If I buy the sixth app in the search results and only care to review two of the earlier ones, the old method was 5 touches before the one I'm buying is in front of my face, while the new method is 5 swipes, and with the new method I get more information about the three I previously rejected based on icon/name alone.
I'm pretty sure my own experience is that the item I am looking for is usually in the top 3 results, and I pretty much always review the top 3 results, so this feels like it will make it significantly easier for me to get to the apps I want to buy.
I'll have to try it out to know, though. One thing I lose here if the 3rd app is the one I want is the confidence that the one I really want isn't somewhere in 4-10. It will take some usage to know if the new design is better for me or not.