Fans of the Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles line-up of games from Square Enix are in for a treat. Not only because the upcoming DS-and-Wii compatible Echoes of Time looks really sweet, but because a recent trademark by Square Enix has opened up the door for another Crystal Chronicles game.
Recently, Square Enix filed a trademark for Crystal Defenders in the US Patent Trademark database. This new trademark has nothing to do with Echoes of Time, seeing as how Square Enix trademarked that back in July. Of course, there's also the possibility that this isn't for anything new and could be tied to a mobile title from the company, Crystal Guardians W1, says Spencer over at Siliconera. We guess we'll just have to wait and see.
While we do love all different kinds of trailers and videos to spaz up our normally dull internet lives, we really appreciate when we come away with something useful after watching one. That's why we love developer's diaries, especially ones that involve the beloved Square Enix, and especially when said Squeenix game is WiiWare's My Life as a King.
With the exception of the almost monotonous voice-over work, we found the video and the tidbits of info offered interesting. Note, though, that we're still a little bitter about the "content updates," which is the developers' euphemism for "Square Enix maiming our wallets for stuff that should have been included in the first place."
Nothing else too special hit the video channel, aside from some previews of upcoming games. Here's the full list, though, for you to judge:
Developer's Voice - FFCC: My Life as a King (embedded above)
We didn't just get one WiiWare game and one Virtual Console game this week. We also got ... some DLC for Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King! Well, that's much better! The new content includes four new dungeons:
the Infinity Spire pack for 300 points, which contains two dungeons, one of which levels up when it's completed,
Castle Renovation for 100 points, a dungeon that enables you to rename your adventurers and listen to the game's music in a jukebox mode,
the Library for 200 points, a dungeon that adds libraries to the game and lets you teach your adventurers skills.
In addition, for 100 points each, you can buy new outfits for the King and Chime. That's right, the Chime bikini DLC has finally arrived. Just in time for summer for furtive, shameful downloading!
We've got a winner in our latest contest: reader Nathan, who was looking forward to Tetris. After all, what's life without a little Tetris? We can only hope he's also looking forward to Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King, since he's picking up a copy on us! Didn't win? Don't worry -- we'll have something new on offer next week!
Interested in trying out a (few) day(s) as the little king of a little region? Then jump on over to our Virtually Free giveaway and throw your name in for a chance to win Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King. The contest winds down tonight!
Don't forget that we're offering one reader a chance to experience life as a (Final Fantasy) king! Head on over to our latest edition of Virtually Free for a chance to win a copy of the WiiWare title Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King. Remember, you can enter once per day until the contest winds down Monday night!
There are two things that led to this particular question of the day: our new column, Born for Wii, and the release of expanded games like Dr. Mario Online Rx. Are there other properties you'd like to see get this kind of enhancement for WiiWare? Or maybe you'd be more interested in something like the direction Square Enix went with Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King -- in that it's a nice break from the typical with the Final Fantasy franchise.
There are tons of original games for WiiWare, sure, but there are equally as many possibilities for things like this, from board games to expanded online mini-games based on popular characters. What would you pay for?
We've got something special for you in this week's Virtually Free giveaway: the chance to live as a king! Manage your peasants, live in a castle, and jaunt around in puffy shorts, all on our dime. Of course, it's virtual, but hey -- we never promised the moon. Or a kingdom. But we are promising Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King ($15) to one lucky reader!
So what do you have to do to win? First of all, you have to leave a comment (with a valid e-mail address) on this post telling us what WiiWare games (current and announced) excite you most. Second, you must be a legal resident of the United States with an American Wii (sorry, Canadians, we have to leave you out of this one; blame the gifting system and not us!) and 18 years of age or older. You may enter once per calendar day between now and Monday, June 16; the contest comes to a close that night at 11:59 PM Eastern time, and we'll select a winner in a random drawing the next day. Questions? Check out the official rules.
My Life as a King fan, are you? Then you'll be happy to know that Square Enix created a love-fest site for the game, in which you take a break from being the king and become the adventurer instead.
When you first enter the site (assuming you've logged into your Square Enix Member's account), you'll be greeted by a quiz that will determine your job (this blogger sadly conjured up the lamest of the lame jobs, the white mage). Once you have a job and a house, you can dally around the town.
