Posted on 12 years ago by Austin(@NE_Austin) in Features, General Nintendo | 0 comments

You can read today’s post of the day here.

Okay, so by now we’ve all heard the news that Miyamoto is not retiring, changing roles, or pretty much anything that the Wired interview said he was doing. I don’t know what got lost in translation there, but frankly it doesn’t really matter at this point! He’s here to stay… at least for a few years. But, I have a question for all of you: Let’s say Miyamoto did retire/step down/whatever. What would you look for in that situation? Let me go over a few possibilities…

In the case that he steps down, maybe he’d stop work on games like Mario and Zelda in lieu of Pikmin, and other smaller Nintendo franchises. If he did this, I’d really like to see him finish Pikmin 3 firstly, and then go in and really work hard on a new Star Fox game. I mean, seriously, when are we finally going to see another great entry into that fantastic (err… sort of fantastic) franchise? I grew up with it, and by golly, I want to keep growing up with it!

But let’s say he stops working on established franchises altogether, and instead goes for making new IPs with a smaller team. I don’t know about you guys, but what I’d want to see is him delving into some really deep and trippy emotional stuff, like he dabbled in with The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask. That game was so dense and layered and fantastic that I got lost in it within half a second, but it took me years- quite literally- to realize the full depth to which that game went in dealing with the emotional and psychological properties of mortality. It was a great game in its own right, but realizing those subtleties makes Miyamoto’s projects that much better.

Lastly, what if he left Nintendo altogether and just stopped making games? This one is the hardest to predict, but I’d really like to hear your guys’ thoughts on this! You can probably come up with more interesting scenarios than I can anyway…

Posted on 12 years ago by Austin(@NE_Austin) in 3DS, Features | 0 comments

(You can read today’s post of the day here.)

Well, despite being delayed once, the 3DS firmware update actually came a couple of days early than expected, giving us 3DS owners plenty of new content to chew on over the coming months. Currently mine is in the process of downloading, and it’s taking its sweet time to do so; I think I’ve had it running for nearly fifteen minutes! I suppose it’s fair, given the amount of content we’re getting, but golly, I didn’t expect to wait this long at all! The big question: What are we all most excited about?

Personally, I think it’s a tie between Find Mii 2 and the stop-motion video creator. I’ve always been a fan of artistic mediums, and I find stop motion to be one of the most entertaining ones to create and share, so the fact that I’ll be able to do it in 3D (albeit with a shoddy camera) is pretty neat. A close second would have to be Find Mii 2, which gives me yet another reason to keep my 3DS in my pocket at all times. Admittedly, I haven’t been even bothering to streetpass since I beat both minigames back in August, so I’m extremely excited to have it passing away again!

Which new features are you most excited for? Have you had the chance to try them out yet? Also, am I the only one who actually enjoys searching for puzzle pieces more than playing Find Mii?

Posted on 12 years ago by Austin(@NE_Austin) in 3DS, News | 0 comments

Whether this is related to the upcoming 3DS update or not, I’m not 100% certain, but it’s certain that as of right now the eShop is undergoing some form of maintainance, giving the standard “please try again later” message. It’s worth noting that Nintendo said the service would be temporarily halting around the time of the update to have it ready for all the new features, and the update is scheduled to hit “by December 8th”, so if this isn’t related I’d be pretty surprised.

The question is: Does this mean we may see the update his a day early? Or maybe even a few hours early?

Thanks to Franco for the news tip on our Facebook wall!

Posted on 12 years ago by Austin(@NE_Austin) in Features, General Nintendo | 1 Comment

Update: Voting is now over either which way. Zelda ended up coming out on top at the last second with 51% to 49%. Good job.

Sorry guys, I’m just making up the post of the day to talk about something sort of weird, but oddly intriguing. You see, I’ve fairly recently begun going on reddit, and through the thousands of upvotes and (now) failing college grades, I noticed that the wonderful folk on r/Zelda were rallying incredibly strongly for the prevalence of The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword in G4’s “2011 Gaming Deathmatch”. Basically the idea is that everyone will vote in head to head matches of video games, and the winners of each round will continue to move up until the final face off. Well, needless to say, G4 seems to have had it in for Skyward Sword since the beginning of the voting period.

