Pokkén Tournament might not necessarily be coming to North America in arcades, as we gathered during an interview with The Pokémon Company International’s Director of Consumer Marketing J.C. Smith, at the 2015 Pokémon World Championships in Boston last weekend.
While discussing the recently-announced Pokkén Tournament Wii U version, we shifted focus to the arcade version.
NWR: How that’s moving towards arcades presumably next year. We’ll see how that goes. Was that organized by The Pokémon Company International also?
JS: It was not actually. In fact, I haven’t been involved in that, but I’ve been told that the arcade machine is not coming to the U.S., so I don’t know exactly what the plan is. But that was a long while ago, so who knows what may have changed. You know, you can’t stop someone from buying an arcade system so who knows what’s down the road.
NWR: So last you heard, there were no plans.
JS: Yeah, I haven’t been working closely on the arcade side at all because, really, I never worked on the arcade side but we’ll see. I think that will be handled by Bandai Namco. But I’d have to follow-up with you on that.
It’s worth noting that when Senior Vice President of Entertainment and Game Strategy at Dave & Buster’s Kevin Bachus originally said Pokkén was going to be tested in their arcades, he specifically mentioned Bandai Namco in the partnership and not Nintendo or The Pokémon Company. However, it is also interesting that if this deal is exactly like Bachus stated, this would also mean that the deal happened with practically no involvement from The Pokémon Company International, and maybe without Nintendo.
Look out for our full interview with J.C. Smith on Monday (Sorry about the wait! Some things came up and plans changed. It will be up Monday though!).
Something more significant than Pokkén Tournament may be coming early next year to celebrate Pokémon’s 20th anniversary, as we learned in an interview with The Pokémon Company International’s Director of Consumer Marketing J.C. Smith, at the 2015 Pokémon World Championships in Boston last weekend.
During a discussion about The Pokémon Company’s plans to celebrate Pokémon’s 20th anniversary in early 2016, we asked about Pokkén Tournament and its place in the overall celebration.
“Will Pokkén Tournament be…is that your main plan for the early part of the 2016 anniversary?”
In response, Smith simply said, “No.”
However, when pressed further, he stated, “I’m splitting hairs. No, there’s lots of stuff planned for the 2016 year but nothing I can talk about now.”
If there is something larger than Pokkén Tournament, there’s no telling if it’s a mainline game, a more substantial spin-off, or something out of Pokémon’s other sectors. And to be fair, this could also suggest that there is something (or some-things) of equal importance to Pokkén Tournament coming in the early part of next year.
Look out for our full interview with J.C. Smith on Monday.
In her third game since arriving overseas, Hatsune Miku makes her first appearance on 3DS in Western territories with Hatsune Miku: Project Mirai DX – following the Project DIVA games that both came out in the last year and a half on PlayStation Vita and PlayStation 3. From playing all three English titles, I think there are three main criteria all Miku games should be judged by:
It’s a simple to control rhythm game that is very easy to learn and very hard to master.
It has a killer soundtrack with a large number of catchy Japanese pop and rock songs, featuring the vocaloid voices of Hatsune Miku and her friends.
It has cute anime girls being cute in happy, sometimes slightly bizarre music videos.
In Project Mirai DX, from the six hours I’ve played (clearing all 48 included songs and playing some of the other modes), it manages to hit the mark on all three of these aspects kind of, while missing the mark in other ways.
To explain how Hatsune Miku games work, they are rhythm games with simple controls. When controlling the game with buttons, you press the right face button or D-Pad direction at the right time (using button prompts on screen similar to Dance Dance Revolution). Sometimes you hold a button, sometimes you press both the D-Pad and a face button at the same time, and sometimes you don’t. In a special, secondary 3DS control method, you do the same thing using the Touch Screen. You press the right colored part of the touch screen at the right time using DDR-style prompts, and sometimes you hold, sometimes, you swipe, and sometimes you spin. The two styles have slightly different timing naturally, but they both work perfectly fine.
In Mirai, the rhythm game is played across three difficulties: Easy, Normal, and Hard. You are ranked using letter grades up to S+, you can fail songs, and you can use items to make songs harder and easier. The game nails all of this basic stuff perfectly, but it doesn’t fully nail it for one simple reason: the difficulty ceiling is a little too low. It’s worth noting there is no Extreme difficulty like in the PS3/Vita games, and the Hard difficulty in this game is just as relatively-but-not-too-cripplingly hard as the Hard difficulty in the other Miku games I’ve played. It’s a minor issue for most – maybe even a non-issue – but its lack of presence is missed.
