Who’s developing the peculiar rhythm-based Final Fantasy game for 3DS? UTV Ignition’s Shane Bettenhausen has reason to believe that the mystery studio is none other than Jupiter.
Some of Jupiter’s previous work includes Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories and Spectrobes. Jupiter also made The World Ends with You for DS, which is one of the most critically acclaimed titles for the DS.
I’m not sure what Bettenhausen’s source is, though in this case I have a feeling he’s right. Jupiter has been involved with Nintendo handhelds since the Game Boy and hasn’t made any recent titles. It’d make sense for Theatrhythm Final Fantasy to fit within their development schedule.
3DS Virtual Console
Fortified Zone
Qix
DSiWare (also available on Nintendo eShop for 3DS)
Jewel Keepers: Easter Island
Roller Angels
Farm Frenzy
Make Up & Style
WiiWare
Just JAM
Apologies for the small screenshots. For some reason, Nintendo has decided to make them incredibly small.
3D Classics: Urban Champion – 600 yen
Adventure Island II – 400 yen
Thanks to Jake for the tip!
Vigil Games general manager David Adams and technical director Colin Bonstead have provided some commentary about Wii U for Game Informer in an eight minute interview. Unfortunately, I don’t believe the video can be embedded, so you’ll just have to watch the interview for yourself here. However, I’ve transcribed some of the important bits from the video for those who aren’t interested in viewing it…
– David Adams has always loved Nintendo platforms
– Excited to be involved with a new console and launch
– Was also a challenge since the corporate office asked if they could pull it off in time for E3
– Took about a week to get their base libraries up and running on the console without graphics
– Another week and a half to get graphics to a point where you could seen something on the screen and play the game (basically rainbow colors)
– Then worked on getting the features and graphical features in
– Took about 5 weeks in total from when they found out about it
Vigil Games has been very pleased with Wii U so far. David Adams, general manager of Vigil, told Game Informer that Nintendo has been supportive towards the studio by providing early access to kits and the company’s development site quickly. Adams believes that Nintendo is dedicated to assisting third-parties by providing them with knowledge to get their content running on the console.
Vigil was able to create a running build of Darksiders II on the console in the span of just five weeks. What’s impressive is that only three developers were working on most of the project. Although it took some time to learn the system’s quirks, Adams said that it became easier to work with the platform as the team gained more experience.
Adams also seems to think that developing for Wii U is easier than what he encountered on the PlayStation 3 and is roughly similar to Xbox 360. He told Game Informer:
“…You can tell the way the software is organized, the way the APRs are writen, that very shortly, it will become a pretty easy platform to develop for. Personally, I don’t really get into the what’s easier and that, but definitely from a pure programmer point of view, it’s definitely a lot easier than say the PS3 was. It’s probably on par with like the 360 as far as just ease of APIs, simplicity of how you interact with the hardware, and that sort of thing.”
