DSiWare Reviews - Page 13

Believe in angles

There's a wealth of puzzle games on DSiWare, but 505 Tangrams is the first tangram-based title to hit the shop so it's got the genre all to itself. How high does it set the bar for future tangram titles to match, though? If you're not sure what a tangram is, allow us to enlighten you. You're given a silhouette, here in one of five...

Economy class

In November, Nintendo Life received an unexpected – and quite pleasant – shock from a little game called Airport Mania: First Flight. It was a release that flew in from totally off the radar, and immediately became one of our favorite games on the WiiWare service. It was a deceptively deep, engaging game of time- and resource-management. It was adorable, fun and, above all,..

Sometimes less is more

Since we've already seen a host of Texas Hold'em games released on the WiiWare and DSiWare services, it would be quite easy to dismiss this fourth entry, Ante Up: Texas Hold'em, as just another attempt to cash in on the game's popularity. But even with the game's minimalistic visual approach, it's difficult not to be impressed with the playability and ease-of-use the game..

Glorious

odenis studio has built a good track record on DSiWare, with its capture-the-flag-on-wheels adventure Pop Island and its follow-up, Pop Island: Paperfield. Before that, however, it was responsible for the combat strategy Glory Days titles, and now it's drastically altered and miniaturised the formula into a downloadable top-down defence-centred package. Glory Days – Tactical Defense is..

Sell it

Quick! What's the most convoluted and fun-deprived card game on the DSiWare service? Wrong: it's The Seller, an unnecessarily complicated and almost completely unstimulating card game that probably won't even keep you awake long enough to irritate the Hell out of you. Now, let's get one thing clear: The Seller isn't broken. It's (almost) a perfectly functional game, and we're sure that if..

Child's play

Virtual books aren't really anything new on the DS, having seen full retail releases such as 100 Classic Books Collection containing classic literature such as Around The World In 80 Days to the DSiWare series of Flips. This time around, we have Missy Mila – Twisted Tales, a small collection of five original children's stories (Baba Yaga, The Toupouloupou, Elvis, The Cow & The..

Not just cruelty to animals, unfortunately

For those who don't know, Animal Boxing was originally released as a DS retail title two years ago to little fanfare. In fact, even though the game has just been recently released on DSiWare, most people don't even know it was originally a retail release. Perhaps this might explain the reason the game's publisher has decided to give the game new life on..

Oscar in Average Land 2: Mediocre Harder

In September 2009 we got Oscar in Toyland on DSiWare, and almost a year ago we saw its follow-up, Oscar in Movieland, come to the service. Both of them were secretly slightly redone ports of Amiga platformers, which, in a weird way, meant that there were actually some Virtual Console games available on the service. We didn't score either game very highly,..

Connect three puzzle action returns to DSiWare.... again

Puzzlers are a dime a dozen on DSiWare. They range from connect three games like A Little Bit Of... Puzzle League to simple bubble-popping in Pop Plus: Solo. Now we have Alien Puzzle Adventure, Mastertronic's second title for the service. Does it do enough to stand out from the crowd? Not really, but it's a decent attempt. There are two game..

Crab your enthusiasm

When last we heard from Electron Jump games...erm...uhhh...well, you know where we're going with this. Suffice it to say we weren't quite thrilled about wading through such questionable waters a second time. But a strange and unexpected thing happened with their most recent release, EJ Puzzles: Hooked. It turned out to be a very, very good game. Now, that's not to say that it..

A+

The year may be young (really, really young) but we've already seen two must-have games hit the DSiWare Shop. The first was Alt-Play: Jason Rohrer Anthology, a collection of some of the most beautifully realised artistic statements gaming has to offer. The second is Surfacer+, a wonderfully unique action-puzzler that came out of nowhere and...

Legend of the seeker

In late 2009 and early 2010, Digital Leisure released versions of Word Searcher on both WiiWare and DSiWare respectively. Finally, after nearly a year of waiting, fans of the original adventures can quit holding their breaths and take in the fresh air of Word Searcher 2, available now as a brand new addition to the DSiWare service. If you loved the first entries then you’re..

Real art style

Jason Rohrer has made a name for himself in the art game sphere with numerous small and thought-provoking PC games. To kick off their Alt-Play compilation series, Sabarasa has pulled together a collection of three of his most notable releases so far in the Jason Rohrer Anthology: Passage, Gravitation and Between. While DSiWare patrons have come across the man’s work before by way..

Hard to beat

Abylight's been putting out music games on DSiWare for a while, so you'd expect the Spanish studio to have it down to a fine art by now, but it's had a few bumps along the way. Thankfully Music On: Drums is a better outing than previous series entry Music On: Playing Piano, as it plays out more like an electronic drum sequencer than a virtual drum kit. While it can't beat stand-out..

Ride into the danger zone

As the variety of shoot-‘em-up games on the DSiWare service continues to expand, it’s expected that some titles are going to stand out better than others. With releases such as Metal Torrent and Paul’s Shooting Adventure already available and rated highly, being a new contender is no easy feat. The G.G Series of...

In good spirits

The latest in Gamebridge's line-up of localised Japanese budget titles is GO Series: Dark Spirits, a horizontal shoot 'em up again courtesy of developer Suzak. It's not exactly a bullet hell shooter like Metal Torrent, but the difficulty can still get pretty high. You play the game as some sort of wizard who can only fire one rather thin pinkish laser projectile straight ahead. You..

500 Point bandit

Gambling is fun. It must be. Millions of grandmothers and potential homeless people can't be wrong. But what, exactly, is fun about it? Is it the glitz of the casino? The pulsing energy of the crowd around you? The free drinks? The wandering magicians and entertainers? The risk? The rush of joy that comes with winning a particularly large amount of money? You'd better hope not,..

Decent multiplayer fun

If the DSiWare service is lacking one thing, it's a compelling multiplayer experience. And if it's missing two things, it's a compelling multiplayer experience and a solid fighter. Cosmo Fighters, the latest from developer Abylight, hopes to kill both those birds with one downloadable stone, and, although it's seriously lacking in personality and inventiveness, it ends up..

Does it measure up?

Cinemax releases have proven to be a rather mixed bag when it comes to DSiWare, from below average attempts such as Sokomania to the some of the best music applications available on the system, most notably Rytmik and Rytmik: Rock Edition. This time around, the company has provided a program for calculating biorhythms, which...