In the first round they pitted Nintendo’s finely crafted adventure against Uncharted 3, and while no one thought it would ever beat such a monster of a PS3 game, r/Zelda rallied like crazy behind it (I heard the folks on ZeldaDungeon got behind it too) and they managed to take down Nathan Drake’s fantastically crafted action adventure title with a final tally of 53-47. Pretty cool, right? Well, in the second round it easily defeated NBA2KGeneric, but the third round had it fighting the critically acclaimed Arkham City. Another great game, another fight no one thought Skyward Sword could win, but once again it narrowly escaped defeat with a final score of 51-49. So why am I telling you this?

Well, now it’s up against the monstrously huge open world fantasy title, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, and while- once again- everyone thought it would lose horribly to such a big game, the current score stands at 51-49 in favor of Zelda. Don’t get excited, because it’s shifting back and forth more often than a tennis match, but the sheer fact that it’s essentially equal to such a fantastically made game is a testament to the strength of Nintendo’s fanbase. Now, I’m not tellin you this because I want you to go vote for Zelda and make “us” win or whatever. If you wanna go vote for Skyrim or forgo voting entirely, I don’t care at all. The thing is that on r/Zelda, people are going nuts over defeating Skyrim, and consequently the Skyrim community is going nuts over beating Skyward Sword. People are making multiple accounts on both sides I’m sure, there’s posts about this very battle across the internet, and in general fans of both games are freaking the hell out over beating their now-rival. It’s sort of silly to me, but I figured I’d bring the discussion to you.

How do you feel about these game-offs that people do? Do you think they’re accurate representations of what’s best? Would you ever vote in them?

Personally, I did vote for Zelda and I definitely hope it wins, but ultimately I don’t want to go overboard worrying about it. More than anything, I just want to “show” G4 for their blatant bias against Nintendo games. Also you can vote here if you want.

Posted on 12 years ago by Austin(@NE_Austin) in 3DS, Features | 0 comments

You can read today’s post of the day here.

Apologies for not doing a post of the day yet this week. Finals are coming up soon, Skyward Sword is just begging to be played, and I have about a thousand other things to do- but alas, I have a free moment this evening and I’m here to tell you all about something I legitimately consider pretty gosh darn important: The brilliance of Renegade Kid’s upcoming platformer, Maximillion and the Rise of the Mutant Mudds.

As some of you who were here during our E3 coverage know, I had the pleasure of spotting and talking to Jools Watsham outside on a bench near a giant tank. I’m not sure what the tank was actually for, but it didn’t really matter because as soon as he put the E3 demo of Maximillion and the Rise of the Mutant Mudds in my hands, I was completely enthralled and forgot about the hunk of metal completely.

The reason I chose this particular post for the PotD is simply because I want to make sure you all know how much I recommend getting the game when it releases this January. This isn’t Renegade Kid coming to me asking me to do a feature, it’s not me getting some secret swag for writing about the game, and it’s not like I’m getting paid to write about something specific. As is the case with everything I write, I’m actually just doing it because I want to tell you guys something I’m passionate about.

For those who aren’t aware, Mutant Mudds was first announced waaaaaay back when as a 3D platformer, but eventually went through various changes/deaths/rebirths until- as we see today- it became a beautiful and incredibly fun “12 bit” platformer that uses the strengths of the 3DS’ glasses-free thing to absolutely fantastic degrees. Honestly, it’s one of the most fun 3DS games I’ve ever been able to lay my hands on, and I’d venture to say that- perhaps in hindsight let’s say except for Skyward Sword– it’s the best game I played at E3. Man, it would be so easy for me to go into a thousand word article about the game’s strengths, but I really want to keep these PotD things short and easy to read, so ultimately just go check out videos and info yourself- I know we have a bunch of it on NintendoEverything. Essentially, if you have any interest in games like Mario and Rayman, please put this one on your list, because it’s looking to become the first great eShop exclusive. Period.

