Messages

[Smash_Brother]

26

Nintendo Gaming / RE:The OFFICIAL Wii rumor thread *bring your own salt*(updated 7/14/2006)

« on: July 17, 2006, 08:26:45 PM »

Quote
Originally posted by: Smash_Brother
Mother = Earthbound 0.

Deal.

That's it's fan-given name.

Mother = Earthbound.
Mother 2 = Earthbound.
Mother 3 = N/A

[Pale]

27

Nintendo Gaming / RE:The OFFICIAL Wii rumor thread *bring your own salt*

« on: July 11, 2006, 12:13:21 PM »

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Originally posted by: Pale
Ruby, you really show some of your ignorance in calling Wii crippleware because it won't play your old discs.  You sound like you think Nintendo went out of their way to lock out such a possibility.  Don't you think booting to a disc and booting to what is essentially an OS loading what are most likely specially prepared ROMs into a specially prepared emulator are different things?

Do you think that it's any more difficult for the emulator to load from the DVD drive than something like say, a USB hard drive (which has been pretty much confirmed)?

The definition of crippleware is something that's not living up to it's potential, because they want to charge you for it. The "special preparations" on those ROMs (assuming there are any, as we're all just assuming here) are going to be there for piracy reasons, not to make the games work.

If all the pieces are in place (original games, CD drive, fully-licenced compatible hardware via emulation, a good controller), and it can't be a substitute for the original hardware, then it's either crippleware (if what they really want is for me to buy my games twice), or it's got self-crippling anti-piracy features.

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Nintendo isn't going out of it's way to screw people over.  The amount of work required to add that capability is not a financially sound decision given how few people will have those discs.

All of your other examples point to reasons where it is financially smart.  Millions of people have GBA games, so a GBA slot in the DS makes sense.  Don't be so silly in your extreme negativity.  If you honestly think Nintendo is going out of its way to ruin your day, you need to wake up.

I don't know how much it would cost to add a Z80 chip to the GBA chip they already added to the DS. But even if it is a lot, they could've tried emulation. There are fan-made GBC emulators that run on the GBA.

And how many millions of people do you think will download VC versions of TG-16 games?

I spoke to a couple of older gamers when the VC news broke, and most are concerned about the life left in their old hardware. Most of them said that if the Rev/Wii qualified as new Sega CD/TGCD hardware, and that it had S-video/Component outputs, they'd buy one at launch, regardless of any revolutionary games. A hardware sale is a hardware sale, and I doubt that non-gaming grandmothers will do more for the Wii's attach rate than these people.

Yes, if the VC is a locked download-only system, that's something unheard of and it's better than nothing. But it'll be falling short of it's potential, and that will make me sad.

[Kairon]

28

Nintendo Gaming / RE:The OFFICIAL Wii rumor thread *bring your own salt*

« on: July 10, 2006, 09:42:29 PM »

Quote
Originally posted by: Kairon
To begin with, the Wii drive CANNOT read TGCD, Sega CD, nor Saturn games. That's just crazy. It's compatible with GC discs (which are almost opposite of any other disc out there, as far as I know) and Wii's own discs (probably DVD-format discs read in a similar manner to the GC's discs? Just a guess) but that's it. Can you imagine the technical mayhem in constructing a drive that can read not just those two alien formats, but also 3 deas-as-a-doornail-formats?

As I mentioned earlier, the Revolution's drive was announced to be DVD-compatible (with an "unlocking" attachment, to avoid fees). The DVD specs supposedly demand CD reading ability. AFAIK, CD-R's, CD-RW's, and PSX discs are different enough to require a second laser. That's why Sony built a custom 2-in-1 laser for the PS2 which caused a bunch of DRE's. But there are $25 DVD players at Wallmart that can play CD and DVD and CD-R and CD-RW, and MP3, and all that kind of stuff, simply by including two lasers. It's apparently not that expensive to have two lasers (or Dolby Digital ports).

The Cube discs are just a slightly different form of mini-DVD. After they finally came out with that Cube modchip, people supposedly got it to read mini-DVD's. And the GameCube GameShark supposedly comes on a (specially written) plain old mini-CD, not mini-DVD or GameCube disc. So the Cube's laser apparently doesn't sweat the CD/DVD difference.

