Disaster: Day of Crisis hero with a heart Raymond Bryce is back with another pair of videos, this time featuring the game's opening cut-scene and first crisis sequence. Painfully wooden acting aside (though it's certainly no worse than Resident Evil 4), it's actually very nicely executed, and genuinely feels quite dramatic.
True to the corny TV dramas on which Disaster could easily be based, this first video ends with a bunch of cliffhangers and questions to be answered. What has become of Steve? Will our intrepid heroes keep their own lives on the mountain? How amusing is Ray's janky running style? Find out ... dun dun dunnn! ... after the break.
We spent our limited Animal Crossing: City Folktime at E3 messing with the new Mii masks, reducing an effigy of a normally jovial executive to a blubbering mess. Should you want to follow our example, it's quite easy to do! And just a little bit off-putting, as this video of the new salon shows.
You just go to the salon, choose the Mii you'd like the mask to resemble, and then ... a giant machine, buzzing and arcing with electricity, clamps down over you and reshapes your head! If you think about it like that, it's a bit weird that the Mii mask blinks and displays emotions. But, then again, you have to earn each emotional display by watching stand-up comedy, so maybe we're already in Weird City.
How do you keep the ESRB from destroying a game like MadWorld, built as it is almost entirely around ridiculously overblown, graphic violence? By warning them, mostly. In order to avoid the dreaded, sales-killing AO rating, Platinum Games and Sega are keeping the ratings board apprised on the development of the game, sending periodic preview builds and getting feedback.
While Platinum is ensuring the maximum allowable violence for an M rating here, they aren't seeking a release anywhere else at the moment. That basically ensures that they can tune the violence precisely to what one ratings board will allow rather than having to worry about many. If there's enough money to be had, Sega will look into other regions, but right now, it's totally US-focused.
Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter believes that Nintendo is preparing the duct tape for a new Wii that will feature high-definition visuals. Speaking in an AFP piece about Wii's bid to appeal to "hardcore" gamers, Pachter insisted that Nintendo needs to overcome the technical gulf that exists between its console and those of rivals.
"A Wii HD would really position Nintendo well, which is why I'm absolutely convinced there is a Wii HD coming," stated Pachter, who thinks the console needs to shed its "toy for my mom" image. Ouch. If you're currently experiencing déjà vu, that's probably because Pachter made this exact same prediction more than a year ago, when he estimated a Wii upgrade to be "two to three years" away.
For the record, we non-analysts at Wii Fanboy still think that's too soon for an upgraded version of a system that continues to fly off shelves -- and developers seem to agree.
Wii lovers and fans of speakerphones across Europe, the WiiSpeak Channel has been dated for your region. The Channel and peripheral will debut alongside Animal Crossing: Let's Go to the City on December 5th, less than a month after North America receives the game and service. Sadly, there's no word on what the bundle will cost you and if it'll be much more expensive than the bundle we're getting in North America. We'd like to think it will cost around the same, but we know how you guys get the shaft sometimes.
When we first saw Sorcery Blade, all we knew was that it was some kind of WiiWare RPG based on a mobile game series. We may still not know all that much about it, but Famitsu has posted the first direct-feed screens, so we have a better idea what it looks like.
Sorcery Blade, evidently set on Mars in the year 3000, uses a motion-controlled combat scheme, with special attacks and magic done by drawing shapes on the screen, prompted by icons. When not in combat, you'll return to the town (we're guessing there's just one), where you'll receive quests and interact with Mii residents.
The idea of a tiny, downloadable RPG is very appealing. There's nothing in particular about RPG gameplay that lends itself to superlong games -- that's just how it's worked out. Maybe Sorcery Blade will be an enjoyable, but bite-size, action RPG.
Either someone out there has been reading Born for Wii, or we have impeccabletaste. Still, if this keeps up, it's going to be hard for us to come up with game selections that make you go "Man, why didn't I think of that?" This week is a case in point: Namco went and ruined the surprise by announcing a remake of Klonoa: Door to Phantomile for the Wii. Really, though, that just makes this week's choice all the more likely to see the light of day.
The Klonoa series is often overlooked when gamers list off their favorite platformers. A certain plumber seems to snag the spotlight all too often. Still, Klonoa has a considerable cult following, and for good reason: the gameplay manages to be incredibly straightforward and fun at the same time. Klonoa 2: Lunatea's Veil is one of the most fun, lighthearted games of last generation, and its atmosphere and design make it a perfect match for the Wii.