Posted on 12 years ago by Austin(@NE_Austin) in Features, GameCube, Wii | 0 comments

Posted on 13 years ago by Austin(@NE_Austin) in Features, Wii | 0 comments

Disclaimer: I will be putting spoilers past the breaks of these articles. These are for people who have played certain parts of the games to come discuss things with me, so don’t click if you haven’t played it yet!

So, it’s pretty safe to say that the majority of you are playing Skyward Sword right now, or if not, you will be playing it very shortly. Since I think we’re all really excited and just looking for a place to gush about how good (or bad, I guess) the game is, I figured I would start a collective playthrough/talk about the game that all of us can get in on and… uh… stuff. I’m not going to go for a really professional tone as I do with many articles; instead I’ll just be talking honestly and candidly, so forgive any weird statements. Here’s the deal:

The Low Down:
– No spoilers beyond the point of the game we’re discussing are allowed.
– Every time a new discussion is posted, it will deal with a new part of the game.
– If you are behind on the playthrough, let me know and we can slow it down to fit as many people’s needs as possible.
– This is sort of like a collective “review” of the game.

This week’s section is going to deal with all of the forest-y area. Hit the break to see exactly what that means.

Read More

Posted on 13 years ago by Austin(@NE_Austin) in Features | 0 comments

(View today’s PotD here)

Sorry about the late post, folks- I started playing Skyward Sword and… well… I couldn’t stop! Before I knew it, four hours had passed and I was scrambling to finish everything I needed to for the night. I’m guessing a few of you are having similar experiences with the game.

It’s no surprise that everyone who’s anyone has Skyward Sword on the brain, but what about Nintendo’s other system. You know, the little handheld one that does other stuff? Well, we got our first PotD-worthy piece of news about the 3DS this evening, and it has to do with that update we’ll be getting sometime this month which will unlock a few new pieces of tech on the device. My personal favorite? 3D video recording. If all goes well, this will also mean a higher framerate for the 3DS’ camera; lord knows we could use it.

The particular post is actually rumor that the update will hit on November 30th, and while that’s about as late as you could possibly get into the month, it’s also only nine days away. If we play enough Skyward Sword I’m sure we’ll make it there in no time. What I’m really curious about is whether or not our free GBA games will come with this update, or if we’ll be waiting longer for those. Anyone want to wager that we’ll have to wait until December for those nice gifts?

~Austin

Posted on 13 years ago by Austin(@NE_Austin) in Features, Wii | 0 comments

Disclaimer: I will be putting spoilers past the breaks of these articles. These are for people who have played certain parts of the games to come discuss things with me, so don’t click if you haven’t played it yet!

So, it’s pretty safe to say that the majority of you are playing Skyward Sword right now, or if not, you will be playing it very shortly. Since I think we’re all really excited and just looking for a place to gush about how good (or bad, I guess) the game is, I figured I would start a collective playthrough/talk about the game that all of us can get in on and… uh… stuff. I’m not going to go for a really professional tone as I do with many articles; instead I’ll just be talking honestly and candidly, so forgive any weird statements. Here’s the deal:

The Low Down:
– No spoilers beyond the point of the game we’re discussing are allowed.
– Every time a new discussion is posted, it will deal with a new part of the game.
– If you are behind on the playthrough, let me know and we can slow it down to fit as many people’s needs as possible.
– This is sort of like a collective “review” of the game.

This week’s section is going to deal with the first ~2 hours of the game. Hit the break to see exactly what that means.

Read More

Posted on 13 years ago by Austin(@NE_Austin) in Features, General Nintendo | 0 comments

A couple weeks ago we held a poll on Facebook asking all of you to vote on which Zelda songs you think are the best the series has to offer. In honor of Skyward Sword’s release tomorrow/Sunday/Friday/whatever, here are the results!

Note to self: Probably no more green screen usage. It just messes with the footage a lot and becomes terribly hard to edit. That, coupled with a few other issues means we’re far from perfect, but I’d say it’s a significant step up from last week! We hope you feel the same.