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This Week in Nintendo Downloads

by Pedro Hernandez - November 16, 2009, 7:59 am EST
Total comments: 26

Pokemon rumble, Indy jumps into action, and WiiWare demos debut.

This week WiiWare only gets one game, Pokemon Rumble, from Nintendo and Ambrella. Players pit toy Pokemon against each other in a variety of stages. The more Pokemon you defeat, the more will be added to your collection. You can switch between Pokemon at any time during battle, and Club Nintendo members will be able to download a special toy Pokemon to use in their game.

Despite getting only one game this week, WiiWare sees a significant update. Originally confirmed by Iwata at a Q&A session, today sees the debut of WiiWare demos. Along with a Pokemon Rumble demo, players can download demos for NyxQuest: Kindred Spirits, BIT.TRIP BEAT, Final Fantasy Chrystal Chronicles: My Life as a Darklord, and World of Goo.

The Virtual Console section sees two games in today's update. For the TurboGrafx-16 we have Capcom's Street Fighter II: Champion Edition, yet another version of the seminal classic. For the Super Nintendo we have Lucas Arts' Indiana Jones' Greatest Adventures, a platforming game inspired by the Indiana Jones films, featuring scenes and locales from each movie.

DSiWare sees three new games today. The first of these is Art Style: DIGIDRIVE, the latest title in the Art Style puzzle series. Arcade Bowling, from Skyworks Interactive, is known for being designed by David Crane, one of Activision's founders. The week closes with Robot Rescue from Teyon, a logic game in which players guide robots through 45 different mazes.

NINTENDO DOWNLOAD: TRY BEFORE YOU BUY: NINTENDO OFFERS 5 GAME DEMOS TO GUIDE HOLIDAY SHOPPERS

There's never been a better time to check out the extraordinary lineup of downloadable games from Nintendo. This week, Wii™ owners who connect their Wii consoles to the Internet can enjoy demos of five exceptional games for the WiiWare™ downloadable game service for zero Wii Points™: BIT.TRIP BEAT, FINAL FANTASY® CRYSTAL CHRONICLES®: My Life as a Darklord™, NyxQuest: Kindred Spirits, World of Goo™ and a brand new entry in the Pokémon™ game series, Pokémon™ Rumble. To get a taste of any or all of these tremendous titles before downloading the full versions, go to the WiiWare section of the Wii Shop Channel and search for "Demo." For more information, please visit www.nintendo.com/wii/wiiware/demo.

This week's launch of Pokémon Rumble for WiiWare delivers more than just a fun-packed new addition to the beloved Pokémon universe. Anyone who joins Club Nintendo™ – or is already a member – will have the opportunity to unlock an exclusive Toy Pokémon character that can be used in the game. Simply connect your Wii Shop Channel account to your new or existing Club Nintendo account, use Wii Points to download Pokémon Rumble and watch for an e-mail containing a special password that lets you access the character in the game. More information about this offer can be found at us.wii.com/wiiware/pokemonrumble/register. The offer is available only through April 30, 2010.

In addition to the WiiWare demos and a new Pokémon adventure, visitors to the Wii Shop Channel this week will also find a pair of classic Virtual Console™ games – one offering irresistible action with the iconic Indiana Jones® series, the other featuring the timeless thrills of Capcom's Street Fighter™ series. Meanwhile, Nintendo DSiWare™ users can visit the Nintendo DSi™ Shop to discover an eye-popping new Art Style™ game, a fun, arcade-style bowling title and a robot-themed logic game, all available for easy download and playable anytime, anywhere on the hand-held Nintendo DSi system.

