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Wark! Two Chocobo trailers waddle into view
Making sure that you get the message -- the message being "Chocobos are really cute; buy our Chocobo games" -- Square Enix has posted trailers for its two recently revealed fall-bound Chocobo titles, Cid and Chocobo's Mysterious Dungeon: Maze of Time DS+ and Chocobo and the Magic Storybook: The Witch and the Girl and the Five Heroes.As you might be able to tell in the promotional clip and the game's title, Cid and Chocobo's Mysterious Dungeon is an enhanced port of Chocobo's Dungeon (released in the U.S. for the Wii this week) with more focus on Final Fantasy regular Cid. Given the nature of roguelikes, this DS release doesn't look like that much of a "downgraded" experience compared to the Wii version!The Chocobo and the Magic Storybook clip isn't nearly as epic, but if you're enough of a Chocobo fan to have read this far into the post, you'll likely want to watch it anyway. Jump past the break for more of the flightless, chubby bird.%Gallery-27055%
Square Enix announces new Chocobo Tales, Chocobo roguelike
As a promotion for its Virtual World -- yes, it's a virtual world titled Virtual World -- Square Enix held a special event in the beta 3D space unveiling two new Chocobo titles for the Nintendo DS -- Cid and Chocobo's Mysterious Dungeon: Maze of Time DS+ (fall 2008) and Chocobo and the Magic Storybook: The Witch and the Girl and the Five Heroes (winter 2008). Cid and Chocobo's Mysterious Dungeon: Maze of Time DS+, as you can guess, will be a roguelike starring Final Fantasy figures Cid and Chocobo. This will actually be Square Enix's fourth Chocobo Mystery Dungeon entry, an enhanced port of Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo's Dungeon for the Wii, now with new jobs and a storyline told from a new perspective (Cid's).The chances of this one coming to the U.S.? Given the current "surge" of roguelikes hitting the States, it's very likely we'll get this one! You can preview some of Cid and Chocobo's Mysterious Dungeon's first screenshots in our gallery below.The second title, Chocobo and the Magic Storybook: The Witch and the Girl and the Five Heroes, follows 2007's Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales, a minigame collection with RPG and card-battling elements. If you remember our favorable review for the original game, we called it "just about the cutest thing ever." Screenshots below!%Gallery-27055%%Gallery-27058%[Via Duckroll]
The DS Life: First-person gaming
The DS Life is a weekly feature in which we scour the known world for narrative images of Nintendo's handhelds and handheld gamers. If you have a photo and a story to match it with, send both to thedslife at dsfanboy dot com.We're breaking away from our usual routine this week -- instead of fawning over touching scenes of handheld gamers, we'll look through ten pictures taken from the gamers's point of view. These photographs can reveal a lot about the shutterbugs who took them! You know, besides what game they were playing at the time.
Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Sale
Chocobo Tales, Square Enix's Final Fantasy spinoff, made for a great release to pass the Spring months with, but it can be hard for a minigame-filled RPG to elbow its way to the front of a crowd filled with must-have DS titles. If you haven't had a chance to pick up Chocobo Tales yet, maybe Amazon's latest sale will be what finally motivates you. The online shop has slashed $10 off of the game's usual cost, bringing it down to a budget price of $19.99. This bargain ends today though, so quit being lazy about buying it!See also: DS Fanboy Review: Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales[Via CAG]
A hollow Chocobo head for your beverages
If you're planning to drink some of Suntory's execrable Final Fantasy Potion, you may as well do it in style, by pouring it into an adorable Chocobo-head mug. Or you could skip the Potion and fill the mug with something that you may actually enjoy. It really depends on what's more important to you: flavor or Square Enix product synergy.Now when you sit down on your Chocobo cushion to play some Chocobo Tales, you can have up to 15 ounces of, uh ... if not Potion, how about "choco-late" milk? It's less thematically appropriate, but it's phonetically appropriate, and has the added benefit of being delicious.NCSX is taking preorders for this $18 mug, to ship in July. While you're shopping, check out the other Square Enix preorder of the day: cool Dragon Quest Monsters toys.
Comparing Square Enix's Japanese and US boxart
In a recent interview with 1UP, Square Enix's marketing communications manager gave us some insight on the process behind adapting Chocobo Tales' packaging for the US. We happen to prefer the Japanese version's modest artwork over North America's chaotic cover, but we understand that the company had a younger audience to appeal to and a different message it needed to convey. We've collected DS covers from Square Enix's Japanese and US releases after the post break for you to compare and decide which one you like best. To its credit, the company hasn't completely mangled its DS boxarts so far (The same can't be said about Nintendo's bastardization of Hotel Dusk's cover). How do you feel about Children of Mana's simplified design? Does Final Fantasy 3's stripped packaging appeal to your western tastes? And do you agree with 1UP that publishers have been doing a better job with dressing their products?
