Nintendophiles 07.02.08

Posted by Theo Fraser on 07.02.2008

This week’s Nintendophiles news report brings you news of the impressive Havok engine coming to the Wii, new Prince of Persia and Castlevania titles are announced (both with some surprising twists), the latest on Nintendo’s plans for a DVD-ready Wii, and a look at the highly anticipated C.O.R.E. FPS title on DS. All that and more awaits you inside!




After 3 days of solidly playing Super Smash Bros. Brawl since its UK release, I've managed to tear myself away for a few hours to get this week's report done. Thankfully, Brawl lived up to my expectations and I am head-over-heels in love with it. Ike is my character of choice right now, although I'm also partial to newcomers Pit and Meta Knight. Unfortunately, the online problems haven't been sorted for the PAL release, which sucks, but it only seems to affect the With Anyone matches (which are plagued by TERRIBLE slowdown), as brawls With Friends seem to be fine. Apart from that relatively minor gripe, it's awesome, plain and simple. And I haven't even unlocked Solid Snake yet!


As an aside, I'd like to send out my congratulations to CM Punk for winning the World Heavyweight Championship on Raw this past week. It means a heck of a lot to me, as he is the reason I first started watching Ring of Honor. It was the hype surrounding the Joe vs Punk trilogy back in 2004 that convinced me to give the promotion a look, so it's extra cool to see both Samoa Joe and CM Punk the respective World Champions of the top two wrestling promotions in the world. Raw provided me with a true mark-out moment, and it was a great spectacle to see. Here's to Punk enjoying a lengthy reign!




2K Games bring Havok engine to Wii
Credit: CVG


Halo 3. Oblivion. Bioshock. Each of these stellar games share the impressive Havok physics engine, which goes to show how highly the engine is thought of. Now it is being brought to Wii via developer/publisher 2K Games, who plan to first put the engine to use in Carnival Games: Mini-Golf. Um…right. Good. Great. *Whistles to self*

Hard to get overly excited about that, but if you're a golf fan, then you'll be happy to have some proper ‘ball physics' (ahem), such as how gravity and wind affects the ball's flight.

Don't think 2K Games are going to waste the Havok licensing, however; there are still a number of other games in production that the developer plans to apply the engine to. Hopefully at least one of them will be a game that can do the Havok engine justice and bring us hardcore gamers a deeper experience than we have been accustomed to on the Wii.




New Prince of Persia DS title goes all ‘Wind Waker' on us
Credit: Cubed3

When the latest Prince of Persia title was announced for next-gen consoles, Nintendo platforms were conspicuously absent, but the reason for that is now obvious; the Nintendo DS is receiving its own entry into the Prince of Persia universe, with Ubisoft bringing us Prince of Persia: The Fallen King just in time for Christmas.

The most recent trilogy of PoP games have been largely very well received and have been a success commercially, so an announcement of a new title starring the titular hero was always going to be met with intrigue and excitement. The Fallen King is already attracting a ton of attention, mostly due to the drastic change in art style. Check out the first screenshot below.





I'm not sure what to think of it, in all honesty. The recent PoP games have had quite a dark tone to them, so it seems almost counter-productive to contrast this with a ‘kiddie-image'. Of course, people said that about Wind Waker when it was first shown off, and whilst parties are still to this day very split on the matter of "Celda", when it was all said and done we ended up with another classic instalment in the Zelda series. We also have to bear in mind that this could be Ubisoft's attempt to branch out the franchise's appeal, bringing in a younger audience on the DS (seeing as how that ‘kid-friendly' stereotype still plagues Nintendo). Plus, this is all based off of one in-game screenshot and a bunch of concept art; it's probably best to hold off judgment until we at least see some actual footage of the game in motion.

Moving away from the visual side of things, it's business as usual for a DS adventure title, with combat and acrobatics mapped to stylus control. Elsewhere, throughout your quest, you'll at times take control of new character Magnus to solve puzzles, explore the environment and fight off hordes of enemies. Not all that much different than the Prince then…

I'm anxious to see more of The Fallen King (that sounded more than a little pervy), and with E3 right around the corner, hopefully our 411 representatives at the show will be able to garner a bit of hands-on time with the game, assuming Ubisoft are ready to show it off to the gaming media. Check back with 411 Games over the E3 period for all the latest.