WiiWare

Pokémon Rumble

Publisher: Nintendo

Players: 1-4

ESRB Rating: E10+ (Everyone 10 and Older) – Mild Cartoon Violence

Price: 1,500 Wii Points

Description: Available exclusively for the WiiWare service, Pokémon Rumble is an action game in which you control Toy Pokémon (referred to as "Pokémon") and take on wave after wave of other Pokémon in a variety of stages. You can befriend some of the defeated Pokémon along the way, which lets you add them to your collection and grants you the ability to use them in battle. Switch between collected Pokémon at any time, taking advantage of the fact that the amount of damage you deal depends on the type of move used and the type of Pokémon hit. Be the last one standing to gain the right to compete in the Battle Royale and test your skills against many Pokémon at once. You can also team up with three people for some multiplayer action (additional Wii Remote controllers required), working together to take down tough Bosses and earning points that can be used toward recruiting or training Pokémon. You can even save your favorite Pokémon to your Wii Remote™ controller for exchanges with friends. Combining beautiful cel-shaded graphics and exciting game-play features, this is one rumble you won't want to miss. Note that a demo version of Pokémon Rumble is also available for zero Wii Points.

BIT.TRIP BEAT Demo

Publisher: Aksys Games

Players: 1-4

ESRB Rating: E (Everyone)

Price: 0 Wii Points

Description: BIT.TRIP BEAT brings retro action back as you use the Wii Remote controller's motion sensor to bounce beats in this rhythm game. Retro visuals, classic game play, four-player multiplayer and an 8-bit soundtrack will get you in the zone and rock your world. Pay attention, though: As with most classic games, the challenges are mighty. If you can stay cool as the difficulty increases, you'll discover the beginnings of the BIT.TRIP saga.

FINAL FANTASY CRYSTAL CHRONICLES: My Life as a Darklord Demo

Publisher: SQUARE ENIX

Players: 1

ESRB Rating: E10+ (Everyone 10 and Older) – Mild Fantasy Violence, Mild Suggestive Themes

Price: 0 Wii Points

Description: Step into the royal shoes of the Darklord's daughter as she installs traps and monsters inside her tower to fight back the endless waves of invading adventurers in this world-conquest role-playing game. Filling your demonic tower with monsters and traps called Artifacts is your only hope to keep the adventurers from destroying the Dark Crystal on the top floor. Fly your tower across the land and conquer every stage on your way to dominating the entire world.

NyxQuest: Kindred Spirits Demo

Publisher: Over The Top Games

Players: 1-2

ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) – Mild Fantasy Violence

Price: 0 Wii Points

Description: NyxQuest: Kindred Spirits is the awesome story of Nyx, an enigmatic winged girl who must descend from heaven in search of her missing friend, Icarus. Fly over the ruins of ancient Greece and avoid falling into blazing sands or perishing in the claws of cruel harpies and hydras. You'll need the help of Zeus and other benevolent gods from Olympus to summon their powers. They will let you cast rays, modify the scenery and control winds at will. Fly, aim and shoot using the Wii Remote controller. Play with a friend and maximize your abilities: While one player controls Nyx, the other will control the powers from the gods.

World of Goo Demo

Publisher: 2D BOY

Players: 1-4

ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) – Comic Mischief

Price: 0 Wii Points

Description: World of Goo is an award-winning, physics-based puzzle/construction game made entirely by two guys. Use living, squirming, talking globs of goo to build structures, bridges, cannonballs, zeppelins and giant tongues. The millions of Goo Balls that live in the beautiful World of Goo are curious to explore, but they don't know that they are in a game, nor that they are extremely delicious.

Virtual Console

Indiana Jones' Greatest Adventures™

Original platform: Super NES™

Publisher: LucasArts

Players: 1

ESRB Rating: E10+ (Everyone 10 and Older) – Mild Violence

Price: 800 Wii Points

Description: Grab your trusty whip and slash your way through all three Indy classics in this no-thrills-barred adventure. If it happened in the movies, it happens here: the giant boulder from Raiders of the Lost Ark, the mine-cart chase from Temple of Doom, the three trials from Last Crusade, Rene Belloq and Colonel Vogel – it's three times the action, all in one fully loaded game.

