I intended to wait until sunday to sit down and write something thoughtful about Rocket Slime (Slime Mori Mori 2, here in japan), but having plowed through the game in under 2 days, I was worried the impression the game left with me would be lost by then.

On monday night, after a short drinking session, I was berated by several GAF members (namely Dragona) to pick up Rocket Slime. I felt rather silly that, despite Slime Mori Mori 2 being available in Japan for the last 5 months, I never really got around to picking up the little gem, for a variety of thinly veiled and silly reasons.

I finally broke, and used some points to pick up the game (I also sold back my copy of God Hand...shush, don't tell anyone), and arrived at home. I left the game sitting on my couch for a good 20 minutes, checking news and eating dinner, before I finally broke down, cracked open the case, and popped the pint sized card into my DS Lite.

Friends had raved about the game's tank battles, so despite some initial ambivalence towards the initial level of the game, I plodded on. As I finished the first stage, and the early events of the game unfolded, I was met with a horrible realization: this is a collectathon!

This isn't to say that collecting something in a game is bad. In fact, it's quite the contrary. Unfortunately, I have a terrible habit. I often miss 1 or 2 pieces of something I must collect...out of 100. There is nothing more annoying than missing 1 or 2 pieces, and having no idea where you missed them, and no idea where you have and haven't been.

In Slime Mori Mori 2, you save citizens of the slime kingdom from evil, and 100 of the slimes are scattered about the levels. As usual, in every level, I would miss 1 or 2. Why 1 or 2? Often times, the ones I was missing were grouped together in a room that I had completely disregarded for god knows what reason. For those who are truly worried about my wellbeing, I did indeed find all 100. Crisis averted.

The real meat of the game is the tank battling, though. While the game proper, most of the time, is a zelda style adventure game, everything you do in the game flows into the tank battles. Items, health, rescued slimes; everything is geared towards improving your tank for upcoming battles.

Tank battles themselves are genius. For once, I actually couldn't figure out how it could have been done on a system without two screens. On the top screen, the two opposing tanks sit, firing volleys (or straight shots) of random items at each other to cause damage. On the lower screen, you control your slime hero, and run around either loading cannons with ammo, or infilitrating enemy tanks in an effort to throw their operation into disarray.

The most classic technique is the ability to launch yourself from your own cannon into the enemy base, and then proceed to demolish machinery in the enemy tank, not only causing an ammo shortage, but also preoccupying the enemy crew long enough to disrupt the firing flow.

The concept of a Zelda style game with tank battles seems disjointed in concept, but the flow of the game is so ingeniously devised, that it makes one wonder how Slime Mori Mori as a game survived with that vital puzzle piece tying the entire game together into a unique and addictive package.

I hate to give letter or number grades in reviews, and instead favor the binary "buy" or "don't buy" scheme that should have been adopted by gaming publications eons ago.

Regardless of that useless prattling, I would have to say that Slime Mori Mori 2 is a "buy," though I'll admit, there was no trying point counting or feature weighing to come to that conclusion. The game is downright fantastic.