Past Retail Games on eShop Nintendo News # 4

Nintendo has announced that you will be able to go on the eShop and purchase downloadable versions of past titles such as Super Mario 3D Land, Mario Kart 7, Star Fox 64 3D, and Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D. This has already happened in Europe, November 1st in Japan, and October 18th in North America. Nintendo has in the past focus on this form of purchase such as having New Super Mario Brothers 2 available day one available for download. Nintendo has shown that they want to do this day one download availability with future games as well including games released on the upcoming Wii U. All retail games for the 3DS are available for 39.99.

Seattle Mariners Nintendo History # 4

We have talked about the many different businesses that Nintendo has been in in the past. Nintendo is primarily seen as a video game company but in the past they almost seemed to be able to do anything. This seems to have waned in recent years to where they focus on their core business but other then cards and video games there is still one other business that Nintendo is still involved in. Major League Baseball.

Ever since 1992 Nintendo has been the majority owner of the Seattle Mariners. They are only one of three teams that are actually owned under corporate ownership. Hiroshi Yamauchi has been a majority stockholder of Nintendo to this day as well as being the previous president. Despite him then being the owner of the Seattle Mariners, he has never attended a game. Yamauchi has never traveled to North America and is said to hate travel. Even so his attendance record includes games that were played in Japan by the Seattle Mariners, although he did own tickets during one of these trips by the Seattle Mariners to Japan but the games were canceled due to the Iraq war at the time. He is said to be the only owner to have never seen his team play in person. In 1992 the Seattle Times reported that up to this point, Yamauchi had never even been to any baseball game before. He was on hand during signings for famous Japanese baseball players that were signed to the Mariners. This included Ichiro Suzuki who was a favorite in Japan. Suzuki was said to meet with Yamauchi yearly during his time with the Mariners. Yamauchi's purchase in 1992 is said to be the main reason why the Seattle Mariners did not move back then while they were on the verge of moving. Also Major League Baseball was strongly opposed to someone outside the United States owning a club. He was at first only allowed to have 50 percent voting rights which has increased to 55 since then.

Nintendo's presence is not hidden at Safeco field. There are advertisements and even Mario has visited games. In recent years you have been able to use handheld systems all the way back to the Nintendo DS during the games to do a variety of things. These include ordering food  and drinks (you can also see the progress of the order), viewing player stats, looking up the map of the stadium, watching the live tv game, multiplayer baseball trivia against the entire stadium, and more. This is done over the internet at the stadium and the cost is 5 dollars per game or 30 dollars per season. Nintendo also has rental systems available and also systems are available for purchase during the games. It is rumored this system might become available elsewhere but this has not happened yet.

Kid Icarus: Uprising Game Review # 3

Kid Icarus: Uprising is the 3rd game released in the Kid Icarus series. It had been over 20 years since the last game. In these years there have been many fans wanting a new games while other games from that same 8-bit era had multiple more sequels. The main character had made a few appearances as his 8-bit self in other games. In Super Smash Brothers: Melee, Pit received his first appearance non-8-bit appearance. This was as a 3-D trophy with his old look and the tagline, "Will he ever fight again?". In Super Smash Brothers: Brawl players were able to play as Pit and his appearance was updated. The appearances in the Super Smash Brothers series added a lot of wood to the fire that Nintendo was interested in making another Kid Icarus game. There was truth in the rumors and Masahiro Sakurai, who is the director of the Super Smash Brothers series, directed Kid Icarus: Uprising.

Despite being the 3rd game in the series, there is no need to play the first games. A lot of the information from the earlier games are referenced in the game. Very early in the game, the plot of the original will be explained and in more detail then you would get from playing the original. The plot of the second game is not referenced in the slightest. There are several game play elements from the original which is poked fun at but Uprising does a wonderful job being able to give the player information that would allow them to understand these things without having to have played the original.

The story of the game is very well written. There is a large cast of characters with plenty of new characters. The story rarely plays out to what you expect. The story rarely takes itself seriously as almost anything can trigger a joke from the cast of characters. The jokes can be quite cheesy but I feel this is the route they wanted from the characters. If you really hate the jokes after playing through once then they can be turned off. I personally love the silliness that is the character interaction in this game. The world of Kid Icarus didn't have much depth before this game came out. With this one game I felt like the game world has become as deep as most other series.