The soundtrack also mostly hits the mark, with 48 songs that are all mostly different flavors of J-Pop. Some favorites like Melancholic and The World is Mine are featured, but my main issue with the song list is that most of the songs just aren’t that great. As someone who loved the music in Project DIVA f and liked the music in Project DIVA f 2nd, there are only maybe 5-10 memorable songs in the whole lineup. None of the songs are bad, but an enormous chunk of them are forgettable, and, dare I say, a little boring. Many of the song structures are so similar they bleed together, and while some are catchy, many of them just have nothing to say. As I play more leading up to the review of this game, my feelings could be changed, but I can’t help but feel a bit underwhelmed right now.
And moving on to the third ingredient of a good Hatsune Miku game, let’s talk cute anime girls. Though I don’t personally find any physical attraction to anime characters, it’s hard to play these games and not get in a good mood because of how nice and pleasant they are to look at. Project Mirai DX changes the art style of the game from realistically proportioned anime characters to a chibi style.
While chibi can be cute, I feel the style takes away some of their personality, and frankly, I just don’t think they look as good as their more realistic counterpart. This is certainly not helped by the visuals for stages, which are just the characters doing dance moves on different backgrounds, as opposed to the full music videos featured in other series games. There are some of those music videos here, but, at least to my taste, the visual style in Mirai is a huge step down from the DIVA games.
The game features other modes, including a Tomodachi Life-lite social mode and custom dance choreography, but I haven’t dug into these modes enough yet. Look out for more on these, as well as other modes, in the full review.
The future of Pokémon may involve “flowers,” as we learned in an interview with The Pokémon Company International’s Director of Consumer Marketing J.C. Smith, at the 2015 Pokémon World Championships in Boston, Massachusetts this past weekend.
While discussing the future of the Pokémon, we asked Smith to offer us a cryptic tease of that future.
“And last but not least, can you just throw a cryptic word out there? Just anything. Something will get me to scratch my head. That, like, in eight months I’ll go, ‘That’s what he was talking about!’”
After a pause, Smith’s response was “Flowers.”
In Pokémon X and Y, Floette is a flower-centric Pokémon with a currently unobtainable form integral to the main plot of the games. Additionally, while its special form, Eternal Flower Floette, has not yet been released officially, it can be obtained via cheat device. It could also refer to something from a currently unannounced game, as Pokémon in 2016 was a major part of the interview.
What do you think “flowers” refers to? Let us know in the comments, and look out for our full interview with J.C. Smith on Monday.
Pokémon Director (and composer!) Junichi Masuda conducts KISEKI, the ending theme for Pokémon X and Y, at the 8/22/15 Boston performance of Pokémon: Symphonic Evolutions.
Here's an up close and personal look at how the audience reacted to the reveal of Pokken Tournament for Wii U. Also, read our hands-on preview of the game here.
As someone who has played exactly what you have in an arcade, I say this- Pokken Tournament is not fun, it is not a 3D fighter, and its movement options are not free in any way.
Did you not strike your opponent into the 2D "close combat" mode that the majority of matches take place in, Alex? I feel like that's a key aspect of the game you've overlooked. Also, you missed out on the most and least fun Pokemon in the game (Weavile being the former).
I disagree on all three points. It uses a circular grid and forces a forward perspective, but it is certainly a 3D fighter and the movement isn't that restrictive. As far as the close combat stuff is concerned, that was just a part of the combo system. I will add a small piece on that though -- thanks for reminding me.
This morning, at the 2015 Pokémon World Championships, some of us may have expected Pokémon Z or a new Pokémon form, but it’s hard to say there was much disappointment in the air at the convention center after the reveal of Pokkén Tournament on Wii U, coming next Spring. And thankfully, to those of us attending the festivities, the Japanese arcade game got its first playable appearance in North America. After playing with nearly every available character and getting a good chunk of time to acclimate myself to the controls, I can say this: Pokkén Tournament is so freaking cool.
If there was any lack of ambiguity in the trailers, Pokkén is a 3D fighter. It doesn't include full-on 3D movement, as the GamePad we played with featured a D-Pad as prime means to control (giving movement a Super Mario 3D World-like grid feeling), but the game takes place in a circular 3D arena and features 3D combat that shifts to 2D combat as fighters get closer to each other. I would liken it to a slightly more 3D Tekken. Other than the D-Pad, the arcade controller featured four face buttons (ABXY Nintendo style) and L/R buttons.
