One of the best Zelda's yet and a great way to bring the series onto the DS!
The graphics of the game are very similar (if not an identical handheld copy of) the graphics from The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker on the Gamecube, they're simple and very cartoony but this sort of adds to the charm of the whole game (at least in my opinion anyway).
The controls are really simple too, you simply control Link by moving the stylus across the touchscreen; this includes everything from picking weapons, attacking and rolling to talking to other characters. There's a wide variety of weapons which you find throughout the game, everything from the classic boomerang and bombs to a bow and arrow and also a giant hammer. This wide arsenal makes the game a lot more interesting as not only do certain enemies need to be beaten with a certain weapon but also there are puzzles in each of the temples you will visit and these normally need a certain item or weapon to be used so that you can solve them and get to the boss. There's also a wide variety of treasures to be found on each of the islands you'll visit and temples you'll go in to, you can even find ship pieces to customise your boat.
The story line for the game is a pretty standard theme among the Zelda series; in Phantom Hourglass you friend is taken away by a ghost ship and you rush off to save her, you get taken to another world where a monster has caused a lot of trouble and has endangered all existence and so you are required to go to various temples collecting certain items in order to defeat said monster and rescue your friend at the same time……ok so maybe it's not exactly like that but you get the gist of it. That being said it's still a good storyline with more than a few comedy aspects thrown in and you'll soon find that it's hard to put the game down.
Now for the only really big gripe that I have with this game, the Temple of the Ocean King……yes that's right my only real problem with this game is one of the dungeons you will encounter. Now while this may seem silly…. when you play the game you'll understand why because this is a dungeon that you will visit at least 4-5 times (maybe more…I lost count to be honest) throughout the game and each time you unearth a new floor…..however you have to go through the previous floors first!! There are no blue portals to take you to the last floor you got to until you reach a certain floor new the middle of the game….and even then you've still got another 3 or so floors to discover after that!! Believe me it gets very very annoying.
Despite this one very annoying level, The Phantom Hourglass is an awesome game which will appeal to just about anyone and I highly recommend it to all DS owners.