Issue #248, December 2009
featuring New Super Mario Bros Wii, Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing (Wii), Infinite Space (DS)

Nintendo announced a flurry of new games at E3 09, but only one was slotted to be this year’s big holiday title… and that’s New Super Mario Bros Wii. Nintendo Power is quick to point out the game is no watered down party minigame collection. In fact, it’s more of a watered-up version of New Super Mario Bros on DS.

As the first console-based 2D Mario title in eighteen years, NSMBW owes everything to the NES/SNES generation. The screenshots show rolling hills, card-matching minigames, an overworld map, and the usual allotment of tubes, coins and blocks. NP stresses that the game is a fully capable single-player experience, just in case you thought the levels were best enjoyed with the 4-man multiplayer.

For those of you coming into the game from the like-minded DS game, note that NSMBW lets you keep a much larger pile of collected items like fire flowers and whatnot. However, you can no longer activate a stored item in the middle of the level; you have to use it on the map screen before a level begins.

Some nitty-gritty items: NSMBW supports both Remote alone and Remote+Nunchuk control schemes. The game seems to have inherited the tilting Remote mechanic used in Warioland: Shake It. This is the first 2D Mario game in widescreen, but NP doesn’t say what happens to those of you with old, crappy 4:3 TVs. Does it center-cut the image, or do you have to play it letterboxed? Just like in Smash Bros Brawl, the camera will zoom in and out depending on how tight the players are in the level.

The Koopa Kids return from the dead to play bosses in New Super Mario Bros Wii. All ugly seven of them. With their dorky American Instruction Manual 1990 celebrity names. There’s a good reason Nintendo has done very little with this team of sops in nearly twenty years. Bowser Jr is also in NSMBW and hopefully he kicks the Koopalings around.

Nintendo is still holding on to the previously revealed playable lineup of Mario, Luigi, Toad and Toad. And no, neither of the Toads are clad in the traditional red so the game can preserve easily identifiable colors for all the players. Mario and Luigi own red and green, so the Toads must come in blue and yellow flavors. I still say Nintendo is holding Playable Peach as a hidden ace, because how can a fan-service title like this ignore the Super Mario Bros 2 cast of Mario, Luigi, Toad and Peach? We’ll see if I’m right when the game is released next week.

Have you checked out Nintendo Week? This weekly miniature TV show starting showing up on the Wii’s Nintendo Channel in September. Clean-cut hosts Gary and Alison spend each episode going over the newest releases from all over Nintendo: Wii, DS, Virtual Console, etc.

Nintendo Power introduces the duo in this issue with a brief interview. Unfortunately, it’s not a stellar showing, as the mag basically asks the same question three times, resulting in the hosts having to say the same thing (”I’m a big [Nintendo] fan!”) three times. We do learn that Gary is currently deep into Scribblenauts and Professor Layton, while Alison likes Wii Sports and Donkey Kong Country.

I’ve caught a few of their shows and they are moderately watchable. They are far too scripted and overwritten for adult tastes (they have an odd predilection for calling the DS “the Nintendo DS System”), but kids should enjoy it. They remind me of the first wave of dopey video game shows that landed on TV when I was a kid during the NES era. Of course, I think that supposedly mature shows like X-Play are far too scripted and overwritten as well. But at least with Nintendo Week you know you’re not going to get clumsy sex jokes before each commercial break.

Nintendo might actually try to leverage Nintendo Week once in a while. The episode for the week of October 26 contained the exclusive reveal of the new WiiWare title Excitebike: World Tour.

NP’s Ultimate Zelda list manages to rank thirteen Zelda games, as well as award categories like Best Weapon and Best Overworld. Here’s their order:

• #13. Zelda II (NES, 1988)
• #12 Four Swords Adventures (GameCube, 2004)
• #11 Majora’s Mask (N64, 2000)
• #10/9 Oracle of Ages/Seasons (Game Boy, 2001)
• #8 Minish Cap (GBA, 2004)
• #7 Phantom Hourglass (DS, 2007)
• #6 Wind Waker (GameCube, 2003)
• #5 Link’s Awakening (Game Boy, 1993)
• #4 Twilight Princess (Wii, 2006)
• #3 Legend of Zelda (NES, 1987)
• #2 A Link to the Past (SNES, 1992)
• #1 Ocarina of Time (N64, 1998)

Having played only eight of those, I’m hardly in a position to rank… but I’d put Wind Waker as number one.

These (NO NAME GIVEN) credits have got to stop.

I don’t know where or how Nintendo Power solicits some of their reader mail. Every issue devotes a page to multiple readers’ responses to one specific question. This issue, it’s “Which game world do you find the most compelling?” They must collect responses through a poorly-defined form on their website, because more and more NP seems obliged to publish quotes from people who do not leave their names. Not even their fakey internet names. Which leads to not-entirely-convincing missives like this one:

I suppose it is entirely possible that one fan thinks Wuhu Island from Wii Sports Resort satisfies some mad definition of the word “compelling.” But signing it with a (NO NAME GIVEN) makes me think the writer was ashamed of his pick. Just seems to unintentionally undermine the whole thing.

Download Staff Picks: Contra Rebirth (WiiWare), Tales of Monkey Island 2 (WiiWare), Phantasy Star (Sega Master System), Puzzle League Express (DSiWare)

Top scoring Wii review: Three Wii games at 7.5 this month… WWE Smackdown vs Raw 2010, Astro Boy: The Video Game, and Harvest Moon: Animal Parade. (all scores out of 10)
Top scoring DS review: An unbelievable six DS games ranked 8.0… Phantasy Star 0, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky, Atelier Annie: Alchemists of Sera Island, Dragon Ball Z: Attack of the Saiyans, Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter, and Space Invaders Extreme 2. No more complaining about low-quality DS games, okay?
Lowest rated Wii review: SimAnimals Africa, 5.0
Lowest rated DS review: Fighting Fantasy: The Warlock of Firetop Mountain, 4.0

Other notable review scores this issue include DDR: Hottest Party 3 (Wii, 6.5), Nostalgia (DS, 7.0), Academy of Champions: Soccer (Wii, 6.5), Cooking Mama 3 (DS, 6.0), TMNT: Arcade Attack (DS, 4.5) and Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 (Wii, 5.5).

Frank busts a move. – You may have heard that the US release of Wii-exclusive Tatsunoko vs Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars will feature Frank West of Dead Rising, but did you know that he can wear a Mega Buster-toting Mega Man outfit in the game?

Follow the money. – Infinite Space became a DS game because director Hifumi Kouno thought his budget was not large enough for a console release. Reasonable fellow, that Hifumi.

Don’t forget your Arceus! – Polish off your legitimately collected Pokedex in Pokemon Diamond/Pearl/Platinum with a visit to Toys R Us during the week of November 7 to 15. You’ll be downloading the last pokemon of this generation, Arceus.

The DSi-specific carts are coming. – Foto Fighter, one of a half-dozen games that I have seen claim to be “the first game made specifically for the Nintendo DSi,” lets you take pictures of household objects to spawn battling monsters. Sounds cooler than it actually is… NP makes it sound like the game is only really looking for basic shapes and colors in your pictures, and the resultant poke-ripoffs look nothing like your source photo.

And this isn’t even Sonic’s first racing game. – Sonic may have been a Brawler and an Olympic champion, but he’s not joining every Mario family game just yet. Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing will feature over twenty Sega characters in their own kart racer.

But he wanted to be an interior designer. – Composer Akira Yamaoka went from the music director for the first Silent Hillto the franchise’s producer for Silent Hill 3 and 4. For the upcoming Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, he’s back to being just the composer.

Next month in Nintendo Power… with the big first-party Wii game out of the way, NP turns to the season’s big DS game, Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks. Plus, celebrate as the DS turns five!

Issue #247, November 2009
featuring Shantae: Risky’s Revenge (DSiWare), Resident Evil: Darkside Chronicles (Wii), Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky (DS), C.O.P.: The Recruit (DS)

Let’s jump right to the reviews since there’s so many key titles to discuss. I’ll take it from the top.

First up is Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days. NP gives it a 9.0 and suggests that it may be Square Enix’s finest achievement on the DS. Although the review reserves an entire page, it really doesn’t say much about the game other than it’s good. The DS game is very similar to the originals in gameplay, but is slow to start and recycles the PS2 soundtracks again.

Kingdom Hearts shares 9.0 top honors with Scribblenauts. The review points out the game’s critical flaws but is far more generous than I am. NP doesn’t bring up the awful controls, but they do point out the stupid snapback camera and the mysterious deaths brought about by confusing win/loss parameters. That doesn’t add up to a 9.0 game in my book.

Speaking of that, the top Wii game of the issue is Beatles: Rock Band with a 9.0. I continue to be mystified by how critics everywhere agreed to review this game in a vacuum where other similar games do not exist. Did the Rock Band 2 instruments on Wii not include auto-calibration? Because Nintendo Power spends fully one quarter of the review lauding the Beatles edition instruments for having that feature, as if that’s a huge selling point.

