There's more in store for you European gamers as Square Enix promises to send out more Taito classics your way, especially after the highly impressive outcome of the Space Invaders Extreme for the DS. Reports have it that you can expect the classics rollin' out your way this summer of 2009.

Electronic Arts' web-based casual gaming site Pogo.com features a whole lot of games playable right from the get-go, as long as you have a browser with Flash support and some time to kill.

EA though is wrapping up a collection of five Pogo games and slapping "For the DS" onto them. Yep, you heard that right the first time: the DS is getting some Pogo love, from Word Whomp to Phlinx, under the packaged name Pogo Island.

Word Whomp is pretty much your Text Twist buddy with a whole tropical feel. Poppit is similar to Bejeweled only this comes with balloons and some good popping.  Tri-Peake Solitaire gives all those who just can't seem to find a complete deck anymore a chance to play the old Solitaire again. Squelchies is a game where three same colored aquatic creatures paves way for more creatures to advance downward. And Phlinx, last but not the least, is the old-time Puzzle Bobble favorite, firing colored balls from a launcher from the bottom of the screen to match colors on top of the screen. This time around, there are two other launcher locations, giving more angles to clear a shot.

A quick-play option in Pogo Island is available so DS gamers in a rush could get right into the puzzle bits, although it also sports a story-mode where you can access the other five games through some short microgames.

Better yet, by playing well you can even earn tokens for your account at Pogo.com if you play the games pretty well, which is pretty much the Pogo.com standard currency. If you wanna check out the games, hop on your pogo and click the "Read" link below.

Homebrew developer, jdoucet, was most likely inspired by the Taito classic-- Puzzle Bobble and has ported a homebrew game for the Nintendo DS dubbed as the FP-r4, which has an uncanny resemblance to the Puzzle Bobble game. If that's not the case, maybe he just has an unexplainable fascination with bubbles or round thingamajigs such as...marbles or something.

Anyway, going back to the focus of this article, the good developer just released the FP-r4 which is quite an engaging game if you have some idle time in your hands. Here are some of the games features:

    * There is a helpWithDotBall feature when you lose (see the screenshot)
    * It is now possible to edit level files and re-include them in the game without a     need for a complete devkitARM toolchain.
    * You can include new background and mod files for each level very easily.
    * The new version has been compiled with the latest devkitARM 19a

jdoucet plans on adding a WiFi multiplayer game capability to his homebrew game, in the coming versions. He is also releasing the source code that he has cleaned a lot, or so he says. So if you wanna help him with the unenviable task of adding multiplayer gaming through WiFi, then you can do so. And as always, your constructive criticisms, suggestions, opinions and other thoughts could greatly help the developer in his effort to perfect the game. So don't hesitate to tell them to us through your comments.

Download: [FP-r4 (DS)]
Download: [FP-r4 (DS) Source Code]