Latest Reviews
Diggin’ up a treat
Image & Form’s SteamWorld franchise has become somewhat of a household name among the Nintendo eShops as of late, with games spread across Switch, 3DS, and Wii U gathering almost nothing but praise from players and critics alike. SteamWorld Dig 2, which is perhaps unsurprisingly the sequel to the rather wonderful...
Review Pokémon Crystal Version
Crystal clear
Akin to Pokémon Yellow's existence to Pokémon Red and Blue, Pokémon Crystal is the next critter-catching adventure to round-off a generation of main series, handheld Pokémon games – that being Pokémon Gold and Silver
Hitting Top Gear to Out Run the competition
Franchises like Gran Turismo and Forza may rule the roost these day but whisper the name Out Run or Top Gear into the ear of a seasoned player and they'll gladly forget all of those hyper-real visuals and authentic physics engines and reminisce instead about the good old days when blue skies and...
Review Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney
Quality sustained!
It's not entirely fair to say that the 3DS is on its last legs, but with the success of Switch and Nintendo's recent mobile push, it's no secret that the dedicated handheld is entering its twilight years. Rather than ignoring the 3DS and slowly pushing it out of the public eye and relevancy, Nintendo instead seems to be...
Review Pokémon Gold And Silver
Golden oldies
Pokémon Gold and Silver are the second generation instalments in the Pokémon series; released at the turn of the millennium, the games arrived just a few short years after their predecessors, Pokémon Red and Blue. Boasting a whole new world to explore, 100 new monsters (bringing the total to 251), and an entirely new cast of...
A rival to Super Mario Maker?
Jools Watsham's Atooi — formerly part of Renegade Kid — made quite a name for itself in the very early days of the 3DS eShop when it put out Mutant Mudds, a high-quality retro action platformer. It seems only fitting then that this splinter studio would put out a similar title here in the autumn of the life of the...
Have a nice trip
Originally available on iOS platforms, Kid Tripp has ran, jumped and smashed its way onto the Nintendo 3DS eShop. We’ve been following the progress of its port for a while now at Nintendo Life and can safely say that the tean behind this auto-runner have done an excellent job - giving us another reason to stop our 3DS consoles...
A Past from the Blast
After 25 years, the Kirby universe has enough material to fill a Hyrule Historia-like compendium (hint, hint). Many games along the way have added little quirks and abilities to shake things up, but Kirby’s Blowout Blast takes a decidedly throwback approach by channelling the veteran hero’s first game. Blowout Blast strips...
A blessing, not a curse
For a series which takes an almost sadistic delight in frustrating those who play it, Capcom's Ghosts 'n Goblins garners a surprising amount of adoration from gamers - but the company doesn't seem particularly interested in resurrecting Sir Arthur for any new adventures, so thank goodness we have games like Cursed Castilla EX...
A fond farewell
Nintendo has been on something of a roll with surprise announcements lately, and one of them was the localisation of the third and final game in the BoxBoy trilogy, BYE-BYE BOXBOY! If you’ve already played the first two games, then this should come as no surprise — BYE-BYE BOXBOY is excellent. If you haven’t played another...
Review Urban Trial Freestyle 2
BMXcellent
2D BMX games have been relatively popular since the turn of the century - take RedLynx's excellent Trials series, for instance. Urban Trial Freestyle, released on the 3DS eShop almost four years ago at this point, was clearly inspired by those games, but managed to bring some extra ideas of its own to the table to create a unique and fun...
Destroy everything
Where would video games be without Tanks? Strong and durable, able to blast incoming enemy threats into oblivion and completely flatten any landmark in sight. The sense of fearlessness a tank provides is arguably unrivalled; games about tanks have been prominent throughout the ages. Anyone who has ever played a video game will...
Go go go
Tanukii Studios' overlooked DSiWare gem, Go! Go! Kokopolo, came at the tail end of the DSi's time on the market, and as a result very few people played the unique action game. While a simple re-release on 3DS would have been acceptable, Tanukii Studios instead crafted a full sequel in Go! Go! Kokopolo 3D. The result is a jam-packed game...
Tactica Generica
Kemco has been steadily supplying gamers with a glut of RPGs through the 3DS eShop over the past few years, all ported from mobile and mostly middling in the truest sense of the word — decent but forgettable games that riff off of classics. As the company's latest release, Legna Tactica is a dependable continuation of that policy,...
The numbers are adding up
We have once again been blessed by a new Picross e game, and you know what that means: new puzzles and, erm... some more new puzzles? By now you should honestly know what to expect with these titles, but here's a quick rundown again! Picross is a classic type of puzzle game that has featured on Nintendo systems since the...
