Oh! Great Infernal God of Destruction!

You who hold our fate in your PSP of Darkness!

Give unto us, the villains of the land, the fruits of your wrath,

Lead us all into perdition, and deliver us from do-gooders.

Those folks at Acquire believe that there can never be too much of a bad, or rather evil, thing. They're out to prove it with Holy Invasion of Privacy, Badman! in 3D! (The "D" Stands for "Dungeon"), the next iteration of their quirky Dark Lord simulation series. No, they're not straying from the series sideview 2D format. They're just expanding our options.

First there's the Main Dungeon section, i.e. the meat of the game. With three areas, three levels of difficulty, and a total of thirty-three stages, there's something for everyone in the main portion of HIPD-3D. The second D is the Daily Dungeon, a set of mission-based challenges unrelated to the main storyline, but which are sure to keep players entertained. Last is the Mystery Dungeon, whose details remain to be quite mysterious.

Adding to the insanity, Acquire has a few more monsters available to would-be gods of destruction: the turtle-like Archelons, the deceptively beautiful Lotus, and a strange cloud creature all now haunt the depths.

So, heroes, what are you waiting for? Heh, heh, heh.

So you're walking around the corner to the 7-11 one night, looking to score some cup noodle and a box of pocky, when all of a sudden some dude in a red jumpsuit falls out of the sky and crashes at your feet. With the last of his strength he passes this snazzy belt on to you.

Congratulations, you're a superhero, the great Makenonger, now what?

Seriously, you still live with your parents, your diet consists mostly of cup noodle and diet soda, and you get winded climbing the stairs. The world can't be this desperately in need of saving, right?

Well consider this: Nippon Ichi is making a super-hero RPG. With their record for zany storylines, the world could very well be that desperate.

Sorry, world. This is your new savior and main character for Zettai Hero Kaizou Keikaku (Absolute Hero Makeover). While it's by the same guys who developed the Disgaea series, this one doesn't look to be a tactical game at all. Instead, it's a sort of dungeon-crawler action RPG. The main character is highly customizable, with all major body sections changeable.

It's not like you're completely going it alone, though. You've got some guidance in the former Makenonger and your new, cutesy-pink sidekick Etrange. Still, you're the one who has to go up against the big-time kaijuu invading the earth, not them.

So the question is, can you survive long enough to even make a difference?

Heaven help us all...

It's been a busy year for Gust. Just this March, they put out Atelier Annie, and then in June there was Atelier Rorona for the PS3. Now it turns out that there's yet another Atelier game in the works, due out this December.

The story as it goes: Lina thought she was having the best day of her life. She'd finally passed the alchemy licensing tests on her third try and was rushing home to tell her best friend Luon all about it. Unfortunately, not long afterwards there wasn't much of a home worth mentioning. A large section of the forest just went up in flames, and for lack of anyone better the fairy folk have decided to blame Lina and Luon for the damages. Like it or not, the two of them now find themselves in indentured servitude to the fairies, and have three years to help fix things. So, let's meet the cast!

The first two are Lina Alteria and Luon Volk. We already know what's going on with them, so let's move on. Next is Gerard, the local merchant prince and financial wiz-kid. Finally there's Fara, a student from a neighboring land who's looking to broaden her knowledge a bit.

Looking over the screenshots available, it's hard to tell what changes might have been made to this entry in the series. It certainly looks like the towns are a bit more explorable than in previous DS Atelier games, and at a guess I'd say that your party members get more special skills this time around as well. Beyond that, I'm not sure. Though I do like Lina's donkey cart.

Our last game of the day is a new one. WiZmans World (yes, with a Z) has just been announced for the DS "sometime." Jaleco hasn't seen fit to give us anything more substantial in terms of a release date. What they have deigned to give us is a story.

The town of Wizarest used to be a prosperous little burgh lying on the trade routes. That is, until the world started to come to an end. Not with a bang, nor with a whimper, but with slow, inexorable destructive force. The town itself has yet to succumb, but it lost all contact with the outside world years ago. The townsfolk have been left to ponder the inevitable.

One young man's reaction is, "Screw that!" He's determined to find a way out and has studied up as best he can on the magic of the land. With three little shapeshifting homunculi in tow, he's going to challenge the borders of reality and hopefully find not only a path to the world outside, but perhaps even a way of halting the progress of destruction.

Man, I wish I could have managed to fit TGS into my schedule. The big problem is, I have Sports Day this Sunday. Only slightly less problematic would have been convincing my boss to let me have Thursday and Friday (the only two days I actually work this week, because of the Silver Week holiday). Alas, it just was not meant to be. Again. Hopefully Chris is enjoying himself over there.

And that's the news from Hi-no-Kuni,

Your man in Japan,

Gaijin Monogatari