On the WiiWare side we have Magnetica (1,000 points), the DS marbles-in-a-track puzzler redone for the console crowd. It includes 4-player multiplayer and the ability to have your very own Mii launching the marbles. Joy!

This week the Virtual Console library gets padding with Fatal Fury 2 for the NEOGEO (900 points), which introduced five new fighters to the series (including Chesty Mai) and featured the ability to smack your opponent back to another line.

A nice pair, but I got my fill of Magnetica on the DS and Mark of the Wolves ruined me for older Fatal Fury titles forever, so my limited Wii storage space is safe for another week.

Wii-kly Update

One WiiWare Game and One Virtual Console Game Added to Wii Shop Channel

You want fireworks? Look no further than the Wii™ Shop Channel, where vibrant bursts of classic gaming action and fresh WiiWare™ content will help fill your living room with a flurry of ooohs and ahhhs. Puzzle-game mavens can enjoy a wild new addition to the WiiWare library, while the Virtual Console™ brings a truly classic fighting game to the fore. For an added holiday-week blast, fans of the WiiWare hit FINAL FANTASY® CRYSTAL CHRONICLES®: My Life as a King™ can enhance the action with new Add-On Content.

Nintendo adds new and classic games to the Wii Shop Channel at 9 a.m. Pacific time every Monday. Wii owners with a high-speed Internet connection can redeem Wii Points™ to download the games. Wii Points can be purchased in the Wii Shop Channel or at retail outlets. This week’s new games are:

WiiWare

Magnetica™ Twist (Nintendo, 1-4 players, Rated E for Everyone—Comic Mischief, 1,000 Wii Points): The classic puzzle game Magnetica is now available on WiiWare , putting its own unique “twist” on the puzzle-game experience. You’re surrounded by marbles, marching slowly but surely down a track. Use a launcher (piloted by a Mii™ of your choice) to shoot marbles with matching colors and wipe them out before they reach the end of the track. Control couldn’t be simpler, as all you need to do is twist the Wii Remote™ controller to aim and press the A button to shoot. And the game play remains as addictive and deep as you’ve come to expect in Nintendo’s puzzle games, with five varied play modes, advanced mechanics such as the ability to lob marbles, and a never-ending supply of combos. This definitely isn’t your typical game of marbles.

Virtual Console

FATAL FURY 2 (NEOGEO, 1-2 players, Rated T for Teen—Animated Blood, Violence, 900 Wii Points): Released in 1992 by SNK, FATAL FURY 2 is the second installment in the renowned fighting-game series. In addition to Terry, Andy and Joe, who appeared in the original game, another five distinctive fighters gather from around the world to compete for the championship title. Also newly added are stage-specific hazards and the ability to perform desperation attacks when a character’s strength is low. These particularly deadly techniques create the chance for a come-from-behind victory achieved with a single strike. Moreover, the innovative two-line battle, which proved popular in the previous version, also has been radically enhanced. Pressing the weak-attack and strong-attack buttons simultaneously enables players to move their fighters to another line themselves, or to launch an attack that pushes opponents back to another line. This game mechanic, unique to this title in the series, allows the player to take advantage of the depth of the screen and create even more exciting bouts. Can you prove yourself the king of fighters again?

That means games like Magnetica and Lost Magic and Contact, titles that didn't burn up the sales charts amid the sea of stellar releases last year, finally make a "best of" list. And, in the Cheap Ass tradition, info on the best deals for each underdog accompanies the write up.

This is one list to hold on to, even for those of us with gaming backlogs, as it will come in handy during the summer gaming doldrums. Michael McWhertor

CAG's Five Most Under Appreciated DS Games of 2006 [Cheap Ass Gamer]

Over at GayGamer.net, they are handing out 5 copies of the DS game Magnetica for those who can write the fruitiest fairy haiku. Contests at other sites are not news. But imagine my delight when GayGamer's editor Fruit Brute wrote, informing me that one of their submissions was a haiku about me:

Florian Eckhardt: though you've won three gaymer's hearts, I'm not that easy.

Honestly, when gay gamers start ejaculating spools of 5-7-5 poetry in your honor, you know you've hit the big time. Oddly enough, though, it got me thinking... Kotaku's constabulary of editors all have names very appropriate to the ancient Japanese art of the haiku. Consider...

BRI-AN CRE-CEN-TE
MI-CHAEL MC-WHER-TOR
E-LI-ZA GAU-GER
GAY BRI-AN ASH-CRAFT

They all work! Why not go over and submit some gay-themed Kotaku editor haikus to GayGamer today? Flor-i-an Eck-hardt

Magnetica Giveaway [Gay Gamer]

In Magnetica, marbles roll down a twisted path toward the goal and it's up to players to stop them by launching new marbles into the oncoming ones. The marbles will disappear if players match three or more in this massive marble elimination. All actions are controlled with the stylus in this title that satisfies even the strongest puzzle addiction.