NES designer talks about the controller
Posted on 9 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, News | 2 Comments
NES designer Masayuki Uemura has offered quite a bit of insight into the console’s controller. Here’s what was shared with USgamer:
“There were, as you can probably imagine, a lot of difficulties we faced in doing things for the first time in building this hardware, but one of the most difficult was, ‘What shape and layout will the controller have?’ This has a touch of coincidence about it, too, but some of those people who had gone to work with Gunpei Yokoi’s team eventually found their way back to our team. So one of the ideas that came up because of that was, ‘Well, we’ve got this Game & Watch multi-screen Donkey Kong that uses the controller format of a plus control pad and buttons.’ So we hooked that up and got it working.”
“At the time, we were prototyping various ideas for the Famicom hardware, as well as controllers. When we took this idea that had been used for controls with the Donkey Kong Game & Watch and got it working on the Famicom prototype with that same style of controls, we immediately knew, ‘OK, this feels right; there’s something good about this.’ That means that there are actually a few people who can claim that they invented the controller for the Famicom!
“I think that the biggest reason that we liked the controls this way was just how good the original Game & Watch Donkey Kong, which was on multi-screen, felt. To expand on that a little further, with this prototype… the multi-screen format of the Donkey Kong Game & Watch means that you have a screen on top and a screen on the bottom, with the controls down below. When we hooked up the prototype, it meant that you were no longer looking down there [at the controls], but up here [at the screen]. Yet we suddenly realized, kind of mysteriously, that you didn’t need to look at the controls while you were playing the game, and it still felt right!
“And up to that point, we had tried a big variety of control styles and they had all had some sort of something that didn’t feel quite right about them, but this was something that no matter who tried it on our team, they could tell right away that this worked. So that’s when I decided to put my foot down and make the call that this is what we would be going with.
“I may have made the decision, but in the end, it’s something that whoever worked on the Game & Watch for Donkey Kong had a hand in, whoever brought the idea to try out the prototype had a hand in it—it was really a team effort.”
“You know, we didn’t patent that technology (crosspad design) at the time. Once it was established, you kind of started to see it pop up everywhere, and now it’s kind of become a standard for controls in games.”
USgamer has much more with Uemura in its piece. You can read up on the full article here.
More: interview, Masayuki Uemura, top
Lots of additional details about the cancelled Project H.A.M.M.E.R.
Posted on 9 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, Videos, Wii | 2 Comments
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.
More: NST, Project H.AM.M.E.R., top
Super Mario Maker getting an update next week – mid-level checkpoints, Event Courses, more
Posted on 9 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Wii U | 21 Comments
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.
More: Super Mario Maker, title update, top
Super Mario Maker players have made 3.2 million courses, more Famitsu collaboration details
Posted on 9 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News, Wii U | 3 Comments
Famitsu is reporting that over 3.2 million courses have been created in Super Mario Maker. About a month ago, that number was at 2.2 million units.
Famitsu also has news about its collaboration content in Super Mario Maker. In order to obtain Nekki – the magazine’s mascot – as a costume for Mario, players will need to clear a level designed by the editorial team.
Some of you may be aware that Famitsu reviews are often published by four different editors. The magazine decided to settle on the level that will be made available to players in Super Mario Maker by reversing things a bit. Four Nintendo representatives were put in charge of judging and ultimately determining the level that will be distributed. The lineup includes producer Takasahi Tezuka, director Yosuke Oshino, senior director Yoshikazu Yamashita, and Yamamura from Nintendo News.
More: Famitsu, Super Mario Maker, top
SEGA – been tough translating Sonic into 3D, new games will be inspired by classic entries
Posted on 9 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, News | 80 Comments
SEGA has taken some heat with the Sonic series as of late. In particular, Sonic Boom admittedly led the gaming franchise astray and resulted in a large amount of criticism.
Speaking with Marketing Week, SEGA Europe marketing director Jon Rooke promised that new games in the series “will be more inspired by how it played in its heyday.” He also acknowledged the difficulty in bringing Sonic into 3D.
Rooke said:
“Sega has publicly apologised to the fans as the quality of console games in the Sonic franchise hasn’t been acceptable over recent years. It’s been tough translating that iconic side scrolling 2D experience from the 90s into 3D but Sonic is still huge for us so the new games will be more inspired by how it played in its heyday.”
Sonic Generations actually felt like a step in the right direction to me. And Sonic Colors, while not perfect, definitely had some redeeming qualities. It kind of makes you wish SEGA could be more consistent with the franchise!
[Review] Adventure Time: Finn and Jake Investigations
Posted on 9 years ago by Vincent Ward in 3DS, Reviews, Wii U | 7 Comments
System: Wii U (reviewed) / 3DS
Release date: October 20, 2015
Developer: Vicious Cycle
Publisher Little Orbit
Author: Vincent
Adventure Time: Finn and Jake Investigations is a game that I want to love. I really do. I used to enjoy the show, and taking a quick glance at this title, it really doesn’t seem that bad. Once you dive deep enough, however, you quickly begin to realize how everything falls apart and how this becomes something that really doesn’t seem worth adventuring through.
Zelda: Tri Force Heroes – more talk of experimenting with 4 players, cut 2-player idea, totem inspiration
Posted on 9 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, News | 1 Comment
The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes features three players rather than four. We’ve heard from the development team a few times now that they did experiment with the latter number, but three Links was ultimately the path that was chosen.
Zelda: Tri Force Heroes director Hiromasa Shikata commented on this once again in an interview with IGN, in which he stated:
“When we tried four player, we definitely wanted to incorporate the totem mechanic, but what happened is that when you totem, the middle two players have nothing to do.”
“When it was four players, the players split up into two and two and each of them would do their own thing. So we thought that three players was the best number to have.”
Shikata also touched on a multiplayer idea that didn’t make it into the final game. Had it been implemented, two players could fuse together.
“[The fused heroes] could only go in one direction if both players wanted to go in that direction. Unfortunately, that made the gameplay very hard, so we had to take that mechanic out.”
Finally, Shikata discussed where the inspiration from the totem mechanic originated from.
“One of my teammates brought a picture of a circus act where people were stacked on top of each other. Looking at that picture, I thought that was a good way to use the 3D feature on the 3DS.”
Tri Force Heroes devs – communication origins, cut item ideas, amiibo in future Zeldas, more
Posted on 9 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, General Nintendo, News | 3 Comments
GameSpot has posted an interview with Zelda series producer Eiji Aonuma and Tri Force Heroes director Hiromasa Shikata. Between the two, they commented on the inspiration behind the game’s communication features, item ideas that were scrapped, consideration for two-player support, interest in using amiibo in future Zelda games, and more.
We’ve rounded up the various comments below. You can also read up on a few extra comments from GameSpot here.
GoldenEye 007 dev on the game’s development, Miyamoto wanted the killing toned down
Posted on 9 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, News | 89 Comments
While speaking at the GameCity festival in Nottingham, co-designer Martin Hollis opened up about the development of GoldenEye 007. A number of interesting tidbits were shared, including Shigeru Miyamoto’s interest in turning down the killing – including close-up killing.
If you’re interested in reading up on the full report from Hollis’s talk, head past the break. You can also check out The Guardian’s article here.
