Category: DS News

wii-u-2Jan. 10, 2013

With more than 460,000 units sold in December, Wii U has now sold nearly 890,000 units in the United States after only 41 days on the market, according to the NPD Group. To date, Wii U hardware sales have generated more than $300 million in the U.S. alone; Wii hardware had generated just more than $270 million at the same point in its lifecycle.

“While the Wii launch established new benchmarks in the United States, Wii U has surpassed its predecessor in perhaps the most important category: revenue generation,” said Scott Moffitt, Nintendo of America’s executive vice president of Sales & Marketing. “The demand for the Deluxe SKU, which was essentially sold out at retail this holiday, and the strong attach rate of New Super Mario Bros. U, shows that we have the value and the games to drive momentum in 2013. We look forward to offering great new experiences and bringing smiles to millions of new faces throughout the year.”

Remember Solatorobo: Red the Hunter?  This game hit Nintendo DS in North America last year, and was definitely the best DS game of 2011.  Well, there’s a sequel in the works, which was recently been confirmed from the game’s developer, CyberConnect2.  That’s really all we know right now, but since the original was on DS, wouldn’t it make sense if it released on 3DS? -Greg Boe (admin)

Source: Nintendo Everything

I’ve always viewed video games as a way to live out your dreams, no matter how crazy they may seem. At the age of sixteen, and with the magic of video games, I have participated in four Summer Olympics, won several professional skateboarding competitions, saved several countries from several world wars, including World War 3, and saved the world from many, many evil masterminds. However, this feeling of my accomplishment is often diluted by characters calling me by the wrong name, or by my character saying something I would never say. This brings us to the main point of the post. As Takao Unno, the director of Pokémon Black and White 2 explains, Pokémon is a first player game, and one that attempts to give the player the feeling that he is his character. They keep the character silent so that he can only be identified by other features, which also explains a few other matters of the game. In English literature class, many of us learned that characters’ personalities are discovered through their actions, their appearance, and their dialog, among other things that do not apply in this situation. By removing the dialog and keeping the graphics of the character pixelated, the only remaining point is the actions of the character, which are determined by the player. This allows the player to determine the personality of his or her character in his or her entirety, making the player feel that he or she is, in fact, the character being played as. Do you feel like you are the character you play as in the Pokémon series?

Source: My Nintendo News

The have been many Pokémon games in the last decade. Many people have found that these games have strayed too far from the original ideas of Pokémon, the epic quest to collect all the pokémon in the world. Now, that is pretty much impossible, and as many of these characters are close to the player’s heart, it is unlikely they will be removed. However, there will be many aspects returning to the game to make it more friendly to the older fans of the games. What will be coming to the game is an unlock-able market that opens up as you communicate with other people (StreetPass maybe?) and, the older fans will love this, you can fight all of the old gym leaders that seem to have disappeared in the recent games, such as Misty or Brock from the blue version on the old GameBoy, in the World Tournament. Surely, this new game will take you back to a time that all of us have missed so dearly. I’m definitely going to get this game as soon as I can, and you should, too! It’s available in North America on October 7th, Australia on October 11th, and Europe on the 12th. What do you miss most about the old Pokémon games?

Source: My Nintendo News

With the release of every “amazing” game from Western developers, it seems like Western gamers have lost faith in Japanese companies.  Just because there have been some great games made over here in North America, it doesn’t mean that developers in Japan have lost their creative touch.  Take Platinum Games for example.  Titles that everyone raves about like Viewtiful Joe, Bayonetta, and MadWorld are made from these guys.  These games are out of the ordinary, yet super great.  Platinum’s Atsushi Inaba explains that a lot of Western devs suck pretty bad too:

“I don’t like it when people lump Japanese games developers all together into one group. Frankly, I think it’s a joke. What do these people know? Think about Western developers. There are many Western developers making terrible games, and then you see one like Infinity Ward making a game that sells 20 million and everyone goes, ‘hey, Western developers are amazing! There are tons of terrible Western developers, just like there are tons of terrible Japanese developers. To lump studios together in great masses misses the point.”

While some of those huge companies over in the West may be getting a lot of attention in the gaming industry recently, always remember that it was the companies in Japan that took the real risks to make games that have inspired the games of today.  What is your take on this subject?

Source: CVG

Two of the internet’s biggest social networks, Twitter and Facebook, have kept us connected with the world for years now.  Pokémon has finally joined in on the fun by opening an official Twitter and Facebook page.  You can check them out in the links below, and be sure to like and follow them!  Check out the links below.

Links: Facebook/Twitter

We’ve been waiting for 4 years for a sequel to The World Ends With You, arguably the best game for the Nintendo DS ever.  While our dreams of a sequel have not yet been answered, Square Enix has released an epic port of the game for iOS called The World Ends With You: Solo Remix.  This game (on the App Store) was said to be more than just a port, and it looks like we all get yet another chance to play the wonderful game on iPhone 4, iPhone 4s, and iPad.  Also, there’s more word on a sequel, which we’ll talk about in more detail very soon.  Best news of the week.

Source: The World Ends With You: Solo Remix (Official Site)