Blockheads

Planet Puzzle League, the successor to Tetris Attack/Panel de Pon, serves as a great example of the benefits of online gaming. The TA fanbase has never been very large. This is true for most puzzle games, except, of course, the original Tetris. Consequently I've had considerable difficulty finding a decent match in the ten years since the initial release. Sort of like finding a date. But all that would change earlier this year when Nintendo announced the American release date. Voice chat! Online rankings! Multiplayer madness! Only that's not quite the case.

For one thing, the game uses Nintendo's hated-from-the-day-it-was-conceived friend codes system. Unlike Xbox Live, where adding another player to your friends list is as simple as a few clicks, every Nintendo game requires you to somehow contact this person outside of the game and then exchange 12-digit codes which you both must enter to complete the addition. This severely stifles the opportunity to build an online community. Additionally, voice chat is only available in these rare, "friends list" matches. However, Xbox Live has shown us that many people use voice chat to shout racist and homophobic slurs, I can do without.

Another major sticking point is the two-player limit on online matches. Given the relatively simple parameters of the match, the dev team should've been more than capable of supporting a four- or even eight- player affair. But alas my dreams of standing atop a virtual hillside, looking down on a gaggle of utterly devastated foes goes unfulfilled.

What I find most disappointing is Nintendo's implementation of their online ranking system. For one thing, a 'ranked' match can only be played against people who share the same birthday (The Nintendo DS requests your birthday when you first power on the system). Yeah that's right. Inexplicably your field of prospective opponents is wittled down to 1/365 of the already-small population. (To clarify, you can play people with different birthdays, but those matches will be unranked.) On top of this baffling constraint, your online record is dropped at the end of every week, meaning there's no win record to proudly display to opponents.



This all means that the online portion is essentially a matchmaking service and not much else. No worldwide rankings to compare my win record with players from Japan and Europe. In fact, players have no clue about the skill level of their opponents before starting a match. I've decimated many a player 30 seconds into game. If we could see each other's win records this could have be avoided.

All of these issues goes back to the frustratingly conservative behavior of the Big N. The company that replaced blood with sweat in Mortal Kombat. The company that implemented an ultra-cute avatar creation system for the Wii. The company that altered mature themes to kid-friendly stuff for American gamers. What I'm saying to Nintendo is quit being lazy and grow a pair. Your fans certainly have them, so give them a little credit. Next time give us online stat tracking for wins and accomplishments. Make them permanent, so a win record actually means something. Allow voice chat anytime. And ferchrissakes, implement an online four-player mode.

I love Calvin and Hobbes.

One comic sums up my entire feelings about work.