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I've been playing Space Invaders Extreme 2, Final Fantasy VI Advance, and PiCOPiCT (aka PiCTOBiTS).

PiCOPiCT is really a fantastic puzzle game. I got it with the free Nintendo points that came with my DSi. At the time it was one of the few DSiWare games available. This is probably my fourth run through the regular levels, and I'm still discovering new ways to go about clearing the blocks.

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A used copy of Kirby's Nightmare in Dreamland that I bought on eBay arrived in the post today. I've just played through the first three worlds. It's slightly more challenging than I remember the original NES Kirby's Adventure to be, but certainly not difficult. But it's solid and satisfying, and the level design beyond the first world is keeping me interested.

I really wish that the clean, simple aesthetic of the backgrounds used in the world map:



would have carried over into the backgrounds found within the levels:



I imagine that in an attempt to update the graphics from the NES source material, they wanted to go for a look with more depth and polish. I think it looks sloppy. Although, I am fond of this background from the interior sections of some of the butter building levels:



Since the perspective isn't parallel to the foreground, it reminds me of the type of scrolling 3D backgrounds you might see in any one of numerous horizontal shooters.

My criticism of the graphics do not detract from my certainty that I'll enjoy this game through to the end, and it will most likely be a game I play through multiple times. It's just fun, and requires minimal commitment.

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Final Fantasy VI Advance. Just spent 10 minutes grinding sleeping at the 1 gil per night Thamasa inn in an attempt to see one of Shadow's dreams. Given up, going to eat dinner. Will probably just watch the dreams on YouTube later.
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Drawing & writing, mostly.

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Final Fantasy VI (Advance) would have benefited from Secret of Mana's gracious feature allowing you to push roaming NPCs in town out of your way. The children in the Mobliz cellar are notably infuriating. Waiting around for minutes for them to stop pacing back and forth in tight passageways and blocking exits really isn't fun.

Astro Boy: Omega Factor arrived in the mail today, so my FFVIA playthrough's being suspended till I've had my way with Astro Boy.

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I think it's really nice that in the opening tutorial of Astro Boy Omega Factor your score is referred to as "experience." Unlike when the word "experience" normally shows up in video games, here it doesn't increase your character's stats. Instead your score reflects your own experience as a player. The better you get at the game, the greater your ability to rack up points (though your ability is slightly augmented by the permanent power ups you're awarded by NPCs).

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I just left the Bamboo Village of Mystery Dungeon: Shiren the Wanderer with 3 additional party members in tow. I had no idea such a thing was be possible.
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I guess I was just surprised that you could accumulate more than on companion at a time, and so early too.

I also had no equipment and no restorative items in my inventory when I left Bamboo Village. Getting to Mountaintop Town alive with all 3 companions intact was nerveracking. It cost me 2 confusion scrolls, a lightning rod, and a dragon herb. But at least I got chef Naoki to the cliffside restaurant.
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Alphabounce is kind of fantastic. There's this grid that's supposed to be a map of the universe, where each square marks a level. There are meant to be over 25 million levels (at least a 5000 x 5000 grid, then). You can't pass over a square until you've cleared it's associated level (there are upgrades that will let you skip over several squares at a time). If there's an item marker on a square, when you clear that level the item is added to your inventory, and is basically a permanent power-up that you can equip to one of your ships' (they call them "envelopes") slots. Your extra lives are actually different ships with varying properties and equipment slots. You can get new ships to swap in by clearing planet levels.

Anyway, the arkanoid/breakout aspects: since you can equip permanent power ups, you can still be consistently breaking bricks with missiles, lasers, etc. even if your balls are missing. When there are 10 or less blocks left to break, a super shot starts to charge which can clear everything in a vertical line. Really speeds things up when your targets are few and spread out. The challenge then comes from enemies, hostile blocks, and the sometimes undesirable temporary power-ups.

The games' pretty glitchy, and half the time item descriptions and in-game lore (e.g. cosmic nutfalls, hibernating interstellar gargoyles) make little to no sense. I thought there was an iPhone version, but I guess not. The browser version gives you 3 free plays per day, and I think also has unnecessary-sounding missions and platforming sections.

The 25 million levels are extraneous to beating the game. Clearing the planet stages is the goal, and they are all within a reasonable distance from each other. At some point I intend to just start heading off in a straight line and see if I ever hit the edge of the universe during my adult life (I don't play the game every day).
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So I picked up a copy of the GBC Metal Gear Solid off of eBay for a very reasonable price a little while ago. Popped it into my GBA SP last night, and played through the first two stages. I wouldn't describe the game as charming, but I'm charmed by what it ostensibly is: simple, but ambitious for its format. However, nothing about the actual gameplay nor atmosphere (nor plot) has got me hooked. Any opinions on whether it's worth a full playthrough?
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Drawing & writing, mostly.

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There is a secret cave to be discovered in almost every screen of Neutopia. They usually contain NPCs who reiterate simple tips on how to play the game or give you directions to other shitty secret caves.
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I've played R-Type Delta a few times over the past week or so. I don't play a lot of shooters, though I like the idea of them (very much informed by the SB podcast episode). Today I got through the first level without being hit, which felt really good, and then I had an embarrassing time of repeated failures early in the second level. Still, figuring out I that I can launch the force into enemies was a major revelation.
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Drawing & writing, mostly.

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Whoa. R-Type Delta's stage 3: Really hard, really good.
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Drawing & writing, mostly.

