PANG: Magical Michael

Michael, an aspiring young magician, has failed an experiment - leading to dire consequences. Balloons have been dispersed, causing trouble to landmarks and cities all around the world. Now, Michael must travel the globe to destroy these balloons and clean up his mistake, before it's too late!

Official Nintendo Magazine awarded it 73/100, saying "This is very hard to put down".

NintendoLife scored it 8/10, with "...you can't really go wrong taking a chance on this if you're the slightest bit interested."

D+PAD Magazine gave it 4/5, with "Pang: Magical Michael is an engaging and consistently entertaining experience. Perfectly pitched for the portable gaming market, it also proves that there are ways out of creative cul-de-sacs - you just need to find the right developer!"

And Cubed3 gave it 9/10, saying "Magical Michael proves itself to be an addictive, high value game that deserves to be recognised amongst the DS's best."

Features

• Classic Pang gameplay which made the original so popular

• Over 40 levels in Tour Mode, taking in some of the world's most famous landmarks and cities, with more hidden stages

• Collect over 20 unique power-up items

• Challenge your nerves across 99 levels in Panic Mode

• Compete against your friends and family via multi-card play or online Wi-Fi play

• Compare your scores with other players using Online World Rankings
  

User reviews

I'm a big Pang fan and this game does not disappoint - on the whole. The gameplay is excellent and as a fan of the series and a perfectionist I'm only critical of the finer details of the presentation out of love, rather than hate.

Whilst it plays a great game of Pang the main character sprite and animation are pretty bad. The voice overs are also bad - low sound quality, a regional English person doing an emotionless, fake american accent. Criminally the voice overs cannot be skipped. Restarting a level was always an instant thing in the previous games and it's not anymore. Also, previously when finishing a stage you could hold the fire button to speed up the celebration/confetti. That also isn't possible which slows the game down a little more.

Pang:MM most similar to the most recent arcade game in the series Mighty Pang (which I happen to own on arcade board) in its style of graphics and the types of platforms and power-ups that appear. All through the series Mitchell Corp have continued to move it on by adding more powerups and platform/ball types. They've always managed to keep the heart of the game in place though.

What I love about this version is that it has continued to build on what has gone before. It's still the round the world tour but with more locations, more game modes, and each level is designed as well as ever. The score challenges or "gold" scores require a subtly different method of play than simply clearing the stage. I love that it works on those two very different levels. It sits well on the fine line between challenge and fairness.

I'd love to see a straight conversion of Mighty Pang for WiiWare/Virtual Arcade. But for now I'm happy to see a new incarnation of one of my all-time favourite games. If you've played any of the series in the past you'll not be disappointed. An essential purchase for arcade fans and DS owners alike.

gingerbeardman

The PANG series dates back over two decades and the core gameplay has consistently kept long-term fans happy, no matter what format it appeared on. Proving to be a massive success in the past, it is surprising that developer Mitchell Corporation has chosen to leave PANG behind and focus more on the likes of Polarium, actionloop and its various DSiWare games (Wakugumi, Sujin Taisen).

Now the Japanese team has created a fresh version that removes the annoying little boys of the original (the tackily named 'Buster Bros.') and replaces them with a suave magician named Michael who uses his magical staff to burst the balloons he accidentally released into the world, splitting the largest ones in half, then repeating the process on the smaller ones until they eventually disappear. As well as the standard magic attack, Magical Michael can use various other methods to burst balloons, including picking up the ability to launch a wide spread of playing cards to destroy more balloons at once, in addition to collecting other special items that can place a protective bubble around the protagonist or even momentarily stop the flight of the balloons.

As well as the standard adventure mode, where Magical Michael must traverse well-known locations around the world to clean up his mess, there are extra challenges that unlock further down the line where things take a tasty turn for the better, with Michael able to jump and pop balloons by bouncing off the top of them, shoot energy balls upwards, and so on. These are a great way to break up the standard play time and avoid boredom setting in, or even frustration when getting stuck on the plethora of extremely tough stages faced much further into the game.

As if that wasn't enough, there are a whole host of achievements to unlock, online leaderboards and a secret Touch Mode that unlocks after making enough progress, where Mitchell has expertly adapted the standard gameplay to a touch-screen-only set-up that would have actually worked very well as an open mode right from the off.

As for the visual and audio style, Mitchell has worked within its limited budget to ensure the game is as colourful and interesting as possible, yet not making the screen overly crammed with detail. Previously there was support from Capcom for other PANG games, and its recent DS, DSiWare and WiiWare releases have had Nintendo's backing. PANG: Magical Michael was done completely off the back of Mitchell alone, and the result is very impressive, using the work of the artist that worked on Mighty PANG. In terms of the soundtrack, there are so many extremely catchy tunes throughout that it would be great to have the music available separately...and the voices have a certain charm, giving Michael his own character that will hopefully be developed further for the planned sequel.

For now, though, be sure to grab this classic - one of the best action puzzle games available on the Nintendo DS, and one that is most definitely deserving of the 8/10 and 9/10 scores it's been receiving from many reviewers in the media. If you want the classic PANG experience with a whole host of new features and a brand new look, check out this bargain release!

AdamC3