We're back again, with a fresh video that's piping hot with gaming goodness. Oh, and there's some dude talking over the whole thing. We're sorry about that. He will be taken care of.
After checking out the video above, head past the break for the rest.
Posted Aug 22nd 2008 5:37PM by JC Fletcher Filed under: News
For the second time after the Smash Bros. Dojo announced that there would be no more site updates, the Smash Bros.Dojo has updated. Rather than revealing something new about Super Smash Bros. Brawl, however, the latest update reveals something about you: that you're all crazy and willing to replay Target Smash and Home-Run Contest over and over again.
The Dojo now features a list of records for the two contests, organized by level and by character. The fastest Target Smash overall? As of the end of last month, it's 3.98 seconds in Level 1 by Olimar. The longest home run? Ganondorf's 7,435.9 feet. And those are just individual records -- it gets crazier in co-op.
If you're good at these challenges, but you've stopped playing Brawl, it may be time for you to hop back in. You might just get on the Dojo! Of course, only you will know, since there aren't any names attached to these records.
Pow! Blam! Thwack! That's the sound of the Wii's biggest software performers in 2008 so far. The likes of Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Wii Fit, and Mario Kart Wii have taken some of the the top places in a new Top Global Markets Report, as calculated by chart specialists Enterbrain (Japan), NPD (the U.S.) and Gfk Chart-Track (the UK).
Although top spot goes to Grand Theft Auto IV (6.29 million copies sold in 2008 so far), the next four places feature Wii games, three of which are exclusives. Brawl (5.4 million) was runner-up, while Mario Kart Wii (4.6 million) and Wii Fit (3.6 million) reached third and fourth respectively. Guitar Hero III (just under 3.4 million) was fifth; obviously, the Wii also had a hand in that.
What does this prove? Well, little that we didn't already know: that Nintendo's console and games are obscenely popular -- even when said games cost way more than regular titles. With four months of the year still to go, we wouldn't rule out one or more of those Nintendo exclusives overhauling that insolent Russian Niko. Commence yaaaaying.
The latest Castlevania Judgment screens, fresh from the Leipzig showfloor, feature a new character not previously seen in the title. "Aeon" is probably one of the fighters produced by manga artist Takeshi Obata, who was drafted in by Konami to provide character designs. Alternatively, he could be from the DS's Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia. "Aeon" is not a name we're familiar with from previous instalments of the franchise, and neither Google or the Castlevania Wiki could shed any light on our confusion. Shanoa, the heroine of Order of Ecclesia, is already accessible in Judgment, so we wouldn't rule it out.
Whoever Aeon is, you can see more of him here, here and here. In other news, Koji Igarashi confirmed to IGN that the title will now ship to the U.S. in 2009. Grab your stake, hit up our gallery for new shots, and then trek past the break for a new trailer.
Another E3 interview with Castlevania series producer Koji Igarashi has surfaced, this time from Nintendo World Report. After justifying Castlevania Judgmentyet again, Igarashi gave a tenuous, noncommittal, but still interesting statement regarding future Castlevania games: "With regards to WiiWare, I'm evaluating that right now, and to be honest, I think a 2D Castlevania game on WiiWare might be the right approach."
He has previously said that he was interested in how things turned out for Mega Man 9, and he has said that WiiWare was an interesting service, but this is the most direct Igarashi has been yet about a WiiWare entry in the franchise. He also confirmed the nature of the Order of Ecclesiaconnection bonus: as we expected, Shanoa is unlocked in Judgment by connecting with a DS running Order of Ecclesia.
Gallery: Castlevania Judgment
Talking about Castlevania is a bit of a cottage industry for Wii Fanboy. Not only do we want the 2Dgames on Wii, we've made it happen -- though not the amazing Dracula X, which Japan has on VC. We've expressed our bemusement about Judgment and tried to gauge yours. In fact, we pretty much bring up Castlevaniawhenever possible.
That's according to LucasArts president Darrell Rodriguez. We imagine the Force Unleashedteam's shoulders drooping a little in unison every time LucasArts undersells their game in favor of serving the larger Clone Wars multimedia hype machine.
This Entertainment Weekly video interview with Rodriguez, Clone Wars TV series director Dave Filoni and George Lucas, as well as members of both the DS and Wii dev teams, features a little bit of excellent-looking footage of the Wii game. According to Krome's Robert Walsh, the Wii game is designed to allow players to replay experiences from the TV show.
LucasArts' goal of a totally convergent game/show experience is cool, but it's kind of a shame that they're spreading those particular character designs across so many screens.
Even more than the world depicted in the bizarre Street Fighter movie, or the outrageous horror-and-Zubaz presentation of the Mortal Kombat movie, we imagine this Art of Fighting 2 commercial is what a fighting game would look like in live action. Huge guys with terrible hair delivering awkward dialogue in semi-yelled monotone, standing totally still until launching into an unnatural-looking punch.
Even though they're awesome to play, fighting game-style combat in the real world would look less like an expert martial arts tournament and more like pro wrestling with less Spandex.
The VC Advantage is a weekly look at the secrets inside games -- not just cheat codes, but assorted trivia and oddities. We aim to bring back the feeling of the hint columns from game magazines, except when we do something else.
Ask people to name the first Commodore 64 game that comes to mind, and we're willing to bet that more than half would mention International Karate +. Despite coming out on loads of different platforms back in the late-1980s, System 3's chop-'em-up is still most widely recognized as one of the C64's biggest hits, and is now available on the Virtual Console for ... slightly more than its 1987 price!
Neo Turf Masters is a rather gaudy, fast-paced take on ruining a good walk golf (though if reviews are to be believed, it's heaps better than theother golfing options on the VC), while City Connection completes the bill. As usual, you can check past the break for footage of all three.