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Also, the GBA could only support GBC and before games due to a COMPLETELY SEPERATE legacy chipset being included. This is tantamount to including a PS2 with every PS3. The new hardware is just too different too make native backwards compatibility feasible. Not to mention that including a seperate legacy chipset drives up the price, or forces you to cut corners. Note that the non-inclusion of a legacy 15+ year old chipset is the reason that the DS cannot play GBC or GB games: the hardware simply doesn't exist in the system. The GB slot is there purely for GBA games, not for, like you suppose, GBC or GB games.

The GBC supported the GB (and gave it color even) through emulation. Emulators for all these systems will already be included within the Wii (not all games will be ported to/enhanced on the Wii, because a lot of the dev teams and source codes are long gone). It's just a matter of reading from the main drive instead of the flash RAM or whatever happens to be inserted into the USB ports (which could theoretically even be an external CD drive).


Edit: Actually, the main issue is Nintendo's copy protection. It's widely believed that Nintendo will encrypt every single download so it can only play on the same piece of hardware which you used to place your order. And if you can play the original unencrypted games, then what's stopping you from playing ROMs that some warez hacker on IRC has decrypted? But really, if you're going to play ROMs, there are far easier ways to do that than hunting down some custom-decrypted Wii versions. And then there are all those Sega CD bootlegs sarcasm. I know they exist, but who in their right mind would bootleg Snatcher if you can buy a 100% legit version for $15 from a trustworthy source at the click of a button? That's what I mean about Nintendo tying their own hands.

Regardless of the encryption/decryption issue, I do want to be able to order hard copies of the games, and plug them into the front drive. But without them being actual "new" legacy games (new games playable on old hardware, and vice-versa), they lose something. And that automatically translates into lost dollars for Nintendo.

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They're not Nintendo games, they never CAN be played right, even on their native hardware.

Zing!  

[will]

29

Nintendo Gaming / RE: The OFFICIAL Wii rumor thread *bring your own salt*

« on: July 10, 2006, 08:30:19 PM »

The Wii will play it's (former) competitors games. I'm bothered by the idea that it won't play them right (I'm used to having high expectations from Nintendo), and I like the idea of buying tangible things more than buying downloads.

When I'm on WiiConnect24, I want a button beside "Download: Panzer Dragoon Saga" which says "Order Hard Copy". And I don't care if it costs slightly more (plus postage) and comes in a new jewel case that has a Nintendo logo on the back. But I want it to be a real Saturn game.

[Kairon]

30

Nintendo Gaming / RE:The OFFICIAL Wii rumor thread *bring your own salt*

« on: July 10, 2006, 08:04:40 PM »

Quote
Originally posted by: Kairon
I think you're being quite unreasonable here. You can't rail against the unstoppable march of future tech that isn't backward's compatible. Heck, I can't find a floppy drive anywhere in my dorm to let me install Civilization on my computer, and after I worked so hard to track down an actual original copy! Oh, not to mention that Windows XP completely refuses to run the entire DOS game library, like the beloved Monkey Island games, or Lode Runner or the aforementioned Civ.

Floppy drives became obsolete, so I can accept that they cut them (although you can still get them on new computers if you want, but that doesn't contribute to this discussion).

If your computer has a floppy drive, but it still can't run Monkey Island or Civ 1 (which is true of Windows XP), then I think that's bogus (and I blame Microsoft). The DS and micro have GBC-compatible cart slots. They're not obsolete, because the GBA still uses them quite well. The Wii has a TGCD/Sega CD/Saturn-compatible disc drive, AND it knows how to use it (which is more than we can say about Windows XP and the DS/micro), but it (probably) won't. The word for that is "crippleware".

Quote
Originally posted by: AnyoneEB
Spak-Spang: Except, that would mean Nintendo is making it difficult for you to exercise your fair-use rights under US (and probably other) copyright law. If you could figure out how to do so, it would be perfectly legal to play your old Saturn/other disc games and even your old cartridge-based games on the Wii.

Nintendo locking out, or failing to provide, native CD game support doesn't impact your ability to mod your Wii and load it up with emulators and play old games. It's just that if they did provide CD game support, there would be no need for the mod.


Edit: And if the Wii was functional as TGCD/Sega CD/Saturn hardware, those systems would lose their status as abandonware, and you'd lose your legal right to break the copy protection on those systems' games as provided by the DMCA.  