Coming in at 8.5 is A Boy and His Blob for Wii, which is described as beautiful, refreshing, challenging and sophisticated. And they don’t even mention the hug button!

Anybody anticipating Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes on DS? No? You may want to re-think that, as it also scored an 8.5. It’s a puzzle-RPG mash-up similar to cult hit Puzzle Quest.

There’s three games at 8.0: Guitar Hero 5 (”noticeably improved from Guitar Hero World Tour“), Dead Space Extraction (”pretty darn satisfying”), and the DS version of Mario & Sonic at the Winter Olympic Games (”many of the games are enjoyable.”)

Clicking down to 7.5 we find three Wii titles: Mini Ninjas, Spyborgs, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Smash-Up. The latter “pales in comparison” to Super Smash Bros Brawl, by the way. Some games, apparently, we’re allowed to review based on how they compare to similar titles.

7.0 brings us the Wii edition of Mario & Sonic Winter Olympics, Hero’s Saga: Laevatein Tactics on DS, Naruto Shippuden: Ninja Destiny 2 (also DS), as well as Spore Hero and MySims Agents, both for Wii.

That’s sixteen well-reviewed Wii/DS games, and hopefully some fine recommendations for the Nintendo fan on your shopping list.

Shantae is back! Shantae has always been the very definition of cult classic for me. The original Game Boy Color game was released in June 2002, which was, you know, a full year after the Game Boy Advance came out. Naturally, even the best reviews couldn’t push a GBC game and it flamed out… but not before developing a rabid fanbase. Creator Matt Bozon notes that Nintendo Power rated it 9.0, the same month they gave a 9.0 to Super Mario Sunshine.

Developer WayForward kept up their love for the character with an unfinished GBA sequel, not to mention Shantae tech demos on just about every system from the GameCube to the PSP. And now WayForward is proud to reveal that the belly-dancing nymph is officially returning in a trilogy of episodic DSiWare games.

Shantae is cute as hell. The first installment, Shantae: Risky’s Revenge, is on the docket for a late 2009 release. The line will follow in the footsteps of classic 2D platformers, but Bozon promises that it will avoid the frustrating design pitfalls of the genre… like, for example, pitfalls.

Last issue, we were introduced to Tower of Shadow, now meet NightSky. Is there some kind of secret Let’s Make Dark Wii Games cabal?

Headed to WiiWare, NightSky asks you to help a ball roll across the level by manipulating the environment. Sounds like a LocoRoco riff, but these screens underline the difference.

The game uses shadow silhouettes over a twilit background to great effect. Looks like another experimental title to keep an eye on!

What is up with the stock photo of the Resident Evil zombie head t-shirt?

You’ve seen this a dozen times by now.

I get that the Capcom press corps probably didn’t want to release an image of a guy lifting his zombie shirt to reveal his doughy gamer’s belly, but isn’t that faked-up image a little weird?

You can expose your own untanned stomach in one of these cool shirts by pre-ordering Resident Evil: Darkside Chronicles through GameStop.

I have codified the difference between Japanese and American game developers. When you read interviews with Japanese game developers (like this issue’s turn with Level-5’s Akihiro Hino), do you find yourself struck with how humble they tend to sound? Almost every Nintendo Power interview with a Japanese dev can be trusted to end with a “please enjoy my game!” Meanwhile, whenever the press talks with David Jaffe, you’re lucky to get anything useful aside from f-bombs and complaints about upper management. Here’s how I see it:

And that’s the difference between Eastern and Western game developers.

Download Staff Picks: NyxQuest: Kindred Spirits (WiiWare), Revene of Shinobi (Sega Genesis), Super Star Wars (Super NES), Art Style: Precipice (DSiWare)

Teenage Mutant Ninja Errata – Last issue, NP said Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Arcade Attack was a Wii game. It’s actually a DS release.

We’ve never played a real one – Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey is on its way to DS, and Atlus is dubbing it the first “true” Shin Megami Tensei game in quite some time. Devil Survivor and the Persona series are just spin-offs!

You didn’t expect this when you bashed the DSi! – Guitar simulator sequel Jam Sessions 2 will use the DSi camera as a wah-wah pedal. No explanation is offered.

That’s one big DS cart – The largest Nintendo DS game yet produced will be Ninokuni: The Another World, a joing venture between Level-5 and Studio Ghibli. The 4-gigibit size seems to be mainly used for the game’s soundtrack.

Nothing is safe from the the modern reinventionists! – Coming soon to WiiWare: Bonk: Brink of Extinction. You know, I lived through the 16-bit era, and I can’t summon up one worthy memory of Bonk.

The all-audiences GTA – C.O.P.: The Recruit is trying to take the 3D world of a PSP GTA game and marry it to the DS-specifics of the DS GTA game. And with a T rating, it may gain some ground as a gateway title for kids on their way to the bigger boys.

Super Mario Postman! – Reader CPL1701 wrote in to laugh about a supposed secret “MARIO” word on his address label… but he figured out that he was just misreading the “MAR10″ that indicates his subscription expires in March of next year.

Next month in Nintendo Power… It’s here, Nintendo’s biggest title of the season (and probably the year): New Super Mario Bros Wii.

Issue #246, October 2009
featuring Avatar (Wii), Tower of Shadow (Wii), Sakura Wars: So Long, My Love (Wii), Dementium II (DS), WWE Smackdown vs Raw (Wii/DS)

This could be a terribly damning statement: “Hollywood’s most notorious perfectionist isn’t about to have his work tarnished by a crappy video game.” As James Cameron’s first movie since Titanic, anticipation is high for Avatar, even if animation wags have already ginned up some unfavorable similarities to box office turd Delgo. You can go enjoy that link, by the way. It’s really funny.

So what about the game? The Wii version will be entirely different from the PS3/360 edition, and none of them will simply follow along with the film’s story as with most movie-to-game adaptations. On the Wii, we’ll get a prequel. And a frankly bizarre assortment of Nintendo peripheral usage.

You’ll flick the Remote to initiate stealth attacks, and swing it to bash around your staff. But that’s fairly normal stuff for a Wii action game, and we can take small comfort in creative director Daniel Bisson’s promise that “Too many [Wii games] ask you to waggle all the time. We wanted to prevent that as much as possible.”

How about MotionPlus support? Yep, it’s on the docket in the form of the Hellfire Wasp. If you have the MotionPlus plug-in, you’ll be able to fly the bug around the level to assist with platforming puzzles. If you don’t have a MotionPlus, there will always be another way to solve the level. Sort of reminds me of the Tingle Tuner from Wind Waker.

And let’s not forget the Balance Board. There are on-rails flying sections that can be controlled by, I assume, leaning.

I have to say, this all seems very average to me. In fact, the reliance on Wii gimmickry raises substantial cause for concern. I don’t get any feeling that this will be any more than a regular ol’ mediocre movie game. Similar to how I don’t see Avatar being more than a regular ol’ mediocre animated fantasy adventure flick. Maybe I’m wrong. But this article certainly doesn’t offer much to change my mind. I’ll go check out Delgo for a preview.

Whatever. Let’s move on to something that legitimately looks awesome: Tower of Shadow. It’s still a long way off (summer 2010), but Hudson’s Wii exclusive looks like this generation’s Ico. The similarity begins with the bloomed-out lighting and subdued color palette, but the game also exudes that thoughtful poignancy that marked Ico and Shadow of the Colossus.

We’ve seen a lot of unique takes on 2D games lately, from Warioland: Shake It to Braid, and Muramasa to the forthcoming A Boy and His Blob. Tower of Shadow’s deal is that the 3D environment creates a 2D platforming world by way of realistically projected shadows.

As the unnamed shadow boy, you’ll exist only in a flat plane, traversing a level that is created as shadows lie across the 3D world. Designer Osamu Tsuchihashi promises that there will be ways to interact with the physical realm to adjust or manipulate the shadows. Tsuchihashi won’t say much about the game’s story… other than that there’s a tower and a boy in it. But when NP drops the word “melancholy” to describe it, one look at those screenshots is enough to convince me they’re on the right track.

A lot can happen between now and next summer, but this is definitely one to watch on Wii.

This reader letter has GOT to be fake.

Am I the only one wishing for a new Mach Rider game? It begs for Wii Wheel support, and when the rider loses a life, it would be cool to see him blow up and come back together with 3-D graphics!

Mach Rider was an NES launch game. So here we have a probable adult (can you imagine a kid picking up Mach Rider on the Virtual Console?) trying to talk up a new version of an ancient, unloved game by suggesting it utilize the friggin’ Wii Wheel, big explosions, and the phrase “3-D graphics.” I call shenanigans.

Last issue, readers submitted “ideas” for Wii MotionPlus uses. This time, it’s all about the Vitality Sensor. The most popular suggestion is that games could sense your stress level and adjust the difficulty accordingly. Which is probably the best idea since we killed off all the passenger pigeons.