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Still chipping away at R-Type Delta. Can now finish stage 2 on normal without being hit, but can't get far into stage 3 yet. I've unlocked free play, but I find by the time I've lost 3 ships and see a continue screen, I've also lost my focus, or flow.

Demon's Souls arrived in the mail yesterday. I've played a bit, and taken down Phalanx, Tower Knight, Armor Spider, and Adjudicator. Having played through Dark Souls one and half times already certainly helps, but I'm still adjusting to the slight differences in mechanics. I see way more spectral images of other players and blood stains in this game than I do in Dark Souls, but far less summon signs. I do get summoned pretty regularly when I put my blue sign down, though. I've only been invaded once, and the black phantom ran past me and killed everything on the way to Adjudicator for me, and then let me pass through the boss fog without a fight. That was unexpected.
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Drawing & writing, mostly.

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I'm now 9920 bomb uses away from unlocking level select in R-Type Delta. I will either have figured out how to play through level 3 (and rest of the game) or given up long before I come close to unlocking this level select.

I'm at roughly a halfway mark in Demon's Souls, and feeling inclined to take a break from it for a week or so (I did the same with Dark Souls). I find the difference between the worlds presented in Demon's and Dark Souls interesting. Dark Souls' is set during the ruinous tail end of a golden age that had been ushered in by the mythic figures responsible for creating the world in its current form. While Demon's Souls world is that of humans, ravaged by an uncontrollable force summoned forth by those desirous of furthering their own power. But the Tower of Latria: What a nightmare. How was that place ever not terrifying?

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Just finished Demon's Souls. Enjoyed it a lot.

Coop was a lot less frequent for me in this game than it was in Dark Souls, but almost everyone I did coop with in Demon's Souls kept in touch over the PSN and we all tried to help each other out again in other areas. I thought that was nice, and also something I didn't really come across in Dark Souls.

Ronnoc, sorry, I know you wanted to coop, but I never made it past soul level 66.
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Speaking of feeling like I've wasted time: I returned to playing through Neutopia for a bit this afternoon. I enjoy the dungeons, though probably only because I like the music. The overworlds are incredibly tedious. I'm past the 3/4 mark in this game, but I probably won't bother finishing it.
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Catrap, thank you for making me work to figure out solutions to your puzzles.
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I just finished Neutopia a few minutes ago, despite having strongly considered not bothering to do so. It's not a very enjoyable game.

Comparisons to the original NES Zelda are unavoidable. One area where I think the Legend of Zelda is the more successful of the two games is in its overworld: Despite the fairly simple visuals, you're easily able to discern variations in place. Mountains are to the north, a sword can be found in a cave next to a lake/pond, there's a graveyard, and a nonsensical forest maze, etc. However, the 4 overworlds in Neutopia really only vary in core visual thematics, and are otherwise a series of unremarkable interconnected screens lacking any significant landmarks.

Going to install the Binary Domain demo now, and give it a try.
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I gave up on Cave Story+'s final cave area again for the second or third time. I can't seem to calibrate the d-pad on either of my USB controllers properly with this game (nor with the OS X freeware port, and that version also wouldn't override my screensaver). For most of the game this meant accidentally aiming in the wrong direction at times, but the final cave calls for some tricky booster rocketing between spikes and over lava. It's frustrating when you launch yourself at spikes in directions you weren't pressing on the d-pad. I'll probably give it another shot in few months from now.

Nintendo of Europe emailed me 50 Club Nintendo stars for my birthday, which gave me enough stars to trade in for 100 Nintendo points. Those points raised my balance to 200, so I went online and had a look at 200 point DSiWare. Didn't see anything I was interested in, so I bought some more points and downloaded Boxlife, Metal Torrent, and Shantae: Risky's Revenge.

I've only played a few of the R&D levels in Boxlife, which teach you how to fold the boxes. I like the mechanics, but I haven't yet got a sense of where the game is headed. I'll put more time into this one after I finish the last few levels of Catrap.

I've started playing the Shantae sequel, but am not very far into it. The environments are gorgeous. I'm a bit weirded out by the bouncing pixel boobs on some of the sprites. Though clothed, it seems somehow more obvious and less tasteful than, say, a naked succubus in a Castlevania (but perhaps I've grown too accustomed to seeing those...). The game controls well. Most of the usual metrovania elements worthy of criticism are present almost immediately. Some interesting variance from Konami's Castlevanias on the DS: Warp rooms are paired with specific other player-unlocked warp rooms, rather than granting access to any previously visited warp room. Saving does not refill health and magic. Enemies respawn very quickly.

I have some things I want to say about Metal Torrent, but I'll save those for another post.
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Game I'll play tomorrow.

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Under Defeat HD arrived this morning. I've spent about half an hour with it, and unfortunately I don't think I'll have any more time for it today. It's pretty rad.

The new order mode normal seems more difficult than arcade mode normal. I'm not sure if it has anything to do with the number of bullets on the screen nor to do with enemy health, but I will say that the wider firing angle you're able to tilt your helicopter at in new order mode seems to make crowd control on the wide screen version of 1-1 a little bit trickier than in it is in arcade mode. Your bullets don't cover as much vertical space when you're fully tilted to the left or right. But if you're nimble enough with your fingers, you can lock your tilt into the narrower arcade mode angle.

I feel like there was a lot of slowdown in the brief time I've spent with it so far. Hoping it won't turn into a major issue.

Also, "This game is autosave function."
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Drawing & writing, mostly.