Here’s a Podcast – Episode 92!
Posted on 10 years ago by Austin(@NE_Austin) in Features, Podcast | 12 Comments
ON THIS EPISODE: We talk all about the games we played this week, including more Mario Kart from Austin (this week? Double Dash!), some Mario 3D World and WarioWare from Jack, and not too much from Laura! We also get into a brief discussion about how Nintendo is still a little behind in many regards when it comes to their online gaming feature-set, and what we’d like to see improve.
PLUS: Our mid-segement this week hits upon Nintendo’s fairly bare-bones release calendar for Wii U as well as the token discussion of this week’s Tomodachi Life controversy. We think it’s dumb to not have same-sex marriage in the game, but a few interesting points come up that actually go against the hubbub.
AND: Listener mail has us talking about our favorite game ever (well… not Laura’s!), as well as a bit of Smash Bros and Mario Kart discussion. Plus a few other things. And lots of mis-pronouncing of words and phrases. Oh boy.
This Week’s Podcast Crew: Austin, Jack, and Laura
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[Weekly Screenshot] Art of Balance Wii U #4 – Multiplayer Info
Posted on 10 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Screenshots, Weekly Screenshot, Wii U eShop | 1 Comment
Have you guys ever heard of Art of Balance on Wii U? I have, because for 3 weeks we’ve been showing off exclusive screenshots of the game, complete with discussion and inside-info from the game’s developer Shin’en! The feature returns with a look at something we haven’t seen before: The game’s newly added multiplayer modes. Manfred Linzer from Shin’en describes it best below, so check out what he has to say and enjoy the warm rays of sunlight in the above screenshot.
Hello there! Time for another screenshot from Art of Balance (AoB), our upcoming Wii U game. Today we will show you an image from one of the many multiplayer game modes.
Everyone loves playing against a friend via split-screen, and AoB allows you to play locally or online using split-screen. The best part: it’s not only one on one but you can play with up to five people locally or up to eight people online. The players get arranged into two teams that try to solve the puzzles in parallel.
Although the single-player mode is great fun, we had the biggest laughs and enjoyment when playing the game in split-screen mode with a few friends. You simply play for hours and hours…
More: Art of Balance, highlight, Shin'en, top
Here’s a Podcast – Episode 91!
Posted on 10 years ago by Austin(@NE_Austin) in Features, Podcast | 1 Comment
ON THIS EPISODE: You wanna hear about Nintendo games? We’ve got Nintendo games! Jack talks about Super Mario 3D World, Austin talks about Super Mario Bros. and Mario Golf, and Laura hits a home-run with her discussion of Rusty’s Real Deal Baseball and Elite Beat Agents!
PLUS: Our panel discussion segment has a lot of discussion about Mario Kart 8’s “new” Battle Mode, Nintendo’s E3 plans, and what Austin thinks is the coolest thing Nintendo has done in a while.
AND: We laugh way too much about some really stupid jokes towards the end.
This Week’s Podcast Crew: Austin, Jack, and Laura
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[Review] Batman: Arkham Origins Blackgate – Deluxe Edition (Wii U)
Posted on 10 years ago by Jack Johnson(@tupachologram96) in Features, Reviews, Wii U, Wii U eShop | 4 Comments
System: Wii U
Release Date: April 3rd, 2014
Developer: Armature Studios
Publisher: Warner Bros. Interactive
Author: Jack
Think prison life’s bad? Having been there twice already, let me tell you, it’s worse than what the movies and books would have you think. Imagine having to shape your masticatory and gastrovascular secretionary actions around predetermined intervals of time throughout the day, with no exceptions. Imagine a life devoid of privacy in being forced to share a toilet bowl in a confined space with a burly ex-construction worker named Red. Now, with that gruesome reality in mind, picture being in a prison taken over by three maniacal super-convicts bent on causing mayhem and destruction upon their escape. Seems like just enough to drive you over the deep end, right? Well, in Batman: Arkham Origins Blackgate — Deluxe Edition for Wii U, you, the player, as the eponymous Batman, find yourself in that very peculiar predicament.
[Weekly Screenshot] Art of Balance Wii U #3 – Perfect Imperfections
Posted on 10 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Screenshots, Weekly Screenshot, Wii U eShop | 3 Comments
As we’ve done for the last two weeks, today we have another exclusive screenshot of the upcoming Wii U eShop game Art of Balance from our friends at Shin’en. They’ll be showing off some genuinely neat stuff this time around, including some changes to the core user-interface and some of the small graphical touches that their known for putting in all of their games. Like before, the following quote comes from Mr. Manfred Linzer over at the developer, and you can look at the screenshot he’s talking about above:
Hi guys! Another week, another screen from our upcoming beautiful Wii U game called “Art of Balance”. This time I’ll show you a screen from the 2nd world.
