Anyone know a release date for Professor Layton and the Devil's Box?

[GrenMag]

I've been starving for more puzzly goodness and since the downloadable puzzles for The Curious Village seem to have stopped, I looked around to see if I could find a release date for either of the next two in the series ("The Devil's Box" & "The Final Time Journey").

As an alternative, maybe somebody knows what the language support is like. If it's like the Phoenix Wright series it may be a possible import candidate...

[Urizen]

I don't have localization news, but unless you're fluent in Japanese, I would not recommend importing Layton. The stories and characters offer some enjoyment, but more importantly, there is often very specific wording that will offer a single and crucial hint to solving a given puzzle.

With rudimentary knowledge of Japanese, you could probably trial and error your way through some of the ambiguity, but I'll be damned if I surrender my picarats that easily.

I can't wait until Layton 2.

[Chris_D]

Yeah I tried solving one of the puzzles on the 2nd Layton game which one of my students had... no luck trying to follow the instructions. I definitely wouldn't recommend it as an import unless you're pretty fluent.

Anyway, I'm really looking forward to when these two games get localised. It's annoying to have to wait so long but in some ways, localising these puzzles requires a lot of work I think and perhaps drastically rethinking some puzzles.

[Gorvi]

I don't think the first one sold all that bad in the US but I think Nintendo USA may have given up on the series. It's a ton of text to localize and they may not want to bother. Sad, because I loved what I played of the first game, and having another DS soon (and being a Level 5 fanboy :p) I'll be picking it up myself soon.

[National Kato]

I'm not even halfway through Layton 1 and I'm already excited about possible sequels. This is the kind of game I can't wait to stick in my girlfriend's hands when we fly to Ohio soon - it may be a great 'gateway drug' to gaming.

[Mike Kelehan]

I don't think the first one sold all that bad in the US but I think Nintendo USA may have given up on the series. It's a ton of text to localize and they may not want to bother. Sad, because I loved what I played of the first game, and having another DS soon (and being a Level 5 fanboy :p) I'll be picking it up myself soon.

It sold well in the west: 310k in the US and another 310k in Europe according to the always accurate VGChartz (http://vgchartz.com/games/game.php?id=12995), which is well worth the effort for a localization. I think the thing that was holding the second game up was the translation for the European market. Layton 1 was just released there, so the team is (hopefully) working on Layton 2 right now. I too want some news on this one, because Professor Layton was hands-down my favorite game this year.

[astranoir]

I love this game. They had better bring the others over, or I'll be super-sad. :(

[GrenMag]

Thanks for the info -- I suppose with the amount of video and text, a dual-language release a'la Phoenix was too much to hope for.

Here's to hoping for good news soon -- this is the game that really got my wife into gaming and also got us both through several weeks of sleepless nights right after our 2nd child was born. We liked the puzzles and she went to sleep with the music.

[Mike Kelehan]

Here's to hoping for good news soon -- this is the game that really got my wife into gaming and also got us both through several weeks of sleepless nights right after our 2nd child was born. We liked the puzzles and she went to sleep with the music.

It CAUSED sleepless nights on my end. I started it on a Friday and had it finished Sunday thanks to "just one more puzzle," although the optional puzzles kept me going for another week or so, and it was always great to wake up on Sunday mornings to a new download puzzle.

[RandoM51]

Devil's box? Maybe I've watched toi much Deadwood recently but that makes me think of one thing, one thing I doubt Nintendo wants associated with the DS.

[GrenMag]

Devil's box? Maybe I've watched toi much Deadwood recently but that makes me think of one thing, one thing I doubt Nintendo wants associated with the DS.


I think it's being retitled "Pandora's Box" for the NA release, if it happens.

I saw over on Shacknews (http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/56416) that Nintendo published the release list for Q1'09 and there's no Professor Layton on the list. I'm going to go cry quietly in the bathroom for a while now...

[pheriannath]

I remain hopeful that it's coming. The first game's manual even states that the sequel will give you a code to unlock extra stuff.

[GrenMag]

I hate to be a pessimist but for everyone outside Japan, that may be the DS version of "stop-n-swop"...

I'm getting way too worked up over this. I'm going to start a new run through of Curious Village this evening...

[Chris_D]

I just ran into another Professor Layton fan, sure seems popular over here.

[Urizen]

I saw over on Shacknews (http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/56416) that Nintendo published the release list for Q1'09 and there's no Professor Layton on the list. I'm going to go cry quietly in the bathroom for a while now...

I pored over the list half a dozen time to make sure Layton wasn't buried in there somewhere. That's really disappointing. I'm still holding out hope that we'll see it turn up during a dry spell during the DS calendar, short as those may be.