31

Nintendo Gaming / RE: The Capcom 2

« on: July 10, 2006, 05:51:43 PM »

Close. Your imagination has probably become distracted by the other good thing offered by butt shaking.

[them...]

32

Nintendo Gaming / RE: The OFFICIAL Wii rumor thread *bring your own salt*

« on: July 10, 2006, 03:46:06 PM »

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Which old games won't we be able to play?

My entire TGCD, Sega CD, and Saturn game collection (meager as they are), for instance.

Just because I have those games, it doesn't mean I won't increase my collections with new Wii-inspired purchases. Or that newbies won't get into those games. Nintendo wants the newbies. And they want me to grow my collection. And they want me to re-buy everything I already have, or get pissed off and tell them to take a hike. One of those three doesn't seem to be worth it for Nintendo.

Letting you play your existing game collections on the Wii will only spur hardware sales.

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If you're going to hold it against Nintendo for not letting "register" the NES games you already own, then you'd better hang NEC and Sega if they don't let you "register" their games as well!

I won't complain about having to re-buy my Master System, TG-16, or Genesis games. I didn't complain about having to re-buy GBA ports. It's unfortunate that hardware restrictions got in the way, but I can understand that.

I will complain if Nintendo doesn't let me download NES games for free if I've registered my NES Classic GBA games with them, because they were forward thinking enough to let you register them in the first place. I did complain when Nintendo yanked GB/GBC support from the DS and micro. I will complain if the Wii can't play a simple CD.

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Speaking of piracy why don't you ask, Sega, how that anti-piracy stuff worked out for them...

The Dreamcast was dead and cancelled long before it's piracy scene exploded. The Saturn was virtually unaffected. If anything, piracy pushed hardware sales on the PlayStation, and it became a juggernaut, which is what killed the Dreamcast.

I am in favor of restricting piracy. But you're not supposed to shoot yourself in the foot or tie your own hands while doing it.

33

Nintendo Gaming / RE: The Capcom 2

« on: July 10, 2006, 02:47:42 PM »

If anyone can't see how this...


...and this...


...would be exponentially better with accelerometers and a laser pointing device, and perhaps even the greatest Wii game ever, then they are utterly devoid of imagination. Which most likely means they sit on the board of Capcom.

[Garnee]

34

Nintendo Gaming / RE:The OFFICIAL Wii rumor thread *bring your own salt*

« on: July 10, 2006, 02:14:16 PM »

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Originally posted by: Garnee
Saturn ROMS = ISOs = Entire CDs = bigass.

I think it makes perfect sense for old cart-based games to be available by download, with CD-based games being custom made (by Nintendo) mail-order reprints.

The old carts were expensive to make way back when, and now they're even more expensive because all the facilities have been destroyed. ROMs are all they have left. Anyone with CD-based games can make as many more of them as they want for less than $0.25 each at the snap of their fingers, provided all the licencing issues are out of the way. And that's on top of the obvious "carts = puny downloads, CDs = massive downloads" thing.

And there's nothing physically preventing the Wii (once it has all the appropriate emulators in place, which is supposedly will) from playing any of the CD-based games. The DVD specs supposedly even require CD support (although not necassarily CD-R support), so if the Wii has an optional attachment allowing DVD movie playback, it must be able to play CDs.

The only problem is that everybody on the entire Internet seems to think that Nintendo is deathly afraid of allowing people to put TGCD and Sega CD and Saturn CDs into their Wii, from a piracy standpoint, and they're also unwilling to allow anyone to play their existing old games on the Wii, from the greed standpoint and wanting to sell games twice, to the few people who already have those games. So people think they won't.

Hey Nintendo, how'd that greed and fear of piracy work out for you on the GameCube?

Nintendo could combat PlayStation by having full 100% Sega Saturn backwards compatibility. But they're afraid of it. Please Nintendo, prove us wrong.

35

TalkBack / RE: The NEW Mailbag Talkback Thread

« on: July 09, 2006, 11:56:34 PM »

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Everything I've heard from Nintendo about the latest Zelda game is they're making both a Gamecube and Wii version. That's all fine and dandy... ...but two different releases? Two different SKUs for stores? Why the hell not package both the Gamecube and Wii disc in the same case, with the same SKU?

