It's that time of the week again, as Nintendo's three different download shops have all received a fresh influx of all-new games – and we've played them all and reviewed them for you right here. WiiWare, DSiWare, 3DS Virtual Console and beyond, it's all evaluated for you in this one-stop spot. So check it out, won't you? It's IGN's eShop Update for July 7, 2011!

REVIEWS


We'll get things started this week as usual, with our top pick of the newest batch of DSiWare. This time it's Roller Angels, a combination of de Blob, Jet Grind Radio, Canabalt and The Powerpuff Girls. It's a constant-movement platformer where you control one of three different cutesy rollerskating girls armed with cans of spraypaint, and your task is to restore color and vibrance to the world as an invading force of black-and-white aliens called the Monodrones are stealing the planet's pretty pinks, blues and yellows.


It's a fun and quick design. Stages are short and the learning curve is easy, as you jump across gaps and over enemies with A, keep your paint supply shaken up in the can with Y and press and hold X to apply graffiti to highlighted spots on walls, billboards and street signs. The three girls – Patty, Mee and Becky – each have different strengths and weaknesses (one's a better jumper, one's a stronger attacker and the like) and that adds a bit of variety to the linear quest. Occasional boss battles break up the action across 50 or so different stages.

It's not an award-winner, but it's a fun romp. Give it a look if you liked any of the games it's drawn inspiration from.

DSi Shop: 500 Points | 3DS eShop: $4.99

DSiWare's latest match-three puzzler is yet another clone of PopCap's Bejeweled. This time around you're matching up like-colored gems as a member of an archeological exploration team on Easter Island, seeking to solve some mysterious mystery that never really gets enough focus or attention to really make sense.


Jewel Keepers' unique twist on the Bejeweled idea is that you clear levels by switching the colors of tiles placed behind each gem on the board. Completing a match of three on top of the tile does the job, so you have to make a match happen at every position on the grid in order to move on. It's a different enough idea to set this one apart just a bit – I've never seen it used before, anyway – but it ultimately just proves frustrating.

You're often left with just one or two little squares hidden in a corner somewhere and have to play for minutes on end making meaningless matches elsewhere while waiting for the right set of gems to get into close enough proximity with each other to be able to clear them right in just the proper spot. That's irritating, and makes me want to just go back to normal Bejeweled or one of its better imitators, like Puzzle Quest.

DSi Shop: 500 Points | 3DS eShop: $4.99

I'm still not sure what the point of this game design is. Farm Frenzy is a mess of ideas – you start off in each level with the task of making grass grow so that your farm animals can eat it. Then they produce products like eggs and milk for you to sell, which you tap on and send to a truck that drives back and forth between a distant city and returns with money. Then you use that money to reinvest in your farm, buying more animals and more water to make more grass grow, and purchasing extraneous buildings to process your products into other products.

And then a bear shows up.


There might have been a good gameplay idea in here somewhere, but what this final product delivers is just confusion – I kind of get it and I kind of don't, and I'm not having fun trying to figure it out. It doesn't help matters that the game does very little to explain what's going on, and it further doesn't help matters that the control seems to be implemented poorly – sometimes you'll tap the ground and grass will grow, other times it won't. (And I had enough water in reserve.)

I think you're better off ignoring this mess of a game and letting the developers go back to the drawing board and figure out how they can deliver something that makes more sense (and is more fun to play) next time around.

DSi Shop: 500 Points | 3DS eShop: $4.99

Go ahead and start making your jokes, but I've committed to covering each and every new Nintendo download that comes along in this new eShop era – so that includes make-up simulators targeted at little girls. Make-Up & Style is exactly what it seems to be, a virtual interface for girls to play around with applying lipstick, eye shadow and rouge to digital faces.

I don't see the point of it. This kind of cosmetics play absolutely has a place in a young girl's life, but that place is when she sneaks into her mom's, her aunt's or her older sister's bedroom, finds their make-up collection and sits in front of a mirror practicing on herself. If you've got a young daughter, niece or sister in your life who's at the age to want that kind of experience, she's probably already had it – or you could sit down with her and share the time together so she doesn't feel like she has to sneak around in secrecy about it.


The game itself does little to argue against my initial dislike of its very concept, as its characters seem creepily lifeless and its "missions" don't convince me that this is really a game at all. Its photo-taking feature is just odd, too – you use the 3DS or DSi Camera to take a picture of your girl's face and it applies her image to one of the in-game models. Again, why not just go use the bathroom mirror?

So unless the little girl in your life is absolutely obsessed with make-up and keeps stealing your cosmetic case when you're in the other room, or unless she's in serious training to become a Hollywood make up artist at the tender age of 7, you can safely skip past this download and let this kind of experience happen where it's supposed to. In the real world. With real make up. Followed by photos you then snap to embarrass her with when she's in high school.

DSi Shop: 500 Points | 3DS eShop: $4.99

We're not done yet! That's all the DSiWare for this week, but we've still got a fresh WiiWare release and two different Game Boy games that have just debuted in the 3DS eShop to review. Click over to Page 2 to read all about Just Jam, Qix and Fortified Zone.