The A button controls the special moves (A forward, backward, and neutral featured unique attacks), B controls jump, and X and Y feature physical attacks and some lighter attacks that aren’t exactly specials (these attacks also vary in conjunction with the various directions). It’s hard to call the X and Y attacks specials or a simple light/heavy split, because Blaziken could use them for a projectile fire attack while other characters use them for physical moves. These buttons are also your main means of executing combos.
As for the shoulders, pressing L triggers your assist character, who are other Pokémon like Emolga, Lapras, and Frogadier, and they act as traditional assist characters, popping in for a second, doing a quick attack, and jumping back out (their use also appeared to be limited, though I’m not sure what regulates it). Snivy’s assist was a small leaf tornado, while Lapras appeared to use a strong Surf move. Pressing R, meanwhile, activates the block move.
If I had to describe Pokkén in a word, it would be “accessible.” The moves, even specials, are so simple and easy to pull off, it’s reminiscent of Smash Bros. I’m awful at most fighting games, yet after two matches, I had a mostly-clear understanding and competence in how to play. Though this may make the game come across as more casual to some, the trade-off, making each match feel like a realistic Pokémon match, is well worth it.
What I mean by that is, every Pokémon feels faithful to its very core. Every special move in the game is based on a real move from the core series, and every Pokémon physically feels like it’s using that move. Machamp has the weight and play of a four-armed macho man, and landing a Cross Chop or Seismic Toss (in which you spin your foe and straight up throw them) just feels right – though the extremely effective sound and visual design (every connecting move sounds like you’re really cracking the enemy with it), though that could be a result of the machine’s loud sound system. When playing as Machamp, throwing guys around and punching them right in the face, I couldn’t help but smile. They totally nailed what it means to play as Machamp in a fighting game.
Likewise, if you asked me how each character feels, I would say, “it feels like that Pokémon.” Charizard feels like Charizard would, lumbering around with its powerful yet slow body. Blaziken feels like Blaziken, quickly speeding around and cutting fools down with its crazy fire kicks and punches. Gardevoir feels more gentle and light, Suicune feels like a legendary beast (attacking primarily with its head and body, barring projectiles like Aurora Beam), Pikachu is fast but relatively easy to throw, and Gengar is a cocky shadow monster that uses the power of darkness. If you have a favorite Pokémon represented in this game, it seems like, from what I’ve played (I haven’t used Weavile or Lucario), the team that made this did them great justice.
Mega Evolutions are represented in the game via Burst Attacks. Upon filling up a Burst meter (filled by attacking, and not by blocking), you can press both L and R to activate a temporary, significantly more powerful form. Charizard becomes Mega Charizard X and Gengar becomes Mega Gengar, but creatures like Suicune and Pikachu, who don’t have Mega forms (yet?) get an aura radiating off of their body and the same boost. Certain attacks in Burst form (which are enhanced versions of standard attacks, at least from what I’ve seen) can take upwards of 30% of your opponent’s life bar (and that’s a conservative estimate on my part), so it’s important to guard and back off when your opponent has it. When you have it though, it feels great, and activating it at the same time as your opponent makes it feel like you’re Goku and Vegeta going into Super Saiyan to fight each other. When I did it one round, I couldn’t help but say, “oh, it’s on!”
And visually, the game does what many Nintendo games did this gen. Like Pikmin 3 and 3D World before it, Pokkén has that soft realism that is both cartoony and super high fidelity at the same time. The stages, while not exactly based on recognizable places in the Pokémon universe, look like places that would exist in that setting. One of the stages I experienced was a stadium, while another was a meadow-like town with little buildings and a child biking in the background. Stylistically, they nail it.
There aren’t a ton of characters yet, and the only content I saw were versus matches, so I’m very curious to see how much content the final Wii U retail release will have when it comes out Spring 2016 worldwide. From what I’ve played, I can say this: Pokkén Tournament is fun, Pokkén Tournament is easy to play, and Pokémon fans will soon be playing the fighting game they want, and the fighting game they deserve.
V-Neck's for the win! Prefer that to a stuffy crew neck. Great show this week, guys. Let's get the discussion started!
Alex! How the heck do you only have 4 amiibo?!? Yeah, there are more coming that will probably increase your amiibo count, but how have you managed to not succumb?! Also, get a separate charger for your 3DS. They're cheap!
Wooooo! Thank you for the kind words. Sorry I missed this. Reading these long responses makes me so happy because it means someone is engaged.
