I can only hope you read this before you jumped on the Wii shop channel to download the latest Wiiware title, SPOGS. To be blunt…this game is bad. Really bad. So bad that the Infendo staff was a little scared to download this title for a review. Unfortunately I took the bait. IGN’s review nicely sums up my experience with SPOGS.

This is as bad as it gets. SPOGS Racing is ugly, boring, and sports some of the worst racing AI ever. It’s an absolute joke that D2C is charging money for this. SPOGS looks like someone’s first go at homebrew developing.

Read the entire review to see one of the lowest scores ever given to a “game” at IGN. Please don’t buy this! I don’t even want to write about this game anymore. Blah!

Any readers get suckered into this deal?

Two new games are available from the Wii Shop Channel today.  One is a new WiiWare racer, the other is an arcade fighting classic.  Click on through for the full descriptions and to let us know if you’re interested in either game.

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It could be the extra Nintendo gene I was born with talking, but this morning I can’t help but think that the Mega Man 9 WiiWare news is much bigger than it initially appears.

Sure, this is a major coup for Nintendo’s infantile WiiWare service, and it’s incredible news for anyone who grew up playing Mega Man on the NES (or other, *cough* CD-ROM systems in the 1990s), but there’s something more to it than that.

On its face, the decision to go backwards in time with Mega Man 9 could be seen as a hat tip to the 8-bit generation (me, and others like me), in the same vein as Super Dodge Ball Brawlers and the entire Virtual Console collection to date. It is, but beneath those primitive pixels is a conscious decision by one of the biggest publishers in the world to buck the trends and, gulp, take a risk. (more…)

At the micro level, it would appear as though Nintendo is gimping its Virtual Console releases as of late. From December 2007 onward, the steady stream of three titles a week has slowed to a trickle, to the point where some weeks have seen just one release or, more recently, nothing at all.

Enter Gamasutra and its bar graphs, however, and a new, more optimistic picture begins to take shape—if you like WiiWare, that is.

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I have to admit, I do enjoy the element of surprise that greets me every Monday morning. What will David post for the VC update? What WiiWare games are going to drain my bank account this week? These are the fun questions that betray my lack of a social life and my obvious love of Nintendo-related surprises.

But what if I were a developer, whose livelihood depended on the games being digitally distributed via Nintendo’s Wii Shop Channel? I’d be a nervous wreck and slightly pissed off, as a matter of fact. Trouble is, this is exactly what’s happening.

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It’s a holiday and a huge Wii Shop Channel Monday today, May 26th, 2008:

Dr. Mario Online Rx - WiiWare - 1,000 Wii Points
The doctor is in! Mario takes a break from his adventuring ways and once again dons his stethoscope for a new generation of germ-battling mayhem. In addition to the classic mode of using vitamins to exterminate viruses, you’ll find two battle modes and an online multiplayer mode where you can hone your skills against players from around the world. Feel like challenging a friend who doesn’t have Dr. Mario Online Rx? Then the WiiWare-exclusive Friend Battle Demo is just what the doctor ordered. Or maybe you’d like some help taking on those nasty viruses? Try out Virus Buster, where four players can simultaneously move capsules simply by pointing at them with a Wii Remote controller. Any way you look at it, Dr. Mario Online Rx is a prescription for fun that everyone can enjoy. [Published by Nintendo] (more…)

From Siliconera this morning comes word that Hudson’s upcoming online Tetris title could have a very interesting new feature.

Will Tetris for WiiWare have any new features other than Mii support or online play? Maybe drag and drop play like Dr. Mario & Virus Busters?

It features a number of new rules and items. Currently, we’re tossing around the idea of using the Balance Board. The game also supports 6-Player Wi-Fi battle.

Oh, and there’s the 6-player WiFi battles to consider too. Is it time for a Tetris resurgence?

As I’m sure you’ve heard, WiiWare launched in North America today with six games. The only one, and I do mean only, that I wouldn’t spend money on is VIP Blackjack. I’ve already purchased and played both My Life as a King and Lost Winds (impressions coming soon, but they are both beautifully looking and sounding games), and am already eying TV Show King, Defend Your Castle, and Pop in that order. Buying them all would set you back $54, not a bad deal me thinks.

But you’re not going to buy them all, are you? That being the case, please offer your thoughtful recommendations in the below comments: which games should everyone buy, why/why not, what’s good, what’s not, what has impressed you the most about WiiWare so far? Let’s hear it, folks!