Nintendophiles 05.21.08

Posted by Theo Fraser on 05.21.2008

Michel Ancel answers our prayers and begins development on a Beyond Good & Evil sequel, Nintendo execs once again address Wii storage issues, the E3 2008 conference line-up is confirmed, and mature gaming comes to the Wii in the form of MadWorld. Check it all out in this week’s edition of Nintendophiles!




Hello and welcome to another instalment of Nintendophiles! For once, I haven't got anything particularly witty to talk about to kick off the proceedings, but there are a few news items that aren't bulky enough to dedicate a whole paragraph/section to, so this seems like an ideal place to talk about them. First of all, Disaster: Day of Crisis has been delayed indefinitely once again in Japan, and whilst an official reason has not been given, it is thought to be related to the recent slew of real-life natural disasters in the East, with Nintendo not wanting to seem distasteful by releasing a video game based on the same kind of events. Don't worry, it's not cancelled, but Nintendo are likely to hold off on a release for a good few months now. Elsewhere, Boogie is returning to the Wii for a sequel, (tentatively titled Boogie Superstars) this time making use of the Balance Board. Expect more of a heavy emphasis on Dance Dance Revolution type of gameplay, although vocals will no doubt still play a part.

That's a few little nuggets of info to mull over...now let's get onto the good stuff!




Beyond Good and Evil sequel in the making! But unlikely on Wii?
Credit: Jeuxvideo, Cubed3





I've often touted in these very pages the greatness of Beyond Good and Evil, the futuristic action-adventure title that graced the Gamecube, PS2 and Xbox back in 2003, and after the awesome cliff-hanger ending of the original, fans clamoured for the next instalment in what was designed to be a trilogy of BG&E games. However, due to poor sales of the first game, all future plans for the series were scrapped, and the hopes and dreams of fans (including myself) were forever shattered. Or so it seemed...

This past week, series creator Michel Ancel (famed for the Rayman franchise) spoke to Jeuxvideo and confirmed that a sequel is currently in pre-production. I may be stealing a John McClane quote here and totally using it out of context, but what the hell; YIPPEE-KAY-YAY MOTHER F*CKERS! This is truly glorious, glorious news. A rough translation of the interview with Ancel tells us,


I am working on Beyond Good & Evil 2. We have been in pre-production on the title for a year, and we're currently doing market research. But for the moment, it's in the early stages, and Ubisoft still hasn't agreed to it. [...] We want to be in continuity with the first game, with a big variety of levels, lots of emotion in the gameplay, and characters we care about. This time we are dealing with planet Hillys' future, and the relationship with animals...


Awesome stuff, right? Except there is one slight setback...the game might not actually be released on the Wii. It's possible that it's an oversight on the part of Jeuxvideo, but the game is only listed as coming out on PS3 and Xbox 360. This is strange for a number of reasons. For starters, the original sold the most on the Gamecube, so surely that would make the Nintendo market a clear priority, as it is likely to cater to the largest audience of existing BG&E fans? Also, development costs would be significantly cheaper on the Wii, and considering the lacklustre sales for the original, surely Ubisoft wouldn't want to take the risk and commission some massive resource-draining project when other cheaper options are available. Plus, it just seems like a natural fit for the Wii, what with the stick/staff combat and ‘photography-heavy' gameplay, which would both work perfectly with motion control.

With Ubisoft yet to officially give the go-ahead, it's still very early days for Beyond Good and Evil 2. But at least Michel Ancel is on board, and I highly doubt Ubisoft would turn down a proposition from a man the calibre of Ancel, who has made some pretty big bucks for them in the past. In regards to whether or not we see a Wii version of the game, that's up for Ancel to decide. But a little encouragement can't hurt. Nintendo fans, now is your time to speak out!




Nintendo executives once again address Wii storage issues
Credit: ONM

It's been one of the hot issues here in Nintendophiles for the first half of 2008, and still we seem no closer to seeing a proper resolution. With the WiiWare service now being available worldwide, concerns over the Wii's on-board 512MB storage space running out are at an all-time high. In recent weeks, various Nintendo spokespersons have spoken out on the matter, with Nintendo boss Satoru Iwata himself addressing the issues. However, none seem too phased by the problems and say that it only affects a very small minority of users. Nintendo of Europe's senior marketing director, Laurent Fischer, is the latest figure to give his spin on the matters, during an interview with Official Nintendo Magazine at the WiiWare promotional event in Germany this past week.


"At the moment, we of course know that some people are strug… well, it's not that they're struggling, it's just that they don't like the system as it's set up at the moment. But at the end of the day, the system is manageable.

I realise that some people would like to store everything in one place, for easy accessibility, which is understandable. For them, it would be more convenient to have more space. But having said that, I don't think that's the general feeling of most of the people.

