There are some strange rare design choices that cause minor moments of frustration, like one song constantly switching on and off between off-beat hits and another song that can overwhelm you with a flurry of notes right after an in-song cutscene, but in general, this game absolutely rules. It does a great job translating the song's lyrics and major beats into a firmly telegraphed form with the overlapping circles + lines that have to be traced as held notes, and they're all placed carefully in order to keep the chart and the player in-tune with the beat, perfect for the compact DS touchscreen. Admittingly it's not ideal relying on sheer score accrual over individual stage rankings to unlock the bonus stages, but it at least provides another incentive to master more difficult stages and the hardest settings when the thresholds are set that high. Either way, the game's charm is absolutely infectious and it never gets old watching three guys in suits and sunglasses dance away everyone's problems, no matter how minor they may be. Without a doubt, I can see myself coming back to push through the highest difficulty after clearing this on normal, so it's an easy recommendation despite some low points. I saw this advertised all over the place as a kid and can't believe it took me this long to finally try it out: hands down one of the best titles on the DS, and it's a real shame we don't see anything from iNiS anymore.

Was obsessed with checking this game out after the Into the Aether podcast waxed poetic about the fun absurdity of this game. Extremely eccentric, with very early 2000s vibes.

The premise of secret agents helping people by bringing dance and music into their life already starts out absurd with helping a babysitter and her boyfriend take care of kids. Then they go help a captain and an oil tycoon find riches, help two supermodels survive on an abandoned island (by...seducing literal lions and bears?), and then takes a SHARP turn into helping a daughter and mother mourn the loss of their dad during Christmas.

And at the end aliens come and two ridiculously difficult levels later you dance your way to victory.

Gameplay-wise, it's a frenetic rhythm game and a Westernized version of an OSU! game (that I tried and was basically the same as well). Tapping and holding beats, with a wacky spinning mechanic that I felt bad destroying my touchscreen with.

I found that it actually got a bit easier after unlocking and switching to the "Sweatin'" hard mode, since the beats more closely follow the full lyrics instead of switching between lyrics and off-beats. Once I got used to the mechanics, would replay a level over and over just to try to not miss any notes.

Was able to get perfect combos for every song (besides one of the finale levels) on all difficulties. Was terrified when the Elite Beat Divas were unlocked, but turns out theirs is just a mirrored version of Sweatin. Wouldn't have kept returning to this and high-score chasing if I didn't enjoy it, and it really did hook me. Was able to accumulate enough points to get the highest rank (Lovin' Machine, excellent).

Overall, an intense obsession for this game for a good month. And also feel bad about my touchscreen, I whaled on it with those taps and swirls.

Stupidly fun game. Charming, hilarious, with a great visual direction, and some great songs chosen too. And the covers are pretty well done too.

I played this first as a kid, and yeah, I loved it just as much back then. Also it introduced me to just about every song in this game, which is cool.

I think my only real complaint is that some of the charting feels a little bit wrong in places, or at least, I couldn't tell what part of the song was being charted. But for the most part it was really solid. I guess it's also really short (~2 hours), but given the whole experience that this is, I'm more than happy with what we got. Really fun game, would highly recommend.

You ever go back and watch, like, Shrek or some shit and then you're like "wait a second, since when was 'Bad Reputation' in this? And how does it work so well?" That's every single stage in Elite Beat Agents. A dozen and a half action-packed vignettes concerning characters trying to do anything from babysitting to drilling for oil to surviving on a remote island, accompanied by a licensed music track that, more often than not, feels lyrically contradictory to what's actually going on in the story. And as you're walkin'-and-a-talkin'-and-a-movin'-and-a-groovin'-and-a-hippin'-and-a-hoppin'-and-a-pickin'-and-a-poppin', you might ask yourself... How? How is it that these specific soundwaves, produced by these low-quality DS speakers, originally devised by pop stars who were already outdated by the time this game released, are able to compel my stylus to fly across the bottom screen so quickly? And with such precision? Because, even if you ignore how genuinely witty this game is, parodying at once both American movie montages and the concept of rhythm gaming itself, it's so utterly mechanically satisfying at a base level. There are few, if any, video games that bring me more joy than what I feel whenever I manage to drag myself out of the red with a perfect string of beats as the EBAs pick their heads up and start chanting in tandem to my actions during the most frantic section of "Sk8er Boy" or "Material Girl." And, yeah, the two scoring systems are at odds with each other, on higher difficulties you can die just because there's too large of a gap in between notes, and spin beats don't serve much of a purpose. But, having just now finally completed the game with the Divas after leaving them sitting on "Without a Fight" for the last who-knows-how-many years, I think I can safely admit to myself that I simply do not care. Most of the time, whenever I'm playing a different rhythm game, I just think about how I could be playing Elite Beat Agents instead. And whenever I think about Elite Beat Agents, I usually think about how they managed to cram three minutes of blatant sexual innuendo into a Nintendo game, and how it happens to air while you're playing as an anthropomorphic representation of a teenager's bloodstream. Or I think about how it presents the most painfully melodramatic Christmas story of all time, focused on an anonymous family that you have absolutely no connection to... and how it still works on an emotional level just because Chicago happens to be playing in the background. But, mostly, I just think about how, whenever I hear any of these songs in isolation, I can still visualize the pattern of in-game beats that appear during each section of the track. Music lives.

Some boys kiss me, some boys hug me
I think they're OK
If they don't give me proper credit, I just walk away
They can beg and they can plead
But they can't see the light (that's right, that's right)
'Cause the boy with the cold hard cash is always Mister Right

'Cause we are living in a material world
And I am a material girl
You know that we are living in a material world
And I am a material girl

Some boys romance, some boys slow dance
That's all right with me
If they can't raise my interest, then I have to let them be
Some boys try, and some boys lie
But I don't let them play (no way, no way)
Only boys that save their pennies make my rainy day

'Cause we are living in a material world
And I am a material girl
You know that we are living in a material world
And I am a material girl

Living in a material world
And I am a material girl
You know that we are living in a material world
And I am a material girl

Living in a material world (material)
Living in a material world
Living in a material world (material)
Living in a material world

Boys may come, and boys may go
And that's all right, you see
Experience has made me rich, and now they're after me

'Cause everybody's living in a material world
And I am a material girl
You know that we are living in a material world
And I am a material girl

Living in a material world
And I am a material girl
You know that we are living in a material world
And I am a material girl

A material, a material, a material, a material world

Living in a material world (material)
Living in a material world
Living in a material world (material)
Living in a material world

Living in a material world (material)
Living in a material world
Living in a material world (material)
Living in a material world

One of my favorite games of all time, i played this SO much my lower screen had circle marks on it. The music is good, the presentation is charming, and playing it on a DS is the best way to experience it. Emulators don't do it justice, and playing OSU is just not the same at all, i will trade the unlimited songs it has for EBA (and the two DS Osu games) for it anytime without hesitation.

I used to play it and the osu games on a flashcard until my ds broke, luckly i managed to find an used copy years later and i can play it on my 3DS. I'm a little rusty but i can still beat hard rock.

Completion: Got a Perfect on every song and every difficulty, and achieved the Lovin' Machine (highest) ranking.

Review: Had this game as a kid and wanted to give it a try over a decade later. This ended up becoming a challenge to get a perfect in every single song/difficulty. Luckily it wasn't too hard to do, thanks in part to the fun and satisfying gameplay not making it feel at all like a chore. The visuals are good, the music selection is alright, and the story is absurdly silly. Overall just a good time.

Proof of Completion