Whether the game gets harder because you’re calm, or easier because you’re stressed, this doesn’t strike me as a particularly accurate use of the tech. I don’t think you can assume that the player is ever 100% focused on the game, and therefore any assumptions based on heart rate or whatever are out the window. What if you’re playing a game to relax and you end up involved in a verbal argument with someone in another room… that stress has nothing to do with the game.

And has anybody considered that the damn Vitality Sensor seems to take one entire hand out of action? It plugs into the Nunchuk port, and it probably requires your left hand to lie still on a flat surface. This trinket is destined for non-games only, gang. These attempts to jam it into a “core” game experience are amusing thought experiments at best, and the ravings of blinded fanboys at worst.

Download Staff Picks: Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a Darklord (WiiWare), Bit.Trip Core (WiiWare), Tales of Monkey Island Chapter 1 (WiiWare), Pulseman (Sega Genesis)

Top scoring Wii review: Muramasa: The Demon Blade and NHL 2K10, tied at 8.0 (all scores out of 10)
Top scoring DS review: Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story 9.5
Lowest rated Wii review: Valhalla Knights: Eldar Saga, 4.0
Lowest rated DS review: IL-2 Sturmovik: Birds of Prey and Bleach: The 3rd Phantom, tied at 4.0

This issue also sees two first-party DS games – Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box and Fossil Fighters – reviewed at 8.0. Cursed Mountain for Wii hit 7.0, but the Wii version of Disney’s stab at Pokemon, Spectrobes: Origins, mustered a mere 5.5.

The Club bonus that could have been. – Before they settled on Doc Louis’ Punch-Out!! as the surprise reward for Club Nintendo Platinum members, Nintendo was considering putting Doc Louis in “an 8-bit bicycle race with upbeat chip-tune music.” Now join me in saying awwwwwwwwww.

Advice from the Guru of Greatness – WWE sports entertainer John Morrison has some advice for your least favorite Smash Bros stars. He says Pit should wear pants, Captain Falcon should smile more, and Luigi should consider “some biometric upper-body work.”

Yeah, you don’t remember him – Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Smash-Up gets points on the board for including little known B-character Fugitoid… but loses BIG points for using the hideous 90s animated series TMNT logo on the box art.

Hot on the heels of Smash-Up – There’s another Ninja Turtles game on the way to Wii, and the subtitle Arcade Attack should tell you all you need to know. The game will feature storyline panels from the original black-and-white Eastman & Laird comic book.

Curious about Sega’s Sakura Wars? – Sakura Wars is a real deal in Japan, with the franchise cresting dozens of core games and spin-off titles… but its western debut comes in the form of a Wii port of the PS2’s Sakura Wars: So Long, My Love this November. It’s an adventure game (like, with dialogue trees and everything!) about steam-powered mechs and young opera singers.

Dementium, spoiled – NP doesn’t mind wrecking the ending of the original Dementium game, Bobby Ewing-style. The sequel, coming to DS early next year, will feature a better save system.

Next month in Nintendo Power… after apologizing for no No More Heroes, NP vows a Halloween-timed focus on Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles. Also, NP will reveal a “major DSiWare title.” Woot!

Issue #245, September 2009
featuring Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: The Crystal Bearers (Wii), Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box (DS), Super Monkey Ball: Step & Roll (Wii), The Beatles: Rock Band (Wii), Dead Space Extraction (Wii)

Hard to believe that Crystal Bearers will be the sixth Crystal Chronicles title. It doesn’t seem like it’s been that long since we tried gathering four GBAs for an evening of connectivity cable madness on the first game in the series. Crystal Bearers has been up and down since 2006, and now Nintendo Power has it pegged for release by the end of this year. NP calls it “one of the most exciting Final Fantasy games in ages” and that it has a “dynamic new logo.” Seriously. They called out the logo.

FFCC:tCB takes places one thousand years after the GameCube original, which is one of those KOTOR-like timelines that always give me fits. You live in the year 2009. Go try and interact with someone from the year 1009. Now explain to me why these games always exist in a thousand-year evolutionary freeze frame, where basic technologies never advance and everybody still speaks the same language.

Now, Crystal Bearers has given the world of Crystal Chronicles some changes in those thousand years. The Lilties are now the top dog (they were the little tanks from the first game) and they seem to have gotten taller. They’re sort of Goron-esque now, which is not a compliment. The Lilties have killed off all the Yukes (the ugly stork people), so the game’s first thrust of plot comes as a lone Yuke re-appears in the world. Probably hell-bent on revenge.

The gameplay hook revolves around lead character Layle being telekinetic. Using the Remote as a pointer, you can pick up items (and people) in the gameworld and toss them around. Layle is actually largely free of weapons, since he can pick up pretty anything and throw it. The telekinetic controls are used for exploration and in combat. NP also suggests the game has no RPG elements that you would expect of a Final Fantasy game. No spells, no inventory, and only a minimum of equipment slots. The development team is aiming for a solid action-adventure title with the depth and backstory of a RPG.

Motion controls are also used in light gun sequences and to pilot an airship. Itahana name-checks snowboarding, dancing and farming as additional waggle-action. It seems sort of minigamish to me, but I would expect that the traditionally heavy Final Fantasy story and free-roaming exploration will add much gravitas to all the shooting gallery dancing harvesttime snowboarding bits. FFCC:tCB does not use Wii MotionPlus, because the game does “not require heightened sensitivity.”

Is there a reason why Nintendo Power can’t name Peter Griffin?

You know, back when The Simpsons, Beavis & Butt-head, and Ren & Stimpy were the Moral Majority’s favorite animated targets, Nintendo Power had no trouble naming those shows.

What is with you fanboys and Wii MotionPlus? You’re worse than 360 kids and Natal. In this issue’s letter column, there is a raft of solicited ideas about how MotionPlus could be used to make gaming better. Look, I bought the damn thing, and I am ALL FOR new stupid control accessories (I’m still pissed that Nintendo bailed on the eReader and allowed Sony to debut a camera-assisted trading card game. Hello, Pokemon TCG?!?!) but the supposed “ideas” are the same silly crap that we all heard back in mid-2006. Here’s some gems for you:

• - 1:1 swordfighting in Zelda!!!!111!!
• - Tail swinging in Godzilla!!!111!!
• - Fight using a staff!!111111111
• - LIGHTSABER OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!1!!!
• - Warioland: Shake It would be more accurate!!!!!11111!!!!

Come the f on. You mean to tell me that NOW, all of a sudden, we’re all so terribly disappointed in how the Wii Remote has worked for the last three years? One reader says that WarioWare: Smooth Moves did not follow movements well enough. Another says that MotionPlus would bring better bow-and-arrow aiming to Twilight Princess. A third wants MotionPlus sword slashing in Sin and Punishment 2.

Here’s the news, gang: These games are not magically bad now that MotionPlus exists. NOBODY was complaining about the archery controls in Twilight Princess or cursing inaccuracies in Warioland: Shake It. And who here thinks that the normal, unsexed Remote is functionally incapable of swinging a sword in S&P2? Go ahead and enjoy new games that leverage MotionPlus, but don’t jump on the bandwagon that somehow Nintendo’s launch day technology is now not up to snuff.

I wish somebody would go ahead and release that 1:1 swordfighting game that everybody thinks they want, so we can all find out how miserably tiring and un-fun that would be. As a community, we need to get past this.

These no doubt apply to all versions of The Beatles: Rock Band, but here’s some of the subtle changes Rock Band fans can expect from the Fab Four edition. The whammy bar will not change the guitar tone, and you will not be vamping any custom drum fills. Both of those features were removed to avoid screwing up the Beatles sound. Spoken parts no longer affect your score. And while harmonies will not hurt you if your singers can’t nail them, there will be a harmony trainer which will help you learn what George was doing. Since the Beatles did not record their vocals independently, Harmonix has put a flute into the trainer that will help you isolate each specific harmony track.

But at least one Beatles-breaking change had to made to appease the marketplace: Paul’s Hofner 500 bass replica is now right-handed. And it has a whammy bar. Hardware director Daniel Sussman claims the company “had a heated debate about these things for weeks.”

Download Staff Picks: Swords & Soldiers (WiiWare), Water Warfare (WiiWare), Space Harrier (Arcade), Mario vs Donkey Kong: Minis March Again (DSiWare)

Top scoring Wii review: Wii Sports Resort, 8.5 (all scores out of 10)
Top scoring DS review: Space Bust-a-Move and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, tied at 7.0
Lowest rated Wii review: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, 5.5
Lowest rated DS review: Ant Nation 2.0

A sign of the old Nintendo Power. – Here’s the kind of fanboy dorkishness that NP really doesn’t need. EIC Chris Slate claims to finally have been “bit by the Game Boy bug” while he helped on the mag’s Game Boy 20th anniversary article. Really. I suppose it’s better than the usual unnecessarily random GameCube slam.

