The Pokemon Company not saying if Shadow Mewtwo is canon
Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, News | 8 Comments
Shadow Mewtwo was created in close collaboration with the minds behind Pokemon for Pokken Tournament. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean that the creature is a canonical part of the overall universe.
In an interview with Polygon, Pokken Tournament producer Masaaki Hoshino said:
“When we were originally coming up with the design, we worked very closely with The Pokémon Company and Game Freak to make sure everything was right. What happened was, we at Bandai Namco had the idea of making a really cool dark-colored Mewtwo, so we had one of our designers take a crack at it and then presented that to The Pokémon Company and Game Freak. They all thought it looked really cool, so then we worked together to brush it up.”
“Because everyone really liked Shadow Mewtwo, I have a personal hope that they’ll continue to use it, but it’s not really our decision, unfortunately.”
Tekken producer Katsuhiro Harada, who is also working on Pokken Tournament, weighed in as well:
“For this game, it is kind of a spin-off from the main series. It takes place in this area called the Ferrum Region, which means something like ‘Iron Region,’ playing back into the Tekken connection. So, within the context of this spin-off, [Shadow Mewtwo] is obviously a canonical character. Of course, how The Pokémon Company and Game Freak decide to use the character is up to them, but I think Mr. Hoshino’s passion for the character might inspire them and encourage them to use it!”
Polygon also reached out to The Pokemon Company and asked if Shadow Mewtwo can be considered canon. To that, a representative said “No comment.”
RCMADIAX looking to focus on fewer games, move away from multiple releases each year
Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Wii U eShop | 1 Comment
RCMADIAX has made over a dozen games for Wii U starting with BLOK DROP U back in 2014. But going forward, the indie developer will be looking to focus on quality over quantity.
In an interview with Nintendo Life, RCMADIAX’s Michael Aschenbrener mentioned that he’d like to launch only a game or two each year. He hopes to start this with his next release, Super Robo Mouse. If successful, we won’t see RCMADIAX’s next game until around 2018 or 2019.
Aschenbrener’s words in full:
“Ideally I would love to develop just a single project at a time – releasing maybe once per year or two. This is the goal starting with SUPER ROBO MOUSE, and should it prove successful, you would likely not see my next release until 2018/2019.”
Splatoon producer on pre-launch jitters, possibility of a sequel
Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Wii U | 19 Comments
GamesMaster spoke with Splatoon producer Hisashi Nogami in its latest issue for a brief interview. At one point, Nogami reflected on how there were some jitters within the team before launch, as they weren’t sure how the multiplayer-focused game would be received.
Nogami told the magazine:
“We’ve dealt with online multiplayer in a number of titles up until now, but this was the first time we’d taken up the challenge of releasing a package game where multiplayer was the main mode. We were not 100 percent sure about how a few sections would be received, and so we’re really happy to see them being well received not only by experienced online gamers, but by a really broad range of players including children and female players too; it’s a real confidence boost. If we have the chance in the future, I’d like to build on online gameplay even more.”
GamesMaster followed those comments by pressing Nogami on the possibility of Splatoon 2 happening one day. When asked, he responded with the following:
“We want to raise this new IP with care, so maybe we’ll get a chance to make it happen if players support us.”
Splatoon updates technically ended last month. But at the Splatoon Koshien 2016 finals a couple of weeks ago, Nogami hinted at possible new content for the shooter.
More: Hisashi Nogami, interview, Splatoon, top
Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate producer – factors behind western success, lengthy localization
Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, News | 11 Comments
Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate is the franchise’s most successful entry in the west. How did that happen exactly? In an interview with GamesBeat, series producer Ryozo Tsujimoto touched on some of the factors that led the game to become a hit in North America and Europe.
Localization changes helped lead Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate to overseas success. But even more importantly, Fujioka says online play “was huge”.
Fujioka told GamesBeat:
“… More than anything the addition of online play on the 3DS was huge. Obviously in Europe and North America it’s very difficult to play with others locally due to everyone being so spread out, so having online multiplayer in the game really showed the appeal of Monster Hunter’s multiplayer to a wide range of players.”
“Given that Japan is a small island country, there are more opportunities for people to meet directly, so the barrier for local play is low enough that lots of people can take advantage of it. This time around, especially outside of Japan we had a lot of people asking for online multiplayer, which of course was a big thing for players.”
Project X Zone 2 devs on choosing new characters, fan feedback, series’ future, and more
Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, News | 4 Comments
A new interview with the developers of Project X Zone 2 has been published by Nintendo Life. The site spoke with Bandai Namco producer Kensuke Tsukanaka and Monolith Soft development director Soichiro Morizumi about the new 3DS game. Topics include how some of the new characters were chosen, the influence of fan feedback, and the series’ future.
