Just as a little editorial sidenote: It’ll be incredibly interesting to see how long Call of Duty can go being annualized before people get fatigued of it. It’s such a well-loved franchise!

Via Joystiq

It’s a bit late, bit EB Games Canada has finally opened pre-orders for The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD Limited Edition. Fans can pre-order the product online here. In-store reservations will begin on on September 10.

Amid speculation that Nintendo might be added to the Nikkei 225– a stock index that takes a big group of Japanese companies and assigns a monetary value to them as a whole– the company’s shares rose 31%. Today, we learned that they will not be added to the Nikkei 225, resulting in a sharp 8.4% drop in share price. This is the biggest single drop Nintendo has experienced in two years.

Via Polygon

The interviews with Eiji Aonuma continue to pour in. MTV Multiplayer has also just put up a piece with Aonuma covering Zelda: Wind Waker HD and plenty of other topics. Among the items discussed include keeping Wind Waker’s art style a secret from Miyamoto, origins of the cel-shaded visuals, concept design for GameCube Island, Tingle Tuner, and Link’s appearance in Super Smash Bros. Brawl.

You can find a number of interview excerpts below. For even more talk, check out MTV Multiplayer’s full piece.

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G4 was originally expected to be rebranded as the Esquire Network this year, but those plans have apparently been discarded. Instead, it will launch on the Style Network.

The initial plan was to scrap G4 and kick off the Esquire Network in late April. But that never happened, and G4 will still be kept around. The Hollywood Reporter writes that the channel will continue “for the foreseeable future, though it’s highly unlikely the company will invest in more original programming.”

Source

Drop, a new indie action game, has a shot of coming to Nintendo platforms. A Wii U version will be created if Kickstarter funds hit $220,000. A 3DS version is further away at $310,000.

Now, what about the actual goal? That comes in at $85,000 CAD. The campaign will have until October 9 to reach that target.

You can find details about Drop over at the Kickstarter page here.

Nintendo has previously spoken about making Zelda accessible. This is something that was discussed even prior to the reveal of Skyward Sword. And it’s something that Zelda producer Eiji Aonuma is striving for, though he’s not looking to lessen the experience.

Speaking with IGN, Aonuma said the following when asked if he’s trying to reintroduce any themes given how long the 3D Zeldas have been around:

“That’s a tough one. Well, for us, when we’re developing a new Zelda, we’re not necessarily focused on which target audience we’re aimed at. We definitely think about who the target audience is, but we’re not focused on a specific age range or specific gender. What we want is a wide audience, so that this game is open and accessible to as wide an audience as possible and everyone enjoys it.”

“I think there’s been a tendency lately to see games as more focused in on a specific audience or a specific age. We’re seeing that range of interest in a game become narrower as we feel like we’re forced to make a game that appeals to a certain group. If we don’t make it appeal to a teenager, then it’s not a game that they’re going to mark off on their calendar.”

“What I want to do going forward is to find that balance, where the game appeals to a wide audience, but is still true to what we’re trying to create. That’s the challenge for us, trying to find that balance. Going forward, I want to make Zelda accessible to a wide audience. It’s trying to find that direction and the vehicle through which we can accomplish that goal that’s the challenge we face every day in development.”

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Another interview with Eiji Aonuma has gone live. USGamer has spoken with the Zelda producer about Wind Waker HD, A Link Between Worlds, and a few general topics such as previous comments he made about capturing the feeling of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.

You can find a few excerpts below. There’s even more over at USGamer.

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