppose. Background music mostly consists of relaxed tracks which are nothing particularly amazing but then again they don't detract from the experience either which is good, aside from that there are a few choice sound effects purely to mark your interaction, it's all mostly functional though, nothing memorable here so it's just as well that the puzzles hold up.

I've found Polarium Advance to be quite the surprise as it's a game which I thought myself to be already aquainted with when it turns out I hardly knew it that well at all, anyone playing through this, the deifnitive version of the relatively modern puzzle title - which is now a mere decade old - will find themselves well-versed in how it plays by the end. There's plenty of value for money to be had here as well, because as it happens it's a title which isn't of incredibly high value in original cartridge form but it is gradually becoming rarer so the digital price is about on par with it currently plus you get the benefit of password sharing over miiverse which is nice in addition to possible help should you get stuck; it's still not the most difficult puzzle game I've ever played but it is fun, challenging and perfectly well programmed, you can't ask much more than that.   

That's it for another installment of VC Weekly which will return again soon. So until then, enjoy the rest of the week and Game On!