Nintendo Wii Fanboy

During their E3 press conference, EA released assets for a bunch of upcoming games. We showed the new SimAnimals earlier today -- these are the assets from the games we already knew about. More Sim stuff of a sort (SimCity Creator), more animal-related stuff (the utterly terrifying Littlest Pet Shop), and ... other stuff.

We've posted the gallery of the nice-looking MySims Kingdom below. Wait, why does the medieval MySims game have rocket rides? After the break, you can find the rest of the galleries, including Pet Shop, Creator, FaceBreaker KO Party, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. It's at least an excuse to break out old EA slogans.

Ah, new screens from MySims Kingdom, the game in which you build a town of anthropomorphic critters, dig up fossils, and spend your time fish-- no? Oh, that's Animal Crossing. Right. MySims Kingdom is the WiiWare game in which you take on the role of a young king tasked with rebuilding your father's king-- no? That's a Final Fantasy title? Blast! All these games look alike, and with the new medieval/fantasy theme MySims Kingdom is taking on for the sequel, it's looking a lot like My Life as a King.

In fact, instead of directing you to look at the screenshots (which, surprisingly, look a lot like MySims, which means they're cute, but not terribly fresh!), we've prepared a minigame for you after the break. If you happen to prefer the screens, check 'em out in our gallery below -- and hit up Famitsu, where they recently featured some others.

EA held an event in Japan last week to reveal the new Sim City Creator as well as MySims Kingdom. GAME Watch has direct-feed screenshots of both games, which should satisfy any would-be fake city-builder, whether they want to build on the micro- or macro-scale, in the past or in the future. There are also plenty of stills from gameplay demos of both games. Of the two, we find ourselves more drawn to MySims Kingdom, which looks like an RPG town creator, and forces players to think low-tech, with puzzles like gear mechanisms that must be turned by the motion of a nearby river.

However, more than either of the actual games, we were impressed with the MySim costume used at the event. How can we build one of those?

Taking a look at the above scan from the latest Famitsu, we can see a couple of normal-looking areas, as well as a crazy neon crystal metropolis. In fact, a whole range of building designs will be available in a bunch of styles, including Futuristic, Crystal, Jungle, Las Vegas, Mediterranean, Traditional Japanese and even Cake -- apparently buildings inspired by your favorite baked goods. Sounds delish.

Adopting a MySims visual style, Sim City Creator's modes include Free Play, Mission, Collection (unlockable stuff -- hopefully cookies and pies to build a library), Memorial Album (happy snaps from Free Play) and City Making Contest. This mode lets you upload your created cities via Nintendo Wi-Fi and have various other would-be architects rank and review your work. Nice one!

Sim City Creator is set for a September release in Japan. Keep those dinosaurs and UFOs at bay until then, and hit the Source link to check out the full scans.

[Via NeoGAF]

In a press release sent out this morning, EA revealed some details of the new MySims sequel, MySims Kingdom. Fascinatingly, Kingdom is designed as more of an adventure than its predecessor, with things like a story and goals other than "build stuff and make friends."

That's still the basic gameplay, but this time you're building (medieval) stuff and making (ye olde) friends at the behest of King Roland (and his daughter, the amusingly-named Princess Butter), who charges you with improving his kingdom. As you build and achieve goals, you'll unlock new building capabilities including bridge-building (or at least bridge repair). These will allow you both to increase the size of your kingdom and to expand into other kingdoms, each with their own unique inhabitants.

Surprisingly, given the setting, you'll also be able to create electrical devices. We assume you will then be run out of town by a frightened mob.

Ah, how we all knowingly chuckled when Sega predicted it would sell four million copies of Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games across the Wii and DS. Like a drunken, rowdy friend boasting of sexual conquests that never actually occurred, Sega's strutting came across as the stuff of fantasy.

And then the news came through. They'd sold five million. D'oh!

We were reminded of our misplaced Mario & Sonic cynicism again today, after That Videogame Blog listed the third-party games that have shifted one million units on the Wii. Sure enough, the plumber and the hedgehog taunted us from the top of the pile (with 3.4 million sales), while Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock (1.8 million), Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition (1.6 million), Rayman Raving Rabbids, Sonic and the Secret Rings, Carnival Games (all 1.2 million), and Red Steel (1 million) sat beneath it.

Helpfully, author Ashutosh Chhibbar has also listed those titles that are nearing the magical seven-digit landmark, with Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles, MySims, or LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga just needing one last push.

For all of you who enjoyed MySims and would like to taste some more, EA Casual Entertainment president Kathy Vrabeck wants you to know that EA has no plans to call it quits with the franchise. In fact, they're going to be dumping more money into future projects on both the DS and Wii.