I try to only buy the Amiibo I really want based on characters I really like. I haven't bought Mario/Luigi/Peach/Bowser/Link and many others yet because the characters don't speak to me that much (even though the games do).
I have 4 + the 3 in the Retro bundle pre-ordered.
Then I need Mewtwo, Blue Yarn Yoshi, Mario Maker Mario, KK Slider, and Tom Nook
I kinda want Splatoon, Falcon, and Greninja.
In other words, I've been good so far, but I'm probably going to own 12-15 by the end of the year. I am scared.
Art Academy is a Nintendo franchise that never necessarily felt like “one of the gang” to me. In a literal sense, it absolutely is, just as much as any other Nintendo game. But from the outside looking in, Art Academy came across as a tool provided by Nintendo more than a game within Nintendo’s catalog. Finally, with Art Academy: Home Studio, I jumped in with expectations that I was in for something very mechanical. Art Academy is not that.
As it turns out, Art Academy is actually very much a Nintendo game that functions as an art improvement tool the same way Brain Age can be considered a brain improvement tool. In other words, Art Academy is learning software that prides itself on learning art techniques first, and you will learn all sorts of real-world techniques, but it’s made with the words “polish” and “fun” in mind. Every lesson is littered with Nintendo-style cutesy humor from your adorable handcrafted teacher Vince, the music is so gorgeous it was giving me Vietnam flashbacks to Animal Crossing Gamecube, and every lesson challenges you to be better in ways only Nintendo games can.
The primary mode in Home Studio features a series of 30 lessons that effectively teach you the basics of drawing/painting your very own artwork using an exhaustive number of shockingly realistic techniques. It may be true that the GamePad is not as precise as an easel (or a Wacom tablet), but what matters is how the game teaches you lessons like “how to use different shades of color to bring realism to a piece of art” or “why smudging is one of the most important steps in pastel artwork,” which are lessons that can easily be carried over into real life.
What I also like about these lessons is that the game doesn’t check how “perfectly” you did something. Vince tells you to sketch something, color one specific part, or whatever, and the lesson will move on once you click the “Next” button. In other words, you could do a real shoddy job and create a piece of crap while still moving on to the next level, or you could take your time and create something you’re proud of, learning these practical skills in the process. In this way, playing Art Academy feels like an RPG where all of the experience is real life.
If the lessons in Art Academy are an RPG, Miiverse, then, becomes the online battle mode. Anything you make in your lessons as well as any drawings you make in the free sketch mode (which is similar to Sketchpad, the Art Academy drawing tool on Wii U eShop) can be shared on Miiverse for others to Yeah, praise, or critique it to their heart’s content. This simple feature immediately becomes one of the most compelling and scariest uses of Nintendo’s social network too; in Art Academy, the only ones who can tell you how good you’re doing are you and your peers. Just like real life.
If you’re the kind of person who finds joy in trying a Nintendo franchise you’ve never played before, Art Academy: Home Studio is a wonderful place to jump into this one. The HD visuals and larger touch-screen easel make this almost assuredly the ultimate game in the franchise, and its relaxing presentation and polished gameplay are cozy in ways only the finest Nintendo games are capable of.
Animal Crossing: Amiibo Festival is probably going to be the only retail Animal Crossing game on Wii U. The off-hand comments of NX at the E3 Digital Event make it sound like Nintendo is trying to wind down the Wii U and move focus elsewhere, and Nintendo’s EAD Software Development Group No. 2, the group responsible for Animal Crossing development, is now juggling two Animal Crossing spin-off titles and Splatoon support as we speak. It just doesn’t seem likely that there’s another, bigger Animal Crossing console game on the way.
Now that that’s out of the way, what game are we actually left with?
Dōbutsu no Mori-o Party
Animal Crossing: Amiibo Festival is a board game played by up to four players that takes cues from Mario Party and Fortune Street. As one of a number of popular characters from the Animal Crossing series – namely Isabelle, K.K. Slider, Tom Nook, Mabel, Reese, Cyrus, Lottie (a new character from Happy Home Designer), and Digby – you play by moving across the board (styled after a town in Animal Crossing) via dice rolls, racking up Happy Points (think Stars in Mario Party but much easier to get), and making bells AKA money (which eventually translate to Happy Points). At the end of the game, the player with the most Happy Points wins.
