Review: Super Monkey Ball Touch and Roll (DS)

Score: 84

A word of confession here: we'd never played any of the previous Super Monkey Ball games on older Nintendo hardware, so this is a review from a first-timer!

As the name suggests, the core game is about rolling a ball with errrr... a monkey in it, around a series of 100 usually fiendishly designed aerial levels. Control of the ball is using the stylus on the toushscreen, applying a 'tilt' to the virtual world and causing the ball to roll this way and that - the system takes a little getting used to, but at least it's 'analogue' and fairly intuitive. The puzzles, as you might expect ramp up and up and your monkey and ball will be taking many a dive into the ocean below before you get too far. The gameplay's tried and tested and there are no complaints here.

Just as welcome as the main game though are the extras, the 'party' games, which are available at all times. My favourite is Monkey Bowling, which does a darned good job of being a 3D ten pin bowling simulation:

Monkey Hockey is air hockey, of course, but it's smooth and fun and will while away many a spare minute:

Monkey mini-golf is another nice extra, with some again interestingly designed aerial holes, all using the same 3D engine as the main game. Tactics and power control play an equal part here and it's great to have this as an extra:

Other party games include Monkey Race (a hard-to-control racing sim), Monkey Fight (a frantic boxing fight game that we couldn't get the hang of at all) and Monkey Wars (a cartoon shoot 'em up that works well but is spoilt by clumsy handling of 'turn left/right' controls).

Touch and Roll isn't perfect by any means - the main game controls have a bit of a learning curve and some of the party games are flawed - but there's still a lot here for your money. If you add in the different characters you can play as and various options and skill levels in all the party games, then mount on top the fact that you can do single cartridge multiplayer games, you'll see why we gave Super Monkey Ball Touch and Roll such a high score.

(Buy Super Monkey Ball Touch and Roll for the Nintendo DS Lite now)