The Japanese site for the upcoming DS platformer featuring the Princess is up, complete with sizzling gameplay clips!

Nintendo of Japan has opened up the Super Princess Peach website. The site features a number of gameplay descriptions (unmercifully in Japanese) dressed up with attractive screens and movies from the game. Currently, three sections are up (heart-shaped links on the bottom) including (from left to right) "Story", "4-Stage Emotion" and "Peach and Kassa".

As the story goes (using my immense powers of deduction/looking at the pretty pictures), essentially usual heroes Mario and Luigi are captured by Koopa and Co. Princess Peach (likely remorseful considering all those times the Mario boys have saved her) is pressed into action, aided by a magical umbrella referred to as "Kassa" (japanese for "umbrella", go figure) and the power of her own roiling emotions. Super Princess Peach is quite obviously lovingly rendered in the style of past Mario platformers with Super Mario World an obvious example. Given the 2D prowess of the DS, the game should be quite beautiful within that art style, and the media present on the site certainly reflects this.

The Princess, perhaps realizing she lacks the pure butt-stomping power of Italian plumbers, will have her own abilities for the Koopa clan to reckon with. Her primary weapon seems to be a "mysterious" umbrella that can perform a variety of attacks including a diving "umbrella stomp" manuever and a charging sword-like swipe. The umbrella also helps her get around, from allowing her to float in the air longer to becoming a convenient boat to cross watery barriers (can't get that fancy dress wet.) The umbrella even has the power to flat out devour enemies, gobbling even giant Bullet Bills with uncaged voracity.

Additionally, the Princess' own turbulent female emotions will have important gameplay ramifications. For example, when Peach is feeling extremely happy she literally floats and twirls with joy with the convenient side-effect of allowing her to reach higher platforms. Conversely, when the Princess is very angry...ohhhh boy, look out. Literally bursting into flames of righteous indignation, Peach is then able to throughly toast or otherwise heatedly torment her enemies. Makes you wonder why she ever needed saving in the first place really, but I digress. The game's developers have conveniently boiled down the range of female emotions to four highly specialized stages at the player's disposal, the other two being "sadness" and "playfulness".

Super Princess Peach, due out in Japan on October 20th, is looking to provide a very fun and charming, classically-styled adventure in the Nintendo vein. The gameplay videos will no doubt have fans smiling and eager to play the game (more movies here.) Stay tuned for more details as the title nears its release, as hopefully its announced European and US release stays on track for this year as well.