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I don't think things will be that difficult. Retailers have been dealing with multiplatform releases forever, so there shouldn't be any difficulties getting that sorted out.

It hadn't hit me before now but... Zelda has gone multiplatform.

It's a sign of the Apocalypse. I wouldn't have believed it was possible, but Iwata has doomed us all. I wonder if Nintendo can earn more money by adopting a "platform agnostic" stance? Five pillars?

Ha ha ha haa ha ha! Excuse me while I go cry.

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Nintendo Gaming / RE: Dragon Quest

« on: July 03, 2006, 01:23:31 PM »

Yeah. It was a standalone device you hooked up to a TV with A/V inputs, and the little plastic sword was motion-sensing, like one of those "Radica" baseball games.

Here's a more detailed impression.
IGN Wii

37

TalkBack / RE: PREVIEWS: Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker

« on: July 03, 2006, 12:55:41 PM »

Nope, Egg Monster Hero is part of one of Square's old franchises that has never come over, not one of Enix's Dragon Quest spinoffs.

The DS just has Rocket Slime and DQ Monsters, so far. The PSP is getting a prequel to DQ8.

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Nintendo Gaming / RE: Dragon Quest

« on: July 03, 2006, 12:40:25 PM »

I think you're expecting too much from the game. If you notice, there are only two kinds of attacks shown. A perfect 90-degree vertical slash, and a perfect 90-degree horizontal slash. The Game's predecessor, Kenshin Dragon Quest, also had 45-degree diagonal slashes, so I would expect those to show up, even though they weren't shown at E3.

I'm expecting some pretty pre-rendered graphics of at least the typical core group of Dragon Quest monsters. And a gimmicky way to smack them around. And the Dragon Quest brand name on the box, available for the system's (Japanese) launch.

Anything more is going to be a bonus.

[IceCold]

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TalkBack / RE:PREVIEWS: Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker

« on: July 02, 2006, 02:21:20 PM »

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Originally posted by: IceCold
Slime Mori Mori?

Nope. That one's coming out in America in September as "Dragon Quest Heroes: Rocket Slime".

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Nintendo Gaming / RE: Possible double-disc Zelda for Europe

« on: July 02, 2006, 12:47:21 AM »

I don't think this would fix ALL of the problems Nintendo created with the Wii version of Zelda (there were complaints about the idea of Revmote control in TP long before Nintendo announced they'd be splitting it up and charging twice for it), but it would get the biggest problems out of the way, and then we could ignore the minor little ones, saying that at least Nintendo's doing everything they can about the situation (which is more than NOA's apparently doing here).

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General Chat / RE: Official Avatar Discussion

« on: July 01, 2006, 10:21:56 PM »

Here IceCold...



I made you a new avatar. It's cleaner and smaller than your current one. You'll need to rehost it if you want to keep it, because Imageshack links expire.

[Kairon]

42

TalkBack / RE:RUMORS: Time Crisis Fully Wiilized?

« on: July 01, 2006, 08:18:15 PM »

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Originally posted by: Kairon
Wow, so Nintendo actually has a console RPG-making second party?

Maybe. It's possible that people are reading more into Namco/Monolith's Nintendo support than we should, and PR reps are a very unreliable source of info.

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... Too bad I haven't seen anything remotely inspiring from them yet...

They supposedly worked on Chrono Trigger. And Xenogears and Chrono Cross.

And Nintendo also owns Brownie Brown, who worked on Secret of Mana and the other Seiken Densetsu games, but they've been similarly lackluster lately.

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TalkBack / RE: PREVIEWS: Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker

« on: July 01, 2006, 07:28:37 PM »

Hi Ryan!

I just finished watching the original Godzilla again.

44

Nintendo Gaming / RE: Returned to the fold..

« on: July 01, 2006, 03:05:39 AM »

R: Racing Evolution is about the best you'll get in the "realistic racer" category.

F-Zero GX is a futuristic racer that should probably have weapons in it (you can fight the other racers, but only by ramming them). It's amazingly fast. Some say too fast. Very extreme.

Mario Kart: Double Dash is a cartoony weapon-based multiplayer party racer. I'd recommend it if you're looking for a party game, not a racing game.

