Nintendophiles 10.18.07
Posted by Theo Fraser on 10.18.2007
This week, it’s all about brand new Nintendo titles, from Wii Music to a new Advance Wars game to Assassin’s Creed coming to the DS! Plus, don’t miss the fantastic new trailer for Super Mario Galaxy! Come inside for your weekly fix of Nintendo gaming.
Here in the UK, it's T-minus 24 hours until the launch of The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, and just a week away from Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, so naturally I'm on a big high this week. Debating whether or not it's really sad to miss lectures and go and buy Zelda first thing in the morning...
Nah, course not...this is ZELDA we're talking about! I'm sure my lecturers will understand.
Wii Music: The First Details
Last week, I mentioned the Nintendo Autumn Conference, where we finally got confirmation of Sonic's appearance in Super Smash Bros. Brawl, amongst a host of other great Nintendo news. Hidden away and pushed aside by the big guns such as Battalion Wars II and Super Mario Galaxy, Nintendo spoke about Wii Music...and yes, it's still coming to a Nintendo console near you!
First demonstrated at last year's E3, Wii Music was used as a way of showing punters the potential of the Wii and how the Wii remote could be used in innovative ways. It was then relatively forgotten about, but this past week, Wii Music saw somewhat of a rebirth, and Nintendo reps were on hand to talk about the game that sounds as if it's going to give Wii Sports a run for its money in terms of "pick-up-and-playness." Yep, ‘playness'...it's in the dictionary...you just have to look veeeery hard.
You'll control a band/orchestra of six members with correctly timed nunchuk and remote swings/gestures, adding in button presses for key variations and the like.
Right now, a whopping 40 instruments are supposedly on offer, and are likely to include guitar, trumpet, bongo drums, maracas and marimbas, as these were displayed back at E3 2006. In single player, you can choose to conduct and play as all six characters, or focus on one in particular and let the CPU handle the rest. Multiplayer will support up to four players (although there will still be six members in the band, so the CPU will control the other two characters if 3 of your friends join you). How multiplayer will actually function is yet to be revealed, although I'd expect both competitive and co-operative modes. Perhaps you'll have to work together to keep everyone in time with each other? I could see that being quite fun, and sounding horrendous should you get it wrong!
Originally set for a Winter 2007 release, it now looks as if it has been pushed back, with a vague "2008" release set for Japan. I'd expect to see it next Summer in the West. And despite the fact that these are just early details, it does seem very promising indeed. This is definitely one to watch out for.
Prince of Persia prequel in the works
Credit: CVG, BSGR
Aside from the ill-conceived Prince of Persia: Rival Swords (it was much better with ‘normal' controls on the Gamecube as Two Thrones), the PoP series in 3D has been pretty top notch. Sands of Time in particular was a high point for the Prince, so it comes as terrific news, rumor or not, that a prequel may be in the works.
Supposedly entitled Ghosts of the Past and in development for Wii, PS3, Xbox 360 and PC, the game will be the first in a brand new trilogy, set before the events of Sands of Time. How very Star Wars of you, Ubisoft!
Blog Surfer Girl Reviews is the site in question, so it's certainly not the most reliable of sources, but it at least sounds like a plausible and convincing idea. A prequel would be a great way to add longevity to the Prince, and might help flesh out his character a bit more. According to the blog, Ubisoft will move away from the darker tone seen in Warrior Within and Two Thrones, to present a more light-hearted adventure in what is described as a cross-over between Sands of Time, Ico, and Zelda.
Naturally, Ubisoft have declined to comment on the matter, merely stating, "We don't comment on rumors." And in the video game industry, that translates as "Holy fuck, how did they find out?" If it IS true, I'd expect to hear some kind of official confirmation by Christmas. If we haven't heard anything by then, I guess you can count this one as ‘wishful thinking'. Watch this space!
Assassin's Creed DS a reality
Credit: CVG
You might remember a little tidbit of news from back in June, when Assassin's Creed mysteriously showed up on the Nintendo DS release list on many US retail websites. Back then, we'd heard nothing about the news, and nobody was forthcoming about any kind of confirmation, so it was rapidly determined to be a simple mistake.
But as it turns out, it was no mistake. We now have official confirmation thanks to Nintendo's official release line-up for early next year. Published by Ubisoft, the game is set to hit stores in February, a mere 3 months after the highly anticipated and much-touted Xbox 360 release.
Of course, whilst the confirmation of the game's existence is great, we still have no idea what the game will look like or how it will play, which to be honest is a little disconcerting as there is now just 4 months of development time left. Supposedly it will still retain the main stealth aspect of its bigger brother, but in what form? 2D? 3D? Third-person? Top-down? And the million dollar question...can it possibly live up to the expectations set by the console version, or will it be another shoddy cash in? Let's hope we get some answers in the near future.
The DS sees Days of Ruin in the near future
Credit: Cubed3
Another quick piece of news for you, but one which shall no doubt please strategy fans, is that Nintendo have confirmed that a DS Advance Wars sequel is on the way, currently titled Advance Wars: Dual Strike- Days of Ruin, although expect that to be shortened in some way in time for the release.
What's more is that the game will be fully functional online as well as including the usual local play facilities, meaning that this could quickly become the multiplayer game of choice on the Nintendo handheld. The online service will include voice chat (awesome!) and a Map Center, where you can download other players' maps and rate them if you so wish. That sounds fantastic already. Early screenshots suggest a slight departure from previous Advance Wars games, offering a slightly more mature artistic style, but the bulk of the game is still supposedly going to function in the manner you'd expect from an AW title. Hopefully we can get some clear screenshots and an official trailer soon, as I'm desperate to see how this looks close-up.
Out of this world Mario trailer!
Can you believe we're under a month away from the biggest Mario game since 1997? It's something to celebrate, that's for sure, and Nintendo have commemorated the moment with a brand new game trailer, which needs no introduction from me, as it speaks for itself.
I swear, every time I see new footage of the game, it looks even more gorgeous than before. There's some awesome-looking moments in that trailer, especially the Bowser battle, which looks to hark back to the N64 days of swinging him by his tail and throwing him off the platform. It looks so good I could almost eat it. Much more of a wait and I'd fear for my safety, but fortunately, we are mere weeks from the launch. If you're not hyped about it, you probably shouldn't be reading this column. This is Mario, and it doesn't get much bigger than this.
The 411 Games Crew
Older DS owners absolutely must check out Ramon Aranda's hands-on report with upcoming horror/thriller Dementium: The Ward, which is released this Halloween.
Vincent Chiucchi has more on Sonic appearing in Super Smash Bros, and the never-ending Manhunt 2 saga continues! It's all in the Select and Start News Report!
Capcom prepare another announcement for you, woes of pre-ordering from Gamestop, and the relevance of Sonic in today's gaming society. Tommy Coloma has it all in this week's Negative Edge News Report!
A Resistance: Fall of Man sequel could be in the works! Mark Salmela has all the news on this story, plus more on L.A. Noire, Timesplitters 4, Guitar Hero 3 and other top titles in this week's SIXAXIS News Report.
Unfortunately, it's been a bit of a quiet news week after the highs of the Nintendo Autumn Conference last week, but hopefully things will have heated up a bit by next Thursday! Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go queue for Zelda...
