Nintendophiles 07.23.08

Posted by Theo Fraser on 07.23.2008

Catch up on the fallout from E3 2008 with this week’s edition of Nintendophiles! Capcom announce a Wii port of Dead Rising, and Lost Planet could be following suit, Sonic takes sword fighting lessons for a new Wii outing, Chrono Trigger DS keeps old fans happy, and Nintendo defend themselves against the backlash aimed at their somewhat controversial E3 keynote speech. Don’t miss all that and more inside!




The hustle and bustle of E3 has passed, so now is a good time to catch up on anything and everything you might have missed from the gaming industry over the past 7 days. Of course, Nintendo have been at the forefront of much of the post-E3 talk, and not necessarily for positive reasons, but we'll get to that a little later on. For now, let's concentrate on the fallout from E3; the major announcements from the showroom floor, the Nintendo news from after the event, and any info we can expect to hear in the coming weeks. Capcom kick off the proceedings this week with some tremendous news for those of us too poor to afford an Xbox 360 as well as a Wii...



Dead Rising comes alive on Wii
Credit: CVG, IGN

One of the big surprises coming out of this year's E3 was Capcom's announcement that they are porting Dead Rising from the Xbox 360 over to our beloved Wii. A few changes have had to be made along the way so as to cater to the new system's specifics, but this is still the awesome zombie mash-‘em-up that received critical acclaim in 2006. With the Wii not being an HD console, let's just hope those text issues (where you couldn't read on-screen text if you were playing on a standard-def TV) from the original version have been addressed!

For starters, with the Wii having less horse power than the 360, Dead Rising: Chop ‘Til You Drop (yikes, Capcom went for the cheese there!) won't be able to throw hundreds of the undead at you at any one particular time, but this has been compensated for by altering the way the zombies behave and react to you, as they'll now rapidly crowd around you as soon as you enter an area. This should in actual fact ramp up both the intensity and pace of the game and could therefore be beneficial overall. Despite the drop in numbers of the zombie population, the massive environments remain, so the game will still be incredibly close to the 360 version in terms of aesthetics.The photo-taking mode has had to be scrapped, meaning that the game will have an all-new camera system, the specifics of which have yet to be revealed.





As far as controls go, this is where Dead Rising Wii will excel, borrowing the control scheme from Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition. Using the remote's pointer, you can aim and fire one of your four stored ranged weapons (selectable on the d-pad), and then you'll be able to command various sub-weapons by pressing the A button, which take the form of different melee items such as golf clubs, frying pans and umbrellas. The title seems a lot more intuitive and accessible, where reloading is carried out with a fierce pull-back of the remote, and Wii-mote gestures such as a straightforward bludgeoning motion are supposedly included, giving Chop ‘Til You Drop unprecedented interactivity that simply wasn't possible for the 360 original. You'll even by able to physically shake off zombie attacks if they happen to latch onto you by shaking the Wii remote in order to break free.

Where Nintendo are content to concentrate on the casual gamer for the rest of 2008, Capcom have stepped up to provide core gamers with a mature and robust title that will keep us happy over the Christmas period, when the game sees a US launch. Hats off to Capcom for this surprising but oh-so-welcome move.




Is Lost Planet ALSO on the way to Nintendo's home console?
Credit: Cubed3

As if Dead Rising on the Wii wasn't enough, a recent Q&A session with Capcom's Christian Svensson on the official Capcom forums has thrown up the possibility that Lost Planet could be getting Wii port treatment in the near future. Check out Svensson's coy response to the following question:


Capcom Fan: "Hey Sven, just out of curiosity, how come you guys chose Dead Rising over Lost Planet for Wii? I'm just curious because it seems like LP would be the easier of the two games to port over, considering that it's an FPS. The number of zombies on screen in the 360 version of DR at once was pretty ridiculous. Factor in the load times and all the different moves, it just seems like translating all this content for the Wii will take a considerable amount of effort. Again, Lost Planet seems like it would have been the easier choice. Is there some kind of major discrepancy in the hardware requirements between the two games that lead to the choice? Also, was it your call or Capcom in Osaka's?

Christian Svensson of Capcom: Let's discuss this next week. I can't comment until then when a bit more will be clear *smiles*.


As always, we can never take this sort of thing as direct confirmation, but surely the notion of a Wii port of Lost Planet would be outright denied if there were no actual plans to do so? I'll most definitely be keeping an eye on this one, and hopefully we'll have an idea of exactly what Christian Svensson is referring to this time next week.




Chrono Trigger DS to satisfy new and old customers alike
Credit: Cubed3

It was during the weeks leading up to E3 that the revelation came about that Chrono Trigger was being resurrected from the grave and updated for the DS, causing RPG nuts to cast Rejoice +7. But between Final Fantasy XIII coming to Xbox 360 and the announcement of Wii MotionPlus, the DS overhaul was understandably somewhat overlooked at the LA games expo. As such, you may very well have missed out on the details that Square Enix revealed regarding Chrono Trigger DS, so let's take a look at everything we know so far about the conversion to Nintendo's handheld.

Hands-on previews with the game at E3 showed exactly how the title is controlled, and this seems like a prime place to start, especially considering that this was one of the areas Trigger fans were concerned about.


Select - Unused

Start - Pause

L/R shoulder buttons - Change menu pages, escape from battle (when held together)

Y - Change message window position

X - Opens main menu

A - Talk, examine, confirm

B - Dash (when used in conjunction with movement), Cancel

Touch screen - Character movement, Menu selection

D-pad - Character movement


As you can see, players are given the choice between standard button control and "Nu sKooL" touch screen implementation. By default, the action is spread across both screens, but if you're a ‘conservative' Chrono Trigger fan and liked things the way they were in the good ol' days, you can opt to play the game on one single screen, a la the way Game Boy Advance games are displayed. I'm not going to pretend that this is some revolutionary method of control, but it's refreshing to see Square Enix taking the approach of "hey, touch screen control isn't for everyone." Quite often, touch screen controls simply don't suit a game, and if that were the case with Chrono Trigger DS, it would in all honesty ruin what should be a classic RPG experience. Judging from E3 reports, the touch control works perfectly well, so we need not worry, but I nonetheless commend Square Enix for giving us the option.