STREET FIGHTER II': CHAMPION EDITION

Original platform: TurboGrafx16

Publisher: Capcom

Players: 1-2

ESRB Rating: T (Teen) – Mild Blood, Violence

Price: 700 Wii Points

Description: This is the classic PCEngine (TurboGrafx16) version of the two-player fighting game that started it all. At the time, a large capacity HuCARD was used to allow faithful recreation of the dynamic arcade game and its features, including bonus stages and sound effects. In the game, players select one of 12 characters and face opponents in a no-holds-barred battle to decide the top fighter. Master a character's special moves and combos to defeat your rivals around the world. In "V.S. BATTLE" mode, there's a convenient handicap feature. Using this feature to adjust a character's performance, a novice player can be evenly matched against a seasoned player to enjoy an intense, head-to-head combat experience.

Nintendo DSiWare

Art Style™: DIGIDRIVE™

Publisher: Nintendo

Players: 1-2

ESRB Rating: E (Everyone)

Price: 500 Nintendo DSi Points™

Description: It's traffic control with a twist as you try to direct identical cars down the same road in Art Style: DIGIDRIVE. This constantly moving puzzle game combines an easily understood playing field (an intersection) and a simple goal (create fuel), challenging you to properly guide a never-ending stream of cars. Stack similar cars five deep to create some fuel, then use that fuel to continue your progress in the game. Play in ENDLESS mode to see how long you can last, or compete against the computer or a human opponent in VS mode. Use combos to your advantage and see if your reflexes can handle the intensity of Overdrive mode. When all is said and done, you may never look at gridlock quite the same way again.

Arcade Bowling

Publisher: Skyworks Interactive

Players: 1

ESRB Rating: E (Everyone)

Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points

Description: From Skyworks comes another addictively classic game, Arcade Bowling. It was designed by video game legend David Crane, one of the original founders of Activision and one of the most critically acclaimed game designers of all time. In the tradition of everyone's favorite Boardwalk bowling game, use your stylus and steady aim to flick "laser" balls down the alley and up the ramp into the scoring holes. The farther away the scoring hole is, the more points you'll get. Arcade Bowling features three futuristic sound tracks, state-of-the-art 3-D graphics and two addictive game modes, Classic and Progressive. In Classic Mode, roll up to nine balls to score as many points as you can. In Progressive Mode, enjoy multiple levels of game play with increasing score plateaus and bonus targets.

Robot Rescue

Publisher: Teyon

Players: 1

ESRB Rating: E (Everyone) – Comic Mischief

Price: 200 Nintendo DSi Points

Description: Robot Rescue is a fun logic game based on a simple but entertaining concept. Your mission is to free robots trapped in 45 evil computer labyrinths while avoiding deadly traps. Sound easy? Not so fast. Each robot shares linked controls, so when you move one, you move them all. It will take clever planning and nerves of steel to pull off this electronic escape. You'll need to avoid many traps, such as mines or electrical circuits, and take advantage of special elements like glue stains. Choose one of three difficulty levels and get ready for a challenge.

Talkback

I am all over DigiDrive and the demo for Dark Lord.

Is that Indy game supposed to be good? I don't think I've heard much about it, but it sounds like it could be similar to the Super Star Wars series, which I liked a lot.

TheFleeceNovember 16, 2009

It's great to see demos for WiiWare! Now people will be able to check stuff out without feeling burnt in the end. Street Fighter II Champion Edition is fine and all, but I'm still holding out for Alpha.

DEMOS!!! I own three of those already, but I can't wait to try the demos for FFCC and Rumble.

Flames_of_chaosLukasz Balicki, Staff AlumnusNovember 16, 2009

Darklord is an awesome game and it's good to see demos for four of the best games available on WiiWare. The Pokemon demo lasted me 40 min and makes me want to spend the $15.

Indiana Jones' Greatest Adventures is a game developed by Factor 5. There was a Genesis version that never got released since the Genesis was at the end of it's life and the Saturn was coming out so it got shelved. If I remember correctly the game features all 3 original movies and I heard it's good but at times really hard.