Most of the people are happy with what they have. Of course, we could increase our technology and add a hard drive, but then what we lose is simplicity and accessibility, which is one of the important things for us. We want our consoles to be easy to access and not cause headaches."


So Nintendo think that making an additional external hard drive available to the gaming public would contradict the Wii's main aim of simplicity and accessibility? That's a ridiculous thing to say. Sure, the ‘extreme' casual gamers (such as the customers who buy a Wii purely for Wii Sports) won't be anywhere close to filling up the internal memory, but why should everyone else be penalised? And an external hard drive doesn't complicate things at all; a customer will only buy one if he/she knows how to use it. Accessibility has got nothing to do with it. It's hardly user-friendly to require the use of SD cards to transfer save files back and forth, not to mention having to re-download the entire game if it's a WiiWare/Virtual Console title. Nintendo really need to stop this naivety. It may be a minor inconvenience now, but pretty soon some people are going to get PISSED.




E3 2008 line-up confirmed
Credit: IGN

The line-up for the 2008 E3 conference, held July 15th-17th at the Los Angeles Convention Center, has just been revealed, and whilst not all of these companies will have Nintendo-related offerings on show, I thought it might be nice for you all to have a gander at. No real surprises, although the notable exceptions are Blizzard and Activision, who pulled out of the conference a couple of months ago after various disputes. So take a look, and start fantasising about what wonders these development teams have in store for us in under two months' time.

• 1UP Network


• Akella


• Atari Inc.


• Bethesda Softworks


• Capcom USA Inc.


• Crave Entertainment


• Codemasters


• D3Publisher of America


• Deep Silver


• Disney Interactive Studios, Inc.


• Electronic Arts


• Eidos Interactive


• Fox Interactive Media


• Indie Games


• Jagex, Ltd.


• Konami Digital Entertainment America


• LucasArts


• Majesco Entertainment Company


• Microsoft Corporation


• Midway Games, Inc.


• MTV Games


• Namco Bandai Games America, Inc.


• Natsume, Inc.


• Nintendo of America Inc.


• Novint Technologies, Inc.


• Nyko Technologies


• Rebellion


• SEGA of America, Inc.


• Serious Games Initiative


• Sony Computer Entertainment America, Inc.


• Sony Online Entertainment Inc.


• Southpeak Interactive


• Square Enix USA


• Take-Two Interactive


• Tecmo


• THQ Inc.


• Toshiba America Information Systems


• Ubisoft Entertainment Inc.


• Valve Software


• Warner Brothers Interactive Entertainment Inc.

It's a MadWorld out there

SEGA premiered three games from developer Platinum Games at their special presentation last week, one of which particularly caught the attention of the gaming press; MadWorld, a brutal third-person action game made exclusively from the ground up for the Wii. As you'll see from the video below, "brutal" may be the understatement of the year. Don't let its unique graphical style fool you; this is over-the-top gore-fest at its most bloody. I think it may be a race to see who gets to this one first; Jack Thompson or the BBFC?

It's a welcome addition to the Wii catalogue, as titles aimed purely at mature audiences are few and far between on Nintendo platforms at present. The team working on the game are of a very high calibre, produced by Atsushi Inaba, who was the director for Okami and the Viewtiful Joe series. Platinum Games itself is a 130-person strong unit, including names such as Shinji Mikami (of Resident Evil fame) and Hideki Kamiya (Devil May Cry designer). Some pretty talented folks right there! I was all ready to put my usual "let's hope it plays as good as it looks" tag for MadWorld, but with such a strong cast behind it, the project is already destined for very good things.

Naturally, as you may have gathered by now, this one is for adults only, so minors should look away now...as should those of a ‘tender nature'!







The 411 Games Crew

Joe Roche returns with The Full Circle: 360 News Report, featuring news on Gears of War 2, Guitar Hero IV, Too Human, and much more!

The 10th Hour is brought to you by Derek Robbins, who counts down the Top 10 Best Games Ever...as a typical GameFAQs user! Check out this unique slant on a commonly debated topic.

Rod Oracheski's Achievement Unlocked details the latest happenings in the world of Xbox Live Arcade. Outside of GTA IV, what's been going on this week in XBLA?

Mark Salmela breaks down his most wanted PS3 games in this week's B3yond the Report.

The PC Centric Extravaganza by Chris Evans features trailers for Red Alert 3 and Race Driver: GRID, and if you've been following the progress of those games, you'll definitely want to check them out.


My drama degree is forcing me to put in 13 hour days of rehearsal, but with my final performance of the year coming up next Monday, I'll soon have plenty of time to relax. Marathon sessions of No More Heroes and Mario Kart Wii sound like a perfect antidote to all the stress of work! And I'll see you right back here in 7 days. Take care.

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