Issue 202 of Edge magazine is thudding onto subscriber doormats as I write this, and this month’s mag has plenty to interest Nintendoites.
Space Invaders Extreme 2 gets a 9/10 review, there’s a very positive preview piece on Punch-Out!! and there’s an interview with the key players of Japanese developer CiNG, creator of Hotel Dusk and Another Code R.
But most exciting of all is the next month page - at least, unless my eyes are playing tricks on me. It shows a close up picture of a seemingly featureless patch of grass, but in the top right-hand corner is a tiny little lilac-coloured blob, which looks very much like a Pikmin.
Does this mean the magazine will be talking about Pikmin 3 next month? Or is my imagination running riot over this seemingly incongruous tiny spot of colour? It’s so small that there’s no point in me posting a scan of the page (though that in itself would be a little naughty) so for the moment file this under ‘rumour and speculation’.
A nice spot from GoNintendo here - Nintendo has some new info on its official Japanese site which says that Smash Bros. creator Masahiro Sakurai is involved in a brand new project. Naturally, this being Nintendo, there are few concrete details, but it seems to be a new second-party company working under Nintendo named Project Sora, whose rather clinical looking official site can be found here.
GoNintendo also has a quote from Satoru Iwata claiming that the game is “an experience that’s different from anything [you've played] up until now.”
Feel free to start speculating, WiiWii readers. Will this new game use MotionPlus? Will it think outside the box like Yuji Naka’s Let’s Tap? Will it really be different from anything we’ve played before? All these answers, and fewer, will be drip-fed from Nintendo when it deems us plebians are worthy of knowing more.
It’s looking increasingly likely that Wii Sports Resort will arrive in either April or May, if new information on a Wii version of Virtua Tennis 2009 is anything to go by.
VG247.com is reporting that the MotionPlus logo has been seen on the Sega game’s boxart, and given that the third-party release is arriving in May, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that Nintendo’s flagship release must be hitting shelves a little earlier.
Of course, it could just be rumour and speculation, but Sega isn’t denying that the game features MotionPlus (despite the non-mention in the official press release) which tells its own story. And it’s a game that would undoubtedly benefit from Nintendo’s new peripheral.
Two plus two equals five? Perhaps. But I firmly believe now that we’ll be seeing Wii Sports Resort in the first week of May at the very latest.
Despite the non-appearance of the now-finished Resident Evil 5 on Wii, waggle fans needn’t be too downhearted, claims Eurogamer.
A translated interview with Resi 5’s producer, Masachika Kawata, suggests he would like to work on a Resident Evil game for Wii, now he’s done with the new HD offering.
“Personally I would like to create something on Wii in the Resident Evil family. At the moment we don’t know and have just been working on RE5, so watch this space.”
Cause for optimism, certainly. Though let’s hope it’s more like Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition rather than Umbrella Chronicles. Decent though the latter is, I’d like a ‘proper’ Resi on Wii - and the console’s already oversubscribed for rail shooters, anyway.
Nintendo’s official Japanese site for the Metroid franchise has an interesting little banner on its front page, which seems to suggest that the Metroid series is set to get a new side story, possibly based on the Space Pirates.
Spotted by an eagle-eyed NeoGAF forumite, the banner mentions ‘Another Side Story - coming soon’. Naturally, there’s much fevered speculation as to what it could be, but with strong rumours that Retro Studios isn’t currently working on a Metroid game, it’s unlikely to be a new 3D Metroid. A 2D outing on WiiWare, then? Perhaps, but I’d suggest it might be some kind of anime series, or maybe a manga comic. Or possibly even just a bit of background info on Samus’ enemies on the site, to tie-in with the Wii-releases of the first two Metroid Prime games in the Wii de Asobu/New Play Control range.
Still, there was that mention of Metroid Dread in Corruption…could it be that Wii’s Year of Hardcore brings us a new space adventure for everyone’s favourite bounty hunter?
Gaming Target is reporting on a rumour that Fatal Frame IV will get a US release later this year, but that it may not have that title when it finally comes out.
The spook-snapping horror has been pencilled in (very lightly) for a European release for quite some time now, but it’s certainly not going to make the February date the site suggests - indeed, it’s not down for the entire first quarter, and still hasn’t been 100% confirmed for launch in PAL territories.
Yet Gaming Target claims to have spoken to an unnamed industry analyst, who claims that it may not be released as Fatal Frame IV. “Why any publisher would throw away the cult of popularity the series has gainded over the years is questionable,” it adds, but then concludes that “the desire to start fresh and make Fatal Frame more of a cult series could be the impetus behind that decision.”
I think ‘popularity’ is the wrong word for the series, which has never performed particularly well in the west, and perhaps under a new banner it could sell a whole lot more. Anyone for Ghost Photography Training?
After much wailing and gnashing of teeth on my part about the extreme unlikelihood of us Europeans getting our hands on Another Code: R, along comes a PDF detailing Nintendo’s financial results briefing for the year, and my hopes are suddenly raised.
Scroll down to page 8 of the report, and you’ll see a launch schedule of primary Nintendo products for 2009. Now this list is clearly incomplete, but CiNG’s Wiiquel is definitely on the European schedule, with the release date given simply as ‘2009′.
Also of interest is the DS list, which suggests Rhythm Paradise (changed from Heaven due to religious concerns, perhaps?) will hit Europe in the first half of the calendar year. The Wii list also has Punch-Out!! down for release before June.
