Kuru Kuru Kururin is a weirdly-named but wonderful (and original) Game Boy Advance game, developed by Eighting and first published by Nintendo in 2001.
The idea is that you have to control a spinning stick, and take it around a series of increasingly twisting and torturous courses, without touching the sides, or hitting other hazards. And do it against a time limit. It’s one of those games with a simple premise, but offers quite a tough and interesting challenge.
Drill Dozer is a fun, side-scrolling “drill ’em up” where you take control of a small tank with a drill on the front, which allows you to dig your way through the landscape and bump off your enemies. You can upgrade the drill as you play, which then requires the learning of new control techniques – using a kind of gear type system. It’s all quite clever and original.
Produced by Hideo Kojima (of Metal Gear fame) and released by Konami in 2003, Boktai: The Sun Is in Your Hand is a clever little action game that uses actual sunlight (as detected by a sensor on the game cartridge) to charge up a solar weapon, to be used against undead and vampires in the game.
Continue reading Boktai: The Sun Is in Your Hand, Game Boy Advance
Released in 2005 on the Nintendo GameCube in Japan, and 2006 everywhere else, Chibi-Robo! is a memorably cute third-person 3D exploration game in which you take control of a small, house-cleaning robot that must do chores for a nutty family in order to rise up the worldwide robo rankings.
Rare’s excellent Diddy Kong Racing arguably eclipsed Mario Kart on the Nintendo 64.
Qix was always a great arcade game, but turning the idea into an adventure for the Game Boy Colour was a stroke of genius for Taito.
Taito’s Lufia series has enjoyed moderate success over a number of platforms and releases over the decades, but this Game Boy Advance release (out in 2002 in Japan, and 2003 in North America – it never got an official European release) is the best game in the series, in my opinion.
Nintendo’s 2004 sequel is a brilliant update of the first Pikmin game, with split screen multiplayer, and challenging single-player story modes.
The King of Grabs 