Different places in the virtual kingdom let you do various things. At the castle, you can write questions, comments, or thoughts about the game to its developers. Throughout the town you can also check out the bulletin to see the "king's behests," download some goodies (like screen savers), see other members' "houses," and other random stuff.
The website is a nice idea for fan service, but to be honest, there's no reason to spend more than five minutes there at the moment. Hopefully Square Enix will add some more neat things to it soon.
Right on time, Nintendo has pulled the appropriate levers, flicked the necessary switches, and sent a whole world of WiiWare goodness down the pipes and into Europe and Australia. Here's what greeted this blogger on his local servers just now:
Nintendo has released a list of eight games described as "launch window" titles ahead of WiiWare's debut in Europe on May 20th. Included are four games that the U.S. is still waiting on -- Dr. Mario & Germ Buster, Star Soldier R, Toki Tori, and Pirates: The Key of Dreams -- though it looks like Europe will be waiting a little longer for Defend Your Castle and V.I.P Casino: Blackjack. Frankly, we'll live without a blackjack game.
Once again, note that these are "launch window" games. How long is a launch window? No idea. "Launch window" is one of those infuriatingly flexible terms beloved by PR types. Anyway, the list of WiiWare games that Europe will be getting kinda near the launch is as follows:
There's currently no news on pricing, but we'd fully expect European WiiWare prices to match those of other regions, assuming Nintendo hasn't found a totally new and unique way to rip European gamers off.
In their GDC presentation, Square Enix's Fumiaki Shiraishi and Toshihiro Tsuchida described the new direction they were taking with Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King. They discussed how they were shaking things up at their company by making a small, low-budget game with no elaborate cutscenes. Brandon Sheffield and Jeremy Parish spoke with the game's co-creators about the advantages and challenges of trying to make a Square Enix game under strict financial and storage budgets.
Shiraishi described the limitations as an inspiring factor for the game's design, and also pats SE's artists on the back: "I don't think we would've had this game design idea if we didn't have the memory restriction to begin with. Once we had the restriction, we had... all our artists are veterans, so if you tell them the size, they'll hit it right on."
Another (very) noteworthy offhand statement comes at the end, in a discussion of Square Enix's attitude toward the Virtual Console. When the similarity in theme between ActRaiser and My Life as a King came up, Shiraishi said "I'd like to make an ActRaiser sequel. That would be kind of fun." Yes. It would.
As we anticipated, Nintendo waited until the last possible moment to reveal the details on WiiWare's U.S. launch. In a press release which describes WiiWare as the "most democratic environment in industry history," Nintendo confirmed the six titles that launched with the download service today -- and it looks like the leaked information from the weekend was spot-on:
So it's finally up -- hurray! Monday mornings haven't felt quite this optimistic in some time! Have any of you lot already downloaded yourself some WiiWare?
Gallery: LostWinds
Gallery: Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King
The North American WiiWare launch is almost upon us, and instead of the stealth releases that we thought were coming, Nintendo's press release of WiiWare games debuting this Monday (along with their point values) was recently leaked. While we can't be sure this list is 100% valid, it looks like we can expect the following:
Although we're disappointed by the lack of Dr. Mario, this looks like a pretty solid launch list to us. It'll be difficult to pick and choose exactly which titles we want, but there are definitely some that stand out more than others.
How about you? Do you plan on downloading any of the above, or are you going to wait for impressions and reviews first?
You have to download an updated My Life as a King from the Wii Shop (and delete the old one) before you can have the privilege of adding any of the new content to your game. Luckily, the interface for feeding your money to the game is nice, and doesn't force you back out into the Wii Shop again. The menu shows how many points and blocks you have available, and the cost in both Wii Points and space of each item on the list.
The only thing missing is a pop-up window that provides periodic "WHAT ARE YOU DOING" and "YOU COULD BE BUYING BONK'S ADVENTURE WITH THOSE POINTS" messages.
Gallery: Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King
We didn't just get one WiiWare game and one Virtual Console game this week. We also got ... some DLC for Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King! Well, that's much better! The new content includes four new dungeons: 
Right on time, Nintendo has pulled the appropriate levers, flicked the necessary switches, and sent a whole world of WiiWare goodness down the pipes and into Europe and Australia. Here's what greeted this blogger on his local servers just now:
