Note: The following is all written in streams of consciousness during my time with the game.

From glancing at the title screen, it looks like you can send a demo to another DS. Props to the developers for actually using an under-utilized DS feature. Now Ubisoft has replaced those kinds of bonuses with DSi Camera functionality. I really enjoyed tearing down "Wanted" posters of my own face in that Assassin's Creed II DS game, guys. Keep up the work.

One of the two is visually appealing. Guess which one.

So this stars 2008 Prince. Elika, Ahriman, and Ormazd (the female sidekick, villain, and fallen god of the 2008 version respectively) are all mentioned in the prologue, which confuses me. I can't tell if this takes place during, after, or outside of the 2008 Xbox 360/PlayStation 3 version. I don't know if the game is even aware of the other game or if the developers of this and the 2008 game were just given a base storyline to work with and sent off to their own machinations.

Now the Magus fellow is running into the Prince…and now he's gone. Let's wait for this loading screen of the Prince running in place to end so I can see how this game plays.

It's all stylus controlled, which means this intro level just devolves into leading the Prince around the touch screen and tapping or double-tapping certain areas to get the Prince to jump, roll, or attack villainous boulders.

Story note: Apparently corruption is formal and needs to be capitalized, as the Prince says "this kingdom looks Corrupted." I might start using this style in my everyday writing. For example, "this game is looking kind of Crappy."

Is it just me, or does it look like he's crying?

You can collect coins to unlock doors in levels, which I'm pretty sure is required in some parts and might possibly hide secrets later on. This game still isn't evolving past "tap a bunch of things to proceed." Wall jumping is especially boring, because you just tap a lot. Tapping isn't better than a button press.

Now we're getting somewhere. The Magus dude is locked up, so I need to go fetch things to free him. Hopefully things will get more interesting when I free him.

First boss fight is this Magus guy. I'm weak against his magic, so I have to trick him into hurting himself. It is not an uninteresting boss fight, but not a great one either. Unfortunately, he escapes afterwards, and it looks he won't be my ally yet. Rats. I might not get to check out a part of the game that is advertised on the back of the box during this feature.

I'm learning, as I'm going through the second area (world? I don't know, they're undefined), that platforming with a stylus sucks. There's no precision, especially since everything is executed by tapping. The game can't differentiate between a tap for a short jump, a long jump, or hanging off a cliff. It's really frustrating.

Similarities: Name. Differences: Pretty Much Everything Else.

I finally got Magus to befriend me. Sadly, he's nowhere near as cool as Chrono Trigger's Magus. He's just a lame little magician who floats behind the Prince and shoots out magic whenever I hold a button down and tap the screen. A little later on, he starts being able to click and drag stuff.

I think that's a good time to put this game down and to rest.

Played for more than an hour and completed about 20 percent of the game. Made it halfway through the second area/world.