DSiWare Game Reviews
Review Electroplankton Hanenbow (DSiWare)
Make like a tree and leave.
Back in 2006, a talented and eccentric media artist named Toshio Iwai developed a very unique title for Nintendo's DS system that allowed the user to interact with various forms of plankton on both a visual and musical level. In fact, it was this combination that gave the game its unique feel and ultimately produced one...
Review Electroplankton Beatnes (DSiWare)
Feel the beat!
Back in 2006, a talented and eccentric media artist named Toshio Iwai developed a very unique title for Nintendo's DS system that allowed the user to interact with various forms of plankton on both a visual and musical level. In fact, it was this combination that gave the game its unique feel and ultimately produced one of the more...
Review Electroplankton Trapy (DSiWare)
A bit outside the lines.
Back in 2006, a talented and eccentric media artist named Toshio Iwai developed a very unique title for Nintendo's DS system that allowed the user to interact with various forms of plankton on both a visual and musical level. In fact, it was this combination that gave the game its unique feel and ultimately produced one of...
Review Bomberman Blitz (DSiWare)
A cut down, portable Bomberman Blast.
Pretty much every platform in this gaming generation has had a downloadable Bomberman title. The DSi hadn't yet, so Hudson must've figured "Why the heck not?" and made yet another one. As with all other downloadable (non-Virtual Console) Bomberman titles, this is strictly a multiplayer affair — there...
Review Sparkle Snapshots (DSiWare)
Adults may find it excessive, but little girls will eat it up.
In 1995, Atlus joined with Sega to create the very first Print Club machine in Japan. Print Club was a special kind of photo booth with the ability for users to add decorative borders, graffiti, backgrounds, and clip-art 'stamps' to their images, which were printed out in sticker form...
Review Little Red Riding Hood's Zombie BBQ (DSiWare)
Not your childhood's Little Red Riding Hood!
You might've heard of Little Red Riding Hood's Zombie BBQ before; after all, a classic fairytale character blasting zombies to pieces should be almost guaranteed to get your attention. Chances are, however, that you never saw the game in stores — this is because the game never actually saw release in...
Review PictureBook Games: The Royal Bluff (DSiWare)
A unique card game on a service that's quickly becoming crowded with them.
We've already seen a host of card games released for the DSiWare service, but PictureBookGames: The Royal Bluff looks to add a little variety to the mix with its unique gameplay and entertaining royalty theme. But with a service already loaded with card games, can it beat a...
Pick a number from one to nine
Sudoku was invented in the late 70's and introduced to Japan in the mid-80's, but it waited nearly thirty years to become a worldwide phenomenon. Newspapers publish sudoku puzzles even more prominently now than the crossword puzzles that have held dominance for nearly a century, and there are sudoku books, toys, and...
Review Combat of Giants: Dragons - Bronze Edition (DSiWare)
Sadly not the Gold Edition.
DSiWare has already seen plenty of "A Little Bit of..." games, which are basically smaller, budget-sized (And priced!) versions of Nintendo-published DS retail games. It seems that other developers are now taking similar advantage of the service - Mitchell recently released Sujin Taisen, and now Ubisoft has...
Review Rock-n-Roll Domo (DSiWare)
It's still rock-n-roll to Domo.
Closing off our title-by-title wade through Domo's résumé, we have Rock-n-Roll Domo, which finds our fuzzy brown friend fronting a wildlife-staffed garage band. It's a rhythm game that might strike many as a little too simplistic, but compared to some of Domo's other outings, this one's not half-bad. The gameplay...
Review White-Water Domo (DSiWare)
Preferable to drowning. Just.
Our week-long Domopalooza continues with a look at White-Water Domo, which finds our fuzzy, angular hero kayaking along a periodically-treacherous stream. As a single component in the larger cluster of Domo DSiWare titles, White-Water Domo doesn't do much to stand out, but neither does it do much wrong. In fact,...
Review Crash-Course Domo (DSiWare)
Sometimes less is more, and sometimes less is less
When you have mini-games like the Domo releases that are so simple in design and execution, it's difficult to review them as separate entities. Crash-Course Domo is basically a bicycle racing game that's extremely basic and easy to pick up, but features very little depth as a stand-alone title...
Review Hard-Hat Domo (DSiWare)
Domo needs his hard-hat because of all the falling quality
With five Domo games to choose from this week, it's more or less a given that some are going to be markedly better than others. That's okay: we like it when games are better than others, and we're sure you do, too. Of course, the flipside of this implication is that some are going to be...
Review Pro-Putt Domo (DSiWare)
It might be cheap, but it doesn't look or play like it
When the Domo titles were first announced for the DSiWare service, many people were left unsure of what to think of them, especially given their rather inexpensive 200 Nintendo Point price tag. Now just as quickly as they were announced Nintendo has released all five titles onto the service at...
Review Viking Invasion (DSiWare)
Pillage the village!
Viking Invasion by BiF is a tower defence game that puts the player in charge of protecting various castles and forts from hordes of Viking invaders. The game takes a slightly different approach to the standard tower defence set up, with foes pouring in through various waterways and rivers. Set over three difficulty levels and...
