Major Minor’s Majestic March designer critical of Nintendo during early Wii development
Posted on 11 months ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Wii | 0 comments
You may recall a bit of a niche music game that released on Wii titled Major Minor’s Majestic March. Masaya Matsuura, who worked on games like Vib-Ribbon and PaRappa the Rapper, was one of the main designers involved with the project.
Matsuura reflected on Major Minor’s Majestic March in a recent issue of EDGE and had some criticisms for Nintendo. He said that the company didn’t do a good job at explaining the Wii Remote’s functionality and said “there was a lack of transparency that hurt developers like us.” Along with “adding new and subtle features” Nintendo was also “amending the design as time went on, which changed the scope for us.”
Epic Mickey director says “gamers didn’t get it”, but “proud” of the title
Posted on 1 year ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Wii, Wii U | 0 comments
Warren Spector acted as director on Epic Mickey – as well as its sequel. As a huge Disney fan, it was a big passion project for him.
Spector reflected on Epic Mickey and its initial reception while speaking with Venturebeat. As someone who worked on immersive sims before like Deus Ex, this was a big change in terms of what fans came to know him for. Specter said “gamers didn’t get it”, but he’s still “proud of Epic Mickey”.
More: Epic Mickey, interview, Warren Spector
Hideki Kamiya again mentions interest in working with Viewtiful Joe, Okami
Posted on 1 year ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in GameCube, News, Switch, Wii | 0 comments
Hideki Kamiya has again expressed interest in working on Viewtiful Joe as well as Okami. Kamiya – who recently left PlatinumGames and was director on both projects – made a few brief remarks about both IPs in a new video published on his YouTube channel today.
As for Viewtiful Joe, Kamiya said that he “actually had the story for a third Viewtiful Joe all thought out.” He also feels that he left Okami “unfinished”.
More: Capcom, Okami, top, Viewtiful Joe
Retro Studios made Portal-esque Wii pitch “Adept”, details on scrapped “The Blob Game” for DS
Posted on 1 year ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in DS, GameCube, News, Wii | 0 comments
Thanks to Did You Know Gaming, we have insight into a couple of short-lived Retro Studios projects – specifically Adept and “The Blob Game”.
Adept was playable in a rough state, but was ultimately just a pitch that Nintendo turned out. It was running in the Metroid Prime 3 engine and was intended to show off mechanics. In late 2007 and into early 2008, Retro was working on Adept that took inspiration from Portal while evolving on the premise – primarily by introducing combat.
More: Retro Studios, top
Switch surpasses lifetime Wii sales in the US
Posted on 1 year ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Switch, Wii | 0 comments
Lifetime Switch sales have now surpassed those of the Wii in the United States. That’s according to the latest data from Circana, with the milestone having been reached in July.
According to GamesIndustry, “Switch lifetime sales now trail Xbox 360 by less than one million units, and PlayStation 2 by fewer than five million.” Nintendo’s console should certainly be over 40 million units sold in the United States at this point.
Dolphin team pulls the plug on plans for Steam release
Posted on 1 year ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in GameCube, News, Wii | 0 comments
The team behind the Dolphin emulator has cancelled plans for release on Steam following the initial announcement in March.
A lengthy post was made on the software’s website today. It was explained that, ultimately, “given Nintendo’s long-held stance on emulation, we find Valve’s requirement for us to get approval from Nintendo for a Steam release to be impossible.” Also reconfirmed is that Nintendo never actually sent a DMCA takedown notice, but Valve’s legal department reached out to Nintendo, and a lawyer for the Big N requested Valve prevent the Steam release.
Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse director on how the game originally came to be made with Nintendo
Posted on 1 year ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Switch, Wii | 0 comments
Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse recently went multiplatform as part of its re-release in March, but some might not know that it was originally published by Nintendo. The game originally came out for Wii in 2008 – though only in Japan.
Makoto Shibata, one of the original directors on Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse, recently reflected on Nintendo’s involvement in an interview with Japanese magazine Famitsu. It turns out that the company reached out directly to Shibata. After creating a proposal, it was accepted.
[Let’s Talk] Ranking the Xenoblade Chronicles games
Posted on 1 year ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Let's Talk, New Nintendo 3DS, Switch, Wii, Wii U | 0 comments
With the Future Redeemed DLC for Xenoblade Chronicles 3 coming out several weeks ago, the main series’ original story has now truly wrapped up. We won’t get into any spoilers, but the first game set certain events in motion that has ties to the other entries. This has all been a big journey for the fans, especially for those that started out with the initial Wii release over a decade ago.
Now that the series has wrapped up for now – but count on more Xenoblade games in the future – we want to hear from you as far as how you’d rank the different games. Which is your favorite? What are your thoughts on the story DLC expansions? We also don’t want to leave Xenoblade Chronicles X fans out of the mix, so feel free to share your thoughts on that RPG as well if you played it.
Valve reached out to Nintendo first before Dolphin emulator was removed from Steam
Posted on 1 year ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in GameCube, General Nintendo, News, Wii | 0 comments
Much discussion has taken place after Valve took down the Dolphin emulator listing last week on Steam. However, new information has come to light revealing that the move was technically spurred on by Valve initially.
Rather than Nintendo filing a DMCA, the GameCube and Wii emulator was removed after Valve brought it to Nintendo’s attention. The Verge obtained emails showing how the Big N’s lawyers especially took issue with the use of cryptographic keys.
The email reads:
More: top
Nintendo was thinking about porting Smash Bros. Melee to Wii before Brawl happened
Posted on 1 year ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Wii | 0 comments
Had things gone in a different direction and Super Smash Bros. Brawl never came to be, Super Smash Bros. Melee could have been ported to Wii instead.
It’s well documented at this point that series director Masahiro Sakurai didn’t initially know that Nintendo planned to make a Smash Bros. game for that console. The news was shared during a pre-E3 press conference in 2005, and president Satoru Iwata announced to the world that a new entry would be released for its upcoming system with online play. Iwata and Sakurai met shortly after, and Sakurai ended up agreeing to make a Smash Bros. game for Wii. But something else Nintendo was considering was a straight port of Melee – we could have seen this if Sakurai “turned the work down”.
