Tag Archives: nintendo press conf october 08

Speaking to VentureBeat at the US Nintendo Media Summit last week, NoA boss Reggie Fils-Aime slapped down talk of Wii Music being an simple game, saying it’s difficult to master and the title’s E3 debut made it look too easy.

“What’s powerful in Wii Music is this juxtaposition of something that looks so simple but is wonderfully difficult to master,” he said.

“We may have done that title an injustice at E3 by showing something that looked so easy. We made it appear too simple.

“Now we’re showing the tremendous variety of instruments and tones and how challenging it is to make music that sounds good.”

The exec added that the game is expected to be in the company’s upper bracket for sales, presumably along the lines of Wii Fit.

“We don’t publicly talk about sales targets but our expectation is it will be one of our top sellers,” he said.

Lots more through there.

GoNintendo’s just published a ton of play-tests and eyes-on impressions from last weeks US Nintendo Media Summit in San Francisco, and such ultimate dedication deserves page impressions: so give them. There’s got to be something you’re interested in here:

• Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia – impressions
• Tecmo Bowl: Kickoff – impressions
• Pokémon Ranger: Shadows of Almia – impressions
• Rhythm Heaven – impressions
• Personal Trainer: Cooking – impressions
• MadWorld – eyes-on impressions
• Boingz – impressions
• Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon – impressions
• Tetris Party – impressions
• Wii Music – impressions
• Call of Duty: World at War – impressions
• Animal Crossing: City Folk – impressions
• The Conduit – impressions
• Rayman Raving Rabbids: TV Party – impressions
• Strong Bad Ep. 3 – eyes-on impressions
• Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop – impressions
• World of Goo – impressions
• Cave Story – impressions

Epic. All written by one man. Dude with tireless typing fingers: we salute you.

Nintendo held a second US press conference today, at which is showed a Tetris game and something called Boingz.

Joystiq live-blogged it, for what it’s worth. See screenshots of two WiiWare games through the link.

We knew they were coming, but Nintendo’s confirmed this morning the actual line-up of GameCube remakes you can expect to be playing on your Wii next year.

The firm’s told Eurogamer that Pikmin 1 and 2, Metroid Prime 1 and 2 and Mario Tennis will all be released in Europe in 2009.

Chibi Robo and Donkey Kong: Jungle Beat, are both are currently TBC for Europe.

More through the link.

According to this Bloomberg report, Nintendo investors clearly weren’t impressed with the firm’s DSi announcement yesterday, with the company’s shares falling 3.7 percent in the aftermath.

The stock rested at 39,500 yen on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. The stock, which more than doubled in each of the past two years, has lost 41 percent in 2008, while Sony shares dropped 51 percent.

“Nintendo’s announcement on the DS didn’t exceed investors’ expectations,” said Yoku Ihara, head of equity research at Retela Crea Securities Co.

“The stock market was so bearish that the news didn’t help the shares gain.”

More through the link.

On Gamespot. There’s a picture of a cartoon horse standing in front of a sign that says “happy” there, which should give you some idea of what to expect.

Take a look.

After the break. The newly announced sequel looks beautiful, if dyed-in-the-wool in terms of sticking to the formula from previous games.

See for yourself. It’s out next year.

More »

After the break. It does look fun, no question, and the video’s in a good resolution so you can properly see what’s going on.

Game’s out next year.

More »

IGN’s posted up nine new videos of Wii FPS the Conduit, presumably grabbed from a box at yesterday’s Nintendo press event in California. Looks relatively pretty. See for yourself.

Nintendo of America boss Reggie Fils-Aime has confirmed that when he said yesterday that US consumers are going to have to wait “well into 2009″ for the launch of DSi, what he actually meant was that the machine was launching in the fiscal financial year.

“The critical decision for those consumers is how long to wait, because we haven’t announced a launch date, and we won’t announce one here today,” he told G4 in responsde to a question about killing the existing DS market with an early announcement of the console.

“Really, for us, it’s going to be in our next fiscal: so that’s after April. That’s a long time to wait for a consumer who will be bypassing great titles like Chrono Trigger and the new Pokemon title. We think, actually, that most consumers are going to opt to jump into DS now, enjoy all of the great games, and then at some future point upgrade to the DSi.”

There’s loads more through the link. Must-watch.

From NintendoEverything. This is all the stuff that got announced yesterday in Nintendo’s US press conference, both for DS and Wii. Going to be grey imports a-go-go for DSi, from the look of it.

• Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia (DS) – October 21
• Pokemon Ranger: Shadows of Alma (DS) – November 10
• Animal Crossing: City Folk (Wii) – November 16
• Wii Speak Channel – November 16
• Personal Trainer: Cooking (DS) – November 24
• Tecmo Bowl (DS) – November 2008
• Age of Empires: Mythologies (DS) – November 2008
• The Conduit (Wii) – Q1 2009
• Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop (Wii) – Winter 2009
• MadWorld (Wii) – March 2009
• Punch-Out!! (Wii) – First half ‘09
• Rhythm Heaven (DS) – First half ‘09
• Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon (DS) – First half ‘09
• Mario & Luigi RPG 3 (DS) – 2009
• Sin and Punishment 2 (Wii) – 2009
• DSi – “Well into 2009″

According to this Kombo story, Nintendo’s confirmed that Animal Crossing: Let’s Go to the City – the more sensibly named Animal Crossing: City Folk in the US – will support a USB keyboard.

There’s going to be lots of typing involved in Tom Nook’s new, plat du jour, clearly. There is literally nothing else we can say about this. So we won’t.

Why not? DS Fanboy’s posted what looks to be all the DS screens from this morning’s Nintendo press conference in SF. Nothing could be better than this. Nothing. Hit the link and see.

Nintendo’s posted its entire Tokyo presentation from this morning on its site, lovingly translated into English.

There are some amazing graphs through there. Best in the industry. There’s also this gem of a quote from Big Boy Iwata:

Portable game machines are designed to be enjoyed regardless of time and where you are. The ultimate sales goal is not “one device per household” but “one for each person.”

You tell ‘em. Take a look.

Speaking to GI, Team 17 head Martyn Brown’s welcomed the ability to slot and SD card into the newly announced DSi, but has warned the feature may bring more widespread piracy to the platform.

“Adding an SD slot makes a bunch of sense for downloadable content given the way things are going,” he said.

“I just hope they’ve done something to counter the mass piracy that exists via the R4 on the Lite. It scares me that with an SD card input, that might leave it even wider open that it was on the original device.

More through the link.

Two new DS titles, Rhythm Heaven and Mario & Luigi 3, were given the pinpoint accurate release date of “2009″ in this morning’s US Nintendo press conference, as reported by DSF.

We’d like to say there are more details through the link, but there aren’t. There are, however, screenshots. So take a look.

According to this DS Fanboy story, Nintendo dated Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon for the first six months of next year in the US at its Californian press conference this morning.

This is apparently very exciting. The RPG, from the makers of Advance Wars, comes replete with online functions and voice chat. Greek to us. Read more through the link.

On CVG. Looks well hardcore. Put porn to shame, it would. Out next year. Take a look.

On IGN. It’s Punch-Out!! on Wii, and looks exactly as you’d expect. No bad thing. Take a look.

Cammie Dunaway apparently called High Voltage FPS The Conduit a first-party game in the Nintendo of America press conference this morning, sparking a flurry of rumour about whether or not Nintendo’s to publish the game.

Basically: it isn’t. Joystiq’s been emailed by the developer to say so. Glad that’s cleared up.