The LoadDown - 03/15/2010 - Castlevania Rondo of Blood!

Another week, another batch of downloadable titles:

WiiWare --Two solid efforts this week.  Rage of the Gladiator is sort of a medieval fantasy variation on Punch-Out, with support for Wii MotionPlus.  Triple Shot Sports is a well-implemented target-shooting game, ported from the iPhone to WiiWare for a reasonable 500 points.

Wii Virtual Console --  We get a major, long-awaited title this week -- the Japanese Castlevania: Rondo of Blood (aka Dracula X: Chi no Rondo) for the PC Engine.  This game is considered to be one of the finest 2-D Castlevania games Konami ever published, and at 900 Wii points it's a heckuva lot cheaper than the original game.

DSiWare -- 4 substantial games this week; the DSi has clearly been attracting developers' attention.  Zoo Frenzy is a Tycoon-style game with animal care mini-games and a Pokemon-style collecting element.  101 Minigolf World supplies stylus-controlled miniature golf with 100 3-D holes to play.  Battle of Giants: Dinosaurs - Fight for Survival seems to be a fighting/exploration game with customizable dinosaurs.  Car Jack Streets is reminiscent of the original top-down Grand Theft Auto.

XBox Live Arcade -- Last week saw the release of one new game called Scrap Metal, an old-fashioned top-down multiplayer car combat game that feels like a pre-Playstation take on the Twisted Metal franchise.  It's well-implemented, with a victory-based mechanism for acquiring new vehicles, but the arenas are small and the gameplay doesn't feel terribly fresh.

PS3 on PSN -- Two games previously seen on other platforms hit the PS3 via PSN last week.  Popcap Games' Feeding Frenzy 2: Shipwreck Showdown arrived, along with Capcom's neo-retro Mega Man 10.