Boktai: the Sun is in Your Hand

The game detects UV light. The game also is set to your local location and time and everything in the game factors into this.What does this mean? You play in the daytime and game is easier, if the clouds come out you play at a slight disadvantage, you play at nighttime and the game gets much harder. Also the game plays on a little while your switched off. I captured one vampire, quit the game because I couldn't kill him at night. When I started the game the following day I had found the vampire had done a runner back to his crypt. Kind of cool.But the games greatest point is its greatest failing. The sunlight meter. You cannot kill the major vampires without sunlight. This means you can play up to a point in the game before you need sunshine. Sounds great? Try playing the first level in 10-20 minutes only to find you have to wait three days before there is enough sunshine to kill the vampire. Further into the game you get powerups and weapons that allow you to play on without sunlight but ending the major levels you need it.The game is not a shoot-em-up. It is a thinking game. Even in the combat you have to hoard the sunlight in your gun and bank as much as possible. If you like thinking games, this is certainly for you. Mindless shooting will end the game very quickly for you, unless you live in a country that gets more then a couple of hours sunlight a day.It is the lack of sunlight that is making me not play the game as often as I would like.

This game has to get top marks for originality - using an in-built solar panel in the game pack, which measures the amount of sunlight and effects what happens in the game. You did hear me right, by the way. In order for this game to work you will need sunlight. This means you will have to go outside - a foreign place for most gamers. Time to get the sun mat, sunglasses and factor 30 out, because with Boktai you have to have sunlight. At first glance, Boktai seems to be a basic rpg/shoot-em-up, having the usual array of dungeons and bosses. But after looking at it in detail, you realise that Boktai is an innovative and well-designed game.In Boktai: The Sun is in your Hand you have the role of Solar Boy Jango, a vampire hunter and the last hope of destroying the vampires and monsters that have gathered in the city of Istrakan. Your main weapon is a solar gun, which is where the sunlight comes in. In order for your gun to work, it needs sunlight to charge it up. The stronger the sunlight hitting the solar panel on the game pack, the faster the gun charges up. In order for you to rid Istrakan of evil, you must purify dark guardians using sunlight, while completing many dungeons full of monsters and puzzles along the way. As you progress though the game, your solar gun can be upgraded in a number of ways - adding a larger battery and changing its actual frame to make it fire different types of shots. For example you can equip the 'javelin' frame which has a shot similar to a shotgun, but is only effective at short range, and there is the 'gradius' frame which gives you automatic fire, but depletes the gun's battery very quickly. Your solar gun can also be equipped with a number of different lenses depending on what enemies or situations you are faced with. Flame lenses are good at defeating ice enemies, and frost lenses are unsurprisingly good at destroying fiery enemies. Add a grenade launcher and you have a surprisingly effective weapon.What makes Boktai different from other rpg's is not only the solar panel, but also the fact that you have to use Metal Gear style stealth in order to do well in the game. Run behind a ghoul when it's back is turned and stun it; shimmy along a wall past a sleeping mummy; knock on a wall to draw the attention of a golem; or simply fire a stun grenade to knock out all the monsters in a room. Of course if you can't be arsed to do that then you can go for the gung-ho approach and simply kill everything that moves, not caring about stealth at all. However, the grade you are given at the end of each dungeon is affected greatly by the amount of times you are found by a monster, as well as the amount of times you are killed and the length of time taken to complete the dungeon. During the game you come across 'Dark guardians,' in which you must fight and purify, as you cannot kill immortals. However, in order to purify them, you have to drag their coffins all the way back through the dungeon. Meaning you have to try to be a stealthy as possible, whilst contending with the annoyed guardian shaking about in his coffin. This makes the game a bit more of a challenge and is not the usual defeat-the-boss-at-the-end-of-the-dungeon type game. The music is variable, with the odd decent tune here and there. As well as the odd decent tune, however, there are a few down right awful tunes, and it seems unfortunately that these ones were picked for the majority of the dungeons, which can get extremely annoying. This is the game's only major down fall however, with the graphics and the storyline being rock solid throughout. There's even some twists thrown in at the end, making an overall decent rpg. Not quite in the league of Golden Sun but a satisfying game nonetheless, and it's the only game that is guaranteed to give you a tan.

This is probably one of the best games that will ever grace the GBA. It has gorgeous graphics and outstanding gameplay all rolled up with a brilliant story line.The idea is so simple, yet Konami have pulled it off brilliantly. You play a young sun child who's job is to negotiate dungeons and traps to reach the vampire, upon reaching which you must re-negotiate the dungeons to your pile driver. The use of the sun works brilliantly. The main use of which is to power your main weapon and the pile driver to cleanse the vampires. Skylights are found around the dungeons, and if you are able to lure the undead into them you will have teh pleasure of watching them dissolve. The strength of the sun will also alter how the game responds. The stronger it is the quicker your weapon will recharge and the faster puddles in the game will evaporate. However as friends have found, the game is addictive and sun burn is a danger.Fans of RPG's must own this game, and fans of the Metal Gear series will also not be dissapointed, as all the tactics used for stealth in those games have been incorporated into this new little gem.

Nintendo really need to advertise more, everyone with a gameboy should own this game. Basically it's a cross between Zelda and Castlevania with a dash of Metal Gear Solid. Nice graphics, easy to get into and so on, but once you add the solar sensor to the mix; it goes from being a good game to being a great game. After only a few minutes it seems like such an obvious and brilliant innovation that you can't help but wonder why no one did it before.Getting too much sun is an issue, but if you do the gun will over-heat and you're instructed to go and sit in the shade, which is nice. Even on a very cloudy day I found I was able to get just enough light to charge my gun, so no worries there (you can’t just sit under a lamp, I tried). In short; the world needs more games like this. A+

great game although the sunlight is an issue.i just sit under a lamp.you can charge your gun if you site under stong light which is no ordinary light, you need specialised spotlights. if you have them or live in a sunny country (unlike me! i live in england! :S) then your ok!