New item available on Club Nintendo UK
Posted on 13 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, News | 0 comments
It’s kind of funny to see how much the prices in North America and Europe differ. On the NA site, this reward would probably cost around 600 coins. In the UK, though, it’s 2,500! One thing to consider is that European members most likely receive more stars for registering games. Or they’re somehow able to secure more points.
Nintendo Week (6/27)
Posted on 13 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, General Nintendo, Videos, Wii | 0 comments
On this week’s episode: The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D Launch Event, friend code talk, Mystery Case Files: The Malgrave Incident and Inchworm Animation.
Just a few days left to reach Gold/Platinum status on Club Nintendo
Posted on 13 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, News | 0 comments
If you want a fancy Club Nintendo prize, you’ll have to take action quick. Members are required to have reached at least 300 coins within the last year for a “Gold” reward whereas the “Platinum” reward requires 600 coins. Please note that there’s just a few days left to accomplish this. The cutoff for gold/platinum eligibility ends on June 30.
Nintendo “expend a lot of time” on matching up Zelda stories… and is Yoshi male or female?
Posted on 13 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, General Nintendo, News | 0 comments
The Zelda timeline is quite a touchy subject for fans of the series. Nintendo has never provided an official sequence of events, causing a significant amount of discussion and debate among franchise followers. Be rest assured though that the developers of each Zelda title put a lot of effort into the stories so that they can match up. Shigeru Miyamoto discussed that topic and more – including Yoshi’s gender – in the latest Iwata Asks.
Iwata: When you make a Zelda game, how do you think about the story?
Miyamoto: The stories in The Legend of Zelda may not match up as the series progresses. We actually expend a lot of time trying to make them match up, though. It would make things a lot easier if the players said, “Oh, that doesn’t really matter.” (laughs)
Iwata: (laughs) You would rather spend your energy making game elements rather than the story.
Miyamoto: That’s right. Sometimes people ask whether Yoshi is a boy or a girl. If I answer, “Probably a boy,” then they say, “So a boy is laying eggs?” (laughs)
Miyamoto’s alternate idea for Epona’s ranch escape, why he wanted a horse in Ocarina of Time, more
Posted on 13 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, General Nintendo, News | 0 comments
This information comes from the latest Iwata Asks…
Iwata: I heard from Osawa-san that you put a lot of effort into the cut scene when the horse jumps over the fence at Lon Lon Ranch.
Miyamoto: Well, rather than putting in lots of effort, I’d say we were pushing the new hardware, the Nintendo 64 system, as far as it would go. I wanted to make it look a little cool without looking strange. If you can leave the ranch wherever you want, rough parts of the ranch may stand out, so we thought of forcing in a special event.
Iwata: You forced that in? (laughs)
Miyamoto: Yes. You know that guy Ingo who’s at the ranch?
Iwata: Yes. He doesn’t have a very nice personality and looks a bit like Luigi. (laughs)
Miyamoto explains why he was determined to include Young Link in Ocarina of Time
Posted on 13 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, General Nintendo, News | 0 comments
This information comes from the latest Iwata Asks…
Iwata: Also, you were the one who really wanted to show Young Link, right?
Miyamoto: Yes. The work was really piling up, but I said I wanted to show Young Link. I think that caused the other developers a bit of a trouble. (laughs)
Iwata: Yes, it seems that it did! (laughs)
Miyamoto: But when I saw Adult Link that Koizumi-san had made, it was cool, but I said, “I don’t want to make this without Young Link!” Then we tested whether we could use both Adult and Young Link.
Iwata: Koizumi-san tinkered with the system and you were able to use Adult Link’s motions for Young Link as well.
Miyamoto: Right. Thanks to that, we could also have Young Link.
Iwata: Why were you so persistent on Young Link?
How an American TV show influenced Ocarina of Time
Posted on 13 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, General Nintendo, News | 0 comments
Have you ever heard of Twin Peaks? It was a show that aired in America in 1990 and ended after a second season in 1991. Now… why the heck am I talking about this? Well, according to Shigeru Miyamoto, it influenced the way he handled characters in Zelda: Ocarina of Time.