Fun for hire
The 3DS eShop is no stranger to strategy RPGs; aside from retail heavy hitters like Fire Emblem: Awakening and Fates and Stella Glow, it's also been blessed with smaller but still eminently enjoyable experiences like Ambition of the Slimes, and the surprisingly solid Mercenaries Saga 2. CIRCLE Entertainment was responsible for
Get up, you son-of-a... 'cos Shiggy loves ya
Ever wonder what it's like to be a fighter? If you'd like to experience the life, Punch Club thinks it's the game for you. Let's find out if this fighting strategy/simulation is worth lacing up the gloves for. Your life in Punch Club starts out with a brief cutscene showing your father, who was...
As simple as black and white
The Shift series has been around since 2008, when the first Shift title debuted as a Flash game. Four mainline games have released since then, with the first two receiving iOS ports as well. Shift DX collects all the levels from the first two games and introduces 100 more to the 3DS; we consider whether this is a treat...
Review Geki Yaba Runner Deluxe
Run, run, Gnomey
As smartphone gaming has become so popular, the runner genre has seemingly reached the popularity levels of the 2D platformer and first-person shooter before it. The latest title of the genre to grace the 3DS eShop is Geki Yaba Runner Deluxe. It's apparently titled Deluxe due to its presence as a mobile game on Android and iOS; on...
Ill-fated Illusionist
From Dragon Quests and Shin Megami Tenseis to Pokémon and Fire Emblems, the 3DS is an RPG powerhouse. It's a testament to the eShop's offerings, however, that those famous names are flanked by a flurry of mid-tier RPGs of every persuasion, some of which are certainly worthy of your time. Kemco has been a prolific publisher in...
Review Ninja Usagimaru - The Mysterious Karakuri Castle
Mysterious indeed
Any American high school student who's owned a TI series calculator and endured hours of math classes has no doubt discovered Block Dude. The simple puzzle platformer was centered around escaping from rooms by moving around a limited number of blocks, and presented a wonderful escape from the dreariness of algebra. Evidently, the...
Road worrier
The history of video games where animals play in traffic is a very staggered one. Frogger hit the scene in 1981, then nary a croak was heard from any other property until 2014's Crossy Road gained mobile popularity. Dangerous Road on the 3DS eShop borrows a lot from its Crossy counterpart, but is unlikely to leave its splat on history...
Not cool
We really wanted to like Wobbly Tooth's Ice Station Z. An open world, multiplayer zombie survival game that takes place in a cold setting, Ice Station Z looked different than other 3DS eShop titles and we'd hoped for a challenging, solid survival experience. Unfortunately, it doesn't live up to its potential at all, instead offering a...
This is a fair 'un
Fairune was a fun - if not particularly ground-breaking - little game that came out of nowhere and charmed us with its simplistic yet addictive gameplay, mixing Ys-like bump combat with a Zelda-esque overworld filled with secrets. We thought the game's story felt pretty complete, so we were quite surprised that a sequel popped up,...
This game is not in season
Any list of the greatest games of the 8-bit era is sure to include the likes Mega Man and Super Mario Bros., along with their fantastic sequels. Conversely, many lists of modern greats will include Minecraft. Pixel Hunter draws inspiration from all of these titles in obvious ways, but doesn't replicate the qualities that...
Slimes' Time
One of our favourite trends in the eShop has been seeing titles that turn tried-and-true gaming experiences on their heads by putting the player in a new perspective. From Weapon Shop de Omasse's comedic take on the day-to-day drudgery of an RPG smithy to The Legend of Kusakari turning Zelda's grass-cutting mechanic into a laser-focused...
Review Gurumin 3D: A Monstrous Adventure
Ceci n'est pas une drill
An often overlooked strength of the 3DS eShop is the way it can serve as an unexpected harbour for under-the-radar gems. We likely never would have touched Yumi's Odd Odyssey without the eShop, nor seen a contemporary remake of Steel Empire. Add to these ranks Gurumin 3D: A Monstrous Adventure, which originally saw light on...
Review Chase: Cold Case Investigations - Distant Memories
A short but solid sleuth ‘em up
Kaisuke Tanasaki is not one of gaming's most well-known directors, but he oversaw some of the DS's most intriguing narrative-led titles in the form of Hotel Dusk: Room 215 and Another Code/Trace Memory. After developer Cing's closure in 2010, Tanasaki-san is back with some of the same team under Arc System Works to...
Review Azure Striker Gunvolt 2
Electrifying, for the right player
Azure Striker Gunvolt, released in 2014, played like a true successor to Mega Man, though with its own ideas at the forefront. Two years later we've received its sequel, Azure Striker Gunvolt 2. With the disappointing mediocrity of Mighty No. 9 just a few months ago fresh in everyone's minds, a project in which...
The (Belmont) Boys Are Back in Town
The Super NES is, for many, Nintendo's greatest console. It boasted a software library that was an envy of competitors and had more than enough power to stave off unfavourable comparisons to arcade games of its age. Unlike many of Nintendo's more recent home consoles, the SNES is remembered just as much for its...
