3DS eShop Reviews

Sonic with a dash extra

The modern gaming scene may still be regularly broken down to battles of hardware technology and game exclusives, but back in the early '90s it was also a battle of mascots. The original Sonic the Hedgehog was the catalyst for the famous Tokyo-based company in the early days of the 16-bit battle for supremacy, as it delivered...

Please don't rise from your grave again

Every video game veteran has a title in its back catalogue which for unknown reasons keeps being dredged up for modern audiences. With Nintendo, it's arguably Urban Champion — a game so lacklustre that it wasn't wanted even back in 1984 — while one-time rival Sega has Altered Beast. A shallow 2D brawler in...

Car wreck

Hey Enjoy Gaming! 1997 called and guess what? It wants its game back! That’s right — Chevrolet Camaro Wild Ride 3D has finally landed on the 3DS eShop, and not only does it look like a game that was ported directly from the PlayStation, but also it’s pretty terrible to play, too. In fact, it’s downright offensive to even think...

Definitely a Winning Run

As Sega delivers its range of retro 3D reproductions to the 3DS eShop, it'll certainly be interesting to see how sizeable an audience warms to each release. For some, fond memories of iconic Sega arcades or home console ports will make purchases irresistible, but perhaps the greatest challenge facing these releases is...

A fitting farewell to the NES trilogy

The three Ninja Gaiden games on the NES are remembered with great fondness, and for very good reason. They may never have reached the same heights of popularity as the original Super Mario Bros. games, or even the first three Mega Man games, but they stand to this day as a testament to the classic years of 8-bit...

Not particularly valuable

When it comes to puzzlers, a certain generation of gamers will remember when Tetris was the title that was endlessly cloned, reinterpreted and reinvented, with countless studios and developers trying desperately to recapture the cultural magic of what had to be the simplest idea in gaming yet: slotting shapes together...

Welcome to the Fantasy Zone

Sitting here in 2013, it's almost impossible to fully appreciate the kind of impact Space Harrier had when it hit arcades way back in 1985 — a year when many of today's active gamers weren't even alive. A showcase for Sega's "Super Scaler" technology and the company's skill at creating impressive hydraulically-driven...

Ohno or Ohyes?

Everyone loves to play an epic adventure, but there's also a place for lighthearted, bite-sized gaming — especially when it comes to portable titles. Despite its "epic" title, Ohno Odyssey, a physics puzzler from Big John Games, offers a bite-sized experience with addictive trial-and-error gameplay and a fair amount of charm. While...

Fit to Burst

Fresh from the friendly fields of Rune Factory 4, XSEED returns with another, decidedly more deadly offering from the Land of the Rising Sun in Senran Kagura Burst. Taking its gameplay inspiration from classic side-scrolling beat-'em-ups, and its over-the-top, undergarment-filled style from anime and manga, this is a fun, frenzied...

Another name on the naughty list

It was a cold night, and the gentle snow was just beginning to fall. All throughout Nintendo Life HQ there was evidence of good cheer. After all, Christmas was coming! Martin and Morgan were decorating the tree, newcomer Liam was introducing the team to his home-made eggnog, and Ron was entertaining the children by...

A rocketing success?

It’s crazy to think that it’s been three years since we last saw Jett Rocket. Three years may not seem like it was that long ago, but a lot has changed during this time. As a result, not only is the planetary inspector only just making his handheld début on 3DS, but his creators at Shin’en Multimedia no longer have to...

Tanks, but no tanks

Field Marshal Archibald Percival Wavell of the British Army once said that “war is a muddle” and, quite frankly, we couldn’t agree with him more. The conflict he described was that of World War II; that's the very same that World Conqueror 3D strives to simulate, with messy results. No more than an overcomplicated clone of...

Find every object, for great justice

There's a real puzzle afoot in Secret Mysteries in New York, and it has to do with the game's title itself. No, it's not our attempt to figure out whether or not the phrase "secret mysteries" qualifies as redundant; it's why the developers bothered to rename Secret Mysteries in London for its eShop release. The...

Blast from the past

3DS has amassed a curiously robust library of music creation software for a chunk of hardware built to play video games. The KORG brand in particular has made itself comfy on Nintendo's handhelds in the past few years, starting with an emulation of the classic MS-10 synth in KORG DS-10, and now the M1 gets the software treatment...

Dark wizard

Word games can be fun, addictive brain teasers, but they can also be tedious, unintuitive and shallow. Word Wizard 3D unfortunately falls squarely into the latter category. Though there are plenty of game modes, and none are fundamentally broken, there's nothing in Word Wizard 3D that justifies its purchase over various alternatives that...

Crash and burn

Originally released as an arcade game, City Connection puts you in the shoes of a man who wants to travel all over the world in order to paint its roads white, thus proving that he's travelled across the globe. Sounds like vandalism to us, but that's the '80s for you! Of course, this would be rather difficult to accomplish on foot, so...

Not a perfect storm

Engine Software's 4 Elements is a fun match-3 puzzler weighed down by unnecessary seek-and-find sequences and occasionally frustrating level design. Originally a PC game, 4 Elements' generic fantasy presentation hides an addictive game that will appeal to fans of Bejeweled and other "casual" puzzle titles. There's nothing wrong...

A pile of shih tzu

We'll say this at the outset: pet sims are not for everybody. We know that much, and while the popularity of certain genres might baffle us at times, we'd never dream of holding a game's genre against it. While we may or may not get swept up in any particular enthusiasm ourselves, we'd like to think that we can distance ourselves...

Cold case

Hidden object games are a relatively new genre descended from “point and click” classics like King’s Quest, Broken Sword and others. Secret Agent Files: Miami strives to combine hidden object gameplay with more traditional point/click puzzle solving and attempts to make good use of the 3DS’ features along the way; yet the end...