Golden Sun: Dark Dawn Impressions

Nintendo of America CEO Reggie Fils-Aime has a way of commanding a crowd. At Nintendo's E3 2010 press conference, he used his imposing presence to great effect to introduce a new trailer for the upcoming Golden Sun game for the DS, called Golden Sun: Dark Dawn. It wasn't a long trailer, but it was long enough to whet our appetites for what the game has in store for us. Fils-Aime also tantalized us with a release window: Dark Dawn is coming this holiday season.

"The world has been reborn," the trailer tells us. "Something has gone wrong," it admonishes. What follows is a series of images that cut in and out, giving us a sense of what we can expect from the newest Golden Sun. From the glimpses we get, it's clear that this role-playing game will feature attractive, sun-drenched environments and fantastic magic effects. We saw the screen light up with crystalline magic and watched a tornado terrorize its victims, though the magic and environments weren't the only impressive-looking parts of the trailer. The enemies also look extremely imaginative, from a giant flying plesiosaur to a huge robotic tank. Of the brief gameplay portions shown, we saw a bit of mid-dungeon block pushing, which hopefully means we can expect some fun puzzle-solving and cave crawling.

Nintendo knows (as Shakespeare knew) that brevity is the soul of wit, so there was little of substance to sink our teeth into--no gameplay demonstration or explanation of the game's mechanics. But these short peeks at Golden Sun: Dark Dawn has us excited to see more of this eye-catching RPG. We'll bring you more as we inch closer to the game's holiday release.