NWR_pap64Pedro Hernandez, Contributing WriterNovember 16, 2009

I tried out the Darklord demo and the Bit Trip Beat demo. The demos convinced me to pick up both games in the near future. They were a lot of fun, though Bit Trip got challenging quickly!

I already own World of Goo, Bit.Trip.Beat, and NyxQuest, and am already pretty backlogged on Tower Defense so I have no interest in Dark Lord, but I'll check out the Pokemon demo.


EDIT: Hey, I just realized, Nintendo's catching up in terms of online. We got online gaming 8 years late; we got a storage solution 7 years late, now we're getting downloadable demos and they're only 4 years late. Nintendo is slowly making progress!

broodwarsNovember 16, 2009

Quote from: NWR_Neal

I am all over DigiDrive and the demo for Dark Lord.

Is that Indy game supposed to be good? I don't think I've heard much about it, but it sounds like it could be similar to the Super Star Wars series, which I liked a lot.

It's been a while since I owned the game, but from what I can remember Indy is very good, indeed.  It's definitely inspired by the Super Star Wars franchise, so it's a little loose at times in how it interprets the movies but it's quite fun.  I never did beat it, though, because I thought the Last Crusade levels were quite hard.

jakeOSXNovember 16, 2009

demos are the hotness, about time. now we just need some DSidemos... or better yet just the Apple App store set up for the DSi. (yeah yeah, i know, nintendo is more protective than Apple, i can dream tho, no?)

does this pokemon talk to the DS? (no, right?)

Mop it upNovember 16, 2009

I am totally going to try all of those demos.

UncleBobRichard Cook, Guest ContributorNovember 16, 2009

Demos show up in your Club Nintendo list of registered games - if anyone wants something to fluff their list up a bit.  Probably won't get coins for them.

NWR_pap64Pedro Hernandez, Contributing WriterNovember 16, 2009

There's something that very few people have noticed: this update is the "test" Iwata mentioned at his Q&A session. Right now, Nintendo is in "doubt" mode. They don't believe that demos will get people to download more games, so rather than going all out with demos, they only did a handful of them and made them available for a limited time. If during that time sales do double them they have to admit that this helped them out greatly and implement it on both new and older games.

Just look at the details...

This was made available on all regions, rather than just on one. Then, look at the titles chosen. Save for Pokemon Rumble and World of Goo, these games received a lot of critical acclaim, yet didn't sell as well as expected. This makes them perfect candidates to see if giving people the chance to try them for free results in more downloads.

We have to watch out for the sales data and see how sales pick up.

broodwarsNovember 17, 2009

Well, Nintendo should definitely keep the demos coming.  I downloaded the demos for Bit.Trip Beat; Final Fantasy; and Nxy Quest (I already own World of Goo and don't doubt that Pokemon Rumble is crap), and with the exception of Nyx quest (which I found just as boring as Lost Winds) I really liked them and will probably download the real games sometime in the near future.  That's 2 games I was completely content with ignoring up till now (especially Final Fantasy since it's a Tower Defense game) that Nintendo probably sold me on with this.

ShyGuyNovember 17, 2009

My thoughts on the demos I have tried so far:

World of Goo - Bleah, good thing I never bought this thing.
Pokemon Rumble - Simple, yet addictive. I kinda liked it.

Mop it upNovember 17, 2009

I tried that Pokémon game out of curiosity. It is simple but was kind of fun, though it doesn't seem like there would be enough to it to warrant 1,500 points. If it were 1,000 then I might.

A maybe interesting tidbit: after you finish the demo for Bit.Trip Beat, it shows you a few comments from critics. One of them is a quote from Nintendo World Report, which said something along the lines of it being one of the best games on WiiWare.

Quote from: ShyGuy

World of Goo - Bleah, good thing I never bought this thing.

I know what you mean, it's too bad this demo wasn't available before I plopped down 1,500 points for it.