DS Fanboy Review: Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales
Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales is a lot like most modern cartoons that seem to be aimed at the younger set -- you know, Disney and Pixar and Cartoon Network in the after-school hours. Like these cartoons, Chocobo Tales is colorful and simple, with a solid storyline that isn't really anything special. It's fun, but not deep. But also like those cartoons, Chocobo Tales is peppered with hilarious one-liners and jokes that do show off some depth and appeal for an older set of fans. It's definitely cliché to talk about something that appeals to gamers of all ages, but that may well be the best possible description for the latest Final Fantasy spinoff.Also, it's just about the cutest thing ever.
Metareview: Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales [update 1]
We've had our eye on Chocobo Tales for quite some time now, watching with fevered anticipation that the spin-off game would provide us with some more entertainment on our handheld system already populated by other highly-entertaining games. Now that the game has hit retail and been reviewed, we can finally see if the full NTSC version is for us. Not that imports aren't our thing, mind you, just we usually steer clear of the Square-Enix titles (lots of text, don'tchaknow).So, what did the critics have to say? Let's check it out: IGN (83/100) doesn't want the presentation to fool you, the game is fun for older gamers: "The game might feel a bit "kiddy" in its focus, what with those great, big, cute Chocobo eyes peeking at you from the box art. But even though the idea might skew young, the product is surprisingly enjoyable for the older crowd." GamePro (80/100) finds the game to be a melting pot of good ideas: "Chocobo Tales is about quick and easy fun. The Crayola art style, pop-up book style graphics and fable stories may make it seem like a kiddie title and technically, it is. However, the game is fun enough that and packed with enough nods to diehard fans that Final Fantasy fans of all ages should give it a look." New York Times (75/100) has issues with the card system: "Tales has a ridiculously cumbersome system in which you can't easily swap one card for another or compare two cards; even finding a particular card in your collection requires a tedious search. The designers would find it challenging to come up with a worse system. This flaw is surprising in a game that is otherwise beautifully designed." The other remaining reviews come from Japanese import copies of the game, so as soon as more reviews of the English NTSC version come in, we'll update the post. In the meantime, discuss!Update: Added the New York Times review.
DS releases for the week of April 2nd
What a week! At this rate, we could almost use a DS drought, just to give us time to save up some cash! But we shouldn't complain, since our counterparts in the UK and Australia aren't having much of a week as far as releases go. Isn't that always the way of it? One week, we get a ton of games and they get none, and the next week it's reversed. The only thing we can ever count on is that Japan is going to debut a veritable truckload of new titles. No matter what's going in the rest of the world, the Japanese must have their new DS games.US releases Cake Mania Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales Honeycomb Beat Konami Classics: Arcade Hits
More Chocobo Tales videos than you can shake a gysahl green at
By the time Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales hits shelves next month, we'll hardly even need to play it! We've already seen several of the minigames in action, and GameVideos has added even more to the collection.And we know, we're not fooling anyone. We're going to play this one until our fingers cramp. That little chocobo is just too cute to resist, and we're helpless when it comes to Final Fantasy.
Kweh! Or, fresh new Chocobo screens
Oh, that little scamp of a Chocobo -- what will he get into next? If these screens are any indication, it looks like he's getting into a giant beanstalk. Considering the upcoming Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales is peppered with references from children's stories, that's probably exactly what it is ... but really, how many times do we need to see the beanstalk here? It's all over this latest batch of screens!Check after the jump for selected screens -- only one beanstalk included.
Chocobo Tales breaks out this April
This year's contender for Most Precious Game finally has a release date stateside: Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales is slated to hit shelves April 3. Since we are suckers for everything Final Fantasy-related, it's a sure bet that we've already got the date circles in our calendars ... and if you saw all these trailers, you probably want to borrow our marker.
'Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales' fluttering to North America
Square Enix keeps the Final Fantasy franchise spinning along, announcing Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales for North America, the ninth game dedicated to the "chocolate ball" birds. Part adventure, part RPG, part card battle, part minigame, and part 'microgame,' Chocobo Tales packs a lotta genre into a tiny DS cart -- and keeps it just as cuddly as last year's Final Fantasy III makeover. Awww...Chocobo Tales is scheduled for release on April 3; retailing for $29.99.
Wark! Chocobo gets updates
Chocobo and the Magic Picture Book is coming to the US in April, just not under that name. For the American release, the game will be retitled Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales. The minisite is pretty bare at the moment, but we'll be keeping an eye out. For now, you'll just have to content yourself with the gameplay video embedded after the jump.
