In addition to those big names, five more titles have dropped across DSiWare and WiiWare. Truly, Nintendo has no pity on a weary eShop games reviewer who had to also drive his baby three hours to grandma's house today. But no worries! Let's do this thing! eShop Update time!
REVIEWS
<a+class='autolink'+href='https://ds.ign.com/objects/125/125991.html'>Doodle+Fit</a>
Kicking things off with DSiWare as always, we first come this week to Doodle Fit. This is a sketchy puzzler (get it, sketchy) about scribbling little block shapes into position inside various outlines. It's tangrams, essentially, similar to what DSiWare has previously seen with the games 505 Tangram and Puzzle Fever.I liked both of those past takes on this idea for DSi, and I like this one as well – the stylus controls and notebook-like art style give Doodle Fit enough of its own feel to make it stand out from those established competitors. It's satisfying to take a look at an outline, then take a look at the available shapes you have to fill it, then lay stylus on screen to draw out your answer instead of "grabbing" a block and spinning it into place, as Puzzle Fever did.
Doodle Fit isn't quite as challenging since you don't have to spin your pieces, so that could either be a turn-off for puzzler fans who want something tougher or a positive point for newcomers just getting into this type of game. Undoubtedly positive, though, is the game's novel visual options – though everything looks like you're using a pencil in a school notebook by default, you can use the options menu to change the entire look of the game to resemble a chalkboard, a sci-fi movie, an old '80s computer and more any time you want. That's snazzy, and more puzzle games should employ that idea – since it doesn't damage the underlying gameplay at all.
Doodle Fit's previously been made available in places like Apple's App Store, so I'll insert my default caveat here that buying this on iPhone is probably cheaper – if that's an option for you. But I like it in DSi form, and five bucks isn't too much to ask for what you'll be getting here. Feel free to fit these doodles into your DSi or 3DS with my recommendation.
DSi Shop: 500 Points | 3DS eShop: $4.99
<a+class='autolink'+href='https://ds.ign.com/objects/125/125994.html'>Rytmik+Retrobits</a>
Next up we have the latest release in the on-going Rytmik series of digital synthesizers, Rytmik Retrobits. This is the kind of download that probably isn't going to catch your attention here in the eShop Update roundup – because if you were the type of person who would buy Rytmik, you would already know that from your prior purchase of the original Rytmik, or Rytmik: Rock Edition, or Hip Hop King: Rytmik Edition.They're all essentially portable music studios on the go, the kind of non-game software that only aspiring musicians or established chiptune composers would be interested in. And I'd consider recommending this to an uninitiated newcomer, but it's the kind of thing that's hard to get into without a full tutorial or previous synthesizer experience under your belt. The Rytmik releases do a better job at letting the unmusical among us craft some audio creations that still sound pretty good, but it would take a lot of patience and practice to get comfortable enough to create a true masterpiece.
It has been done, though! And for that niche audience that's been using the previous Rytmik downloads to make truly excellent music (hit up Google or YouTube for some great examples), Rytmik Retrobits will become another trusted tool in your audio arsenal. This one's packed with old-school gaming sound bytes the likes of which we used to hear back on the 8-bit NES, so it's certainly going to be the chiptuner's friend.
If that's you, download now. If you've got no clue about anything musical, move along.
DSi Shop: 800 Points | 3DS eShop: $7.99
<a+class='autolink'+href='https://ds.ign.com/objects/125/125996.html'>Chronicles+of+Vampires:+Origins</a>
Here's something new for the Twilight fan in your life – a hidden object game centered on investigating vampires. If the genre name doesn't ring a bell, hidden object games are the ones that present you with terribly messy and cluttered screens full of junk and ask you to pick out a set of specific items from amongst the mess – like the Where's Waldo? book series. Chronicles of Vampires: Origins does a little something new with this concept, though, in that it gives a bit more storyline support to why you're sorting through all this junk in the first place.The game casts you as an investigative reporter named Linda, and her sorting through mountains of garbage is always in support of her overall investigation – she might be gathering clues (which justifies tapping on lots of things on the touch screen), or taking pictures of different points in a crime scene (again, justifying the action), or any of a number of other motivations.
It's a subtle thing, to be sure, but I actually liked having some reason behind hunting the hidden objects in this adventure – most other games in this same genre are wholly random, giving you clutter for clutter's sake, and those always break down into mindless screen-tapping for me. Here, though, there's some purpose – and I stayed more engaged in the process.
Chronicles of Vampires: Origins isn't the prettiest game, as its static 2D backgrounds often seem "JPEGy" with visual compression artifacts screwing up the scenery. It's also not the most robustly animated vampire tale either, especially with protagonist Linda – she seems to adopt the same awkward pose and shocked facial expression no matter what she's in the middle of doing.
