Shigeru Miyamoto was out first to talk about the Zelda
franchise as a whole. He started off talking about the music and he used the
orchestra in front of him to full effect, having them play chimes from the game
such as the classic ‘item get’ music and the fairy fountain theme. Ah fairy
fountain, that takes me back, already I sense this is going to be a good
conference! I do love Miyamoto though, he’s like 58 now and he’s still a child
at heart, mucking about on stage, doing the actions for opening a treasure
chest. It was great, even if the orchestra played it too quickly and the
translator spoke over him the whole time.
Skyward Sword is one of Nintendo’s most anticipated games
right now so it probably wasn’t a surprise to see them talk about it straight
away. First of all, when it’s released there will be a special promotional
Golden Zelda Wiimote for the game which looks cool, whether or not it’s
available all over the world remains to be seen. They showed off some more of
the game at E3 this year, gave people a hands-on play but there wasn’t any new
major news on the game set to be released before the year is out.
The Iwata-Reggie combo
Once Miyamoto had finished larking about, Satoru Iwata came
out to tease the audience about the new home console they were bringing out,
talking about it but not showing anything! He did however introduce a trailer
to show off some new 3DS games that are on the way. Mario Kart, StarFox 64,
Super Mario, Kid Icarus, and Luigi’s Mansion 2; and no he didn’t tell everyone
to put on their glasses.
The king of marketing, Reggie Fils-Aime strolled on stage
afterwards to talk more about them and what’s going on with the 3DS in general.
First up was the new Mario Kart title which will now feature the ability to
drive underwater and will include the use of a hang-glider enabling you to get
an extra bit of speed off of jumps. Coins are back although I don’t know how
they’ll be used yet and you can now customise your kart from the body to the
wheels; whether or not this will give you any speed advantages I’m not yet
sure.
Next up Reggie spoke about StarFox 64 which as you probably
know is a port of the N64 title that was known as LylatWars in some areas
(it’ll always be LylatWars to me). This game has some new features, the most
obvious of which being the 3D. There’s new ways to play too, you can stick to
the traditional button pressing or you can use the 3DS itself to fly your
crafts in a six-axis like manner. I think I’ll stick to buttons but I suppose
it’s good to have the choice. Online multiplayer is in, and it’ll use the 3DS’s
cameras to show your opponents real time reactions. I’m sure this probably
means a lot of people will be seeing a randomer’s penis but we can all hope it
won’t end up like that. Also new is the voices, which is a bit of a shame as
the old voices wipe the floor with the new ones. Peppy’s “do a barrel-roll!”
just doesn’t sound right!
Something that does sound right though is this: Super Mario,
a new Mario game which seems to mix the side scrolling of Super Mario Bros with
the 3D world of Mario Galaxy. I’m interested in it because it looks so varied
and diverse in its gameplay and puzzles. It flips from side scroll to a wider
world seamlessly and doesn’t feel like a port of New Super Mario Bros Wii. Oh,
and the Tanooki suit is back! (I always knew it as the racoon suit) Yep, one of
Mario’s favourite suits has made a comeback and it looks just as good as
before.
Also making a comeback is Kid Icarus in a game that was
revealed at the last E3. It’s called Kid Icarus Uprising and stars Pit who’s
not been seen in his own game for Lord knows how long though he was in Super
Smash Bros Brawl. It’s also got a new character who appears to be fighting
alongside you, he looks like he’s fallen out of a Final Fantasy game if I’m
honest. Some of the gameplay footage had a bit of a StarFox vibe to it, flying
through levels on the rails shooting enemies as you go, others looked like
Zelda with the boss battles for example. It kind of reminded me of the old N64
game Rare made called Jet Force Gemini, especially in the footage involving the
multiplayer, which is three on three by the way.
Last but not least, Reggie showed off Luigi’s Mansion 2
which has come right out of the blue. It’s the sequel to the game that launched
the Gamecube, and I’m actually looking forward to it. I thought Luigi’s Mansion
was an underrated game on the Gamecube so it’s good to see Nintendo showing
some faith in it. Some will say Nintendo are struggling for new ideas bringing
this game back but I actually think it could be a good addition to the 3DS
catalogue and the 3D effects could actually look quite good.
Other games that received some screen time include: Resident
Evil: The Mercinaries and Resident Evil: Revelations, Mario and Sonic have a
new Olympic games title for London, Ace Combat 3D, Tetris, Cave Story, Driver:
Renegade, Tekken 3D, and Metal Gear Solid: Snake Eater. Difficult to get a
reading on them really seeing as so little was shown on them.
As for downloads the e-shop is now open for business. As I
mentioned before Link’s Awakening is now available as is Excitebike from the
NES. There’s a free Pokedex download available now which gets some use out of
the street pass; you collect new Pokemon by passing others in the street or
trading. Oh yeah and Excitebike is FREE. What’s with the free stuff Nintendo, you’ve
not been hacked have you?
It was a good showcase for the 3DS considering it has a
relatively poor catalogue right now. I’m not really sure why the 3DS launched
so early as it didn’t really have many titles to offer. With these new upcoming
titles set to be with us before the year is out I’d expect sales to skyrocket.