Miyamoto: But while making it, I noticed that I didn’t want to tell a story so much as I wanted to have a lot of people appear around the main character and portray their relationships. Some years back, a television show called Twin Peaks was popular. When I saw that, the most interesting thing wasn’t the ins and outs of the story, but what kinds of characters appeared.
Iwata: Oh, (Takashi) Tezuka-san said the same thing in our session of “Iwata Asks” over The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks.
Miyamoto: Oh, he did?
Iwata: Tezuka-san told the staff of The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening that he wanted them to have a bunch of suspicious characters appear like in Twin Peaks.
Zelda: Ocarina of Time originally had Ganon’s Castle as the only area in the game
Posted on 13 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, General Nintendo, News | 0 comments
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time is partially known for its expansive lands and Hyrule Field’s wide-open area. Early on in development, however, none of that existed.
Shigeru Miyamoto revealed in the latest Iwata Asks that, initially, he was thinking of only including Ganon’s Castle as the setting in the game. Miyamoto compared the idea to Super Mario 64, in which separate adventures would be made available in different rooms. Ganon’s Castle would have acted like a hub, just like Peach’s Castle in Super Mario 64.
Miyamoto: Right. So I would have “A” stay there all the time and the other data switch in and out. If you only change what you have to, the memory is more efficient and the data reads more quickly. In other words, you make good use of the characteristics of the ROM.
We put constructing the system first, and since we were going to determine the story in line with the system’s capacity, at first I thought only having Ganon’s Castle might be enough.
Iwata: Huh? At first you imagined Ganon’s Castle as the only setting?
Activision registers numerous GoldenEye 007 domains
Posted on 13 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, News | 0 comments
Twitter user supererogatory has discovered a slew of domains picked up by Activision. Registered websites include goldeneyereloadedgame.com, goldeneye007gamereloaded.com, goldeneyereloaded007.com, and goldeneye007reloaded.com.
GoldenEye 007 saw a revival on Wii last year and was met with both critical and financial success. However, that doesn’t guarantee that a new entry in the franchise will necessary appear on a Nintendo platform. Activision is definitely bringing a new GoldenEye 007 to market though, as indicated in their 2011 product lineup.
Kojima despises MGS NES, doesn’t mind Snake’s Revenge, led to future MGS games
Posted on 13 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, News | 1 Comment
Hideo Kojima recently received a great deal of attention for some remarks he made to Nintendo Power. The Metal Gear creator expressed some significant disdain for the NES version of Metal Gear. Kojima told the magazine:
“I had absolutely no participation in the development of the NES version. The NES version was a pitiful title developed cheaply and simply by a small team in Tokyo. That was during the bubble economy where anything and everything that was released would sell. I came across the game in a bargain bin and tried playing it, but the game design is pretty bad. There is some new gameplay that includes infiltrating a base that didn’t exist in the original. However, even I, the developer of the original game, was unable to infiltrate the base even once. Furthermore, being ‘Metal Gear,’ it goes without saying that Metal Gear should make an appearance at the end. However, from what I’ve heard, due to technical difficulties in displaying the spirte on the screen, they swapped Metal Gear out for a gigantic monitor. That made me see that those who created the game had no sliver of appreciation for the players. However, even though it was an abomination, it was during the bubble economy and it sold millions overseas. That title has only soiled my reputation.”
Of course, this news post wouldn’t be complete without some commentary from Kojima regarding Snake’s Revenge on the NES. Interestingly, Kojima told Nintendo Power that if the game was never developed, then Metal Gear 2 on the MSX2 and MGS for PlayStation would never have been been created.
“I wasn’t involved with Snake’s Revenge for the NES either. However, this was created by the Kobe development team and wasn’t what I would consider a ‘bad game.’ Actually, one of my juniors was working on the NES Snake’s Revenge and he said to me, ‘We’re making a sequel to Metal Gear, but what I really want is a true sequel made by you, Kojima-san.’ It’s because of that request that I ended up creating Metal Gear 2 on the MSX2. If Snake’s Revenge for the NES had never existed then there would not have been an MG2 and there would never have been an MGS for the PS1.”