But, overall, this is something a little different for the hidden object genre – and what it does differently, it does well.
DSi Shop: 500 Points | 3DS eShop: $4.99
<a+class='autolink'+href='https://ds.ign.com/objects/126/126140.html'>Christmas+Wonderland</a>
And if one hidden object game wasn't enough for you, how about another? Ho, ho, ho! Santa's here to deliver a second helping of the same genre, on the same day. (I'm sure Chronicles of Vampires' publishers must have loved that.)The Vampire people can rest a bit easier with the knowledge that theirs is the superior game, though, as this quick Christmas cash-in is much more bland. As I just finished explaining above, hidden object games aren't much fun when there's no motivation behind hunting the objects – and here there's none. It's just "Hey, here's a room full of Christmas stuff. Get tapping!"
It's not entirely terrible, as the artwork is nice and there are a few thoughtful gameplay additions – the items from The 12 Days of Christmas, for example, are extra hidden objects throughout the game's array of scenes (so you can hunt for the 12 pipers piping, 10 lords a' leaping and all the rest over the course of the whole "quest," with a running tally keeping track of your progress.) There are other, different types of gameplay mixed in to add some variety too – like memory games, jigsaw puzzles and the like.
Really, this is the same kind of holiday-themed grab bag of casual gaming that we saw two months ago with Halloween: Trick or Treat. (It's from the same team, of course.) As I concluded with that game, though, the eight-dollar price here is too steep to justify the content you'd be getting – so stay away from this one unless you're really desperate for something new to keep your kids quiet on the three-hour ride to grandma's house.
DSi Shop: 800 Points | 3DS eShop: $7.99
That covers this week's new releases for DSiWare, but we've still got more reviews for you. Turn the page to get the verdict on the latest WiiWare and 3DS Virtual Console releases.
REVIEWS
Soccer+Up!
It's not too often that WiiWare gets straightforward sports sims, but Soccer Up presents about as simple a soccer-playing package as possible. This is vanilla soccer gaming. No frills. No complicated controls.What's most interesting about this particular version of video game soccer, though, is its ball physics – given the game's cartoony visuals, you'd probably expect a more arcade feel to the game flow with the ball quickly getting "glued" to the feet of the player currently possessing it (as tons of past soccer titles have done.) But here, that's not the case. The ball is an independent beast, bouncing and rolling and spinning around just as normal physics dictates it should – no video gamey assistance makes it any easier to control.
Soccer Up becomes less of a simple and straightforward soccer experience in this one aspect, then, as you have to unlearn some of what older games have taught you and instead focus on maintaining good ball control as you run, pass and shoot across the field. It's different. I think some soccer players will enjoy it, but others may be turned off by the change and just head back to the safety of older titles like Mario Strikers Charged.
Soccer Up is rounded out by an option to use Mii characters as your in-game athletes, but the camera angle's pulled out too wide for you to really notice the difference. There are a couple of different control options, a handful of A.I. strategies that you can re-assign on the fly to alter the behavior of your fellow players and multiplayer for up to four people. A general array of extras, those.
So overall, Soccer Up is OK. The unique ball control sets it apart a bit, but I don't know that that will be enough of a selling point to really generate a lot of interest here.
Wii Shop Channel: 500 Points
Tetris
The game that sold a million Game Boys is back! This is Game Boy Tetris -- the Tetris for nostalgic Nintendo fans. The version that was included as the free pack-in game with the original Game Boy handhelds way back in 1989.It's a brilliant game. Nintendo made one of the best moves in the history of the gaming industry by pairing the new portable with this spectacular puzzler, as Tetris was a perfect fit for play on the go – tons of people got hooked on this game 20 years ago. Seriously, it was a phenomenon. You think Angry Birds is huge today? That was Tetris back at the dawn of the '90s. A megaton hit.
This particular version can no longer compare against more modern revisions in terms of featureset – newer releases like Tetris DS, Tetris Party Live or Tetris: Axis are all packed to overflowing with extra modes, online multiplayer and more. And in fact, this 3DS Virtual Console edition of Game Boy Tetris has had a chunk of its content cut – since Nintendo's VC re-releases are still not supporting multiplayer, you can no longer go head-to-head against a friend here (which is particularly sad, since Tetris was the game that actually established two-player Link Cable play in the first place.)
So Tetris has its negatives, granted. But I still think this re-release is spectacular, deserves your attention and demands four of your dollars – because it's the Tetris!
Really, this one wins on its nostalgia. That's a factor in all Virtual Console re-releases, of course, but this one is magnified in that regard – because everyone had this game before. Everyone – every Game Boy owner across a whole generation of the industry. Its audience was huge. Its impact on pop culture more pervasive, more engrained than even the Mario and Zelda releases of the same era. And if you think that a thin argument, I dare you to do a quick Internet search to bring up this game's iconic background music and see if you can resist the pull of reaching for your wallet.