First up will be MySims Kingdom, hitting the DS and Wii this year (sometime between October and December, Q4). Also, EA plans on producing MySims Party, which will also hit the DS and Wii, which will arrive much later, sometime in Q1 2009. EA also revealed SimCity Creator, however platforms were not discussed.

Hooray for third-party support. eh?



[Via Joystiq]

During 2007, lots of companies realized that the Wii was doing good. Perhaps, too good. So, they scrambled to make games that they could port or "enhance" for the Wii, or other games that were made to take advantage of the console's adopters who were new to gaming and thus susceptible to spending money on crap games the unique capabilities of the Wii's controls scheme, causing a slew of cash-ins on the console that didn't necessarily bring anything new to the Wii other than another game sitting on the shelf. So, let's look at those games and you tell us what the most shameless and useless game of the lot is.

To commemorate the British release of MySims, EA commissioned some apparently famous fashion designers to come up with some crazy junk as part of the MySims Capsule Collection. The four items are all intended to serve dual purposes, and embody "the core attributes of the game - Self Expression, Customisation, Creativity and Collectability."

The item descriptions should give you all the information you need to make informed decisions about whether or not you want these items. For example, the House of Holland MySims Pouch Tee is a t-shirt with a pouch for a DS. It also uses a big-slogan style that you may remember from "FRANKIE SAY RELAX" or Wham!'s "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go" video. Also, two of the four items are Wiimote bags. Bags-- for your Wiimote.

[Via GoNintendo; image via Kotaku]

We've had a love affair with EA's MySims since the game was first announced. The overall look of the Sims spin-off is so charming that it turned out to be irresistible, especially with all those shots of the new chibi sims engaged in adorable activities. But looks are only one part of the equation -- the real question for any reviewer to address is: does it stand up under scrutiny?

This week shows the release of several new titles, some that many have been looking forward to and some that have been just about invisible on the radar. There's a couple different games to choose from for the gamer looking to get their feet wet in some new waters. So, will you be picking up something new to play over the weekend? If not, what will you be playing?

Last week's lack of releases has really been corrected this week as there are numerous titles available to play that encompass several different genres. So, there should be something for everyone this week. Personally, we're interested in checking out Dewy's Adventure and MySims.

• Cosmic Family
• Anubis II
• Fishing Master
• Dewy's Adventure
• MySims
• Mercury Meltdown: Revolution

Any of you plan on picking up a new game this week?

The reviews that have been coming in for MySims make sure to point out the EA-developed title's lack of depth and polish, but we're sure it'll sell just fine with casual gamers based on its cheerful cuteness alone. This latest video preview shows off all the fun you can have when you're not busy gentrifying your MySims town -- play pranks on unsuspecting goth kids, DJ at the local discotheque, and straight-up mack on some pink-haired honeys.

Apparently, you can even have a dance-off with restaurant-owner Gino Delicioso! How did an Italian chef learn to Crip walk like that?

If waiting a week for something is totally outside the realm of possibilities for yourself, then check out these videos for MySims. Focusing on building a home, starting a new life and some other fun town activities, they really do grab our fancy and tickle it something fierce. But, in case you're trying to limit your exposure to the game as you are planning on picking it up, then you might want to enjoy our other posts.

Heck, give them a second glance. We promise they read just like the very first time.

Tim Letourneau of EA took a few moments to chat with G4 at E3 (it's an acronym party!) about MySims, and he had some interesting things to say about designing the game for the Wii. And by interesting, we mean both vaguely amusing and very revealing. Since we're such nice people, we thought we'd take a moment to offer a translation for some of the things you can hear in the video snippet found after the break.

First, Letourneau says, when EA began planning MySims, they needed to figure out how to give a Sims game a unique look and feel for Nintendo and the Wii. Translation: How can we make a Sims game sell well in Japan? He goes on to mention that one of their goals was accessibility -- but what we hear is: the money-printing Sims franchise can bring in a whole lot more money if we finally make a version that's great on consoles. Let's make it all-ages friendly, too! And actually, we agree that this is a fantastic idea; surely you've noticed us mooning over every aspect of the game. However, "accessibility" has become one of those Wii buzzwords that we're getting tired of.

But it's the last bit that makes us giggle. Letourneau spends a good portion of the brief segment discussing how the whole thrust of this game -- and how it's different from other Sims titles -- is to allow the player to craft an entire town, from the ground up, for that Nintendo experience. We're pretty sure he wanted to say that Animal Crossing experience ... because other than being able to build and fiddle around in the other houses in the town, what he's describing sounds essentially like that beloved title. But again, we don't mind -- we love Animal Crossing, and a similar game with expanded building and decorating options sounds like something we'll pour entire months of our lives into. Bring on MySims!