Familiar activities get a funky boost with this week’s additions to the Wii Shop Channel and Nintendo DSi Shop. A trio of fresh WiiWare titles will have players wrapping their minds around unique puzzles, entertaining brain drills and awesome mini-golf courses. A new Art Style game for Nintendo DSiWare turns cutting paper into a cool hand-held gaming challenge. And simple things like air and weather conditions become exciting game elements in the latest classic offering on the Virtual Console.
Drill Sergeant Mindstrong (XSEED Games, 1-4 players, 800 Wii Points) – Line up and get ready to use your mind. Drill Sergeant Mindstrong is a party game that allows up to four people to play at once. Players become boot-camp trainees under the tough Drill Sergeant Mindstrong, going through mind-boggling, mind-training games. The rules are simple, but concentration and quick thinking are key. Become the top boot of your class and earn promotions based on your efforts. This game is best played with friends and family.
NEVES Plus (Yukes, 1-4 players, 600 Wii Points) – Try your hand at the newest puzzle craze to come out of Japan, NEVES Plus! Enhanced for WiiWare, NEVES Plus not only retains all the simple, mind-bending tangram-based game play from the original Nintendo DS version, but also includes new multiplayer modes wrapped up in an Egyptian theme. This time, you and up to three others can work together to move, rotate and flip the seven Lucky stones into each of the 500-plus silhouette puzzles. You can also challenge one another in new multiplayer modes such as Versus, Speed, Lucky Number and Party Mode. Whether you play every mode by yourself or with friends, NEVES Plus is set to charm you with harder-than-they-look silhouette puzzles.
Family Mini Golf (Aksys Games, 1-8
players, 500 Wii Points) – Daddy, Mommy, Sarah and Billy are back for some mini-golf action. Play through multiple golf courses that contain obstacles ranging from bumpers to speed ramps to fans and more. Up to eight players can play together using a single Wii Remote controller. You can download new courses to expand your fun-filled mini-golf experience, creating even more complex and difficult challenges to overcome. Can you conquer all the courses and become the mini-golf champion?
Art Style: BOXLIFE (Nintendo, 1 player, 500 Nintendo DSi Points) – Climb the corporate ladder in the world of BOXLIFE using your wits and… paper? Use the Nintendo DSi stylus to cut and then manipulate the paper into a box shape. Be careful-if you’re not efficient with your cuts, you’ll waste paper and be penalized. RandD mode teaches you new patterns and challenges you to complete various ranks, while Factory mode gives you the chance to earn money by making as many boxes as possible from an endless sheet of paper. Success in each mode brings its own reward: Clear ranks to earn a promotion, change your character’s appearance, and use your earnings to acquire new items for your character’s miniature garden. With this game’s stylish graphics and catchy sounds, thinking inside the box isn’t such a bad thing.
SimEarth: The Living Planet (TurboGrafx16 CD-ROM, Hudson, 1 player, 800 Wii Points) – An entire planet becomes your laboratory in this large-scale simulation game. Players help foster new life and promote its evolution into life forms of higher intelligence. Guide civilization along the path of evolution until it can achieve Exodus, the ultimate goal of settling on another planet. The basic challenge of the game is to maintain a comfortable environment for the life forms by adjusting atmospheric and geological parameters. Small organisms called Prokaryote and Trichordate will grow and evolve into a multitude of life forms. Making a drastic change is a recipe for disaster. The key to success is making small adjustments and watching how the life forms react. SimEarth also includes planets with environments different from Earth, such as Mars and Venus. Try your hand at terraforming these planets with harsh conditions and creating a world where life can thrive.
Nintendo adds new titles to the Nintendo DSi Shop and the Wii Shop Channel at 9 a.m. Pacific time on Mondays. Users with broadband Internet access can redeem Wii Points or Nintendo DSi Points to download the games. Wii Points can be purchased in the Wii Shop Channel. Nintendo DSi Points can be purchased in the Nintendo DSi Shop. A Nintendo Points Card can be purchased at retail locations. All points from one Nintendo Points Card must be redeemed in either the Nintendo DSi Shop or the Wii Shop Channel. They are not transferable and cannot be divided between the two systems.