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![It is time…
Tiny Cartridge’s favorite Tiny Cartridges of 2012!
This year was a crucial one for handheld game systems, a statement year even. Tablets and smartphones continued to make their case as the rightful successors to the portable gaming throne, and so the onus was on handhelds to argue their relevance in this mobile era, if not through sales (real talk, PS Vita’s hardware numbers aren’t going to get it done), then through the quality of their software.
It wasn’t enough for the 3DS and PS Vita to deliver enjoyable games in 2012; this new handheld generation needed to separate itself from the last, setting new standards in their visuals, online services, and concepts’ creativity. Fortunately for us, portable game developers met that challenge, and gave us a year of platform-defining titles — even the ports kicked the butts of their big-screen counterparts.
Below you’ll find our favorite 3DS, eShop, PS Vita, and PSN games that helped make 2012 a killer year for handheld fans (presumably you’re one of those fans, since you follow this site). Oh, and we have plenty of GIFs too, of course! I say “of course” because a lizard hijacked this Tumblr, and threatened to blow it up if we don’t meet a weekly quota of animated images. Please excuse the loading time!
2012’s best handheld games
5. Gravity Rush (SCE Japan Studio) - We’ve long since finished this gravity-bending action game, but it’s still fun to fly around its intricate city, taking in the atmosphere, searching for upgrade gems on the underside of its enormous floating islands, and using my gravity powers to chuck bystanders around. Hopefully the first of many extraordinary original IPs to debut on PS Vita.
4. Theatrhythm Final Fantasy (Indies Zero) - Try not to think too much about the overpriced iOS scheme. The important thing about Theatrhythm is its loving treatment of Final Fantasy music, paired with the most adorable art style for the series’ characters we’ve ever seen. You’ll have a favorite Final Fantasy song after playing this sweet but often challenging rhythm game, even if you’ve never played any of the RPGs.
3. Persona 4 Golden (Atlus) - This technically came out on PlayStation 2 several years ago, but it belongs on handhelds, with its gameplay divided up into in-game “days” that make it perfect for short sessions. Even if you aren’t feeling RPGs right now, you should absolutely check this out and experience a unique combination of anime storytelling, visual novel, dating sim, and dungeon RPG.
2. Zero Escape: Virtue’s Last Reward (Chunsoft) - Writer and director Kotaro Uchikoshi killed it with this 3DS/Vita sequel’s script, putting together a suspenseful story that’s just as engaging as 999. Chunsoft murdered it when it came to improving on the original with the terrific voice acting and streamlined replays. And then Aksys iced the localization by packing it with enough humor to fill several weeks’ worth of Tiny Cartridge posts. Good people die, and Virtue’s Last Reward made sure they went out in a spectacular fashion.
1. Kid Icarus: Uprising (Project Sora, Sora Ltd.) - The voice acting, customization options, and amount and variety of content in Kid Icarus: Uprising embarrasses almost any other portable game. And then there’s the witty dialogue, constant plot twists, numerous easter eggs, weird enemies like the Tempura Wizard (pictured), clever AR card features, and stellar music — Masahiro Sakurai went HAM with this one, and we ate it up to the bone.
And, jeezy creezy, the online versus mode! Has there ever been a more fun portable game to play online? Our elite gaming clan Garfield & Friends ruled over Light vs. Dark multiplayer this year, brandishing our Gaol Blades, Beam Claws, and Eggplant Bombs menacingly at the sight of every threat. And then dying.
Shout outs to: Kingdom Hearts 3D, Adventure Time, motherfuckin’ Style Savvy, and Pokemon Black/White 2. We also gotta mention our Mare Odomo X Tiny Cartridge games — we ain’t forget you, Kissing Party. We love you, boo.
2012’s best handheld digital games
5. Retro City Rampage (Vblank Entertainment) - Start with Grand Theft Auto, remove all the dumb story stuff, any semblance of reality forcing you to feel whatever moral ambiguity, and the 3D camera. Then add a power-up that lets you stomp on things like Mario, and about a million jokes aimed at kids who grew up in the ’80s and ’90s.