Beyond just pure wistfulness for the old days, though, this Tetris really does succeed in several other areas. It's the core Tetris game, the design that's been so endlessly replayable that it's gone on to inspire over two decades' worth of spin-offs and sequels (let's see if anyone remembers Angry Birds in the year 2033). It includes both endless mode (A-Type) and a 25-line score attack with adjustable levels of garbage blocks (B-Type.)
And Tetris has also benefitted quite a bit from being presented through the new 3DS Virtual Console emulator software. Its Restore Point functionality is interesting to use in a puzzle game – you can cheat and artificially increase your high scores to a certain degree by scouting out several pieces ahead and then resetting back to an earlier save state – but more intriguing is the simple power to now suspend your session in progress.
This lets you do two things – first, you can get several minutes deep into a run through endless mode without worry that a need to leave your game idle will ruin a high score in the making. And second, you can save your high scores. That seems such a simple thing, but the original Tetris Game Boy cartridge didn't have battery back-up – so you could enter your name next to an impressive point total, but it would always get erased every time you powered off your system. There was no permanent way to track your scores. Now, that issue's resolved – simply leaving Tetris by way of the Home Button on the 3DS will also keep the same session of the game saved and active, so you can put up scores for weeks, months and years now without fear that a drained set of AA's will delete all record of your achievements.
Tetris endures. It was one of the greatest video games ever made when it first appeared back in the '80s, and it retains that status to this day. This particular version of Tetris just adds to that sense of awe, as it's inarguably the most important and nostalgic edition of the game ever published. I was shocked and surprised that Nintendo decided to re-release it here on the 3DS, and I'm pleased to recommend it once again to all old-school Nintendo fans looking to relieve a bit of an era gone by – or to any newer Nintendo fans who just want an affordably-priced, straightforward version of a truly excellent puzzler.
3DS eShop: $3.99
Swapnote
The sequel to Pictochat has finally arrived. Pictochat, if you'll recall, was the built-in communication software available for free on every Nintendo DS system – it let you scribble out little drawings and messages to your friends, then wirelessly share them with any other DS owners. Any other DS owners who happened to be in the same room with you, that is.That drawback of forcing you into local proximity with other Pictochatters made Nintendo fans sure that the company would upgrade the software to be able to send message over the Internet someday, and now seven years after the debut of the DS we're finally getting that vision realized. Swapnote lets you scribble out little drawings and messages for your friends in a very similar black-and-white aesthetic to Pictochat, but now you can use SpotPass and StreetPass to send those sketches across the world to far-distant friends.
It's a snazzy little app. You'll need to have previously added other 3DS owners as Friends to your system to be able to communicate with anyone (other than the application's Mii character host, Nikki), but if you have a solid group of those friends established then you should be in for some fun letter-writing times. You can also unlock a 3D pen tool after writing your first several notes, and using it will allow you to add a bit of screen-popping 3D flair to your drawings – making this app even snazzier.
I won't pass judgment on Swapnote in the form of a review score right now, though, for a couple of reasons – one, it's only been out since this morning, so not a lot of note-swapping has had a chance to happen so far. And two, it's free! You can just go download the thing and try it yourself, putting it right alongside other freebie applications like Nintendo Video.
But maybe after the holiday break is over, the VoiceChat podcast crew can also spend some on-air time discussing their opinions and assessments of the software based on their interactions with each other – that is, if they can take a break from collecting hats in Find Mii 2 long enough to fire up a different 3DS app.
3DS eShop: Free
Mighty+Switch+Force
Last of all, the biggest game release of this week – WayForward's 3DSWare debut, Mighty Switch Force. Said to say it, though, friends – I'm going to make you wait for this one. Mighty Switch Force is a major new game release for the eShop, and as such it's been flagged for the full review treatment. I'll be diving into it immediately and playing it long into unhealthy hours of the night to be able to form my opinion of it, and then you'll be able to check back here on IGN's 3DS channel to read my thoughts very soon.If you can't wait? Go ahead and buy. The fast thought is that it rocks.
3DS eShop: $5.99
And that's it for this mega-sized Christmas avalanche of content. What do you think of this last batch of new game releases before Christmas Day? Will you be downloading one, two, all eight? And is my opinion of Game Boy Tetris too dramatic, or right on the money?
Let me know with your comments below, and then stay tuned to IGN for more throughout the days and weeks ahead – it may be holiday time, but we've still got bowlfuls of jolly game coverage coming right at ya.
The Last Three eShop Updates
eShop Update: eShop's Killer App Arrives | Last Week's Update: Carmen Sandiego | eShop Update: Bloobs on Adventure Island |