When creating the Wii U version we thought about how we could make the game feel more ‘real’; a subtle but nice change was how to pick the shapes. On 3DS and Wii, the shapes were simply picked from a 2D HUD Layer and then projected into the 3D screen. On Wii U, we placed the shapes directly on the table, so you can select them with your GamePad or Wii Remote. This feels very natural and gives a more ‘solid world’ feeling.
Also we wanted the game to feel ‘gemuetlich’ as we say in German, so the levels should feel warm and inviting. Besides choosing the correct lighting and props, we figured out that it was important not to have that typical ‘clean’ computer rendering style, so we tried to give everything little imperfections. Just look at the table – all of the little scratches and variations in particular. This is used on every asset in the game. It’s very subtle, but gives that little extra touch we wanted.
More: Art of Balance, highlight, Manfred Linzer, Shin'en, top
Here’s a Podcast – Episode 90!
Posted on 10 years ago by Austin(@NE_Austin) in Features, Podcast | 1 Comment
ON THIS EPISODE: Some extensive talk about the Mario Kart series and why each entry isn’t just a copy-paste of the last permeates our first segment, plus some brief talk about Batman: Arkham Origins Blackgate Deluxe Edition and Mario Golf’s demo squeeze in later on.
PLUS: Listener mail is our last segment of the day, in which we discuss what Wii games are good for tiny baby kids, how we feel about Nintendo’s season pass for Mario Golf: World Tour (and their DLC in general), and why Skyward Sword gets so much hate.
This Week’s Podcast Crew: Austin, Jack, and Laura
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[Random Thoughts] Talking about a few of last week’s Nintendo-related announcements
Posted on 10 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, Features, Videos, Wii U | 0 comments
There were quite a few announcements last week, and a number of them were Nintendo-specific. I figured I’d take a few moments to recap some of the news in the latest “Random Thoughts” video. Although it’s not anything special, I hope you’ll enjoy it in any case!
[Weekly Screenshot] Art of Balance Wii U #2 – Marvelous Menu Screens
Posted on 10 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Screenshots, Weekly Screenshot, Wii U eShop | 4 Comments
Hey all, it’s Brian and Austin from Nintendo Everything here to re-welcome Manfred from Shin’en back with yet another screenshot from the upcoming Wii U release of Art of Balance! He’s got plenty to say about what graphical details they’re implementing for the menus in the game, so revel in the relaxing room where you select your levels and read up about how it came to be below! Unless you’d rather simply revel at the picture. That’s okay too.
Hi guys, it’s Manfred from Shin’en again with another fresh shot from Art of Balance Wii U. This time we’ll show you one of the the level selection screens.
When developing the original game on Wii, we realized that a simple 2D grid would be good enough for a level select menu, but that in itself was too boring. So we came up with the idea of stacked boxes in a lush 3D environment. We think coming back to the this beautiful menu gives players a nice break after solving a level. On Wii U, we had tons of performance to waste on this screen so we implemented quite a number of effects.
More: Art of Balance, highlight, Shin'en, top
Here’s a Podcast – Episode 89!
Posted on 10 years ago by Austin(@NE_Austin) in Features, Podcast | 2 Comments
ON THIS EPISODE: Video games are stupid, so we kick things off by discussing a book called “Earthbound” by Ken Baumann! Both Jack and Austin read it and found it enjoyable, if a little rough in spots. Laura runs through her thoughts on the well-loved Disney Magical World for 3DS, Jack brings in impressions of Batman: Arkham Origins Blackgate Deluxe Edition, and Austin says he thinks Conception II is pretty terrible!
PLUS: Our middle segment is taken up by a discussion of Tomodachi Life, including our thoughts, what we’re looking forward to, and what we’re a bit nervous about.
AND: Listener mail has us answering questions about what quirky JRPGs people should play and whether using restore points on Virtual Console games soils the experience.
This Week’s Podcast Crew: Austin, Jack, and Laura
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More: highlight, Tomodachi Life
[Developer Musings] ‘A Flawed Paradise’: Three devs weigh in on the good and bad of Nintendo’s eShops
Posted on 10 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS eShop, Developer Musings, Wii U eShop | 12 Comments
We’ve brought in three more developers for the next entry in our new feature series, “Developer Musings”. This week, we have a few words from Ripstone (Knytt Undergroud, Pure Chess), Image & Form (Steamworld series), and Two Tribes (Toki Tori 2, EDGE) as they share some thoughts about the eShops. Head past the break for their comments.
Unsure as to what Developer Musings is about? Check out our first entry here for an explanation.