4. The Denpa Men: They Came By Wave (Genius Sonority) - RPGs often have great battle systems, but are usually a million hours long and full of complex stories. The Denpa Men proves those aren’t necessary (though they’re welcome, of course -– see Persona 4 Golden), providing a stripped-down dungeon crawler that focuses entirely on dungeons and character building. What text is there is hella adorable!
3. NightSky (Nicklas Nygren, Nicalis) - This is the Journey of handheld games, a wordless, serene trip through a beautiful, ethereal world. Though it released for Steam some time ago, NightSky was meant to be played in bed, with the lights off and headphones plugged in for maximum immersion.
2. Sound Shapes (Queasy Games, SCE Santa Monica Studio) - Everything about this game is beautiful, elegant, minimal, and above all, musical. We dream of a future in which we can inhabit every new Beck album as a series of platforming challenges.
1. Sakura Samurai (Grounding Inc.) - “[It’s] an eShop game about timing, about knowing the right moment to dodge and riposte, like Punch-Out!! but set in feudal Japan, yes, but it’s also about patience and gambling, sometimes literally with the coins you’ve pocketed from making short work out of enemies that have no business holding a katana, and other times with your life as you push your luck to see how long your sense of timing will keep you alive.”
Props to: Level-5 for bringing almost the entire Guild01 compilation the West as individual eShop releases, even if they were more curiosities than must-have titles. We also have to tip our hats to other slick digital releases we enjoyed like Colors, Crashmo, and Zen Pinball 3D. Uh, and I guess there were maybe some decent things that released on iOS (lol*)?
So, those are our picks! Let us know which ones we missed, and why we are terrible people for failing to include them in our personal favorites. Thanks for following us in 2012, and for caring about what games and other nonsense have caught our attention!
The images featured in this post, by the way, come by way of Slither Up, Herro 3DS, Polygon, Octopedes, and other genius GIF artists whose names escape me.
*Nah, iOS is cool
BUY Nintendo 3DS and 3DS XL consoles, upcoming releases](http://25.media.tumblr.com/62ab16860465d85a932d8aa2ead2e330/tumblr_mfnci8uK671qzp9weo1_500.gif)
It is time…
Tiny Cartridge’s favorite Tiny Cartridges of 2012!
This year was a crucial one for handheld game systems, a statement year even. Tablets and smartphones continued to make their case as the rightful successors to the portable gaming throne, and so the onus was on handhelds to argue their relevance in this mobile era, if not through sales (real talk, PS Vita’s hardware numbers aren’t going to get it done), then through the quality of their software.
It wasn’t enough for the 3DS and PS Vita to deliver enjoyable games in 2012; this new handheld generation needed to separate itself from the last, setting new standards in their visuals, online services, and concepts’ creativity. Fortunately for us, portable game developers met that challenge, and gave us a year of platform-defining titles — even the ports kicked the butts of their big-screen counterparts.
Below you’ll find our favorite 3DS, eShop, PS Vita, and PSN games that helped make 2012 a killer year for handheld fans (presumably you’re one of those fans, since you follow this site). Oh, and we have plenty of GIFs too, of course! I say “of course” because a lizard hijacked this Tumblr, and threatened to blow it up if we don’t meet a weekly quota of animated images. Please excuse the loading time!
Welcome to the new Tiny Cartridge!
By now you’ve probably noticed that some things are different around here – things that have been the same for the last four years. Eric spent all of Sunday implementing our new site design, by the talented Cory Schmitz. We’re pretty happy about it!
We’ve got image dimensions that make sense in 2012, a wider text area to save your scroll wheel, an “Upcoming Releases” page that we’ll likely update consistently this time, and a new responsive design that fits your screen no matter how you resize your browser window – or what kind of device you load it up in. Even Tiny got a makeover!