From back before canon was king. – In November 1992, Super Star Wars arrived on the SNES allowing Luke Skywalker to lightsaber banthas and Han Solo to leap over TIE fighters. It is simultaneously odd and refreshing to think that, at one time, this decidedly non-canon game was about all the Star Wars product available. Lucas’s brand defense team would string you up if you suggested perverting the continuity like this today.

Random does not equal win – In a victory for those of us against giving your creative product a purposefully random or ironic name, WiiWare platformer Eduardo the Samurai Toaster was given a middle-of-the-road “Hmmm…” rating.

Oh, THAT’S why they didn’t review it. – Reader Pojo asked why NP never reviewed Wii Music, suggesting that they didn’t want to give it a low score and hurt holiday sales! NP bowed out of the discussion with the old chestnut that Wii Music isn’t a game per se. This must be a new editorial policy, because NP once gave Mario Paint a 3.9 out of 5.

Project Natal, scooped. – Ubisoft has a new fitness title coming (hooray!) that uses a USB camera to guide your exercising. Your Shape is due this very winter, ensuring that camera-assisted exercise games will be old news by the time Natal sees retail.

In those days, the pixels were larger. – The original Game Boy screen was 160 x 144 pixels. Today, your Instant Messenger buddy icon is probably bigger than that.

And you said it wasn’t a system-seller. – WWE champ Kofi Kingston just bought a Wii “two weeks ago” for Punch-Out. He claims to have run (like, jogged) to Best Buy to get it. He has never played Super Mario Sunshine, one of his favorite gaming characters is Solid Snake, and when he can’t play himself in a wrestling game, he picks the Undertaker.

Next month in Nintendo Power… “big upcoming games” like No More Heroes 2! Not much of a tease, I know.

Issue #244, August 2009
featuring E3 2009 roundup, Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story (DS), No More Heroes 2 (Wii), Trauma Team (Wii), Wii Sports Resort (Wii), Legendary Starfy (Wii), Fragile (Wii)

I’m not going to bother saying much about E3 showponies like Super Mario Galaxy 2, Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks and Metroid: Other M. You already know enough about those. Instead, I’m going to present some tidbits from the lesser-known E3 reveals.

Like Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: The Crystal Bearers (Wii). WTF. I moderately enjoyed the original GameCube Crystal Chronicles, but this Wii version sounds completely different. They’re still calling it an action-RPG, but every time I hear about it, it seems to be less and less RPG-like. In fact, it sounds a lot like Elebits, as the main character relies on a grab-and-yank telekinesis ability to solve puzzles and interact with the environment. NP reports that the demo had “no spells, items, or pointless NPC conversations.” Can this sub-franchise deviate any further from Final Fantasy?

Dead Space Extraction is working to earn that Wii pedigree. The prequel will make you shake the Remote to charge your light, and your gun’s secondary modes are activated by turning the Remote sideways.

You remember The Conduit, right? Boy, it seems like ages since anybody talked about that one. When did that come out? 2007? Holiday ‘08? … Oh crap, it came out last week? Jeez.

Anyway, developer High Voltage brought two new Wii games to E3, which makes me think poor Conduit was simply the proving ground for better games to come. The Grinder moves the FPS genre from sci-fi to horror, as players will become monster-killing bounty hunters. The Grinder will a four-man online co-op mode. High Voltage’s second game is a fighter called Gladiator A.D. NP claims this one is in the Bushido Blade fighter model with “light RPG elements” to enhance your chosen character. Seriously, has anybody heard of either of these games before? Both are scheduled as “TBD 2010.”

Start planning your perversions now… that personality quiz at the beginning of Silent Hill: Shattered Memories (Wii) will determine what kind of clothes are worn by the game’s female police officer. She can apparently show up in full riot gear, as a Law & Order-style suit detective, or with a “provocatively unbuttoned” tight shirt.

What? A sequel to Dementium (DS)? It’s happening! I’ll avoid Nintendo Power’s classless error and not reiterate the COMPLETE SPOILER they toss out about the first one.

A Boy and His Blob (Wii) will include a “Hug” button to soothe the blob in times of stress. That is all.

And finally, I want to reiterate a point about Wii Fit Plus: they are not kidding about the “Plus.” This sequel has all of the activities of last year’s runaway sales hit, but adds six new exercises and a pleasant-sounding fifteen new balance games. Also, you can string together a custom workout. Wii Fit Plus will incorporate your save file from the first one, so there is literally no need to own the original. I’m hoping the standalone release arrives at the $30 price point.

Miyamoto has some notes about Nintendo’s upcoming releases in his Nintendo Power E3 interview. If you’re wondering how New Super Mario Bros. Wii will handle multiplayer deaths, you can rest assured knowing it will be as punishment-free as possible. As long as another player is still alive, a dead player will simply re-appear right where he or she died.

The game will also feature the return of the Koopa Kids (”We’re still working on it!” Miyamoto promises, as if there’s some sort of complex contract negotiation to work out with Wendy O. Koopa.) Plus, NSMBW will debut the long-rumored “Kind Code” feature that will let the game play for you if you get to spot that you can’t complete. I’m sure I’m in the minority on this one, but I will totally turn on Kind Code – or Demo Play or whatever the final name is – and watch the game play itself start to finish. I like watching games, what can I say.

When asked about the playable characters being Mario, Luigi, Toad and Another Toad, Shigeru Miyamoto says “That’s it.” I still maintain that they’re holding back Peach as a secret character. Either she’s in from the start or you unlock her after beating the game once. The game has such a Super Mario Bros. 2 vibe that I can’t imagine Nintendo ignoring the obvious and not completing the SMB2 quartet.

Super Mario Galaxy 2 is intended to be more difficult than the first, which means I should probably just bail out now. Miyamoto says not to expect any new suits (instead: Yoshi and new abilities for Yoshi), that the game will feature all new galaxies (why would you assume they would repeat, because Wii Fit Plus repeats?), and that there will be a time slowdown effect. Miyamoto doesn’t say if this is an in-game effect, or if this is another take on Kind Code to make the game easier to play.

Oh, and about that new Legend of Zelda for Wii? Great quote from the master: “I don’t think it’s going to be that radically different.” Have fun with that one, gang.

This is no Fallout. Although Fragile will bring a post-apocalyptic RPG adventure to the Wii, it’s more about atmosphere than gameplay. In fact, Japan classifies an entire subgenre of adventure games as “funiki”; NP cites such great-atmosphere-but-questionable-gameplay titles as Killer 7, Siren and Rule of Rose as funiki games. These are games that were all frustrating to play to certain degrees, yet oozed an undeniably unique style that kept you coming back for more.

Fragile owes a lot to the Japanese “modern ruins” explorer movement known as haikyo, where amateur archaeologists venture into abandoned locales just to see what’s there. I’ve followed various haikyo weblogs for years (sadly, many of my old favorites are no longer around) and have always found the resultant photography fascinating. Japan has a wealth of these lonely sites, which may seem odd for a country so frequently described as being densely populated. From schools to hospitals to hotels to amusement parks, these locations are real-world cyphers, sitting broken and silent yet full of questions… as if they are forgotten remnants of a mass evacuation or a ground zero nuclear blast.

So needless to say, after reading this I’m suddenly very interested in Fragile. It’s due this winter.

Download Staff Picks: Final Fantasy IV: The After Years (WiiWare), The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask (N64)

Top scoring Wii review: Little King’s Story, 9.0 (all scores out of 10)
Top scoring DS review: Dawn of Discovery, 8.5
Lowest rated Wii review: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, 5.5
Lowest rated DS review: Mega Man Star Force 3 6.0

Other scores this month: The Bigs 2 (Wii) struck out at 6.0, Guitar Hero On Tour: Modern Hits (DS) hit 7.0, and Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor (Wii) reached a respectable 8.0.

Although being different games, both the DS and Wii iterations of the Overlord franchise scored 7.0.

Bowser, done Book Style. – As if the concept of Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story wasn’t confusing enough, at certain points you’ll have to turn the DS sideways (like Brain Age) and control a giant Bowser across both screens. Also: Fawful is back!

Now that is an awesome subtitle. – In Japan, the game we know as The Legendary Starfy carries the subtitle “Confrontation: Dire Pirate Squad.”

Trauma Team is not Medical Minigames. – After reading the first vague press releases, I was worried that Trauma Center was going to become Trauma Party. Although the game features six doctors with different specialties, Trauma Team still maintains the dramatic storyline and style of the rest of the franchise. The key improvements are a greater variety of operations, full voiceovers, and a step away from the series’ more fantastical elements such as GUILT and the Healing Touch.

Some More Shinobu. – The No More Heroes sequel will break up all the Travis Touchdown with a little playable Shinobu, the young girl who is one of Travis’s early boss fights in the first game. Also, creator Suda 51 is including some exercise minigames for Travis’s pet cat because he “didn’t want to lose against Ubisoft’s Petz series!”

