Ubisoft initially toyed around with making Mario + Rabbids a musical game or a first-person shooter
Posted on 7 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Switch | 9 Comments
Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle is not your typical game. It makes sense then that during early development, Ubisoft considered a few different genres for the title.
Creative director Davide Soliani told Glixel that Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle was initially considered as a musical, or even a first-person shooter. He said:
“We started to scratch them out, one after the other. We went through a musical game, a first-person shooter game; but really the team is composed of mainly tactical fans.”
Soliani had also mentioned that, early on, a group of five people came up with 13 ideas. Most of these are a mystery.
Ubisoft was surprised by ease of Switch development while making Mario + Rabbids, no issues with Snowdrop engine
Posted on 7 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Switch | 158 Comments
It’s been a busy day for Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle interviews, and another one has surfaced from ntower. The site spoke with Andrea Babich, lead narrative designer at Ubisoft Milan.
Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle will be the first Switch game to make use of Ubisoft’s Snowdrop engine. Despite that, there were no issues along the way.
When asked if the team encountered any problems while developing for Switch, Babich noted:
“Actually we were really surprised about how easy the development for this system is. I don’t want to sound like a Ubisoft or Nintendo fan, but when we got the Dev-Kit and put the Snowdrop-Engine onto the Switch, these two perfectly fit together. The Snowdrop-Engine, which is our engine for almost everything and which we used for the last South Park game is so versatile that we quickly lost our worries about the development.”
Ubisoft scrapped a “Fumble” mechanic from Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle
Posted on 7 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Switch | 5 Comments
Not every idea developers come up with makes it into the final game. With Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle, this was the case as well.
One mechanic Ubisoft scrapped early on was “Fumble”. This would have players missing attacks. Rather than successfully shooting an enemy, the gun would explore in your face as well.
Ubisoft talked with Nintendo about the idea, and the feature was ultimately cut. Nintendo felt it was a bit too chaotic and random for it to be accessible.
Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle lead producer Xavier Manzanares told USgamer:
“We thought it was like Rabbids. Even if it sounded cool on paper, when you play it you say, ‘awww man I was about to defeat the enemy but I got this fumble.’ It’s funny one time, but not funny the second time.”
Mario Kart partially influenced Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle, Ubisoft on Rayman’s absense
Posted on 7 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Switch | 9 Comments
Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle takes inspiration from all sorts of games and sources. Among these was actually Mario Kart. Although the two are in completely different genres, creative director Davide Soliani mentioned to Game Informer that the team wanted to translate that action into the Switch game.
Davide said the following when asked how Mario + Rabbids sets itself apart from other strategy titles:
“Since the very beginning, when we started to brainstorm this game, we wanted to come up with something that was totally new. If we were going to propose to Nintendo, we knew we had to have something that they were not used to or that they weren’t already doing. So, we started with the intention of saying we should renew the genre a little bit. We thought that tactical games are known to be slow paced and they tend to be a little niche, so why not try to have something very dynamic and colorful and fast paced. That’s why our first reference was Mario Kart. How cool would it be to try to translate that kind of action into the combat of our game? Compared to a lot of other tactical games, you see enemies taking cover and the heroes are doing the same, and they’re both shooting at each other, but they’re not moving much. In our game, the A.I. is coming towards you, so you must react to the situation, and the action is focused on moving around the battlefield.”
Nicalis planning “some familiar and some brand new” games for Switch
Posted on 7 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Switch | 7 Comments
Nicalis has shown quite a bit of support for Switch thus far. The publisher already shipped The Binding of Isaac: Afterbirth+ and Cave Story+ with even more titles on the way.
As for what lies ahead, Nicalis’ Tyrone Rodriguez teased in a recent interview:
“We have several more games coming out on the Switch this year, some familiar and some brand new. You’ll have to wait and see!”
Nicalis will be bringing Blade Strangers, The End is Nigh, Ittle Dew 2, and Tiny Barbarian DX to Switch. It’ll be interesting to see what else is in store.
More: interview, Nicalis, Tyrone Rodriguez
Limited Run says its Switch releases are on hold due to success of other games and reprints
Posted on 7 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Switch | 43 Comments
Limited Run Games puts out physical versions of smaller games that normally wouldn’t receive a retail release. Digital games, niche titles, and others along those lines are given an opportunity to be purchased by collectors.
Originally, Limited Run wanted to have its first Switch release ready sometime this summer. But those plans changed after Nintendo decided to focus on publishers involved with bigger print runs.
More: Douglas Bogart, interview, Limited Run Games
Minecraft dev on how the Switch version was updated to support 1080p
Posted on 7 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Switch | 0 comments
Minecraft: Nintendo Switch Edition now looks better than ever. After an update published a few days ago, the game runs at a 1080p resolution when docked. The initial resolution was set to 720p.
TIME caught up with 4J Studios CTO Richard Reavy to learn more about the update. Reavy was able to explain how the 1080p resolution was added to Minecraft on Switch.
Reavy pointed out how futher optimization was needed that Minecraft on Switch could handle 1080p without issues. With more time for testing, 4J Studios believed they could get it done.
Reavy said:
Koizumi says Switch success is half-expected and half-surprising, talks Mario development and Zelda dev differences
Posted on 7 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Switch | 12 Comments
This month’s issue of EDGE has a cover dedicated to Super Mario Odyssey. There really isn’t a whole lot new about the game itself, but the magazine does have a few choice words from Nintendo EPD’s general producer Yoshiaki Koizumi.
One of the topics Koizumi commented on was Switch’s success. Regarding the console’s performance thus far, Koizumi said:
“It’s half expected and half surprising. I always feel a certain amount of confidence in my work, and I imagine a lot of different scenarios. The one that’s come to fruition was one of the better ones I was imagining! We wanted people to have more time to play games.”
Square Enix’s Tetsuya Nomura on designing characters for Xenoblade Chronicles 2
Posted on 7 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Switch | 18 Comments
This week’s issue of Famitsu features an interview with Square Enix’s Tetsuya Nomura. The Japanese magazine primarily talked with Nomura about Kingdom Hearts III, but there was some brief discussion pertaining to Xenoblade Chronicles 2 as well.
For those who haven’t heard, Nomura contributed to Xenoblade Chronicles 2 as a character designer. He worked on characters included in the game’s Ira organization.
Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle footage from Comic-Con with dev talk
Posted on 7 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Switch, Videos | 0 comments
IGN featured Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle during its Comic-Con live stream yesterday with associate producer Cristina Nava. Watch some footage below, along with commentary from Nava.
