DS Review: Clubhouse Games

Mini-game compilations are a no-brainer for the DS; the touch screen lends itself perfectly to quick and twitchy gaming action. Super Mario 64 DS and New Super Mario Bros. included great mini-games, and last year’s Bomberman Land Touch! Mixed RPG elements with minigames and ended up being great. Last October, Nintendo released Clubhouse Games, a massive collection of minigames featuring online play that is addictive, lots of fun, and offers a great amount of variety for gamers. Unfortunately the game isn’t selling as well as its makers might have hoped. Despite these slow sales, our review found that the game is well worth the price of admission and offers a great deal of value to those who decide to pick it up; continue reading to find out why you should not miss this diamond in the rough.

Clubhouse Games features over 40 different games, divided into different sections. You have Card Games such as Rummy, Spit, Memory, Texas Hold ‘Em, President, Blackjack, and numerous others. Also included are board games such as Chess, Checkers, Backgammon, Dominoes, and Turncoat, to name but a few. The game even features more sophisticated Action games such as Billiards, Bowling, and Darts. The variety of gameplay is insane; over 40 games with customizable rules and both single and multiplayer action extend the replay value of the game to great extents.

You can play any game just for fun and challenge a CPU opponent of a determined skill level. You can also enter Stamp Mode, in which you go from one game to the next, playing it enough times to win stamps and move on to the next game. This is a great way to get to know all the games and their rules, which are explained in easy-to-understand manuals with visual aids. Another form of play known as Mission Mode gives you specific tasks to complete on certain games, such as pocketing three balls in Billiards with a single shot or scoring a certain amount of points with 10 dart shots. There are some single-player-exclusive games such as Solitaire and Escape, which are very fun and challenging.

As robust as the single player experience is, the core appeal of Clubhouse Games is its multiplayer support. You can play any game with local friends with a single copy of the game. By doing so, you can PictoChat with friends as you play, complete with colors. If no local friends are available, hop online and play with random worldwide gamers using Nintendo’s Wi-Fi Connection service. Over 30 of the games available feature online multiplayer; some, such as Bowling, Balance and Darts can support up to eight players against each other. As you play with online opponents, you can send pre-set messages such as ‘Good Luck!’ and ‘That was Close’. This isn’t as fun as full voice chat or PictoChat support, but at least we get some form of communication during online play. Of course, if you take the time to enter Friend Codes, you can PictoChat with friends online. Searching for opponents is easy, and there’s always someone ready to play, and the game features leaderboard rankings; no wonder we included Clubhouse Games in our Best Nintendo DS Wi-Fi Games List.

Every action in the game is controlled solely with the stylus, and it’s all intuitive and easy to do. Although some imposed rules are sometimes lacking, particularly on certain card games, everything is well organized and laid out, allowing for a great gaming experience for hardcore and casual gamers alike. The game’s audio and graphics are quite plain, but the game shines were it counts; great fun and addictive gameplay for everyone.

Clubhouse Games is the perfect representation of Nintendo’s Blue Ocean strategy for which the Touch Generations series was developed; great fun for everyone regardless of gaming experience. The game is quite possibly the best multiplayer game available for the system, with over 40 mini-games most of which can be played with local friends or online. Great variety, high replay value, robust online features and addictive gameplay make Clubhouse Games a must-own for every Nintendo DS player.

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