Plans for DVD-ready Wii put on hold
Credit: IGN

Nintendo have always been adamant about making games consoles as opposed to multimedia devices, but that didn't stop rumors from cropping up about plans for a new, more expensive Wii system that would include the capability to play standard DVDs. However, at a recent Nintendo stock holder meeting, held on June 27th, President Satoru Iwata addressed the issue, stating that,


"With supply constraints [of the Wii] continuing worldwide, the priority is on the current model."


For once, that's not a bullshit answer; the Wii is still heavily in demand, and whilst the ‘original' version of the console is still selling so well, it'd be pretty pointless to release a revised version right now. The GBA was reshaped into the GBA SP when sales started to dwindle, thus invigorating them once again. This is probably Nintendo's plan of action here; wait until the Wii's magic begins to wear off (in terms of the media frenzy), and then release the updated console to entice the people who had held off on purchasing a Wii before. It's a simple marketing ploy, but it's worked well in the past.




Castlevania comes to the Wii in an unexpected form
Credit: Nintendo Power, Kotaku, Cubed3

Well this one came out of left-field! Word of a Castlevania Wii title has been floating around for some time now, but it was always assumed that the title in question would be an action-adventure game, in keeping with the rest of the series that has come before it. So it came as a huge shock to find out that the newly announced Castlevania Judgment would in actual fact be a 3D fighting game.

If your response to that was "Huh?" you're not alone. Forgive me for being totally subjective here, but in my personal opinion, aside from Simon Belmont and Dracula himself, the cast of the Castlevania series haven't been all that memorable, which makes the jump to a beat ‘em up title (where characterisation is of the utmost importance) somewhat questionable.

Characters confirmed for the game so far include Simon Belmont, Dracula, Alcurd, Shanoa, and Maria Renard, but expect a whole host of others to join them when Konami officially reveal the game.

Motion controls will play a role, with reports showing Wii remote-based attacks, with the Nunchuk left for movement, but the exact specifics have not been unveiled at this time. What we do know with regard to gameplay, however, is that the game will employ a "subweapons" system, which depends upon the number of hearts you've picked up during the course of the fight. These subweapons come in a variety of forms, from holy water, spells and daggers to giving you the ability to set traps for your opponent in the destructible environments you'll be fighting in.

It may be an odd move to bring Castlevania to the one-on-one fighting genre, but at least with this ‘subweapons' gimmick, it appears to be trying something different to set it apart from all the other clones out there. Official screens have yet to hit the net, but a scanned screen from Nintendo Power shows off the in-game engine.







C.O.R.E. blimey, guv'nor!

C.O.R.E. is the upcoming first-person shooter from NoWay Studio, and if the debut trailer is anything to go by, this will be one to keep an eye on. Quite simply, it looks utterly fantastic; easily the best visuals we've seen in a DS title. Gameplay-wise, it looks like it may be more of a run-and-gun type of game as opposed to something a little more ‘cerebrally challenging', but it's not fair to judge based on a 3 minute clip. Hopefully we can get some hands-on time further down the game's development.







The 411 Games Crew

Joe Roche presents probably the biggest edition of The Full Circle to date! Check it out for all the latest on Gears of War 2, David Dyack and Silicon Knights,

Derek Robbins takes you through the Top 10 Video Game Villains in this week's 10th Hour. See who made the list!

The Select and Start News Report by Vincent Chiucchi has the news on the announcement of Diablo 3, plus an update on Hot Coffee, even more Soul Calibur IV details unveiled, the Big N getting sued and much more! You don't want to miss this one.

Mark Salmela goes B3yond the Report, looking ahead to the big E3 extravaganza in a couple of weeks.


Apologies for the later-than-usual column this week; some last minute changes to family commitments played havoc with my scheduling! Anyway, come back in 7 days, when things surrounding E3 will surely be heating up. It's this time of year that makes me so excited to be a gamer, with the promise of new titles and shock announcements right around the corner. What surprises await us? Keep checking 411 Games and you'll find out soon enough!

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