In order to get Happy Points, you roll the die and land on spaces that each have an event of some kind tied to them. When you land on a space, a micro-episode of Animal Crossing happens and your character is affected positively or negatively. For instance, Tom Nook could land on a space where it shows him smiling and sitting down, and it says “I decided to visit another town today. There’s something relaxing about waiting for the train.” In another scene, K.K. Slider gets some happy points because he’s shooting the cover for his album. The events you land on are often specific to the character you choose and what they would be doing in the world of Animal Crossing, which is nice, and allows us to see what K.K. Slider is doing when it’s not Saturday evening. For what it’s worth, the Animal Crossing charm appears to be fully intact.
Animal Crossing further bleeds into the game through other situations. For instance, what determines the board you use is what month you decide to play in. Each game takes place over the course of a month (with each set of turns being one day), and events that would happen on a certain day in a traditional Animal Crossing game happen on those dates. In other words, if it’s summer, you might expect the bug catching tournament or a Holiday to happen on a specific date, and that is represented here. Other Animal Crossing mainstays are represented like villager interactions, the turnip stalk market (which has daily price fluctuations as well), and visitors like Gracie and Redd.
There are also bonuses, events, little Animal Crossing dialogue trees, and other such things that make this come across as a surprisingly robust Animal Crossing board game experience. And as Nintendo Treehouse Live points out, there is still “more” to Amiibo Festival that Nintendo hasn’t revealed yet. Neither the trailer nor the Treehouse Live segment featured actual mini-games, but the fact sheet in Nintendo’s press kit said that Amiibo cards could be used to play mini-games of some kind. My guess is that this is going to be a three-pronged game, featuring this board game mode, a series of Mario Party-esque mini-games in their own unique mode, and some return of Animal Crossing Plaza, the now-dead Miiverse and photo-sharing application that was conveniently shut down at the end of 2014.
IRL Bells May Be Required
In order to play Animal Crossing: Amiibo Festival, it looks like you will need to have one of the non-card Animal Crossing Amiibo. Using one of several Amiibo figures (each representing one of the playable characters – go K.K.!), the figures are how you roll the die every turn (by tapping the figure to the GamePad), and the figures are used to store Happy Points earned during each round to “expand your own game even more,” whatever this means. Moreover, you can optionally use Amiibo cards otherwise used with Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer to bring villagers into the game in some way – as well as any house of theirs you design in HHD.
The Amiibo are such an important part of the game that there’s word of the game being a free download on the eShop (similar to the way Wii Fit U was initially distributed perhaps). I still have my doubts as to whether this is true, but we do know for a fact that the game will be sold as a physical retail bundle with the game, two Amiibo (Isabelle and her twin Digby), and three cards. Retail price on this has not been 100% confirmed as of this writing (it’s listed for $60 at a few stores in the U.S. but official suggested price is still TBD), though if the game is offered on the eShop gratis, this could very well be a $30-$40 dollar bundle.
Ultimately, this is a board game that, while not Animal Crossing proper, contains its essence. It looks like Animal Crossing, sounds like Animal Crossing, has the writing and humor of Animal Crossing, and seems like it feels a little like Animal Crossing too. When it releases this holiday season, Animal Crossing: Amiibo Festival will not be the next full installment of this beloved franchise, but if there’s any consolation to be had, it looks like this entry will follow the series tradition of having a whole lot of heart.
This year at E3 2015, we're going to be doing way more ridiculous and recurring video and podcast content than ever before. If you want to check out the action, stay tuned to this here website and keep an eye on our YouTube channel. You can also view our planned schedule below.
Sunday June 14
3 p.m. PT: A few of our staffers live in Los Angeles will discuss the Nintendo World Championships as they happen.
That might be it for the day, but there's also the possibility we stream later, perhaps some Smash Bros. with the crew all in one room?
Monday June 15
10:30 a.m. PT: We'll be discussing and watching the Microsoft press conference, so feel free to join us on YouTube. We'll comment on Battletoads or whatever other stuff gets revealed there.
6 p.m. PT: We're planning to discuss the Sony press conference live, though if Neal has his way, the staff will be all watching Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Final (Go Blackhawks!).
If you're in the Nintendo eShop scene, we will also be doing cool stuff like that throughout the day. There's an off chance we do a live stream with Renegade Kid and Image & Form (internet permitting). You also tune in late on Monday for a podcast for our home team talking about the news of the days as it pertains to Nintendo.
Tuesday June 16
9 a.m. PT: Along with our coverage on Nintendo World Report as the news breaks during the Digital Event, you can also hang out and watch the video with us on a live stream (consider the Microsoft/Sony streams the day before as a test run for the Digital Event).