When The King of Fighters '94 introduced the concept of the three-person team to side-scrolling fighting games, it simultaneously introduced the idea of the joke team. While the other teams consisted of martial arts champions, mercenaries, and wielders of ancient powers, the American Sports Team was a group of three American professional athletes:
Brian Battler, the football player in a single, giant shoulder pad, obsessed with tackling
Lucky Glauber, a pro basketball player who spends his spare time street fighting
Poor Koji Igarashi seems to be getting the same question a lot: Why is Castlevania Judgmenta 3D fighting game? He had his stock answer about short-session Wiimote whipping at the ready when Wired's Chris Kohler asked him.
He also had other, shockingly new things to say in relation to Judgment, which sadly reveal the kinds of budgets Konami offers Castlevania games these days. In response to a question about the environment for third-party games on the Wii, Igarashi said the following, which lays bare the approach taken by Konami:
"I think there are two roads you can take: Create a game for the core fans with as low a development cost as possible; the other is to just find a different market for these consoles outside the core gamer."
There is hope for more real Castlevania games on a smaller budget, and that hope is called Mega Man 9. "I'm watching that very closely to see how it does," IGA told Wired. "Myself, I'm a big retro gaming fan, so if it is successful that definitely opens up doors for what I can do." It's no wonder that Igarashi would be interested in a console game that reuses 8-bit sprites.
We've seen screens, dabbled a bit in gameplay footage -- now it''s time to get a word in edgeways from Glenn Stotz, introduced as a Naruto "product specialist." A paid Naruto fanboy, perhaps? And here we are watching the series for free like suckers, when we should be raking in the cash. Le sigh.
Stotz talks about Clash of Ninja Revolution 2, which is a pretty ambitious product with a deep storyline and a huge range of Wiimote gesture controls. It's a fighting game at heart, but we wouldn't mind a fighter that actually tries to present some semblance of a plot. Watch the interview and you'll see that Naruto is a perfect license for doing exactly that.
We've already documented our feelings about Castlevania's transformation into a 3D fighting game, but it wasn't until this morning that we got a proper look at the game in motion. It's not actually all that bad! Okay, so the lip-synching is a bit off, most of the lines positively reek of cheese ("I'm a Belmont -- that's my job"), and some of the voice acting makes the guy behind Leon Kennedy seem almost De Niro-esque.
Such quibbles aside, we suppose this is the best that could be done with a Castlevania fighting game. Environments and characters are solidly built, there are some pleasant enough effects, the music is great, and we're pleased they opted for a free-roaming style, if only because it reminds us of Power Stone. Make the jump for a trailer and some direct-feed footage.
If all-out battle royales are your thing, you might want to check out the above trailer for Naruto: Clash of Ninja Revolution 2. It seems to meld the finesse of a fighting game with the brutality of a brawler, and evidently does a pretty good job of it. Hopefully, the key to winning battles won't just be spamming the Shadow Clone Jutsu over and over again -- we are looking for a nice, balanced fighting experience.
If you look closely, you'll be able to see a few on-screen indicators of particular Wiimote movements in combat. Gone are the days of pushing complex sequences of buttons rapidly to execute attacks -- fighting games have evolved somewhat to recognize fluid movements as a valid form of control. It works -- believe it.
As a plucky young ninja, Naruto does heaps of fighting. More fighting than a mob of pre-teens looking to grab that last copy of Pokemon Rangers 2. The difference here is that Naruto -- the anime -- is pretty cool, and occasionally spawns a few decent products -- the games. Today's Naruto game is none other than Clash of Ninja Revolution -- the sequel.
We heard about Clash of Nnja Revolution 2 a while back, and it was better-than-bad news, considering the original isn't too shabby. It's not amazing, but hey -- sequels are designed for improvement ... right? If you think the screens in the new gallery below show a promising future for Naruto games on the Wii, let the public know. As a Pokemon-esque anime phenomenon, it's pretty gosh darn entertaining -- and we want awesome games to come along for the ride. Believe it!
The judgment of a Fanboy is brutal, terrifying and often accompanied by various LOLs and ZOMGs. In fact, the revelation that Castlevania: Judgment for the Wii was to be a fighting game resulted in the biggest ZOMG of them all. Hey, Konami may be tampering with a classic formula, and pitting classic characters against each other for no excuse but to witness a violent showdown -- but what the heck is wrong with that?
Bring down your gavel of screenshot-hating justice after viewing the latest images in the gallery. An empty excuse for a cash cow Wii title or not -- it looks very pretty.
Another E3 interview with Castlevania series producer Koji Igarashi has surfaced, this time from Nintendo World Report. After justifying Castlevania Judgment yet again, Igarashi gave a tenuous, noncommittal, but still interesting statement regarding future Castlevania games: "With regards to WiiWare, I'm evaluating that right now, and to be honest, I think a 2D Castlevania game on WiiWare might be the right approach."
Talking about Castlevania is a bit of a cottage industry for Wii Fanboy. Not only do we want the 2D games on Wii, we've made it happen -- though not the amazing Dracula X, which Japan has on VC. We've expressed our bemusement about Judgment and tried to gauge yours. In fact, we pretty much bring up Castlevania whenever possible.
The VC Advantage is a weekly look at the secrets inside games -- not just cheat codes, but assorted trivia and oddities. We aim to bring back the feeling of the hint columns from game magazines, except when we do something else.
Ask people to name the first Commodore 64 game that comes to mind, and we're willing to bet that more than half would mention International Karate +. Despite coming out on loads of different platforms back in the late-1980s, System 3's chop-'em-up is still most widely recognized as one of the C64's biggest hits, and is now available on the Virtual Console for ... slightly more than its 1987 price!
