iPhone

2011 has the potential to be a big year for video games. We're weeks away from seeing the Nintendo 3DS hit retail, motion control technology for the Sony PlayStation 3 and Microsoft Xbox 360 will continue to mature, and there's going to be plenty of software just waiting to be bought. Before the year really gets into high gear, I'm going to log five predictions here about some events that I think will happen.

Here comes the gushing: It's the best 3-D platformer ever made. I said it on the podcast, and I'll say it here too: Every level is like opening a present. No game released this year offers such a relentless onslaught of creativity and joy.

All Matchy-Matchy

HIGH Scoring a dozen chained matches with one move brings forth big, silly, grins.

LOW The anxiety and dread elicited by the Ice Storm Mode are deadly.

WTF I have no idea how anyone could match six gems at once without the use of Lady Luck's hands.

Castlevania Puzzle: Encore of the Night rocks.

No, seriously, it does.

So you're Nintendo. You've been sitting atop the handheld mountain for like 20 years. During that time you've seen challengers come and go—Atari (Lynx), NEC (TurboExpress), Sega (Game Gear), SNK (Neo Geo Pocket Color), Bandai (Wonderswan) and finally Sony (PlayStation Portable). All of these devices possessed features and technology that surpassed anything Nintendo offered, but Nintendo still outsold them and did so with a single, very simple philosophy: release cheap, existing technology with a long battery life, at a low price. It worked so well that with every new competitor, Nintendo would fall back on that practice.

Ringing... Ringing...

HIGH Ah, the soothing sound of windchimes... how relaxing!

LOW Doesn't seem long on its legs.

WTF It's not a flashy game, but I think App Store reviewers are awfully harsh on such an inexpensive purchase. (Admittedly a common problem in the App Store.)

For those of you who've been paying attention to the puzzle genre lately, you may have been hearing the name "Capy" popping up lately, and for good reason. Nathan Vella, co-founder and president of Capybara Games and his team have crafted some strong titles worthy of attention, and they've got more in the pipe sure to make a splash.I recently had the opportunity to ask Nathan a few questions about their current smash Critter Crunch, the studio and more.

Imagine selling lightning in a bottle. It's a curious and somewhat paradoxical image, isn't it? Our heads can't quite wrap around the idea of packaging the intangible... of owning a fleeting moment in time that leaves behind nothing when it is gone. That's because lightning isn't an object. It's an idea. It's the way our eyes and minds make sense of natural phenomena, ionic polarization and discharge in the atmosphere. These phenomena exist in physical space, in our reality, but the visual impact of their interaction—the brilliant ghost image left in our heads, the multi-veined concept we call "lightning"—doesn't exist as we perceive it. Yet it exists for us.