Review Wakugumi - Monochrome Puzzle (DSiWare)
Ikaruga: the puzzler
There’s a great “I’ve got it!” moment in Wakugumi where you graduate from simply sliding blocks about in the hope of making a capture to preparing combo captures with expert precision. Something about the game simply clicks and you find yourself having that classic puzzle inner monologue – “well, if this bit goes...
Review Pinball Pulse: The Ancients Beckon (DSiWare)
Maybe too realistic for its own good
Pinball simulations have always been a mixed bag over the years. While some developers have chosen to shoot for more of an authentic pinball machine experience, others tried to make their pinball simulations more arcade-like using multiple boards and mini-games to further accentuate their gameplay schemes...
One more proton and you'd be playing Protactinium Wars.
It's always refreshing (to us at Nintendo Life and also, we imagine, to you folks at home) when a game is released for WiiWare or DSiWare that fills a tangible gap, and the first thing you'll notice about Thorium Wars is that it's like nothing else available through DSiWare. That uniqueness...
Review Art Style: INTERSECT (DSiWare)
It'll drive you mad!
Games in the Art Style series have a reputation for originality, aesthetic invention and for being among the highest quality games on WiiWare and DSiWare. Art Style Intersect, however, is a remake of an old GameBoy Advance title known as DigiDrive, originally produced by Q Games of Pixeljunk fame. Although it might sound...
Review Art Academy: Second Semester (DSiWare)
Less of the same.
Two weeks ago, Nintendo released Art Academy: First Semester. We reviewed it and were happy to do so. The title was impressively functional, easy to use and very much successful at fostering creativity. These are all good things. We were painting apples and red peppers like there was no tomorrow. The sun was shining. We were merry...
Review Dragon Quest Wars (DSiWare)
It might not be a typical Dragon Quest RPG, but there's still plenty of fun to be had
It goes without saying that the Dragon Quest series has enjoyed phenomenal success around the world as an RPG series over the years, so placing the name on any game is going to automatically heap certain expectations onto that game, no matter what type of game it...
Review Yummy Yummy Cooking Jam (DSiWare)
A fallen soufflé
You may remember this game from its appearance on WiiWare, so you won't be surprised to know this is a direct port. We didn’t think much to its incarnation on the Wii, particularly struggling with its controls, but now it’s on the DSi is it more to our taste? Yes and no, is the answer. Essentially, the DSiWare version is...
Review Clubhouse Games Express: Strategy Pack (DSiWare)
Nintendo rehashes another set of Clubhouse Games, so we rehashed the review. Touché!
Nintendo seems to have a penchant for taking its DS retail releases, cutting them up into bits and selling them on the DSiWare service. So it should come as no surprise that it's at it again with this third release in the Clubhouse Games Express series. This time...
Review MySims Camera (DSiWare)
Ever wanted to share a photo with a My Sim? No, we haven't either...
My Sims Camera is a simple program that requires an equally simple explanation; essentially, it takes animations from the My Sims series and allows you to edit photos taken with the DSi camera by placing characters and stamps into your photos in various poses and styles. The game...
Review Art Academy: First Semester (DSiWare)
Paint Misbehavin'
Much moreso than WiiWare, DSiWare has seen a significant number of non-game releases. Applications, utilities, programs...call them what you will, but they're not games, and they've not been exactly welcomed universally, either. Art Academy may well be poised to change that, not least because they've selected as their focus...
Review 2-in-1 Solitaire (DSiWare)
Like a deck of cards, only smaller...
As you'd expect from a 200 point version of Solitaire, you're not exactly going to be blown away by all the options on offer here. You've got Spider and Klondike versions of the card game, and they both have two initial difficulty settings to choose from, so once you've made your selections on both screens...
Review Clubhouse Games Express: Family Favorites (DSiWare)
Another stripped-down retail release for DSiWare
Nintendo seems to have a penchant for taking their DS retail releases and cutting them up into bits and selling them on the DSiWare service. So it should come as no surprise that they're at it again with this second release in the Clubhouse Games Express series. This time around, they're offering up...
Review Dictionary 6 in 1 with Camera Function (DSiWare)
Oh, what's the word? Ah yes - "exiguous"!
First things first – this is not a dictionary in the traditional sense of the word. Not a single entry here comes with a definition or any usage guidelines, just a list of the equivalent words in five other languages. What we have here is more of a word bank, and sadly not a hugely in-depth one at that...
Review Oscar in Toyland (DSiWare)
A colourful trip down memory lane
Originally released as Trolls in 1992 for the Amiga, Super Nintendo and PC, Oscar in Toyland is a remake of what many consider an Amiga gaming classic. The game combines platforming with a “scavenger hunt” game mechanic which challenges the player to find a certain number of “baby Oscars” per level. The game...
Review Pop Plus: Solo (DSiWare)
Who would have thought that popping bubbles could be so much fun?
For the uninitiated, Pop Plus: Solo is an enhanced remake of the original game, Pop, released on the WiiWare service last year. The game garnered a reasonable amount of popularity and was widely praised for its simple yet addictive and eloquently executed gameplay. Over a year later...
