Well, greetings once again, fellow humans! We have arrived to another heartwarming moment with your host, Conquer001.

You might have already been very familier with the fact that most of my posts consists of reviews of sorts, but so far, on gaming devices and gaming titles. Well, I'll be doing just that. However, being a human for a couple of weeks without any form of venting methods is both mentally, physically, and psychologically damaging, which will lead us to the 2nd posting of expressing hatred and disgust to my family members and life itself.

Therefore, if your purpose here is to read the reviews, I ask that to just stay with for the next few moments while I savagely type away the building frustrations before getting to the meat of the post.

Now, first of all, as you all might have already know if you have been diligently reading my previous posts, I have quite a grudge against the very blood-kin. You might think that it's because of petty disagreements and stuff. Think again, my meat-bag friend. (That's a joke. Please don't take it seriously.)

Here's a very good example of a case of biaseness within the family; my younger who went to Argentina for the Biology Olympiad, is a very smart kid and has won many favors with the family inside out, including relatives and stuff. My parents would go to the extend of even buying a brand new, I repeat, BRAND NEW Panasonic Lumix Digital Camera, for him because of the trip. However, when I have to go to India for education reasons as well, they didn't even bother. Well, to the people on the sidelines this seems like nothing more than jealousy of the elder brother to the younger one.

But then again, this is just one of the many scenarios. Another one is after this incident, when my friends (Which there a few, by the way. The reason? I'll explain in due time. =) ) came for a visit to my house and I just simply wanted to take a picture of the sunset of my house, which on that specific day was exceptionally beautiful. However, the crappy camera function of my mother's phone failed to do it justice and so, I forced myself to borrow my brother's digital property to take it in a better and clear resolution than I've ever seen. (Well, technically speaking, I've seen better. But I meant that in contrasts to the stuff in my household.) When I finally took it and transfer ONLY the pictures that I've taken to the computer, my friends asked me about the origins of the camera. I explained that it was my brother's, but my brother overheard it and corrected me by saying that it belongs to the family. Do you believe that? Personally, I do not and I avoid borrowing it, not to mention even touching it, if there's ever a situation where the camera would fail and the family would once again point their accusing fingers at me, declaring in an unanimous vote that I'm guilty again.

*Takes a deep breathe and leans back on the chair. Closes eyes for a few minutes.*

... ... ...
... ... ...
... ... ...
... ... ...

Phew! Thank you for your endurance. Consider yourself to have earn 20 Conquer points for future redemption of my personally crafted, microwaved Cheese Pizza... if I ever knew how to make one.

Anyway, to the juice of the story: Today's Game review would be the recent release of one of Japan's popular gaming titles for the PS2, which this time is for the NDS. The title?

Tenchu: Dark Secret

For the PS2 devouts, if you happen to have the NDS system, you would most likely would have gotten yourself this game, which is english now, by the way. Tenchu: Dark Secret, or Tenchu DS, is a ninja-era game set in ancient Japan, where you control either gender of two ninjas, whose mission is to rescue a princess who is being fought over by 2 warlords. Talk about lust for beauty.

Anyway, Tenchu DS is somewhat similar to the gameplay of Metal Gear, a stealth-based game, which would suit the nature of this game title extremely well. The difference is that you do it all in the view of a third-person or what we would say it as a bird's-eye view. You seek to eliminate the threats towards the princess by navigating around the map, seeking the opponents, killing them either in plain sight or do it ninja-style, from the back without them noticing.

You would most likely be using the directional-controls, the A, B, X, Y buttons, and the shoulder buttons, L and R. Why? Because there's just does not seem to have enough options of touch-screen capability except like selecting items and stuff, which you can easily do so with the controls as well, so the touch-screen function is kinda redundant in this game.

However, as much as it uses these simple controls, it still takes time to master the skills and techniques to successfully kill your enemies. Fortunately, the game offers more than just plain samurai-sword slashing and hacking. You can have numerous options of eliminating your targets with methods such as poisoning, traps, bombs, throwing stars, many more for you to unlock and discover.

Also, the game story proceeds in a style of mission-accomplishing, in which you must fulfill various mission objectives taking place in different locations. However, so far the number of different terrains seems pretty limited and at most of the time, these terrains seems to be used for different mission objectives in the same places.

It could get kinda boring but hey, maybe playing it a little longer might prove otherwise.

The game also comes with basic tools construction, such as making a rice-pack for restoring your health, or constructing a bamboo-trap with the materials you find in the field. You also can purchase such items via shops and you obtain money by selling the bounties, which are the enemies that you've killed, and earn those cash.

Finally, the Wi-Fi feature. I was pretty much looking forward to it as it seems to give me the idea that you could take on a complete stranger over the net and fight him or her, ninja-style. However, reality couldn't have taken a more drastic way to prove me wrong. Apparently, the Wi-Fi feature is for you to set up a virtual store so that people can buy your goods, or you can do it the other way round. In other words, the Wi-Fi function for Tenchu DS has been reduced to a virtual marketplace to sell your wares. Quite disappointing to me, if I might say so myself, and I'm pretty sure this will come as a shock too to the people who have bought the game.

Nonetheless, for Metal Gear addicts, this handheld version of ninja stealth should do well it quenching the thirst of shadow-killing but might dull you after a while.

I'll give this game a 7.5/10, because the mis-treating of the touchscreen and the Wi-Fi function just simply do not do justice to the potential of the game.