We’re still working on stuff, so if something looks wonky or doesn’t seem to work right, follow this simple two-step procedure: 1) forgive us and 2) let us know!
![Someone made a tiny appearance in They Bleed Pixels, the gothic lolita action-platformer from Spooky Squid Games. I heard a lot of great things about this when it released for PC last week, but now that we know Tiny is in it, it’s safe to say They Bleed Pixels is Game of the Year material.
I’ve no idea what compels people to drop Tiny into their games, but we’re super appreciative that they love him enough to do it, and can’t thank them enough for it. We actually have a few other Tiny games we’ve been meaning to mention here… We’ll get to them really soon!
Buy: Tiny Cartridge sticker packs for DS/3DSSee also: More Tiny posts[Thanks, Rich and everyone who sent this in!]](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m9y8phVJE11qzp9weo1_1280.jpg)
Someone made a tiny appearance in They Bleed Pixels, the gothic lolita action-platformer from Spooky Squid Games. I heard a lot of great things about this when it released for PC last week, but now that we know Tiny is in it, it’s safe to say They Bleed Pixels is Game of the Year material.
I’ve no idea what compels people to drop Tiny into their games, but we’re super appreciative that they love him enough to do it, and can’t thank them enough for it. We actually have a few other Tiny games we’ve been meaning to mention here… We’ll get to them really soon!
Buy: Tiny Cartridge sticker packs for DS/3DS
See also: More Tiny posts
[Thanks, Rich and everyone who sent this in!]
“Videogame culture store” Attract Mode has evolved into “video game collective” Attract Mode, a group site featuring contributions from luminaries Adam Robezzoli, Matt Hawkins, Cory Schmitz, Maré Odomo, Daniel Rehn, Derek Yu, Tiff Chow, Steph Thirion, Paul Levering, Paul Owens, Asif Siddiky, Phil Fish, Ted Martens, Zach Gage, Evan Shamoon, Superbrothers… and us?! I think I speak for both of us when I say we’re proud and vaguely confused to be among such brilliant company.
The store is back as well, now managed by our friends at Fangamer. It features items like the Spelunky Minis (which I’ll be buying as soon as I can afford), Cory Schmitz’s Faraway t-shirt, and the DS/3DS sticker packs we produced with Maré Odomo!
For more Attract Mode-ness, check out the Fangamer Versus Attract Mode party at PAX, featuring Super Time Force!
Meteor Night becoming three AGBIC games!
Meteor Night, the fake game by us and Ashley Davis made for My Famicase Exhibition 2011, is the inspiration for three separate entries in the “A Game By Its Cover” indie development competition -– probably because we kind of actively lobbied for people to use it.
All three ideas sound amazing!
We’re honored when anyone wants to hear what we’re talking about, not to mention when someone wants to hear, like, our opinions, and not just our hot picks for Pokemon screenshots.
Simon Carless, UBM Techweb EVP, Gamasutra publisher, Eric’s boss, and general bigshot, interviewed the two of us for his personal website, as part of a series about hobbyist curators on the web. Oh, I guess it is about our hot Pokemon screenshot choices, in a roundabout way.
I think the interview turned out pretty nice! I also think the part where he calls us his “favorite video game weblog in terms of curation” is pretty nice… If you’ve ever wondered why we do this, or why we like the DS and 3DS, please check it out!
And on the subject of Tiny Cartridge minutiae, did you know we almost called the site DS Nuts? I think we could have gotten away with it. I think it would have been really funny. I’m also glad we didn’t do that, for the sake of my business cards, at the very least.
Buy: Tiny Cartridge sticker pack for your games See also: More posts about Tiny Cartridge
My Kid Icarus: Uprising review has just gone up on Joystiq, and it’s … I’m going to say “comprehensive.” That’s my euphemism of choice this time.
There’s just so much to talk about! It’s a complicated game, with complicated controls. Controls that made me really dislike the game at first — I came back from E3 convinced that it was a big old poop. I finally got used to the weird controls and found a very deep, very Sakurai action game.