Freakin’ standardize this, already! – Wii Sports Resort will feature Achievements, er Trophies, er Challenges… er Stamps that you receive for completing various tasks within the game. Hey Nintendo: it’s clear you like the Achievements idear, so go ahead and make that a console standard, okay?

Next month in Nintendo Power… Professor Layton!

Issue #243, July 2009
featuring Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days (DS), Tatsunoko vs Capcom (Wii), Scribblenauts (DS), Rhythm Heaven (DS), Muramasa: The Demon Blade (Wii), Astro Boy (Wii)

Straight off, let’s get it out of the way that Nintendo Power does not know what 358/2 Days means. What they do know is that this DS exclusive takes place between Kingdom Hearts 1 and 2, focusing on Roxas. Roxas is kind of like Raiden if you consider usual series lead Sora to be the Solid Snake.

With the spotlight on Roxas, 358/2 Days is going to make for a different kind of Kingdom Hearts. Although Roxas will visit Disney-based worlds, he’ll do so without sidekick regulars Goofy and Donald Duck in tow. In their place, you can choose from various members of the doomed Organization XIII. I say “doomed” because if I recall KH2 and the GBA sidestory Chain of Memories, most of these guys were dispatched by Sora and company.

In fact, 358/2 Days seems to be primarily about filling in the gaps created by the typically Square Enixian storyline. Nintendo Power promises the game will reveal how Roxas met his friends in Twilight Town (the people and setting for the extended prologue section of Kingdom Hearts 2), introduce a new Organization cutie named Xion, and go into Roxas’s friendship with series thorn Axel.

But if screens like this one are anything to go by – and given that we already know that Roxas and Sora are the same person, sort of – it’s not too hard to guess that the Roxas / Xion / Axel relationship will be a mirror of the Sora / Kairi / Riku trio.

I know I just dropped a heap of Hearts trivia on you, but game creator Tetsuya Nomura (and character designer for Final Fantasy, as if you didn’t know that) promises that 358/2 Days is also a good jump-on point for gamers unfamiliar with the series. After all, Roxas himself is something of a cypher and has to learn about his role in the Kingdom Hearts mythology right alongside the player.

358/2 Days has an offline WiFi multiplayer mode, where up to four players can compete in Four Swords-esque missions. These missions are unlocked during the single player quest and in return, the rewards collected in multiplayer can earn special items back in single player.

Rumors can continue to percolate about Kingdom Hearts on Wii. Nomura, in a classically vague riposte to NP’s question, says he may consider it at some future date.

This game has been getting coverage everywhere, so the article on Tatsunoko vs Capcom is pretty much all old news. The press release Aeropause HQ received for Tatsunoko vs Capcom mentions that animation studio Tatsunoko (the half of the game where you need to be a serious classic anime buff to recognize anybody) is perhaps most famous for the original Speed Racer. Well if that’s the case, how come I don’t see him listed on the fighters’ roster? Maybe he’s a secret unlockable.

Speed’s lack notwithstanding, it is an interesting mix of characters. TvC will include characters from Street Fighter, Darkstalkers, Lost Planet, Mega Man 64, Onimusha, Okami, Viewtiful Joe and Rival Schools. And that’s obviously just the video game side.

They’re also considering adding online play, which was not included in the original Japanese release. Just get me Speed Racer and I’ll bite.

It seems to have been completely overshadowed during E3, but Scribblenauts is a game to watch. Coming to DS this fall, Scribblenauts is a puzzle/action game where, when confronted with a challenge, you simply write a word onscreen to make your way through. And I don’t mean some kind of prompted writing, as in Typing of the Dead, I mean that you literally have to come up with your solution out of thin air. Nintendo Power shows this example of a puzzle where you have to get a cat off a roof, and three possible solutions would be to write the word “fish,” “lasso” or “water balloon.” Each word you write summons the object, and how these objects interact will determine if you have solved the puzzle or passed the challenge.

This sounds like a promise of Molyneaux proportions, but NP (and just about every other article I’ve ever read about the game) says every word the tested created some kind of response. You’re limited to nouns only (as if that’s a limitation), but nothing vulgar and no proper nouns. So a penis would likely not help save that cat. Among the words that NP tested include tsunami, minigun, jerk, capybara, rutabaga, moose and god. Developer 5th Cell claims “tens of thousands” of words can be used.

Creative Director Jeremiah Slaczka mentions a hilarious but simple word combination that crashed the game during development: writing “bunny” and “bunny.” The randy buggers multiplied to infinity.

The only knock I have against Scribblenauts is that 5th Cell also brought us Drawn to Life, which was completely oversold on its concept of being able to draw your own game. Most of Drawn to Life involved coloring, not drawing, so I am the teenciest bit worried that Scribblenauts could be similarly misleading.

Here’s your top WiiWare games, as picked by Nintendo Power. I own exactly three of them.

In order from bottom to top: Dr. Mario Online Rx, Gradius Rebirth, LIT, Space Invaders Get Even, LostWinds, Tetris Party, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King, World of Goo, Strong Bad, and Mega Man 9.

It’s shameful nonsense that Bonsai Barber did not make the cut (pun!) And I suppose that the mag went to print too soon to properly judge the recently released funfest that is Swords & Soldiers.

Download Staff Picks: Penguin & Friends: Hey! That’s My Fish! (WiiWare)

Top scoring Wii review: Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10, 9.0 (all scores out of 10)
Top scoring DS review: Knights in the Nightmare and Harvest Moon: Frantic Farming, tied at 8.0
Lowest rated Wii review: Destiny of Zorro, 2.5
Lowest rated DS review: Miami Law 3.0

Other notable DS scores: Nintendo’s own Legendary Starfy gets a 7.0 and the mystifyingly not-LEGO-like LEGO Battles hits 5.0.

On the Wii front, Let’s Tap received a 7.0 (Would you have expected much higher? This one is more concept than game anyway), Ghostbusters: The Video Game and Indiana Jones and the Staff of Kings both got a 7.5, Boom Blox Bash Party reached 8.0, The Munchables landed at 7.0, and The Conduit reached 8.0 (cue flailing about the failure of “hardcore” games on the Wii).

Here’s your only Beyond Good & Evil appearance you’re likely to see this year. – Photographer/adventurer Jade will be in Ubisoft’s Wii MotionPlus-enabled soccer game, Academy of Champions. In addition to genuine sports stars like Pele and Mia Hamm, you’ll also get to kickabout with Rayman and Sam Fisher.

Marvel jumps on the LEGO train, but not with a LEGO game – Marvel Super Hero Squad (Wii and DS) borrows the popular family-friendly gameplay of LEGO Batman/Star Wars/Etc but utilizes the super-cute chibi toy line of mini-heroes. We’ve got a ton of these toys at my house, but I imagine I’ll be going for the PS3 edition of the one, simply for the Trophies.

Elsewhere this issue, there’s Scooby-Doo: First Frights, which will also follow the same formula of easy multiplayer and cutesy redesigned characters.

Here’s one for the otaku among you – The lead creator behind Rhythm Heaven, TSUNKU (his spelling, not mine), was not only lead singer for Sharam Q, but also was producer, songwriter and backup vocalist for legendary j-pop girl group Morning Musume. One of Morning Musume’s songs was featured in the first Ouendan.

Coming to WiiWare: Braid – Not really! But PC-to-WiiWare conversion Super Meat Boy promises to wrangle cameos from stars of the indie game scene, including Commander Video from Bit.Trip Beat and Tim from the 360 platformer Braid.

Was Muramasa originally intended as a PS2 game? – Wii watchers have been drooling over Muramasa: The Demon Blade since the first screens surfaced of the shockingly beautiful 2D actioner, but developer George Kamitani reveals that the game would likely have appeared on the venerable PS2 if publishers hadn’t already starting “rejecting PS2 proposals” by 2006.

Next month in Nintendo Power… you know that thing we just had? That convention? E3? Yeah, they plan to devote the issue to that. Sucks being in print media.

Issue #242, June 2009
featuring Red Steel 2 (Wii), MySims Agents (Wii, DS), Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth (DS), Punch-Out!! (Wii), Nostalgia (DS), Spore Hero (Wii), Mario & Sonic at the Winter Olympics (Wii, DS)

You have to wonder why Ubisoft is bothering to go with Red Steel 2 as the game’s title. The “sequel” has nothing to do with the Wii launch title, and the development team is determined to erase all the bad memories associated with the disappointing original. One supposes Ubi still thinks the Red Steel brand has market value, but for all intents and purposes, Red Steel 2 is an entirely new game.

There’s two big reasons why: first, a new visual style that leverages style over realism… and second, Wii MotionPlus.

