When I asked Ashley Monif to tell me about Fieldrunners, the first thing he did was start rattling off awards the game had won. Small wonder, because the game spent six months in the top twenty on the iTunes App Store, made Time Magazine’s top ten game of 2008, and won best game in the IGF Mobile competition. That’s not bad for a tower defense game that started out with four towers and no sound effects. Check out the full text of the interview to read about the game in depth, accessibility in the RTS genre, and how Subatomic Studios ended up developing for the App store in the first place.

That’s right! He’s single, Ladies! Following up on the Tingle teaser seen in Famitsu two weeks ago, Nintendo has announced that the fairy-obsessed mapmaker from Majora’s Mask is getting a second game. It seems that Nintendo is trying to emphasize that Tingle doesn’t solely follow around little boys, because his upcoming game is entitled Irozuki [...]

Although the DSi may not be the revolutionary leap that investors or gamers could hope, 1up has posted a hands-on evaluation of the Japan release of the new handheld. It’s pretty long as a 30-minute video, but we’ve detailed the novel highlights below (check here for the old stuff).

Smoothing out the experience: Owners of the original DS and the DS Lite make constant use of the power switch. Any time you change settings, swap game cartridges, or use the download play function, you have to power the system down to return to the main menu. The DSi will function more like the Xbox 360 dashboard, and rarely requires a restart. Functions are hot-swappable, and the power button now functions as a reset button as well. It’s not a huge change, but it makes the device more useable overall.

Real-time Camera Work: The DSi’s camera might not be particularly impressive as an image capture tool, but it’s a surprisingly smart image distortion tool. The DSi’s image manipulation software operates on the digital information stream before you capture any images. Unlike, say, Photoshop, where you edit static information to correct artifacts, the DSi’s image manipulation software lets you do your tweaking so that you start with the best image possible. Of course, the tools aren’t terribly powerful, but it’s a spiffy inversion of the way things are normally done.

Face Facts: The camera is also good at picking out faces and facial features. Even in poor light and unfavorable angles, the camera can accurately tack a pair of cartoon sunglasses over your eyes or a pair of wax lips over your mouth. Although that’ll be interesting for about seven seconds, it does mean the the DSi stands a good chance of being a successful EyeToy clone. Better still, its portability may make it the life of the public-embarrassment party!

The Incredible Shrinking DS: Losing the GBA slot seems to have made a difference, because the DSi appears to be even lighter than the Lite. This is good news for your carpal tunnel, but bad news in case of a strong breeze.

It’s still not looking like it’ll be worth swapping your existing lite for a new DSi (unless you’re made of disposable income), but the improved usability and possible new gameplay may well justify it as the preferred alternative for fresh purchases.

Edit: Oof, it looks like the battery life has taken a hit that’s measured in hours, though. There’s a portable caveat for you.

Nintendo’s Tokyo press conference revealed quite a bit of news from the usually tight-lipped company, but the DS hardware update, the DSi, has dominated the industry chatter. Unfortunately for Nintendo, not much of it has been positive.

The new device will feature a 0.3 megapixel camera, a bigger screen, the ability to play AAC files, and a new SD slot to load those files up. The SD card will also function as a storage device for a new download service that will bring digital distribution to the handheld. Heck, slap telecommunications in there and it’s a cheap iPhone.

All the new functionality occupies space, though, and the GBA slot has been removed to make room. Fans of Guitar Hero: On Tour and backwards-compatible gaming at large will be disappointed by the loss. The price of entry has risen as well, and the whole package is being promised to Japan at the equivalent of $180, just $70 cheaper than a Wii.

Investors were not impressed by Nintendo’s announcement, and the company’s stock dropped by nearly 9% after the announcement. Adding to these troubles, developer Martyn Brown criticized the SD slot, warning that it would make the device more susceptible to piracy.

The handheld is scheduled to appear sometime in late 2009. With all the criticism flying around, Nintendo will be burdened with either changing the handheld or trying to demonstrate its worth.