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• Hollywood 61 Hands-on

  Yes, the 3DS is the most exciting thing to happen in gaming this year. Disagree? Well, sorry - you're just plain wrong. Nintendo's new handheld sings and dances with as much verve and gusto as the hype that's surrounded it since its first unveiling at E3 last month, and another very welcome chance to go hands-on with the device does little to quell our excitement.

   

  But our first chance to actually play a third party offering does its very best to hold our expectations in check, and while the likes of the long overdue Pilotwings reboot sends our heads spinning in the clouds, Ubisoft's Hollywood 61 keeps our feet firmly on the ground. It's not that it's bad - this is an early glimpse at just a slither of a game that's some way off of release - it's just that it fails to live up to its spectacular platform.

   

   

  

   

  A puzzle collection that's wrapped in a noir-tinged narrative - think Hotel Dusk meets Professor Layton but don't expect the quality levels of either of those games - Hollywood 61 isn't the greatest of showcases for the 3DS's capabilities. Opening with a non-interactive cutscene, it offers a mesh of styles that can't quite sync with each other; the story is framed in gumshoe fashion by a man behind the wheel of a car who is a curious mix of live action and cel-shading, the end result like someone's lazily swiped a paint-brush over a B-Movie Bogart impersonator.

   

  As the car pulls up outside an LA cinema the 3DS briefly dazzles, displaying an admirable level of depth and rendering an equally impressive model of the vehicle itself. The mini-game that follows isn't quite so spectacular; a simple light-switch game set within the rafters of the cinema, it's more trial and error than anything else and forms a disappointing centrepiece to the demo. There's a bit more exposition at the mini-game's end, revealing a dead body and a crudely drawn threat on the stage curtain, though it's far from dramatic.

   

  Despite this unflattering first showing - which is, in part, down to how wonderful everything else currently looks on the 3DS - there is potential here, and if it's 149 other mini-games offer a little more depth and engagement and the noir stylings come together this could yet be a worthwhile addition to the handheld's library.