Art Director Stephane Bachelet makes a very important point when he says “If you try to do realism on Wii, you’ll always be compared to the other systems.” So Red Steel 2 sidesteps that issue with a cel-shaded look, but Bachelet is quick to stress that they feel their take on cel-shading is a bit more “mature” than, say, Jet Set Radio Future. He also mentions that the original Red Steel was set in the 1970s and “was not a fun look.” But while the two games are very different, there is at least one recurring visual theme: East meets West. The first used 70s style and Yakuza gangsters; Red Steel 2 turns the clock back to the American West with an overlay of the era of the Japanese Samurai.

Wii MotionPlus allows Red Steel 2 to detect the power of your swing more precisely than before. Early on in RS2, a tutorial will ascertain whether you’re a kid or an adult and then judge your swinging power accordingly. Nintendo Power tested the power-sensing by throwing light swings followed by heavy swings, and the game was able to render the resultant destruction accordingly. And of course, there’s the swordfighting. NP doesn’t drop the hallowed phrase “1:1″, but they do claim the onscreen sword followed the Remote motions “exactly, without any noticeable lag.”

I’m still very skeptical about the longterm playability of the vaunted 1:1 swordfighting. I simply do not find overdone motion controls fun to play. Standing in my living room swinging an imaginary sword does not sound like something I could keep up for hours at a clip. To date, Wii games have either beat our brains in with stupid motion controls that make your arms physically ache, or they split up the motion control into small segments so that you end up playing for only a short time (IE, mini-games). Neither solution is what I want in my gaming. I want subtle motion controls that are suitable for long sessions or short sessions. Few Wii titles have nailed that sweet spot.

But Red Steel 2 seems to have some smart decisions behind it, particularly the stylized look. And the dev team is actively seeking to address the concerns of the first Red Steel (Hey! You can instantly switch between your sword and your gun!), so maybe there’s redemption for this title yet.

Check out the preorder bonus for Little King’s Story It’s a cute little black devil demon thing… oh hell, I’m not going to pretend I know what an “Onii” is in relation to Little King’s Story. Here’s what it looks like. I’m guessing it’s made of that soft “stress ball” material.

Little King’s Story strikes me as a potentially brilliant title that will get washed over in sales, ignored by Nintendo’s core since it’s not a known property and sniffed at by the hardcore crowd because it features cutesy Animal Crossing-level art direction. We’ll find out when the game is released this July.

Yuji Naka reveals Sega’s loose hiring practices in his Power Profile interview.

“I wanted to go to Namco. But I didn’t get very good grades in high school. That’s why I didn’t go to university. Back then, Sega and Taito were the only companies that would hire people without a university degree. So I chose Sega.”

And of course Sonic’s father would have a hobby focused on speed… Naka dabbles in circuit racing with a Lotus Elise and a Ferrari 360 Spider. After admitting to running “about 20″ Ferrari races this year, Naka throws down the gauntlet at the feet of Gran Turismo creator Kazunori Yamauchi: “I think I’m the person who knows the most about cars in the games industry.”

Worst Product Description Ever Writer Justin Cheng describes Guitar Hero Metallica as “Imagine Guitar Hero World Tour with a Metallica-heavy track list, and you’ve got Guitar Hero Metallica.” No forking snot!

In other news, Justin summarized Cooking Mama World Kitchen as “Imagine Cooking Mama but with a world kitchen,” Raving Rabbids TV Party as “Imagine everyone’s favorite Raving Rabbids having a TV party,” and the new Punch-Out as “Imagine the old Punch-Out but on the Wii.”

Out of the four arcade titles that debuted on the Wii’s Virtual Console Arcade last March, only Namco classic Mappy scored a “recommended” from Nintendo Power. The other three, Gaplus, Star Force, and The Tower of Druaga (which you Baten Kaitos fans should recognize) all received a lesser rating.

To celebrate, here’s a Japanese band doing a swinging version of the Mappy theme.

Download Staff Picks: Bit.Trip Beat (WiiWare), Super Punch-Out!! (SNES)

Top scoring Wii review: Punch-Out!!, 8.5 (all scores out of 10)
Top scoring DS review: Magician’s Quest: Mysterious Times, 7.5
Lowest rated Wii review: Help Wanted, 4.5
Lowest rated DS review: Black Sigil: Blade of the Exiled 5.0

Localization is… slow – Japan has SIX Professor Layton titles. We have one. NP reports that they’re working on localizing the second one for a western release.

Ignore the barber behind the low score – NP gave WiiWare release Bonsai Barber a “Hmmmm”, which the middle level of their three-grade method for rating downloadable games. They are wrong. It’s a top WiiWare title. Incidentally, the only DSiWare release with a “Recommended” rating is Art Style: Aquia.

An idea with no explanation – Treasure World for DS is one of those games that sense various WiFi signals and generate specific in-game items. While this is cool and all, NP doesn’t say anything about the actual gameplay. More details, please.

Your ball, America – Deca Sports 2, the minigame collection that launched a million WII IS DYING rumors when it flopped in Japan, will arrive on our shores this fall.

Next month in Nintendo Power… no teaser here, NP promises a big article on Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days for DS.

Issue #241, May 2009
featuring Silent Hill: Shattered Memories (Wii), Punch-Out!! (Wii), G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra (Wii, DS), Rabbids Go Home (Wii), Let’s Tap (Wii)

Dude. Silent Hill: Shattered Memories is sounding really good. Although positioned as a reboot of the franchise, don’t make the mistake of assuming this is some kind of flaky PS1 port jacked up on waggle controls for smacking fleshdactyls with lumber. Not only does the game turn the original storyline on its head, but it also has no combat at all. Speaking as somebody who still suffers from flashbacks of getting stuck inside five-second attack animations while taking damage from an enemy who moved four seconds ago, I’m calling that a step in the right direction.

So what makes this look like the Silent Hill franchise’s departure album? First of all, it’s the attempt to subtract traditional video game elements like the ever-present examination text boxes. Then there’s the appropriation of Wii-specific tricks that have been used to great effect in previous games… like LIT’s first-person flashlight and No More Heroes‘ Remote-as-phone-speaker. Now add in a storyline that changes as you play it, to an extent far more complicated than “did you get the good ending or the bad ending.” Check out this list of features and see if you’re as psyched as I am (especially now that Fatal Frame 4 has been seemingly barred from release):

• No door textures painted on walls. Every locked door can be opened. You can even crack the door and peek into the room with your flashlight if you think something scary may be hiding inside.
• The Remote will ring when you get an incoming phone call. That famous Silent Hill enemy static sound will also come from the Remote.
• How you play the game (and answer an early psychology mini-exam) will determine what characters you meet, what locations can be explored, even how the enemies manifest themselves. “Every piece of voice changes [according to your psychology profile].” – Sam Barlow, lead designer
• Far less backtracking than previous games. Puzzle solutions will be nearby “not five rooms back.”
• The game’s main inventory interface is hero Harry Mason’s iPhone clone… which acts as your map and in-game camera as well as a phone. (Call 911 and then feel like an idiot as the dispatcher can’t hear you because you’re talking to a Wii Remote. Now that’s horror!)
• “Rusty brown corridors were a perfect fit for the PlayStation back in 1999, but we wanted to push the visuals much further.” – Tomm Hulett, producer

Worst Idea of the Year So Far: Kingdom Hearts on Wii as envisioned by NP reader “roxasthemighty”:

“When you think about it, that series is more suited to the Nintendo fan base. I think Square Enix should get together with the developers of Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn to make a strategy-type Kingdom Hearts where you would control Sora, Donald, Goofy, Riku, etc. on a grid-based map. When you attack an enemy the game would become an on-rails fighter in which you use the Wii Remote to swing the Keyblade or use spells.”

Um, no. After reading that capsule proposal, I’m not even sure I want Donald Duck in the next Kingdom Hearts.

Wishing you had a side-scrolling 2D real-time strategy game on WiiWare? How about if it showed up with a visual style reminiscent of Castle Crashers or Fat Princess?

Meet Swords & Soldiers, coming very soon according to the official website. Controlling one of three factions (Viking, Mayan, and an Asian culture to be named later), S&S simplifies the RTS for consoles by making it 2D and adding a tower defense element. You’ll hustle for resources as per norm in RTS games, but after your attack units are built, they march on to the enemy base automatically. Using the Remote as a pointer, you’ll select spells and give orders to your troops.

Unfortunately, NP does not offer an official release date or a price point. There will also be no online multiplayer.

Despite that, I’m embedding a gameplay trailer because I am already hot for this one.

Swords & Soldiers is from the same gang that gave us de Blob, but we won’t hold that against them.

So if a franchise has five installments since 2002 but none ever made it out of Japan, does that make it a new IP from our perspective? The Legendary Starfy comes to your US DS this June. If you don’t follow the import scene, Starfy is a Nintendo-published series created by TOSE. You may know of TOSE because of the company’s bizarre attitude of almost never putting their name on the games they develop. The Starfy series being one of very few exceptions across thirty years of working on Nintendo games.

