I have the privilege of living in university-owned housing, meaning we have a ridiculous amount of fire drills. From smoking in the stairwell to hanging coat hangers on sprinkler heads, the silliest actions can cause everyone to evacuate the building at odd hours of the day. So I thought it was no big deal when the fire alarm scared me half to death last Sunday afternoon. I grabbed my DS Lite and a handful of games, heading out for what I hoped would be a normal 20-minute exercise in patience.

I wasn’t able to touch my DS for the first 20 minutes I spent outside. My mother called on my cell phone and I felt slightly disappointed, as homework awaited me inside. However, we did not get let back in after 20 minutes. I started up the DS and played a little Mario Kart. I really wanted to play Elite Beat Agents, but I didn’t want to disturb the other residents nearby with some of the mediocre covers of decent songs.

Unfortunately, Mario Kart was a lot less fun outside. I was doing okay for a while, but the bright California sun was washing out my screen, even on the brightest setting. I think part of it was due to the relatively low contrast of the game, since most of the colors are equally bright. It got practically unplayable when I was racing in Luigi’s Mansion. I couldn’t tell a shadowed door from a solid wall, getting me turned around entirely and causing me to come in at 5th place.

At this point, I was slightly miffed because I was in first place for the cup before. I still did win the cup (as it was on one of the easiest difficulties), but decided it was time to switch games. I played Super Mario Bros. for a grand total of seven minutes. That was the amount of time it took for me to get a game over and accept that, despite my ineptitude with Mario, it was really hard to see because of the low contrast issue.

I then moved on to Brain Age. I’ve been playing that game for a while and I really enjoy using it to take short study breaks. I love listening to the happy music and solving puzzles. I never really understood Sudoku before playing it in this game but I now it's one of my favorite puzzles. However, my mother called back in the middle of my play session and I turned it off, as you can’t really pause easily in that game.

I was getting pretty anxious now, as we had been outside for nearly an hour and I was getting cold. Also, people had begun sneaking back in the building at this point so there weren’t that many of us left outside, preferring not to commit a federal crime by re-entering the building. I turned to Elite Beat Agents, hoping that my recent favorite would help me feel better. Unfortunately, this was also a bit hard to see and I was self-conscious about the music. Finally, I turned off the DS and stood around like everyone else.

While my DS did help to stave off my boredom for a while, I felt that my anxiousness regarding the fire drill prevented me from truly appreciating any of the games. Also, the sun made it difficult to see many of the bright, happy games (like the Mario games). I have certainly played my DS for an hour at a time, but I find that many of the games lend themselves to shorter play sessions. If I learned anything that day, it’s that the DS may not perform the best outside, but it is certainly handy when you’re stuck outside your building.