Friday, June 21, 2013
WARNING: LARGE WALL OF TEXT APPROACHING
Full
disclosure. I’m a Nintendo fanboy. When I was younger you couldn't have
paid me to have a Sony or Microsoft game product under my roof. I’m not
as bad as I used to be. Hell, I even own a PS2 and Xbox 360 now.
However, when push comes to shove, I will back Big N to the grave.
Naturally this means that I was super excited for the recent Nintendo
Direct that came out of E3. At first I was a little skeptical with the
fact that Nintendo was eschewing the traditional big show, but after all
has been said and done, I’m very pleased with the result.
In
the past year Nintendo has been utilizing a series of online
presentations called Nintendo Direct. This is how they have been
distributing all of their major game announcements. “Directly” to the
public. Get it? For E3, the President and CEO of Nintendo, Satoru Iwata
gave the presentation from Japan.
I choose you Mr. Deer and Birdy-With-Fingers!
Up
first was the brand new Pokemon games, Pokemon X&Y. Now I will
admit openly that I am a huge Pokemon fan. To the point where I have
owned a game from every single generation since Red and Blue came out in
1998. It’s needless to say, but I'm excited for this new experience
(well, probably old experience but w/e). In the Direct we were shown a
brand new type of Pokemon; the fairy type. Since they revealed the new
Eevee evolution some months ago, this was rumored to be happening. It’s
nice to see some confirmation for it. Several old Pokemon will be
re-branded with this new typing, and it is super-effective against
Dragon type. Awesome! Several new Pokemon and a few other new modes were
introduced as well. They announced a global release date of October 12,
this year.
The
next thing that we saw was a trailer for the new Super Mario 3D World
for the Wii U. I'm actually pretty excited for this one as well. This
game is obviously a sequel to Super Mario 3D Land on the 3DS. Super
Mario World is my favorite Super Mario game so I’m hoping that this game
takes a little bit of inspiration from it. You can play with up to four
people at the same time, which is a first for a 3D Mario game. The
roster is the same as Super Mario Bros. 2 (the U.S. version) on the NES.
For the uninitiated, that’s Mario, Luigi, Peach, and Toad. They all
play similarly to their NES counterparts with Toad being the fastest,
Peach being able to float, etc. It’s nice to see a nod to Nintendo’s
history. The game drops this December.
Zooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooom!
The
next game that Mr. Iwata showed off was Mario Kart 8 for the Wii U.
First let me say that I really like the current naming scheme that
they've gone with for the Mario Kart series. Gone are the subtitles like
Double Dash or Super Circuit or God forbid - 64. Now it’s just the
number. I love it. It looks like we're going to see the return of
motorcycles, coins, hang gliding, and the underwater segments. I’m
pretty neutral on all of those choices. They all are fine with me. I
didn't see any sort of indication that the customization of karts from
Mario Kart 7 will be back. Unless there is some sort of rock, paper,
scissors element to the parts you can use, I like the idea of just
having standard karts with standard stats. With customization, there is
usually one combo that rises to the top and everyone uses that. Of
course, the new big mechanic is the anti grav driving. While zooming
around the track, you will hit marked strips that will allow you to
drive on the walls and ceiling. This is really exciting evolution
because it offers so many different variations for courses. The best
thing about Mario Kart, besides the use of items, has always been the
creative and clever track design. I can only imagine what they’re going
to be coming up with now with this new anti gravity mechanic. Mario Kart
8 isn’t going to be out until Spring of 2014
I'm not a party guy, unless it's Mario Party time.
The
next few games that were talked about I was not super excited or
interested in. It was announced that Wii Party U and Wii Fit U are being
delayed a little bit to October and December of this year respectively.
Wii Party U looks to be standard Mario Party fair, which is fine with
me. Those games are always fun with a group of friends. I'm sure Wii Fit
U has its fans, but I am not one of them. Hopefully they can bring
enough new things to the table to make people want to buy a third
iteration of a fitness game. The Direct also included a segment on a new
drawing application coming out. It's apparently part of a series of
games called Art Academy. It looks like a basic drawing tool, but it's
going to cost you money so I don't really see the appeal in it. But
that's just me. Maybe this is the app people have been waiting for!
From
there Nintendo started talking about all of their third-party titles
and downloadable titles. There was fair amount of these for the Wii U
and the 3DS from both major game studios and independent developers
alike. There were a few new ones that piqued my interest, like Shovel
Knight, but the majority of them I'd seen before. It was hard to get
excited watching yet another trailer for Batman Origins and the like.
Still, it's nice to see something, considering that third-party support
for Nintendo has been very unstable in the past. Here's hoping that
changes in the future.
Up
next from there was The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker HD. The original
version of this game is in my top 3 Zelda games of all time, but I
honestly can't get too excited about this one. A re-release like this
feels a little unnecessary to me. I would much rather have seen them put
the resources they used here into a new Zelda. That would have made me
much happier than a fancier looking version of a game I already own. The
game comes out this October.
