Best Buy has opened up pre-orders for Animal Crossing: amiibo Festival. To get a reservation in, head on over to the product page here.
Game Freak, developer of the Pokemon RPGs, has acquired Koa Games. The mobile studio created titles such as Labyrinth RPG, Erunea Kingdom, Legendary Legion and Road Roller.
Koa Games had been suffering from financial losses, which prompted the takeover from Game Freak. As for the actual studio, Koa will be disbanded and absorbed into Game Freak. The acquisition itself took place in August.
Telltale Games readied a new trailer for Minecraft: Story Mode’s second episode, known as “Assembly Required”. View it below.
In Europe, Comic Workshop 2 has received an update. The latest patch available is version 1.2.
Developer Collavier said on Miiverse that the update includes an auto-correction for curves. Additionally, several bug fixes have been implemented.
Collavier’s full Miiverse message reads:
Return to PopoloCrois: A Story of Seasons Fairytale will likely feature dual audio, according to XSEED localization specialist Thomas Lipschultz. Players should able to choose either English or Japanese voices in the game. The news should be made final once all of the official business has been finalized.
Actually, PopoloCrois will feature three options once the paperwork is all settled. Selecting the English track is possible, but there are also two Japanese language versions that feature different actors for Pietro and Narcia.
As explained by Lipschultz:
“Currently we’re shooting for dual audio. It’s in the game already, but we don’t have all the final signatures and paperwork in yet, so we can’t officially say yes — but it’s 90% right now. I’ve been joking that it’s actually “trual” audio, since there are actually two Japanese language tracks. They’re exactly the same for most characters, but for Pietro and Narcia, they recorded two separate tracks, with two actors for each character. They went with a more classic-styled, 90’s era track for one of them, and a modern anime moé style for the other. So you get to pick which type of Japanese voice you’d prefer: something a little more in line with the classic feel of the game, or something a little more modern – or you get to choose English! Assuming we have the Japanese options in, of course, which it’s looking like we will.”
Lipschultz also commented on the English track:
“The English track is based off of the more classic style, and I think it turned out great. We can’t reveal the actors’ names or anything, but there’s a character who joins your party, the Blue Wolf, and we actually got a pretty big-name actress to bark and growl and howl for the part! It was just a fantastic process in general, and a lot of fun, and I think the voices turned out great – I’m really looking forward to hearing what people think of them when they hear them in context.”
Liam Robertson dug deep into the development and troubles surrounding Project H.A.M.M.E.R. earlier this year.Today, Robertson published a new report that sheds even more light on the cancelled Wii game.
Here are a few highlights:
– Shigeru Miyamoto wasn’t happy that NST spent over $1 million on lavish CGI sequences which were ordered the game design was concrete and before the game’s reveal in 2006
– Mario vs. Donkey Kong 2: March of the Minis also featured cut-scenes from Silver Ant for a high sum of money
– This all caused the person in charge of budgetary concerns on both H.A.M.M.E.R. and Mario vs Donkey Kong 2 getting a slapped wrist from Miyamoto
– Miyamoto branded the investment in CGI “superfluous”
– This ended NST’s relationship with Silver Ant
– Katsuhiko Kanno was the person in charge at the game’s inception
– Kanno was apparently “difficult to work with”, “rude” and “uncooperative”
– Around this time, is is thought that a large number of NST staff left the company under their own volition
– Staff count at NST dropped from 50 to about half of that
– To steady the ship staff were moved onto the project from elsewhere in Nintendo’s North American network
– Metroid Prime level designer Jason Behr was brought on to bring things back on course
– Behr found himself singled out as a scapegoat for the game’s shortcomings
– Behr stayed on until around 2008, and would leave NST to join Monolith Productions
– Senior staff at NST finally spotted the friction between Kanno and his team
– He was removed from the project in 2007 and replaced by Masamichi Abe (Pikmin 1 and 2 director)
– Metroid Prime producer Kensuke Tanabe joined in a supervisory role towards the end of the project
– He didn’t have much of an impact, and only visited NST’s offices a handful of times
– Project H.A.M.M.E.R. would be re-tooled as Wii Crush, a casual title aimed at the Wii Sports audience
– Would have supported MotionPlus
– Project cancelled entirely in 2009
You can see the latest report on Project H.A.M.M.E.R. in its entirety below.
The Pixel Mario New 3DS cover plates, which were announced for Japan last week, are now confirmed for Europe as well. They’ll be releasing across the region on November 27.
Here’s the news straight from Nintendo’s European Twitter account:
These awesome Pixel Mario cover plates for your #New3DS arrive in stores on 27/11 pic.twitter.com/02IVJIFFCD
— Nintendo of Europe (@NintendoEurope) October 27, 2015
Another round of footage has come in for the Quiz Show mode in Animal Crossing: amiibo Festival. Check it out below.
Nintendo has announced a sizable update for Super Mario Maker. This will be made available starting on November 4.
Once the update has been applied, mid-level checkpoints can be used. These flags let players start at the selected point if they lose a life instead of having to start again at the beginning of a level. Existing levels that are edited and re-uploaded can be made with checkpoints as well as entirely brand new ones.
Also coming next week is the addition of Event Courses in the Course World online hub, which feature levels from partner creators outside Nintendo. One of these will be the “Ship Love” from Facebook’s “hackathon” event. You’ll also find a new Official Makers section in Course World that contain specially selected courses, including some created by Nintendo.
Finally, the patch introduces a more challenging version of Gnat Attack and allows players to insert power-ups dependent on Mario’s status. For the latter, by attaching a Super Mushroom to a Fire Flower and placing it inside a block, Mario will receive the Super Mushroom when he is small, and the Fire Flower when he is large.
View a trailer for the update below. You can also find today’s full announcement after the break.
Corecell Technology is developing AeternoBlade II for 3DS and PlayStation Vita, the company announced today. We’ll be seeing it on the eShop “around the end of Q2 2016.”
New to AeternoBlade II is the inclusion of a time manipulation mechanic and more action features. The game will still maintain the “Metroidvania-style” features of the original, including exploration, solving time puzzles, and collecting relics.
AeternoBlade II will star Freyja and Bernard. Here’s an overview of each:
Freyja
After creating a new paradox, her life has changed for the better. But in response to a universal time effect, Freyja has to pick up the AeternoBlade again.
Bernard
A young knight who specializes in heavy weaponry. He isn’t very talkative, but has a kind heart.