Head past the break for a few excerpts from the interview. Find the full interview here.
Video: Nintendo Treehouse’s Erik Peterson talks 3DS RPGs
Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, Videos | 10 Comments
During the 3DS RPG press showcase a few weeks ago, Electric Playground spoke with Erik Peterson from Nintendo Treehouse. You can hear Peterson talk a bunch about Fire Emblem Fates and Bravely Second, and a bit about Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam and Project X Zone 2 as well.
ZeNfA Productions on how the Nindies Love You sale came to be, wants similar promotions in the future
Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS eShop, News, Wii U eShop | 0 comments
Several developers partnered together to host a “Nindies Love You” sale on the eShop today. 50 percent discounts are live for a number of Wii U and 3DS games in North America, Europe, and Australia.
The campaign started with an idea from Greg Wiggleton, the founder of ZeNfA Productions. In an interview with Nintendo Life, Wiggleton explained how it came about:
I truly had the idea for this group event sale around a year ago when the 1st and 2nd “epic indie sale” events were happening. I was curious if it was possible to host my own type of sale with other indies I’m in contact with and if Nintendo would advertise it on the eShop at all. It was around August 2015 that I finally started to get active in recruiting other Nintendo indies and contacting Nintendo directly about setting up one of these sales.
The very 1st step I took was taking charge of this idea and contacting Nintendo (already with a few select indies interested) back around August 2015. I was curious on how these group sales came into being. Nintendo would go on to tell me that these group indie sales were 100% created from indies and that Nintendo just helped set it up with the indies being in charge of it. From there I tried to gather a bunch of different indie Wii U games that would go well with this sale and show Nintendo that we were interested in doing our own sale. From here, I would go on to be Nintendo’s main contact for our group and talk to Nintendo on what is required, type of banners needed, and deadlines for different parts were. Every few weeks I would send updates to all involved as well as keep Nintendo involved with our developments to help keep them informed that we were serious about doing this sale.
The original goal was to have this 2 week sale period occur sometime around Christmas of 2015. A few of us involved early on thought this might be a good idea. After all, the Christmas period can be very nice for sales. However, a problem with this plan was that this period is usually very crowded. Nintendo themselves even warned us that a sale like this in December was a bad idea and recommended January or February for doing this sale. By October we finally decided to officially make it a February sale. Since this would take place around Valentine’s, we decided on that as a theme and came up with the “Nindies Love You” title for it.
As for another promotion like Nindies Love You, Wiggleton is very much interested in making that happen.
I would love to create new promotions like this in the future. I am hopeful that this event goes well for all involved so that we can all continue to make interesting and fun games for Nintendo systems for all to enjoy. Who knows, maybe one day you might see a similar promotion by me for the Nintendo NX for a new set of games!
More: Greg Wiggleton, indie, interview, sale, ZeNfA Productions
Big Red Button reflects on Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric, SEGA on Sonic’s future and more
Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Wii U | 50 Comments
Today, Polygon published a massive piece about Sonic’s history. The site chronicled the series’ early times all the way up through Rise of Lyric as well as the future (in general terms).
We highly suggest giving the full article a read here if you’re a fan of Sonic. But after the break, you can find a breakdown of comments from Big Red Button CEO and co-founder Bob Rafei about Rise of Lyric as well as other comments from SEGA about the franchise.
Kamiya reflects on making Bayonetta and harsh directing style, Platinum on collaborations
Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, News, Wii U | 10 Comments
With PlatinumGames celebrating its tenth anniversary, Japanese magazine Famitsu has a big feature about the studio in its latest issue, including an interview with several staff members. It focuses more on the developer as a whole rather than specific games. There are some interesting Nintendo-related bits from the discussion though.
Hideki Kamiya has only made two games in the last ten years at Platinum. Of course, those are Bayonetta and The Wonderful 101. Kamiya created the original Bayonetta with the following prerequisites: make an original game with hardware you’re touching for the first time with no library, no resources, and no game engine. He wanted to have it published in three years.
More: Bayonetta, Famitsu, Hideki Kamiya, interview, PlatinumGames, top, Yusuke Hashimoto
Niantic delves more into the origins of Pokemon GO
Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Mobile, News | 1 Comment
In Famitsu last week, Niantic went more in-depth with the origins of Pokemon GO. The magazine caught up with Setsuto Murai, representative president of Niantic Japan and Kento Suga, marketing manager of Niantic Japan.
As has been mentioned before, you could say that the concept was born after Google teamed up with The Pokemon Company for an April Fools event back in 2014. Murai and Suga touch on this, and then explain how things carried on from there.
Head past the break for our full translation.
