Dragon Quest Heroes: Rocket Slime is the first of what we hope is several Nintendo DS games that focus on the lesser characters in the Dragon Quest RPG universe. In this particular instance it's a loveable slime named Rocket. Anyone that's played the Dragon Quest series will be instantly familiar with this blobby smiling creature. It's usually the first thing you encounter in the game. Having literally murdered thousands of these cute creatures it's time that gamers see what it's like on the other side of the fence. And what's on the other side is the cutest hero you'll meet on the DS to date.

In this game, a slime named Rocket is having fun playing with his friends when suddenly his hometown of Boinburg is attacked by a giant rolling fortress. The town destroyed, the invaders, called Plobs. Collect all the slime and take them away. Through sort of a fluke, Rocket is left behind to pick up the pieces. Rocket sets out into the world to find his fellow slimes and put his town back together, ultimately leading to a showdown with this dirty little Plobs and their Mafioso stylized boss known as The Plobfather. Thus begins the adventure of Rocket, a good slime with a huge heart and the mad skills to save his town from this cute but insidious menace..

Remember in grade school when you'd stretch a rubber band on your index finger, wait for the little girl with the braided hair to have her back turned and fire it into the back of her head? Well that's pretty much what you do with our hero Rocket. He's a living projectile that you fire at enemies by stretching his body and fire. The longer you stretch and hold him, the more potent his attack is. This send your enemy into the air, allowing you to catch him and carry him. You can either throw him or collect him by putting him on the transit system in the game that takes everything you throw in there back to town.

Rocket Slime is all about collecting things - empty treasure chests, bullets, enemies, your fellow townsfolk, etc. The townsfolk you rescue populate the destroyed town and unlock areas that are blocked by giant spiked balls. They also unlock services for Rocket that will heal him, let him save, play the game's mini-games or upgrade his tank. The items you collect will eventually be used as ammo for aforementioned tank, and each item has it's own damage type and number. Collected items also have one other use - they are needed for recipes that are used to create new and more powerful items. You get recipes from the little slimes that you rescue, who immediately email you once they make it into town. It's grand to see that the town of Boingburg is so technologically advanced. Apparently Rocket has a pretty sweet Blackberry hidden somewhere in his inventory (but no arms to use it). The last thing that Rocket collects is cold hard cash - and he'll need it all to upgrade his tank to make it battle worthy..

The tank battles are a very important part of the gameplay. Basically you have two tanks with a set number of hit points. When one side or the other has their hit points reduced to zero it gives the opposing side access to the engine room. If the other side succeeds in destroying your engine, or the heart of your tank, then the match is over and you or they lose. Now in the first part of the game it's Rocket versus a team of bad guys in a tank, but as the game progresses you'll be able to assign a crew to help you with various aspects of battle like defense, sabotage and loading the upper and lower canons. This frees Rocket up to go and attack the other tank. If Rocket can infiltrate the enemy tank and keep the bad guys from firing at your tank, then your crew will do what it needs to do to deplete the enemy tanks hit points. With Rocket already there, he can simply head to the engine room and destroy the engine.

Tank battle are a lot of fun in this game because they are very strategic. For example, you'll have to time firing your upper and lower canons to both block incoming enemy shots, and getting your own shots to connect. This aspect ultimately delays the inevitable victory because you may use a lot of ammo just defending your tank. But as I already mentioned, if Rocket has a crew you can stop the enemies assault altogether by directly assaulting the enemy's crew and damaging their tank. It's a lot easier to defend when no one is firing anything at you. And because your crew has different skills, picking the right folks to handle your tank is very important.

And remember how we mentioned collecting the enemy? Well later on in the game, after saving the correct slime, you'll be bale to recruit them. There are certain conditions that have to be met (we won't spoil it for you by telling you specifics) before you can do this, but the point is that it's nice to see that there is a serious reward for all your hard collection activities.

Rocket Slime also offers a pretty solid multiplayer tank battle mode using the DS' Wi-Fi connectivity. You can play the game via one game cartridge or multiple cartridge which enables multiple players to partake in the mayhem. There's not a lot of difference between the single player and multiplayer battles save that your opponents and teammates are now real live people who may or may not be better than those cute little AI controlled slimes. But putting that aspect aside, these tank battles are so much fun and a great way to kill some time on the go or at home.

In the end Rocket Slime is another lesson in how to take a franchise in different direction entirely - and with great effect in this particular case. This iconic slime that has been a staple of the Dragon Quests series for years finally gets the respect he deserves and in turn gamers get a decent game that's all about fun. Buy, play it and love it. - James Fudge.