Nintendo Wii Fanboy

A few days ago, Nintendo held a special press event in Redmond (we were invited, but were too busy preventing nuclear war to go) where the media could have a very long, very uninterrupted playthrough of the final build of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess.

No less than a dozen major gaming sites and publications have already released their in-depth experiences with everyone's favorite kinda-elf, so we've done you the favor of assembling the cream of the crop right here. The overall gist? 1) Don't wait for the Gamecube version, and 2) Holy damn this game is amazing. Of the five listed, we recommend good 'ol Matt Cassamassina's impressions; they're quite thorough.

Zelda Impressions from IGN: Matt Cassamassina

Zelda Impressions from GoNintendo: Raw Meat Cowboy

Zelda Impressions from 1up: Jeremy Parish

Zelda Impressions from Gamespot: Ricardo Torres

Zelda Impressions from Planet Gamecube: Steven Rodriguez

Over the weekend, the Internet was all abuzz with the latest outrageous rumor -- that EB Games and GameStop wouldn't take money for Wii preorders, but instead were only accepting $50 worth of trade-in goods. Not your old credit either; the trades had to be made on the spot for credit toward a Wii (or, if that's your fancy, a PS3).

But it turns out that the doomsayers jumped the gun. While the program does seem to be for real, it only applies to certain stores in Hawaii and Guam, not to every EB Games or GameStop around. This may be the first time we're glad we don't live in Hawaii. However, none of the stores we called were yet taking preorders at all, at least, not on the system itself. If the test goes well in Hawaii (oh, that's likely), then this may be the future of console preorders, but we wouldn't toss out those credit cards just yet.

[Via Joystiq and various tipsters!]

Development studio System 3 has scored rights to the old Epyx library of games and is already planning to bring popular titles Impossible Mission and California Games to the DS and PSP. Impossible Mission is due to grace the handhelds in January, while California Games will release in May including unlockable content in the form of older titles Winter Games and Summer Games. While these games will be remakes of their original, dust-covered cousins, System 3's founder Mark Kale said they will not be updated to 3D.

"You gotta keep the gameplay mechanics the same or else it ceases to be the original game and you're only using the game brand to sell games," Kale said. "It ceases to be Impossible Mission or California Games or what have you. ...What we're doing is we're incorporating the original gameplay and mechanics and bringing the gameplay up to date."

Kale also noted that versions of these remakes are also planned to release on the Wii, which he was quick to say had the ideal control scheme for these games. We assume the games will be sold independently via Nintendo's Virtual Console service, however the piece makes no mention of distribution plans.

The folks over at Gamespot were witness to a recent EA event showing off an early build of Madden 07 for the Wii. With the unique control style of the Wii, it looks like essential functions, as well as some cosmetic ones, of the game will be handled fairly well. During the demo, the exhibitors showed how the ball could be snapped, thrown to a selected receiver, and even how the crowd's intensity could be manipulated. In the case of hushing the crowd on offense, all the player need do pre-snap is place the Wiimote and nunchuk above their head and the QB will shush the crowd.

On the other side of the ball, the setup is presented in much the same way. When playing as a defensive back, you could raise the Wiimote and nunchuk to jump for an interception or just wave the Wiimote to swat the ball down. Basically, the nunchuk is to represent your player's body and legs while the Wiimote represents the player's arms and hands.

Considering last year's edition of the popular football franchise failed to improve on anything from the 2005 edition (see: QB = mobile lighthouse), we're hoping these changes bring back some life to the game. It's not like we have another football game to fall back on anymore!

Gamespot has recently posted an interesting Q&A session with Elebits producer Shingo Mukaitouge. Though the game suffered a rather iffy showing at E3 this year, Mukaitouge states that it was an extremely basic build of the game. He plans for over one hundred of the power-bestowing creatures to inhabit the game, each with unique properties that will eventually allow the player to perform such daunting tasks as levitating automobiles and houses.

Elebits will be released either at launch or very soon thereafter. Claiming a wide appeal, this game might be the sleeper hit of the initial Wii lineup.

Gamespot recently received a postcard from Kojima productions inviting them to a E3 press conference. The team over there suspects that this invitation, which is located directly above this chunk of text should you have missed it, is directly tied to an interview Kojima had with Japanese gaming mag Famitsu where the man himself revealed he was working on a Revolution Wii title that would be a brand new IP and geared towards girls. Thankfully, there isn't much time left to speculate and come close to this time next week, we'll all know for sure just what this perplexing invitation is all about.