Now, it’s too early to start celebrating just yet, but I’d assume that if a European release wasn’t at least considered for Another Code: R, then it wouldn’t show up on the list. I’ve fired off an email to Nintendo UK to ask if anyone can confirm the information, but haven’t had a response as yet.
More tidbits of info: Endless Ocean 2 is another conspicuous absencee from the North America listing though it remains on the schedule for Europe. And somehow, Pokemon Platinum has shifted ten thousand units outside Japan. Lots more facts, figures and tentative release dates here.
Quite possibly. PSU is reporting that the latest edition of US mag Game Informer carries a piece suggesting that “RockStar North is alreadyworking on the next instalment in the Grand Theft Auto franchise, which should be ready for release this holiday season.”
And this isn’t just downloadable content, no sirree.”We’re not talking about new DLC or a collection of previously available DLC, we’re talking about a full retail game,” says the mag. “We expect this title to follow the suit of previous GTAs and use a subtitle such as GTA: San Andreas etc. Tokyo might be a possible setting for the game,” it adds.
Now GTA IV was by all accounts a mammoth undertaking, and given that the team behind GTA IV will undoubtedly have its hands full with the Xbox 360-exclusive DLC, that the release would come very close to the launch of the second episode late in 2009, not to mention the fact that it would seem impossible to craft an entirely new HD GTA in that sort of timescale - possible on last-gen consoles, maybe, but not these days - and you’ve got a host of problems that point to it not appearing on PS3 on 360. Which can only mean one thing: GTA on Wii.
Think about it - Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime has mentioned how he’d love to see a GTA on the Wii. The console’s success has turned the heads of quite a few publishers who are now all racing to produce more high-quality games for the console after dismissing its early sales as a fad. Then you have the head of 2K Games - which owns Rockstar - mouthing off about the dearth of top-notch Wii titles. Put that all together with the reduced development period required for a Wii title compared to its hi-def rivals, along with faint whispers that the game has been in production for quite some time already - and, of course, the appearance in March of a GTA on the DS (a case of testing the waters, perhaps?) - and you’ve got a strong chance that GTA is indeed coming to the Wii.
Even the suggested setting makes a lot of sense - IV performed very well in the Japanese sales charts recently, and a GTA set in Tokyo would be a definite tilt towards the eastern market. Any game with ‘Grand’, ‘Theft’ and ‘Auto’ on the box is likely to be hungrily gobbled up by western audiences regardless of its setting, so Tokyo would seem a very good fit on the most popular piece of home console hardware out there. It potentially raises Rockstar’s profile in the east, and is an almost surefire smash hit in the west.
I’m sure if quizzed about this, Rockstar would pull a Nintendo and declare it to be nothing more than ‘rumour and speculation’. But don’t be too surprised if E3 brings us a big reveal of the first 3D GTA on a Nintendo console.
Clever internetters with too much time on their hands have uncovered a patent filed by Nintendo, which suggests the next Zelda game will feature an elaborate hint system involving players being able to view videos uploaded by other gamers, offering solutions to puzzles they’re stuck on.
Equally interesting is a new DVD-style chapter system, which will apparently allow players to replay certain sections of the game, and also offer the possibility for players to skip a section they’re stuck on, but only after a certain amount of time has passed. Thus, in theory, encouraging less able gamers to complete the game, while still giving them a chance to figure out the solution for themselves.
One of the pictures accompanying the patent strongly suggests that the game will be played in the third-person, and not - as some (ahem) have suggested - a radical change to a first-person perspective.
Strong rumours were afoot that the next Zelda would offer something very different to previous titles, and for this intriguing new structure to work, it looks like it could be a little more linear than before. It also suggests that the game’s puzzles will remain as brain-ticklingly tricky as ever, but that those without the time or the smarts to figure out the more taxing riddles will be more likely to finish the damn thing.
Potentially, this could be an intelligent, elegant solution to what Miyamoto perceived as a problem with Twilight Princess - he was disappointed in that game’s sales, and hinted that its epic length and difficult puzzles may have been off-putting for Wii’s expanded audience. With the option to turn hints and skips off for hardcore players, the next Zelda looks like the best of both worlds - a game which offers plenty to both casual and hardcore players.
So will we be seeing a new Zelda at E3 2009? The hype meter just got turned up another notch.
Industry predict-a-tron Michael Pachter is getting his rough estimates in early this month. Speaking to VG247.com ahead of his ‘official’ sales estimates in a week’s time, he suggested that Nintendo would be celebrating another incredible month for Wii, with sales up 100%, making for a staggering 3 million consoles sold during the month of December.
By comparison, Pachter surmised that the Xbox 360 sold less than half that amount, at around 1.2-1.3 million consoles, with Sony’s PS3 limping home with a comparatively measly but not-all-that-bad-when-you-think-about-it 700,000. Crikey.
Once again, gaming laughs in the face of impending economic doom. But here’s another prediction: 2009’s likely to be a bit trickier - even for Nintendo.
In other not-really-related news (but it’s too small to have its own story, and I needed a pic for this piece that wasn’t just a shot of Pachter), Another Code R’s release has been delayed by a couple of weeks in Japan, according to this here post on Nintendo of Japan’s site. You can have that one for nowt, folks.
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