One thing I didn’t mention in the review (it was already getting kinda long!): The soundtrack, by Motoi Sakuraba, Yuzo Koshiro, Masafumi Takada, and other such luminaries, is spectacular. I’d totally consider buying a copy. It’s really dramatic!
Buy: Kid Icarus Uprising Find: Nintendo DS/3DS release dates, discounts, & more See also:More Kid Icarus media [Image: the winners of Nintendo's nationwide Kid Icarus tournament]
More Creepy Black cartridges in real life (plus Tiny!), by StreetPass Nashville, Todd Pine, and Michael Pang. Todd put these stickers on Pokemon Black and Retro Game Challenge carts, which is … so beautiful.
In case you really haven’t been paying attention to us, our Tiny Cartridge x Maré Odomo sticker packs are available now at Fangamer for just $5 (before s/h). I freak out every single time I see one of these in use!
Buy: Tiny Cartridge x Mare Odomo stickers See also: More Tiny Cart Sticker Pack posts
Rhythm Heaven Fever wallpaper, one of a selection of great desktops at the official site (warning: sound!).
I’m almost certain some of our readers have an interest in Rhythm Heaven-type games, so I thought I’d point you to the review I wrote for Joystiq last week. You should also check out Mike Schramm’s gallery from last night’s Rhythm Heaven Fever/iam8bit launch party!
And while I’m pointing out rhythm game writeups at Joystiq, how about a preview of Rhythm Thief and the Emperor’s Treasure? I was really proud of how that turned out, and I just noticed it has all of three comments. Mannnnnn.
Buy: Rhythm Heaven DS, Rhythm Heaven Fever ($30) See also: More Rhythm Heaven/Tengoku posts
Tiny Cartridge x Mare Odomo stickers for your DS and 3DS games, homebrew devices/flashcharts, or any dang thing you want to stick cute artwork onto.
Just a reminder that you can grab a $5 sheet of stickers at Fangamer, and transform any boring cart into a tribute to a creepypasta haunted game, the Letters to an Absent Father series, or a smiling face belonging to our mascot.
By the way, some were wondering if you can remove the sticker after it’s been applied — Fangamer tells us it was able to remove a sticker a week later without ruining the original cartridge art or leaving any residue. Yay!
Send us photos of your carts once your stickers come in!
I’m unable to control my excitement about getting to reveal the culmination of literally years of secret work: our Tiny Cartridge X Maré Odomo “Tiny Cart Sticker Pack,” produced and sold by Fangamer.
With these, you can decorate your DS or 3DS cartridges (or, anything, really) with the face of our mascot or the cover of an imaginary game by Maré!
Each sheet includes:
- Face in a Cart - Tiny Cartridge’s iconic mascot, now available as a for-real tiny cartridge
- Letters to an Absent Father - A tender note from Maré Odomo’s wistful comic series
- (Creepy) Black - Own the haunted game, the creepiest of pastas
- Kissing Party - Give your lips practice with casual pecks or passionate make-out moments
- A special (virtual) gift!
This is basically my favorite thing we’ve ever done, and you can get your own sheet for $5. I hope you enjoy them! Thanks to Fangamer and Maré for working with us on this weird daydream of a project, and thanks to you for even briefly considering a purchase!
Tiny Cartridge’s favorite tiny cartridges of ‘11
Now that 2011 is a couple weeks behind us and most other sites have published their “best games of the year” articles, we can put out the true list — real talk, the only one that matters: our favorite tiny cartridges of 2011!
Despite predictions of handheld gaming’s death, this was an exciting year for portable fans: we saw two new platforms launched (3DS, eShop), plenty of free digital releases, and developers showing what the DS is capable by putting out some of the finest releases for the system.
To prove how great last year was for tiny cartridges, here are ten of them (well, some aren’t technically tiny carts) from 2011 that you absolutely should have played.