To date, Starfy’s only appearance on our shores was as an Assist Trophy in Super Smash Bros Brawl. (Where he was called “Stafy” since that’s closer to his Japanese name.) The game we’re getting is the second DS Starfy title, which was released in Japan last year.

While you’d be forgiven for assuming his adventures take him to outer space, Starfy actually does most of his platforming underwater, according to Wikipedia. As a star that fell to Earth and masquerades as a starfish, Starfy’s levels alternate between land and sea, with the usual patterns of sub-stages and boss fights.

I’m sure that since Starfy is supercute and his chosen genre is portable old school platforming, his relative newness won’t be enough to get him past the Nintendo haters’ gate as they continue to complain about the lack of new IP. When you hate, you hate for life.

Voice actor Jennifer Hale is totally working on Brutal Legend, but Nintendo Power doesn’t want to name names for some reason. In the interview with Hale, NP describes her current project as “a game featuring Jack Black written by Tim Schafer.” Jennifer herself, responding to a question about standout game scripts, says “One I worked on written by Tim Schafer (don’t know if I’m free to say the name of the game yet): fantastic, funny and so cool.”

At this writing, Brutal Legend is not scheduled for release on any Nintendo platforms, ahem.

You may know Hale’s name from just about every single game with awesome female voiceover work, including Knights of the Old Republic, Mass Effect, Metal Gear Solid 4 and the Metroid Prime series. And no, she doesn’t play video games.

Shop Channel Staff Picks: Gradius Rebirth (WiiWare), Life Force (NES), Ogre Battle: The March of the Black Queen (SNES)

Top scoring Wii review: Klonoa, 9.0 (all scores out of 10)
Top scoring DS review: a three-way tie for 9.0… Rhythm Heaven, Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars and Pokemon Platinum
Lowest rated Wii review: Don King Boxing, 5.0
Lowest rated DS review: Dokapon Journey 4.0

Other notable scores: Excitebots: Trick Racing (Wii) was given 8.0. Steal Princess (DS) hit 6.0. Broken Sword: Shadow of the Templars – Director’s Cut (Wii) scored 7.0. Old school adventure The Dark Spire (DS) is a 5.0. And poor Major Minor’s Majestic March only managed a 6.0.

No, you’re not getting any details – Smash Bros and Kirby creator Masahiro Sakurai is working on a new game. It has nothing to do with anything he has ever done before, and we’ll likely not get any details for another year or two! So stop asking!

Take the red pill – Rabbids Go Home is apparently not another junky minigame collection! It’s an action-adventure-exploration game where you help the rabbids shoplift junk so they can build a tower to the moon.

For the six of you who still moon over Working Designs – He brought us Arc the Lad, Lunar: Silver Star Story and Elemental Gearbolt, and now the former president of Working Designs, Victor Ireland, is back with a new company and a new game. The company, Gaijinworks, was announced some time ago, but the debut title is new info: Miami Law, a DS adventure game. It sounds like something in the Lux-Pain / Phoenix Wright / Hotel Dusk mode.

Firebrand’s solo adventure – This month’s retro game flashback is Gargoyle’s Quest for Game Boy, one of my very favorite GB games. Released in 1990, this game took a mid-level baddie from Ghosts ‘n’ Goblins and made him the hero of a side-scrolling RPG-lite adventure with stunningly large and detailed sprites (for 1990 Game Boy, anyway).

Spoiling is half the battle – The movie is called G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, and so is the game… except that the game is a sequel. So I guess Cobra makes it through the movie more or less okay.

That’s a good price for no controller – Yuji Naka’s Let’s Tap, that game where you place the Remote facedown on a box and tap to play, is slotted for a June release at only $30. Unfortunately, there’s only five games on the disk and one of them is a sound visualizer.

He’s busy… IN SPACE – Mario will not return as the boxing referee in the new Punch-Out!!

Next month in Nintendo Power… “a special report on Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter games,” plus the inevitable 9.0 review for Punch-Out!!

Issue #240, April 2009
featuring Pokemon Platinum (DS), Excitebots: Trick Racing (Wii), A Boy and His Blob (Wii), Grand Slam Tennis (Wii), Rhythm Heaven (DS)

Let’s begin this one at the beginning: the always-hilarious reader mail column. Spielberg fan Stacy M. thinks the level editor in Boom Blox “rocked.” It did not. Reader Jack laments the crush of poor Disney Channel-to-video game properties like Hannah Montana, and then closes his letter with “It was a sad day when I bought one.” An unsigned plea for the DSi mentions how one of his four destroyed DSes “fell victim to a Juice Baby Bottle Pop.” Reader Acerox thinks Will Smith’s I Am Legend would be the coolest movie game ever, and “a perfect fit for Wii.”

And finally, a reader with an agenda reports:

The movie I would want turned into a game is Twilight… NOT! I know this is a bit off topic, but I can’t stand that book/movie. Nothing against the fans of Twilight, but I can’t imagine a gamer liking the awful thing.

That bit of love comes to us from reader TwilightHater. Now on to this issue’s games!

The mag’s ten reasons to get Pokemon Platinum include some mindless fappery (”#10: It’s everything you’ve always loved about Pokemon!”), but the real meaty chunks are meaty indeed. Platinum is definitely the biggest Pokemon game to date, which helps to ameliorate the long-held feeling that each generation’s third game is nothing more than a tweaked cash-in. (Witness Crystal to Silver/Gold, and Emerald to Ruby/Sapphire.)

Several Gyms have been changed entirely. The core Sinnoh Pokedex has been upped to over 200. The new subplot (featuring Team Galactic and monstrous pokemon Giratina) highlights an M.C. Esher-inspired level called Distortion World. A new WiFi area lets you stroll through an amusement park with touchsceen toys to share and multiplayer mini-games to play. And if you have an online trade cooking, the game will message your Wii to let you know if it has completed!

Then there’s these mysterious silhouettes:

Which Poke-fans have already sussed out to be additional varieties of Rotom based on household appliances. The first Rotom, found in Pokemon Pearl/Diamond, resembles a television set.

As a Wii launch title, Excite Truck was an uneven affair. Lots of people liked it; lots of people ignored it. Perhaps the biggest factor against it was some general blandness. It did not feel or look like a core Nintendo release, and the connection to the two Excitebike games was tenuous at best.

Well, there will be nothing boring in the sequel, Excitebots: Trick Racing, as the ho-hum trucks have been shown the door in favor of giant animal robot cars. Excitebots is instantly franchise material in a way that Excite Truck could never be. Giant animal robot cars!

Developer Monster Games thinks ‘Bots is easier to control, thanks to improved handling. And while the game will support Mario Kart’s Wii Wheel (which seems like a no-duh since the original was basically Wii Wheel without the Wii Wheel), ‘Bots will not have alternate schemes for the Nunchuk or GameCube controllers. But it will have online multiplayer!

If you remember the two original A Boy and His Blob games, you’re probably pretty old (in video game years). The NES game appeared in 1989 and a Game Boy sequel arrived a year later. Since then, the name has been dormant and several hardware generations have come and gone without ever knowing the joy of feeding jellybeans to the Shmoo. (And if you get the Shmoo ref, you’re even older. Thanks for coming. Shall I go for a Herculoids gag?)

The Wii title is essentially a new take on the original. The Blob is an alien lost on Earth, in search of help to liberate his home planet. He finds the Boy (who appears significantly aged down from the tall pixel nerd of the original) and they discover that different flavors of jellybeans will transform the Blob into various useful forms. A licorice bean creates a Blob ladder. Tangerine makes a trampoline. Lime turns Blob into a key. By cleverly managing your jellybean supply, you must guide the pair through a traditional platforming environment.

What made the original such a memorable title was the unexpected puzzlely nature. It looked like a Mario platformer, but you needed to think your way through it since the Boy could not leap like Mario. What makes the new edition an instant standout is the handdrawn 2D animation and lush painted backgrounds. Like Wario Land: Shake It (your mother will be a natural), the new Boy & Blob proves that modern 2D can be beautiful.

Oh, and developer WayForward (LIT, Shantae, Contra 4) is heavily hinting that the ketchup-flavored bean – which you could use to warp the Blob instantly to the Boy’s location, should they become separated – will not return in the Wii version.

Shop Channel Staff Picks: Wolf of the Battlefield: Mercs (Genesis), LIT (WiiWare)

Top scoring Wii review: Madworld, 9.0 (all scores out of 10)
Top scoring DS review: Valkyrie Profile: Covenant of the Plume, 9.0
Lowest rated Wii review: MotoGP, 4.0
Lowest rated DS review: Lux Pain 4.0

Lots of important reviews this month. Henry Hatsworth, Puzzle Quest: Galactrix, Peggle Dual Shot, Gardening Mama and Avalon Code all scored 8.0 or higher. On the disappointing side, Tokyo Beat Down got a 6, Onechanbara: Bikini Zombie Slayers is a 6.5, Ready 2 Rumble Revolution ranked 5.0, and both Crystal Chronicles: Echoes of Time versions scored in the 6’s.