You, me and Wii
So about an hour into the conference Nintendo finally
revealed their latest addition to their home console family. Reggie was doing
so well talking about the 3DS that he stayed with us all and was given the
honour of announcing it. It’s called the Wii U.
Good name? Bad name? I’m undecided. I didn’t like the name
Wii back when it was revealed and now it’s just part of everyday lexicon, so
who knows maybe Wii U is a good name. As soon as I heard it though I thought
Nintendo were opening up a new university. Sounds like my kind of uni!
As for the console itself we only saw a brief snippet of it.
It sits horizontally this time but still carries that iconic simple Wii white.
It is fully backward compatible, everything the Wii did you can do with this,
including playing on Gamecube games although the controller ports appear to be
missing. All the peripherals such as the Wii Wheel and Wii Zapper are all
compatible as is the balance board so there’s no need to panic in that
department either.
The new controller is where most the attention went to, it’s
a new tablet-like controller with a 6.2” touch screen built in. That screen can
be used to play the game on instead of your TV, you simply switch it from TV to
controller and off you go, meaning other members of your family can watch TV
should they want to without disturbing you on your videogame.
You can make video calls with it, draw on it with the stylus
provided, aim on screen with it and it offers more new ways to play. For
example putting it on the floor as a golf ball while you swing with the
Wiimote. It also integrates with the Wii Zapper too acting as a scope. There
appears to be many possibilities most of which were shown using Wii Sports.
Nintendo wants to brush off its image as a casual console
and appeal to the more hardcore audience found using the Xbox 360 or PS3. They
believe they have developed hardware that will allow game developers to use it
how they see fit and get the best out of certain features applicable to their
game.
This new console is High Definition which was essential,
bringing it up to speed with its rivals and there was a Zelda tech demo shown
off at the show using the new controller in which you played as Link fighting against Goama. It showed the lush 1080p high definition graphics, together with
the extremely brilliant lighting effects. The controller looked impressive in
its use. The map was on the touch screen and the game could be transferred to
it via the TV. All in all, the tech demos looked quite impressive and there is still more to come from the third parties.
Three’s a party
There is a lot of third party support for the Wii U, several
games companies are on board already. Darksiders 2, Tekken, Dirt, Batman Arkham
City, Assassin’s Creed, Ninja Gaiden, Ghost Recon and EA have even mentioned
Mass Effect. So that’s Sega, THQ, EA, Activision, Disney, Ubisoft, Namco
Bandai, Codemasters, Warner Bros, 5th Cell, Irrational Games, all enrolled at
Wii U already, and we haven’t even seen any first party games! Although Smash
Bros was mentioned to a rapturous applause, quite possibly the loudest one I
heard all E3.
And that was that, an impressive conference for Nintendo
that was certainly a lot better than their two main rivals. No pandering to 3D,
no Move or Kinect to plug to death all because they are already ahead of the
game. Nintendo has its foot in the 3D door with the capabilities of the
no-glasses 3D found on the 3DS. They released their version of Kinect five
years ago when they launched the Wii. All of this means Nintendo can progress
faster, show new things, develop great games, and wow audiences.
They didn’t bore everyone with five minute long montages,
they didn’t bombard the audience with too much generic rhetoric, and there was
certainly no embarrassing Ghost Recon moments! Nintendo used their personnel
well, as they usually do. Reggie is the king of marketing and delivers their
products concisely to their audience, Miyamoto represents probably the greatest
game developer of all time, and with Iwata at the helm Nintendo have never been
stronger. You get the feeling with Nintendo, especially with Miyamoto, that
they’re making games they would enjoy, they look like gamers to me, whereas the
other two appear to be in it for the money, rather than the games themselves.
No gamer out there takes a game like Ghost Recon and adds ridiculous Kinect
controls for the cause of gaming do they?
Nintendo’s weakest aspect over the last five years has been
the fact that they don’t possess the power and graphics that the Xbox 360 and
PS3 offer. Now with the Wii U they’ve caught up in that department, meaning big
games that shift their rival’s consoles will now shift theirs. Assassins Creed
and Batman Arkham Asylum amongst many will help Nintendo out a lot. I wouldn’t
be surprised to see Modern Warfare games on the Nintendo console either.
There are two key areas Nintendo must sort out to become
successful with the Wii U. The first and probably most important is the online
arena. The Wii’s online capabilities were very poor, with only Mario Kart Wii
being a true online game. The likes of Super Smash Bros Brawl were poor online
so it’s important Nintendo address this and catch up to their rivals who are
already way ahead. If they do, then Microsoft could well be in big trouble.
Nintendo and Sony both offering free online play might just turn a few people
off Xbox especially if games like Modern Warfare are available for free on two
other consoles. Throwing in some extra maps isn’t going to cut it for Microsoft
anymore.
The second thing Nintendo must address is the sheer amount
of shovelware that appears on their consoles. The Wii was great, but after a
year all sorts of drivel was being released on it in an attempt to snare the
casual market. They have to put a stop to this before the Wii U becomes just as
casual as the Wii became.
Overall Nintendo revealed a lot of good content throughout
the show and easily took the best of E3 crown. Oh Nintendo: you had me at
Zelda, take my money!
***
The Wii U trailer is below. Warning: Contains very cheesy
acting.
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