The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass -- The Controls.

I am roughly about to enter the third dungeon in Phantom Hourglass and I've spent enough time running around and exploring to feel confident in commenting on the controls. As mentioned in the previous entry The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass on the Nintendo DS controls entirely with the stylus. You point where you want Link to go and he follows along as if he were a dog on a leash. Essentially bringing PC point and click style control to the series. Link is still able to do everything he always did so nothing has been technically sacrificed in going with touch controls. Link still automatically jumps where appropriate. He still cuts grass and attacks poor defenseless signs with sword slashes. Only now they're done with a slash of the stylus to anything that's within range. The slash does need to be at the correct angle to register. It becomes quite intuitive to get the correct angle. Link is still able to do the sword spin. Only this time you quickly circle Link with the stylus to initiate the move. Combat is handled by merely tapping an enemy and Link will perform a lunging attack. The shield automatically works depending if you have it equipped and the level of the enemy attack. Link still has all his standard tools such as bombs and a shovel and the boomerang. You need to hit the item button on the lower right and then select whatever tool to equip. The tool icon will show up in the top left-hand corner and it shows the currently equipped tool. There two ways to access it. You can tap the tool icon itself or you can hold either the L or R button. I prefer the button method. Holding R with the bombs equipped makes Link hold the bomb over his head. You just tap where you want him to throw it and he throws it. Holding the button with the shovel equipped readies the shovel and you just tap the screen where you want Link to dig and he digs. Holding the button with the boomerang equipped allows you to actually draw out the flight path and then lifting the stylus from the screen sends the boomerang on its way. Link is able to creep, walk, or run depending on how far you point in front of him. To make Link roll you'll need to have him at a full run and on the far edge of the screen in whichever direction he's running you'll need to quickly draw a circle and he'll roll. The last one is pretty much the only one that's a tad iffy. Otherwise the controls work. And I guess one could make a claim that they're simplified and more inviting to the casual Nintendo DS owner who normally stays away from real games and is off playing Nintendogs and Brain Age. But I don't actually care if Nintendo needs to sell games to grandmas the world over. I only care about the game I'm playing for me. And I have to say while the controls technically work I do find myself wishing for a traditional configuration because as they are now it sort of feels like you're playing Zelda for Dummies.