The gameplay can be difficult to get used to. There are two main modes. One is where you are on a set path through the air as you dodge and attack enemies. The other mode is where you are on land and have complete freedom to get to the objectives. This game is perfect for someone looking for almost any kind of difficulty. At the beginning of a level you can offer hearts (the currency) to make the games difficulty harder or easier then the normal difficulty. With harder difficulties the more you are able to earn if you can survive. Also some paths open up on harder difficulties to offer more risks and rewards. On lower difficulties then average you will be able to go all the way down to where the game is a cake walk. I personally feel that the average difficulty where no hearts are used is just a tiny bit of a challenge for beginners but not enough to where it is too hard. As a seasoned gamer, I rarely played a level without being in the mid range difficulties. The game recommends you a difficulty on levels as you play through the game. With 91 difficulty levels there is a lot to do to make the difficulty just right. The controls have been something that has been called out a lot by gamers. The game comes with a stand and this provided me a lot of comfort while playing. Many complain that it hurts to play. I agree that the way you play this game is rarely seen in a majority of games. I rarely used the stand as I wasn't near a surface to use it on regularly. After playing for a few days this was a non-issue as my hands were used to how I was playing. I imagine I could still not play for hours without wanting to rest but never had this issue as how well the game is broken up.

The sights and sounds were amazing in this game. There is a lot of music and each is unique. The music can be quite epic at times and always matched the settings I was surrounded by. The graphics were very beautiful on my handheld. I always had to keep my 3DS charged as I wanted to keep experiencing it all in 3-D.

The multiplayer is a load of fun. The modes are based on the on foot segments of the main game. You can play with a team or have it be everyone for themselves. Weapons and abilities are randomly given out in multiplayer, received in the main game, and received through Streetpass. The best weapons are typically rewards on higher difficulties in the main mode. You can also build better weapons through fusing two other weapons or buying the better weapons. I feel that the way this is done gives anyone with the ability to get those better weapons in multiple ways. The team mode is perfect for beginners as dying with a lower rated weapon makes a very small dent in the team combined health while higher weapons and dying can take out huge chunks. If you become Pit in this mode you are randomly given a high powered weapon in this mode also.

If you are looking for a fun game for online/local multiplayer or looking for a epic main quest with tons of replay value, this is that game. I recommend it to anyone that has the system and anyone that is looking for a reason to own the system.

Mario DLC Nintendo News # 3

The big news this week in the world of Nintendo has been Nintendo revealing information on the upcoming DLC for New Super Mario Bros. 2. This is the first time Nintendo has released paid DLC. The DLC is already available in Europe and Japan. It will be released in North America on October 4th. The prices around the world for each pack is $2.50, €2, and 200 yen. Each pack is playable in the coin rush mode separately from each other and are the same 3 levels each time you play the pack. The Gold Coin pack coins are abundant and players strive to hit the ceiling on the amount of coins they can carry. The Coin Challenge Pack A is standard levels which have players compete all around the world for the record. The Nerve-Wreck Pack is for advanced players and are hard to complete. It was also announced that in North America there will be more packs released at the end of October and November.

Game & Watch Nintendo History # 3

This is the story of Nintendo's first handheld electronic games. Most people think of the Nintendo Game Boy when they think of this but before even Donkey Kong hit arcades in 1981, there was the Game & Watch in 1980. Each Game & Watch came with a game that played on the LCD screen. The name comes from the fact that other then playing games, it had a clock and alarm.

Gunpei Yokoi got the idea after seeing someone bored pressing the buttons on a calculator. The D-pad which is used even in modern controllers was created by Yokoi for the Donkey Kong Game & Watch in 1982. These games were very basic and each system only had one game on each due to the design of the systems. There were 60 different Game & Watch systems created with only 59 being for sale and the last being  only given away as contest prizes. Over 43 million systems were sold with the last being released in 1991. To get an idea for that period of time, the Game Boy was already released worldwide and even the Super Nintendo was getting its start. The clam shell design that came with the multi-screen series looks almost like a Nintendo DS and in fact this design was what inspired those future handheld designs.

The series has lived on in every Nintendo handheld as there has always been either a re-release or compilation available for each one thus far. Also the character, Mr. Game & Watch, was created as a sort of mascot for this series. The character was first seen in the Game & Watch game Ball but it was Super Smash Brothers Melee that made this character into this mascot position he now holds. Since then, Mr. Game & Watch has shown up multiple times in recent years as a background character in addition to being a character in the Smash Brothers series.

The World Ends With You Game Review # 2

The World Ends With You is an action RPG made by the same team that made by the Kingdom Hearts team and Jupiter at Square Enix. Jupiter made Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories before being a part of this game. It originally released on Nintendo DS in Japan in July 2007 then other regions in April 2008.