And we have one more giggle at the expense of Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop:

For the second month in a row, Capcom opted not to send us a copy for review – not a good sign, especially since the game will be out by the time you read this. We’re calling this one dead on arrival.

This issue’s Fatal Frame Fakeout – The preview article on Dead Space No Colon Extraction is titled “The Fatal Frontier” and it features a bunch of dark, indeterminate screenshots. For a split second I thought we finally had some news on the Western release of Fatal Frame 4.

A tech detail you may have missed – The DSi will play music off an SD card, as long as the song is in AAC format. You can screw with the song by changing the speed and pitch and adding audio filters. NP also mentions a Mario visualizer that sorts of makes your music look like a game.

Start the begging campaign now – You may remember Japanese WiiWare title Pole’s Big Adventure when it made the weblog rounds a few months ago due to some penis-related sight gags. Although NP manages to sidestep any penile issues, they do show off a amazing NES parody that we should all get behind right away. When Pole hops into a green pipe, he comes out covered in crap. Naturally, there’s no US release in sight for this one.

Yes, you want Klonoa – The Wii remake of this cult 1998 PS1 platformer has full English voice acting as part of the coat of paint… but you can set it to the original MIDI-level gibberish! Plus, the game supports GameCube and Classic Controllers. We need more Wii games to do that.

Are you missing WarioWare? – Then you will want Rhythm Heaven, coming to DS next month. Although all fifty games revolve around a similar input mechanic – tapping to the beat with the stylus – Rhythm Heaven rallies around the bizarre Japan-o-random visuals that turned WarioWare into a franchise.

Next month in Nintendo Power… the teaser page has a bunch of cold-related puns. Is this the triumphant return of Ice Climber?

Yes, the cover story teased last issue with a map of Indiana is in fact a new Indy game, a waggle-heavy nostalgia fest called Staff of Kings. Can Nintendo Power make us love Indy Jones all over again? Read-a-long?

Issue #239, March 2009
featuring Indiana Jones and the Staff of Kings (Wii), The Conduit (Wii), Boom Blox: Bash Party (Wii), Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor (DS), Major Minor’s Majestic March (Wii), Broken Sword: Shadow of the Templars (Wii/DS)

OK, I need a researcher assisting me on these articles. Because the seven page feature on Indy begins with this quote from lead designer Stephanie Brochu: “Indiana Jones is perhaps one of the best video game licenses out there.” Come again? For serious? What past Indiana Jones video game was anything much above mediocre? Is there a single Indy game anywhere near the greatest video games of all time?

Anyway, Staff of Kings seems to be gunning for the most motion controls packed into a single Wii game. Every time you turn the page, the feature is crowing about another “immersive” gesture. You punch enemies by swinging the Remote and/or Nunchuk. Light a torch with a flint-striking motion. Shake to scramble up a cliff. Shake to reload your gun. Fly a plane by holding the Remote like a joystick. And of course B+swing flicks the whip. I’m tired just thinking about it.

Interested in something beyond the waggle? How about the ability to smash up an aquarium in a bar fight, and then chuck a liberated octopus at an enemy?

‘Cause that’s one of the game’s signature elements… providing Indy with a roomful of interactive objects that can be utilized in a fight. I’ll classify octopi-abuse as a Plus for Staff of Kings, even if it probably initiates some insane Remote hand motion to do it.

Staff of Kings also includes a two-player co-op adventure (wholly separate from the main quest) that features Indy and (presumably) his father. Two four-player modes allow for multiplayer tank and plane battles. And a secret unlockable is something “that will make old school gamers very happy.” What, like the sort-of-rare N64 version of Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine?

Before we continue, let’s look at the back cover. It’s an ad for Sonic and the Black Night, which we learned a few issues ago is now part of a Sonic sub-brand, the “Sonic Storybook Series.”

Aw, they even have a Storybook logo at bottom right! Let’s take a closer look…

Oh settle down, Sonic apologists. It seems that Sonic and the Black Knight is something akin to not bad at all… NP gives the game an 8.0 in this very issue. It’s just that every time I see Sonic with a sword, or turning into a wolf, or being driven like ExciteTruck, it reminds me how fall the guy has fallen. While Mario’s sidestories are generally memorable and acclaimed (Paper, RPG, Kart, Tennis, Golf… and at least half of the Party run), Sonic just keeps twisting in the wind. The war is over: Mario has won.

The DSi arrives this April, and a key reason of why you’d want to upgrade is the all-new DSiWare store. Just like the Wii’s Shop Channel, you’ll be able to purchase and download a variety of new games and apps. (No word yet on Virtual Console-style retro games, eh?) Prices range from free to around $8.

NP names some of the games that have already arrived to Japanese DSi owners… like shortened versions of old retail releases like Clubhouse Games and Master of Illusion. DSiWare will also bring new iterations of Brain Age. Can you believe it’s taken Nintendo this long to flog Brain Age beyond two DS games?

Perhaps the most interesting name in this initial rush is the return of WarioWare. All WarioWares circle a new interaction gimmick, and this DSiWare version will be based on the DSi’s dual cameras. Old WarioWare fans may be interested to know that two previous WarioWare minigames, Paper Plane and Pyoro, will show up on DSiWare as fully functional separate downloadables.

“Planting seeds in the rich dirt of my mind” is how artist Rodney Greenblat describes his relationship with Masaya Matsuura. Just as this team approached PS1 classics like PaRappa the Rapper and UmJammer Lammy, so have they built Major Minor’s Majestic March. IE, Matsuura comes up with the game and Greenblat does the “whimsilogical” art direction. M4 is a rhythm game where you must use the Remote as a marching band baton. Perhaps surprisingly – especially after the custom songs that made PaRappa oh so memorable – M4 uses licensed and public domain tunes.

Nintendo Power has a one page interview with Greenblat that is just plain hilarious. When asked why he hasn’t worked with any other game designers, he says “None of them have asked me.” And when he suggested using human characters in M4 instead of animals, “Matsuura preferred animals. He is the leader, so I went with animals.”

The results are in on the 2008 Nintendo Power Awards, and as you’d guess, Super Smash Bros Brawl won all six categories in which it was nominated. NP readers know that the mag pulls a weird switch on their annual awards… they ask the fans to vote, but the final result goes to the editors’ picks regardless. A democracy, this ain’t. So let’s look at some the more interesting arenas where the mag’s staff and the bourgeoisie seriously differed…

Best Music/Rhythm Game… 40% of voters picked Guitar Hero World Tour; 27% said Rock Band 2 The editors gave the award to Rock Band 2, noting the game to be “slightly superior.” Is that like one of those “jumbo shrimp” kind of things?

If the Nintendo fan populace had their way, No More Heroes would have won nothing. And that’s because none of them played it. NP gave No More Heroes awards for Best Sound/Voice Acting, Best Adventure Game, and Best New Character. Your Friend Code-loving fanboys gave those away to Strong Bad, Okami, and Somebody from Sonic Chronicles, respectively.

And in other Third Party news, a whopping 56% of voters chose Mario Super Sluggers as Best Sports Game, over the editorial pick of Tiger Woods 09 All-Play… which garnered a mere 5% of the popular vote.

Shop Channel Staff Picks: Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse (NES), Phantasy Star IV (Genesis), Zoda’s Revenge: Startropics II (NES)

Top scoring Wii review: Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon, 8.5 (all scores out of 10)
Top scoring DS review: Dragon Quest V: Hand of the Heavenly Bride, 8.5
Lowest rated Wii review: We Ski and Snowboard, 6.5
Lowest rated DS review: My World, My Way and Boing! Docomodake DS, tied at 7.0

It’s already better than Drawn to Life: Scribblenauts, coming to DS late this year, lets you solve environmental problems by writing the word of the item you need. Like, “ladder” or “axe” or “Swedish Bikini Team.”

It’s already better than Endless Ocean: Let’s Tap, that tapping game from Yuji Naka, is in fact coming to the US, against all possible odds or reason. It’s coming this summer, and it will be only $30.

It’s already better than Pokemon Pearl/Diamond: Pokemon Platinum, the expected third release to the DS Pokemon generation, has some pretty nifty upgrades. Aside from the usual tweaked story and bonus characters (Shaymin! Origin Forme Giratina!), there’s a new Wi-Fi Plaza that looks like a bitchin’ amusement park. Plus, you can upload videos of your best battles!

It’s already better than FOX News: The alien enemies that storm into Washington DC in The Conduit are called “The Drudge.” Is that some kind of political joke? (Good news: The Conduit supports the Wii Speak mic for voice chat with Friends!)

Next month in Nintendo Power… a cover story on Pokemon Platinum and MadWorld reviewed. This issue is sure to confound parents everywhere about them vidja games!