Now all we need is to cast a good Hastaga spell so that the game's Winter 2008 release rolls around quickly!




Sonic gets his knighthood
Credit: Nintendo Power, Jump_Button





This is the screen that caused a minor outcry across the internet this past week. Sonic...with a sword??!!

As much as it may seem like an early April Fool's joke, SEGA have provided official confirmation that Sonic and the Black Knight (no, not Martin Lawrence) is a brand new Wii-exclusive adventure title, scheduled for some point in 2009. This time, Sonic isn't relying on his jumping ability; he's packing heat! From SEGA's press release:


Sonic returns to the Wii™ on a wild ride through a storybook world of Arthurian legend in his all-new adventure, Sonic and the Black Knight™. Designed exclusively for the Wii, Sonic and the Black Knight brings a new twist to Sonic gameplay by combining Sonic's legendary speed with frenetic swordplay action that makes full use of the unique Wii control system.

In this strange, enchanted medieval world, Sonic wields a sword in his effort to save the day. Encountering many friends and foes along the way, Sonic shows them what it takes to be a true hero and the ultimate knight. Master the sword and unravel the mystery behind this intriguing adventure…


Sonic's fantasy universe has always steered clear of real weaponry, save for Shadow the Hedgehog's gun-toting antics a couple of years ago, so it's a surprising move to see Sonic taking up steel to do combat against his enemies. The swordplay aspect will form the bulk of the gameplay, so let's hope it's sufficiently deep and varied and doesn't turn out like Dragon Quest Swords, where the swordplay became repetitive after about 35 seconds. I'll say right off the bat that I'm not particularly fond of this new direction for Sonic, but I'm willing to hold off judgment until I see the game in motion and find out exactly what constitutes the gameplay.




Iwata and Miyamoto explain Nintendo's ‘casual gaming' approach at E3
Credit: BBC, MSNBC

Lacklustre. Disappointing. Downright pitiful. I've seen each of these phrases used to describe Nintendo's E3 showing this year, and whilst I don't share that view, it can't be ignored that many fans were left feeling a little shortchanged after Nintendo's E3 keynote speech failed to deliver the big bang that they are usually so successful in providing. In response to the criticisms, head honcho Satoru Iwata and Nintendo mainstay Shigeru Miyamoto gave their reasoning behind the company's casual gamer-oriented E3 address.


Iwata-san: At this E3 we had to focus on software for the mass audience and software that will be sold in this year or next. This was one of the rare opportunities to reach out to mass audiences around the world.

In order for us to create a new Super Mario game or Legend of Zelda game that can cater to the strong demands of core gamers around the world it takes two to three years. We really want to keep surprising people. It's not easy at all.


Shigeru Miyamoto followed this by revealing that Nintendo no longer see E3 as the right stage for debuting ‘core' games:


Miyamoto-san: Our view of how we use E3 has changed. For a very long time, E3 was an event [that] - and certainly Nintendo included - catered specifically to the core gamer.

Now we look at it more... an opportunity for us to introduce new concepts and new types of play that we intend to bring to the broader audience, particularly because of the media that gathers at E3 now.

So while attending an E3 event like this, they might be given the impression that Nintendo is no longer focusing on the games that appeal to the core gamer, in fact we're still working on many of those titles, but it's just not the type of event where we'll be showcasing that anymore.


E3 is the one games event that does garner worldwide mainstream press, so in that respect I can totally understand Nintendo's approach. What does worry me is where Nintendo's platform for showing off these core games that weren't demoed at the Los Angeles Convention Center will be. Nintendo pulled out of this year's GDC in Leipzig, there's no sign of the Nintendo-only Space World convention being resurrected for September, the Tokyo Games Show doesn't appear to have any Nintendo involvement...so when exactly WILL we see games such as Pikmin 3 officially revealed?

Gamers shouldn't feel too hard done by, however. A new Zelda and Mario are very likely in development, but at an early stage; if they were officially announced/revealed now, they'd still be in development at next year's E3, and people would once again complain about the lack of surprises from Nintendo's keynote speech. Catch-22! In the mean time, Wii Sports Resort is a title all gamers can look forward to, and we've only got an 8-month wait, unlike the usual 2-3 year wait we are accustomed to when the Big N announce a new first-party title. See, Nintendo were just thinking about our sanity!




The 411 Games Crew

Mark Salmela's B3yond the Report takes an in-depth look at Sony's E3 titles. God of War 3, Resident Evil 5, Resistance 2...it's all inside!

The Select and Start News Report is presented by Vincent Chiucchi, with a different slant on the proceedings at E3, looking at what the third-party developers had to offer us.

The Post-E3 edition of The Full Circle: 360 News Report is brought to you by Joe Roche.

Jacob Lopez has a full report from Nintendo's behind-closed-doors E3 Developer Roundtable.

Drew Robbins (and not 'Collins' as I inexplicably attributed the column to last week, major apologies for that!) presents Coming Attractions with a look at all the upcoming releases for next week, as well as breakdown of all things E3.

Drew Robbins sticks with E3 for The 10th Hour, presenting the top 10 games of this year's show.

Rod Oracheski brings to you Achivement Unlocked.

Chris Evans talks to representatives from SI Games in this week's The PC Centric Extravaganza.

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