The gameplay is hard to get used to but is satisfying to master. It boils down to doing two things at once as you keep track of action on both screens. There are ways to assist such as having the top screen auto or go auto after no input for a short period of time. When the top is in auto it will not make decisions nearly as well or as fast as you can so it would be recommended to take the time to learn to play. Luckily you can control the difficulty in two ways. You can change your level and the enemies difficulty. This game can be either a walk in the park or very hard with this system. For those that go for the harder path they are rewarded with better drops from enemies and/or higher drop rates.

The story is great. If you are looking for something like Kingdom Hearts but without Disney, this is it. It is very unique as you play as a youth in Shibuya, where making fashion statements are just as important except used to fight enemies. The game will take you for a ride and expect to not know what to expect throughout.

The music is worth purchasing just by itself. There are many great songs and the music matches the vibes from the game. There are many times where I would pause the game and just listen through the soundtrack.

This is a fantastic game and a most own for anyone that is more then a little curious. This is probably one of my favorite games for the Nintendo DS, a system that had many great games. It is also definitely one of my favorite games period. This is a game that I had to have in my collection and bought a second time because my first practically 100 percent completed copy was stolen. If you can't find a copy, last month an IOS version was released Worldwide. I can't recommend that version since I have no experience but it would be worth looking into if its the only way you can experience this game.

Bayonetta 2 Nintendo News #2

Things have died down a lot since last week. No new major announcements. Now begins the wait for all those that were able to get a pre-order in for the Wii U.. But there is still some people talking about the big announcements last week. The cause: Bayonetta 2.

The original Bayonetta was a single player mature action game that was released in late 2009/early 2010 depending on where you live. The game was developed by Platinum Games and Sega was the publisher. It can now be played on just the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3. The game has received great reviews and awards and sold just under 2 million copies since it was released. Like possibly many other Nintendo gamers, I have not been able to play this game due to it not being released on a Nintendo system. This game series as a topic went from recently off the radar to be one of the most talked about discussions currently. Even after most other discussions have died down after last weeks announcement, this discussion keeps going on and new information keeps coming out. Bayonetta 2 being exclusive to Wii U was a surprise announcement last week. For myself I first thought it was great that Nintendo was putting focus on a core game that was releasing exclusively for Wii U. I felt Nintendo needed to show something like this to show that they wanted to be the system not just for casual and the Nintendo loyal but for everyone. Unfortunately many did not see this the same way. There was a large amount of people that went to the internet to voice negative opinions regarding this which was far more then those that felt this was a positive at first. Things have slowly died down as the week went on and this was in part to additional news. Executive Director Atsushi Inaba came out and said that without Nintendo there would be no Bayonetta 2. After piecing together a lot of information a larger story appeared. There have been reports of Sega going through a low period. There were rumors that they had to cancel the development of Bayonetta 2 due to not feeling it would be profitable enough to continue. We don't know if Nintendo saw this and made the first step or if Sega or Platinum Games had been looking for publishers (and if so if Nintendo was first). One would assume that even either way that other avenues would have been looked at to either make it multi-platform or at least released on one or both of the systems the original was released on. If that was the case then it would seem Nintendo publishing was the only way. This stopped a lot of hate as it could no longer be viewed as Platinum Games selling out to Nintendo's money. Platinum Games show they want to make a sequel and have been responding to fans several times this week.

One now may wonder what would happen if this was a core gamer franchise that had even more popularity and was also never released on any Nintendo systems. One that had no risk of not continuing. Would history repeat and a larger outcry would happen? One could imagine what would it be like if the internet was how it is now back when the Final Fantasy series was only on Nintendo systems and then suddenly Final Fantasy 7 was announced for PlayStation exclusively. Back then the developer stated they needed what the PlayStation had to make the game they wanted to make. Was that wrong back then and would it be wrong now for a developer to do the same with the Wii U if they felt they needed what it has? Another thought is to buying exclusivity. It isn't exactly a secret that money has been spent in the past to buy exclusivity whether it be a timed exclusive, extra content, or complete exclusivity. Many currently find that Nintendo saving Bayonetta 2 as a good thing as it would never be released otherwise but what if it was a series that would have no issues releasing a sequel on the platforms it had originally released on. Would this be wrong and if so, where is the line? These are questions on my mind and possibly many gamers after the fallout from this news.

One good thing that came out of this news is I know a lot more about the Bayonetta series then I have before. I feel that this might be the case for many other gamers also. I would be very interested in purchasing the original if it comes out to a system I own now or in the future. I personally hope there is news of this happening in the future or that the sequel is released in a way that assists those that have not played the original.