It's Morphen time... wait, what?
Wonderful
101 is a game for the Wii U that has been getting me more and more
interested every day. You play as a group of super heroes (101 to be
exact) that are protecting a city from an alien invasion. To do this you
utilize formations/attacks that are drawn on the Gamepad. The larger
your drawing, the more members of your team are used, and the stronger
your attack is. I assume that as you are damaged more and more members
from your group will be killed. This way you'll be limited in the
strength of attack that you can do. I can’t wait to give this game a try
when it comes out September 15th.
So
now we know what Retro Studios has been working on and unfortunately
it's another Donkey Kong game, this time subtitled Tropical Freeze. I
never played Donkey Kong Country Returns for the Wii, however I heard it
was very good. I liked DKC on the SNES but DKCR just didn't strike me
as something that I wanted to spend my money on. This new game looks to
be just more of the same. They've added Dixie Kong back into the mix,
which is cool. It’s nice to see the legacy of Donkey Kong is still
alive. I am a little nervous that this means they will make another game
with the big draw being the addition of Kiddy Kong or another playable
Kong. I just feel like this style and game series has been worn out.
Seriously, the big “innovation” in this game is that this time around
the camera angle changes. Woah, that's amazing! I really, really wish
Retro was working on another game franchise instead because with their
creativity and their approach to games they could make a much more solid
entry in another series. Fingers crossed for Star Fox. Donkey Kong
Country: Tropical Freeze comes out this November.
Fashion 101
The
next few games that were talked about were the new title from Monolith
Soft, tentatively titled X, and Bayonetta 2. Monolith is known for
numerous games, the most recent being Xenoblade Chronicles. X looks
pretty interesting with it’s open world robot fighting. Hopefully this
will be another massive hit for the Wii U that Xenoblade was for the
Wii. As for Bayonetta, I never played the first game and I’m not very
excited for the new one. When the biggest talking point that you have
for a sequel is that the main character’s costume has changed, that
doesn’t strike me as a strong position. Both games are going to come out
in 2014
Fight!
The
last game that was shown got my heart all aflutter. Of course I'm
talking about the brand new Super Smash Brothers game. The trailer that
showed footage for both the 3DS and Wii U version looked amazing. I like
the use of cell-shaded graphics for the 3DS version. The returning
characters aren't that surprising. Mario, Link, Kirby, Donkey Kong, Fox,
Pikachu and Samus are all part of the original 8 (12 if you count
unlockable) characters from Smash 64. I think it’s pretty safe to assume
that all the characters from the original game will show up in this
one. Bowser and Pit were also confirmed to be coming back, both with new
movesets. It was nice to see all the characters have updated looks.
I will open my thousand mouths and sing the song of your destruction
Let’s
be serious. The real thing that everyone is looking for in these
announcement trailers are new characters. Oh. We got em. In the last
game Animal Crossing had a stage and now they have a fighter! The
Villager from Animal Crossing really is a perfect addition to this
already colorful cast of characters. It looks like he will have a very
diverse moveset and I love the downpour of memes that have cropped up
about him having empty, soulless eyes. Wicked funny. The next character,
who wasn’t actually announced during the Nintendo Direct, is the Wii
Fit Female Trainer. Nobody saw this coming and I think it's hysterical! 5
years ago I would have been so pissed to hear about this, but now I can
take it with a grain of salt and I think it's a really clever addition
to the roster. Her moves are based on yoga poses and other various
fitness routines.
Oh my God, it's a Mega Man!
And
of course the last person that they announced was f****** Mega Man! Oh
my God, I cannot stress how excited I am about this choice! Mega Man has
been the number one character that I've wanted in Super Smash Brothers
game since Melee. I was a little surprised with how much they are
sticking to the classic design in terms of movement/aesthetic. I guess
I’ve just been used to seeing the character in Marvel vs. Capcom, so I
figured they would go with a modified moveset from that game. I realize
now that would have been a little silly. Mega Man’s updated character
model looks amazing; I love the lines that they've added to him to make
him seem even more robotic. This is going to be an excellent addition to
an already excellent series. 2014 cannot get her quick enough so these
games can be released (Let’s be honest, they will probably be delayed
until 2015.)
So
overall I was very impressed with the Nintendo showing. Naturally there
were some places they could have improved, namely Zelda, but there's
only so much that you can really expect. I read an interview with
Shigeru Miyamoto where he basically said that no matter how many amazing
games they show, people will always complain that there isn’t more. I
know some people complain that it’s the same games they always show but
it’s Nintendo! They have their flagship titles and that's what people
come to them for. I am super excited about what the future holds for the
Wii U, to the point where I actually went out and bought one. Nintendo
convinced me and they have reaffirmed my position as a lifelong Nintendo
fan.
