The 100 Classic Book Collection reminds me of a balance scale whereby the pros weigh the same as the cons. Let’s start out with the cons first. I don’t think I would be the first to highlight that the books on offer in this software are most, if not all, in public domain.
Reading them at no cost at all would involve downloading them from a website such as Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org), and reading it on a PC, or sticking the files into a flashkart and reading then with a homebrew e-reader software.
Just Browsing
On the other hand, the 100 Classic Book Collection has an interface on a class of its own. Holding the DS sideways to support either hand preferences, browsing through the books is like browsing through a book shelf, and it’s presented really nicely.
Slide the stylus left or right to go through the books on the shelf or tap the left and right buttons (tap too much sends the software to run through the shelf really fast, and pick a random title!). You can even sort the titles based on title or the author’s name.
Don’t like browsing? Use the search function or have the software recommend some titles by answering a brief, if not slightly disjointed questionaire in the Book Guide. Besides reading the book, tapping the spine of a book on the shelf allows you to find out more about the book and its author.
Reading, DND
Reading utilises both screens and the sliding of the stylus turns pages back and forth. There’s a handy slider which you can utilise to skip to a certain page. The ability to add bookmarks and read footnotes makes for an even more enriching reading experience.
Further adding to this experience are the reading options. You can set the font-size, the reading background music and assign the DS buttons as hot-keys.
Book Hoarding?
WFCÂ connectivity is provided and with that, you can download an additional 10 e-books. You can also send and receive books from friends via the local wireless.
The Bottom Line
In summary, 100 Classic Book Collection is an accomplished piece of software but pity the books on offer. Fans of classic books should find themselves pretty comfortable with this software. 100 Classic Book Collection for the Nintendo DS is currently available at Amazon UK, click here for details.
Glossary
Here’s the list of books in 100 Classic Book Collection for the Nintendo DS:
- Louisa May Alcott   Little Women
- Jane Austen   Emma
- Jane Austen   Mansfield Park
- Jane Austen   Persuasion
- Jane Austen   Pride and Prejudice
- Jane Austen   Sense and Sensibility
- Harriet Beecher   Stowe Uncle Tom’s Cabin
- R.D. Blackmore   Lorna Doone
- Anne Bronte   The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
- Charlotte Bronte   Jane Eyre
- Charlotte Bronte   The Professor
- Charlotte Bronte   Shirley
- Charlotte Bronte   Villette
- Emily Bronte   Wuthering Heights
- John Bunyan   The Pilgrim’s Progress
- Frances Burnett   Little Lord Fauntleroy
- Frances Burnett   The Secret Garden
- Lewis Carroll   Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
- Lewis Carroll   Through the Looking-Glass
- Wilkie Collins   The Moonstone
- Wilkie Collins   The Woman in White
- Carlo Collodi   The Adventures of Pinocchio
- Arthur Conan Doyle   The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
- Arthur Conan Doyle   The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes
- Joseph Conrad   Lord Jim
- Susan Coolidge   What Katy Did
- James Fenimore Cooper   Last of the Mohicans
- Daniel Defoe   Robinson Crusoe
- Charles Dickens   Barnaby Rudge
- Charles Dickens   Bleak House
- Charles Dickens   A Christmas Carol
- Charles Dickens   David Copperfield
- Charles Dickens   Dombey and Son
- Charles Dickens   Great Expectations
- Charles Dickens   Hard Times
- Charles Dickens   Martin Chuzzlewit
- Charles Dickens   Nicholas Nickleby
- Charles Dickens   The Old Curiosity Shop
- Charles Dickens   Oliver Twist
- Charles Dickens   The Pickwick Papers
- Charles Dickens   A Tale of Two Cities
- Alexandre Dumas   The Count of Monte Cristo
- Alexandre Dumas   The Three Musketeers
- George Eliot   Adam Bede
- George Eliot   Middlemarch
- George Eliot   The Mill on the Floss
- Henry Rider Haggard   King Solomon’s Mines
- Thomas Hardy   Far From The Madding Crowd
- Thomas Hardy   The Mayor of Casterbridge
- Thomas Hardy   Tess of The D’Urbervilles
- Thomas Hardy   Under the Greenwood Tree
- Nathaniel Hawthorne   The Scarlet Letter
- Victor Hugo   The Hunchback of Notre Dame
- Victor Hugo   Les Miserables
- Washington Irving   The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon
- Charles Kingsley   Westward Ho!
- D.H. Lawrence   Sons And Lovers
- Gaston Leroux   The Phantom of the Opera
- Jack London   The Call of the Wild
- Jack London   White Fang
- Herman Melville   Moby Dick
- Edgar Allen Poe   Tales of Mystery and Imagination
- Sir Walter Scott   Ivanhoe
- Sir Walter Scott   Rob Roy
- Sir Walter Scott   Waverley
- Anna Sewell   Black Beauty
- William Shakespeare   All’s Well That Ends Well
- William Shakespeare   Antony and Cleopatra
- William Shakespeare   As You Like It
- William Shakespeare   The Comedy of Errors
- William Shakespeare   Hamlet
- William Shakespeare   Julius Caesar
- William Shakespeare   King Henry the Fifth
- William Shakespeare   King Lear
- William Shakespeare   King Richard the Third
- William Shakespeare   Love’s Labour’s Lost
- William Shakespeare   Macbeth
- William Shakespeare   The Merchant of Venice
- William Shakespeare   A Midsummer-Night’s Dream
- William Shakespeare   Much Ado About Nothing
- William Shakespeare   Othello, the Moor of Venice
- William Shakespeare   Romeo and Juliet
- William Shakespeare   The Taming of the Shrew
- William Shakespeare   The Tempest
- William Shakespeare   Timon of Athens
- William Shakespeare   Titus Andronicus
- William Shakespeare   Twelfth Night
- William Shakespeare   The Winter’s Tale
- Robert Louis Stevenson   Kidnapped
- Robert Louis Stevenson   The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
- Robert Louis Stevenson   Treasure Island
- Jonathan Swift   Gulliver’s Travels
- William Thackeray   Vanity Fair
- Anthony Trollope   Barchester Towers
- Mark Twain   Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
- Mark Twain   Adventures of Tom Sawyer
- Jules Verne   Round the World in Eighty Days
- Jules Verne   20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
- Oscar Wilde   The Importance of Being Earnest
- Oscar Wilde   The Picture of Dorian Gray
[…] Full review here […]
[…] Full review here […]
Hey i’m actually reading through dorian grey on this and all i can say is its awesome. i own most of the books in some shape or form but the ds compiles them into readable chunks and lets u mark where uve got to and has 3 bookmarks to play with and informs you if youve read them, i mean it has the whole of les miserables do you know how daunting that is if you can see all the pages, in ds format there are 15000 now smush that into real pages and imagine how daunting the small text is
@hayley: Strange, I always appreciated the fact that I can actually read without turning the pages every 3-4 seconds. I would agree with you on les miserables though, the number of pages is daunting indeed, but if place in the context of 100 Classic Books and my Nintendo DS, I’ve to click my shoulder button or press the screen 15000 times?
There’s no excuse from being lazy in turning pages, and I really doubt publishers are out to make readers blind. Don’t you think?