Turn your Nintendo DS into an acoustic guitar

While music games have typically been geared towards vicarious rock-stars, and not garnering much interest from those who can already play an instrument as a result, Plato's Hiite Utaeru DS Guitar M-06 for the Nintendo DS turns the genre on it's head. Essentially an acoustic guitar simulator, you're obviously not going to be able to belt out the riff for Ironman in its full glory - but if you're looking to further your knowledge of music theory (or show off your real skills on the weirdest acoustic guitar on the planet) this is a great deal more likely to tickle your fancy than games like Guitar Hero.

16 chords can be used simultaneously, chosen from a library of 120 chords - these are accessed by holding a direction on the D-pad (holding either of the L/R shoulder buttons giving you access to the other 8 chords) and the instrument is played by "strumming" the touch screen with a stylus or your finger.

Audio samples are unfortunately absent, so we're unable to comment on how it sounds - but no doubt we'll hear this on a number of recordings (whether we know it or not) if for no other reason than scoring geek-culture brownie points.

Unfortunately the game is currently only available in Japan - hopefully it won't be too long before gamers outside that region have an option other than importing (and brushing up on their Japanese to navigate the menus).

My inner head-banger hopes there is a chugging distorted guitar sequel in the works.

Full information at NCSX, via onetonnemusic