Wave Race: Blue Storm is pretty underrated. It's not much of an improvment over the N64's revolutionary Wave Race 64, but if you haven't played the first one, it's a pretty unique experience. It's Jet-Ski racing. On water, of course.

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TalkBack / RE: RUMORS: Time Crisis Fully Wiilized?

« on: June 30, 2006, 11:05:53 PM »

Baten Kaitos 1&2 were apparently made by Tri-Crescendo (a splitoff from the frequent Enix-ally, Tri-Ace), under the directions of Monolith (a company that split from Square and joined Namco).

Tri-Crescendo is just finishing up work on Baten Kaitos 2 (which Nintendo apparently took over from Namco) and Valkyrie Profile Silmeria for Enix on the PS2. Next they're working on an Xbox360 RPG for Namco called "Trusty Bell".

Monolith is ending the Xenosaga series after #3, and yeah, they're apparently working on Disaster: Day of Crisis for the Wii next, apparently without any involvement from Namco. There are rumors saying that maybe Namco/Bandai sold whatever hold they had on Monolith to Nintendo, possibly in exchange for the chunk of Bandai that Nintendo owned, because a Nintendo rep said that one of Nintendo's second parties was making Disaster.

There are a whole bunch of "Tales" teams, but it's hard to tell which ones are working on what. Right now they're working on Tales of the Tempest for the DS, a full Tales of Destiny 1 remake for the PS2, a Tales of the World game for the PSP, a Tales of Destiny 2 port for the PSP (not to be confused with the Tales of Eternia port already on the PSP, which was called Tales of Destiny 2 in America), and a Tales of Symphonia (PSX version) port for the PSP. I'm probably missing some more.


If this rumor has any weight to it, there's nothing stopping Namco from making/hiring a new team (especially if they've lost Monolith), and/or declaring them to be yet another "Tales" team.

[TheBlackCat]

46

TalkBack / RE:Wii's 'Sync' Button Revealed

« on: June 29, 2006, 07:22:13 PM »

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Originally posted by: TheBlackCat
I am the only one here who finds it the least bit strange that the label on the Wii disc is facing towards the SD memory card slot and not away from it?

IIRC, the GameBoy Player's commercial showed a GBA cart getting inserted label-side up, presumably just so you could see the label as it went in.

It's just nonsense marketing decisions.

[Caliban]

47

TalkBack / RE:Capcom Replenishes Phoenix Wright Supply

« on: June 29, 2006, 01:19:41 PM »

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Originally posted by: Caliban
Yeah, that's good for the USA, but have you seen how much Canadians have to pay for s&h? $100 or so, that's just for s&h, plus what the game costs. Oh well, that just pushed me to go and see if I can buy it in 2nd hand if I'm lucky, or a miracle would be to buy it brand new. Oh well...

Capcom's store uses UPS to ship to Canada, so it'd cost even MORE than that. They only hit you with all the "hidden fees" when they hand you your package. By my experience, those can add up to more than $50 just by themselves.

Highway robbery is what it is.

48

Nintendo Gaming / RE: getting the most out of my GBA-GC link cable

« on: June 27, 2006, 09:56:26 PM »

You can use the cable to use a GBA as a controller for the GameBoy Player (in case you happen to like playing GBA games with a GBA-style button layout, and not the screwed-up GameCube-style layout used by Hori's GameBoy Player Controller).

It's kind of neat, but the price of the controller and it's battery usage get old fast.

49

Nintendo Gaming / RE: OOT Triforce

« on: June 27, 2006, 04:10:34 PM »

On the off chance you're being serious, you can't get the Triforce in Ocarina of Time.

This image...

... of Adult Link finding it on a pedastal somewhere is from an early version of the game, and didn't make it into the final release version. Young Link didn't even exist yet when this screenshot was released.

The only time the Triforce is seen in Ocarina is during the cutscene explaining that the three goddesses left it behind when they departed (the only full version in the game), and in three ghostly 2D images on the backs of the right hands of Link, Zelda, and Ganondorf (each with a different portion illuminated), and even those just appear during scripted events.

50

TalkBack / RE: Nintendo DS Becomes Movie Star

« on: June 27, 2006, 12:59:46 PM »

So the DS is spyware now? That's bad news for WiiConnect24.