Every week, Born for Wii digs into gaming's sordid past to unearth a new treasure fit for revival on the Nintendo Wii. Be sure to check out last week's entry in the series, Lemmings, and for more great titles that deserve your attention, take a look at Virtually Overlooked.
Aside from some new screens, as well as a video walkthrough of the entire first level, we've not seen much on The Conduitlately. Well, today brings us a bounty of fresh videos, so those of you who have been jonesing for a fix on High Voltage's upcoming shooter, look no further. Hit up the video above, then head past the break for several more.
Remember back when Mark Rein let loose somebody was working on Unreal Engine 3 for Wii? Well, we finally know what game will be using it, we guess. Kind of. We don't really know much about the exact game, per se. What game? The one that EA is publishing from Q Entertainment, Resident Evil co-creator Shinji Mikami and the man responsible for one of our most favorite Wii games, Suda51.
Suda says Unreal Engine 3 is a "powerful, easy-to-implement game engine" that is aiding his company to "quickly bring our vision to life." He also added that the "tools and technology" allow him to "create games faster, easier and with less risk." So are we excited? Well, maybe. It's not like the Wii version is mentioned and we would think it should be, considering no title up until now has utilized Unreal Engine 3 technology. But, hey, we'll try to be as optimistic as we can, because we feel confident in the abilities of all involved, to tell the truth.
Now if only we could some information on what this game is ...
The official website for the WiiWare release of Cave Story has opened, featuring faithful-looking screenshots (also in our gallery!) and a special, upbeat message from Pixel. A message, by the way, that lends further evidence of the WiiWare game's use of the Aeon Genesis fan translation. If they're named right there on the site, their work is probably in the game! The music, by the way, is "Moonsong" and it's a very ... MIDI arrangement.
There's also a link out to an official blog maintained by producer Tyrone Rodriguez, in which it becomes clear that Rodriguez and Pixel are in frequent contact about the project. Pixel even sent Rodriguez the hand-drawn birthday card seen above!
Our favorite part, however, is the wallpaper page. The selection of wallpapers is different for every user, but they're all wonderful!
Okay, so there are more WiiWare games in Japan this week than Virtual Console games, but the WiiWare games are boring. How boring? The most interesting games on the list are both puzzle games, and one of those is only noteworthy because it's super cute awwwww puppies.
But the Virtual Console games are better. Sure, one of them is a shooter, an imperfect port of an arcade game, but the other is a Kunio game and a one-time NES pack-in!
Do you like free stuff? Of course you do, who doesn't? Well, we're giving away one copy of Wario Land: Shake It! for the Wii (valued at $50). Want to enter for your chance to win this great game?
To enter, simply leave a comment between now and Sunday, October 12th at 11:59PM ET, telling us what your favorite game featuring Wario is. It can be one of his own games, or any other he's in. You can leave one comment per day. We'll select a winner the following day via random drawing.
There are a few things you should know before entering. Entrants must be current and legal residents of the United States or Canada (excluding Quebec) and at least 18 years of age or older. Read up on the rest of the official rules right here.
There's a lot to be excited about from Nintendo's latest press conference. One of the things we've been extremely excited about is a new Punch-Out!! game. We can tell the game will include a couple of classic enemies, including King Hippo, Von Kaiser and Glass Joe. We were wondering, though, who you'd like to take on in the upcoming game. What boxers from the original Punch-Out!!, as well as Super Punch-Out!!, would you like to take on in the new game? What opponents do you want to topple in the upcoming Punch-Out!! for Wii?
Earlier today,we told you about a Guitar Hero: World Tour deluxe bundle. Some mistook that as a price for the whole entire band kit. On top of that, confusion surrounding the price for the bundle still gathered, enough so that Activision Blizzard had to clarify the issue. Pricing for the game's bundles is as follows:
To allow for the fact that the DSi will feature an online store, Wii Points were recently renamed to Nintendo Points.
Despite this rebranding exercise, Nintendo has revealed that you won't be able to transfer points between its new handheld and the Wii. In other words, if you buy a Nintendo Points card and use it to purchase (say) DSWare, you'll have to spend any remaining Points from the card on DSi downloads (and vice versa). This also means you won't be able to transfer any 'spare change' Points from the Wii to your DSi, meaning you're stuck with the 100 Points that have been on your Wii account since about March 2007. THERE'S ALWAYS A SPARE 100 POINTS ON OUR WII. They sit there, silently mocking us.
Anyway, the above slide, dug up by Siliconera from Nintendo's Media Summit presentation, highlights the point emphatically enough: you won't be able to transfer Nintendo Points.
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