During my playtime with Vicarious Visions' DS version of Quantum of Solace, I was surprised that it reminded me a lot of Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass. Like last year's innovative Zelda game, Quantum of Solace is controlled almost exclusively by the stylus. The game is played a bit differently as it is held like a book with a map on the top screen and the game on the touch screen. With some very easy context sensitive moves like hopping over crates or opening up briefcases, the controls for movement work almost perfectly.

The combat controls are also fun but not nearly as polished as the controls for movement. The gunplay is pretty simple as all it requires is a push of a button and tap of the stylus, which works very well.

The melee combat, while fun, is frustrating. As with the rest of the game, melee is controlled through stylus movements on screen. The problem is that the detection of these attacks is a little tricky and not always responsive. Even more frustrating is that the enemies always seem to have a punch waiting for your face whenever you enter melee combat. While you can block attacks, I was never able to block that initial punch even when I knew it was coming. The melee combat reminded me a little bit of Punch-Out for NES because Bond can throw straight punches and uppercuts and the enemies all have some sort of twitch that gives you a warning before they attack. At its base, the combat is simple but there are a lot of skills and moves that you can upgrade as you traverse through the game.

Graphically, the game looks fine. With a nice isometric, 3-D aesthetic, I saw no slowdown and everything was easily identifiable. Items are somewhat comically picked up in briefcases dropped by defeated enemies. I don't think I'll ever know why all these villains carry these large briefcases just for guns and poker chips...

Quantum of Solace is set to be released for the DS on November 4.