Beat is indeed one of the best WiiWare games. They just recently updated it too, fixing some bugs and easing up the system by which you unlock the levels.

World of Goo probably doesn't demo well. The genius of that game only becomes apparent over time, as new levels nudge you into trying things with the mechanics that you hadn't done before. And when it finally introduces new mechanics, you're blown away. I didn't love that game at first either, but it grew on me very strongly. Besides, if you really needed a demo for this game, you could have tried it on PC a year ago.

I played the Rumble demo and will definitely not be purchasing that game. It's way too simplistic and repetitive for my tastes. The whole "toy" thing seems like an excuse to avoid important elements like leveling up and evolution. The level designs are arbitrary, and according to IGN's review, they are reused throughout the game.

NWR_pap64Pedro Hernandez, Contributing WriterNovember 17, 2009

That the thing about some demos: depending on what you show you either sell it or guarantee that no one buys it. It doesn't matter for World of Goo, though. The game is still selling it so I doubt the demo will affect it.

KDR_11kNovember 17, 2009

Hell, World of Goo sold over a million on WiiWare alone (I think it's something like 2 million on all platforms).

Mop it upNovember 17, 2009

If World of Goo is so successful then why is it one of the demos on offer?

KDR_11kNovember 17, 2009

Because they had a PC demo at hand already and it wasn't much work to provide a WiiWare version of the demo? Demos aren't trivial to make, many devs want to skip them because of the work involved.

broodwarsNovember 17, 2009

Quote from: Mop_it_up

If World of Goo is so successful then why is it one of the demos on offer?

While a million sales on WiiWare is impressive, the overall Wii user base is dramatically greater than that so there's always room for improvement.  Besides, Nintendo's throwing these demos out there to try to draw attention to the WiiWare service in general, so it's best for them to put out demos for the best games they can have representing the service.  World of Goo being by far the best game on the service in terms of sales and critical reception, it's a no brainer for that to be on the demo list.

vuduNovember 17, 2009

I downloaded and played the NxyQuest demo.  I enjoyed it so much I immediately downloaded the full game.

I hope they release demos of the other Bit.Trip games.  I already own Beat, but I'm curious about Core and Void.

TJ SpykeNovember 17, 2009

World of Goo is a decent game, at most. It is NOT worth 1500 Wii Points, even 1000 is pushing it. I am just glad that I was gifted the game, I would have been pissed if I spent the $15 on it. I doubt the game has sold 1 million copies (even when combining PC and WiiWare). Based on the info we have, that would make it one of the highest selling games on any of the 3 download services (it's like a retail game selling 10 million copies, it's a rare feat that most games will never come close to reaching). The PC version has bombed, although that may be because the developers have said that about 90% of the copies being played are pirated versions.

vuduNovember 17, 2009

World of Goo is amazing.  I loved every minute of it.

Quote from: TJ

World of Goo is a decent game, at most. It is NOT worth 1500 Wii Points, even 1000 is pushing it. I am just glad that I was gifted the game, I would have been pissed if I spent the $15 on it.

I could not disagree more.  Even at 1500 points, I feel like it is the only WiiWare game that is truly an outstanding product from start to finish.  It could have been a disc release at $40 and I would have been happy with that price.  $50 would have been pushing it.

Mop it upNovember 17, 2009

Quote from: TJ

World of Goo is a decent game, at most. It is NOT worth 1500 Wii Points, even 1000 is pushing it. I would have been ticked if I spent the $15 on it.

Agreed. Though I got my points through that Pepsi promotion a while ago so it was about $3 for me. It was worth that. No WiiWare game should be more than 1,000 points.

ShyGuyNovember 18, 2009

I tried a couple more demoes tonight

Bit Trip Beat - What a clever little game. I'm no good at it, but it well done. Cheap too!

Nyx Quest - More impressed with this than I thought I would be. I wish the character sprite was a tad bigger, and I think the constant desert would get boring, but I liked platforming quite a bit.

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