Approximately 10:30 a.m. PT: Our home team will be doing a live episode of Nintendo News Report to recap the crazy news explosion.
12 p.m. PT: The E3 show floor opens! Expect tons of coverage throughout the day.
Approximately 9 p.m. PT: Our LA-based team will do a live stream at around 9 p.m. PT discussing the day and taking your questions.
Stay tuned as well for Kim and Becky's first show from E3. Additionally, James Jones will be putting together a home team podcast with some RFN favorites.
Wednesday June 17
Approximately 9 p.m. PT: Our LA-based team will do a live stream at around 9 p.m. PT discussing the day and taking your questions.
Stay tuned as well for Kim and Becky's second show from E3. We'll also be doing a deep dive on Mario Maker.
Thursday June 18
Approximately 9 p.m. PT: Our LA-based team will do a live stream at around 9 p.m. PT discussing the day and taking your questions.
Stay tuned as well for Kim and Becky's third show from E3. We'll also be doing a deep dive on one of the major Nintendo games.
As I write this, we’re about a month out from E3 and no Pokémon game of any kind has been announced for 2015 yet. If one is coming, it is (almost) unquestionably going to be announced at or right around the show. It could be announced beforehand (Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire were announced on the morning of May 7 last year), but if there is no game announced at the show, we’re likely not getting Pokémon Z/XZ/YZ/Gamma Z/A this year. So what are the chances?
A Pre-E3 Pokémon Announcement
This year, E3 is being held June 16-18, 2015. Last year, E3 was held June 10-12. Although there is certainly no pattern to the announcements, it’s worth noting that ORAS was announced with the lead of a full month to fully separate it from the show. E3 2015 is held a full week later than last year, and if Pokémon was announced today or tomorrow as of this posting, things wouldn’t be that off-schedule. Although the announcement would likely be dropped as a surprise, I just don’t think that’s the case this time.
Around this time last year, Mario Kart 8 was being pushed the same way Splatoon is now. The Nintendo Direct for Mario Kart 8 happened a week before Pokémon’s announcement, and the Splatoon Direct happened about a week and a half ago (May 7 to be exact!), so the conditions are similar. That is, if you don’t consider reality.
Mario Kart 8 is big enough that it can hold its own on the consumer attention battlefield, even with Nintendo’s handheld golden goose getting an announcement between its hugest pre-release marketing push and its release date. On the other hand, a Pokémon game being announced before Splatoon coming out would eclipse the attention Nintendo is desperately attempting to build for this brand-new EAD franchise. We don’t know exactly how announcements are figured out between The Pokémon Company, Nintendo, and Game Freak, but if there were plans to announce a new Pokémon game now, I bet Nintendo would have pushed to get the reveal moved to E3.
Moreover, it just seems like we would have gotten the announcement by now if it were coming. There’s always room for surprise, but the third version(s) of Pokémon X and Y (or something else) being announced before the show doesn’t seem to make sense.
Chances: Not that high
An E3/Right Around E3 Announcement
Like I said, if a Pokémon game is happening this year, it’s going to be announced by E3. There are two things to consider here, and one of them is a recently revealed piece of evidence.
The first, non-evidence-based piece of evidence is that Pokémon has been getting pretty comfortable with its annualized release schedule (I lay that out better in this article). There isn’t much in the way of enormous 3DS games slated for late 2015 (barring the Animal Crossing spin-off), and at this point, not even the Wii U has anything slated for 2015 on the level of Super Smash Bros. or Mario Kart 8. If not this, than what huge game is Nintendo counting on?
The second, severely more important piece of evidence can be found here at the 2:50 mark:
What you’re looking at is an intended-to-be-confidential tease for an upcoming pre-E3 show (like something Spike TV would put on) shown at a motion graphics conference with a series of names and teases (found by NeoGAF). The way the speaker presented it made it clear that this is something that’s real at least at the conceptual level.
In the teaser, a series of names came up, like Valve’s Gabe Newell, Shigeru Miyamoto, and the name I care about: Satoshi Tajiri – the creator of Pokémon. If this list of names is legitimate and this show is indeed happening with Satoshi Tajiri, we’re getting something massive.
The reason I say this is that Satoshi Tajiri has not been the face of these games for a long time, and barely makes appearances of any kind anymore. He has been listed in a vague Executive Producer role since Diamond and Pearl, and it’s clear that Junichi Masuda has become the new public face and creative force for this franchise. So if Tajiri is making his first major public appearance for one of these games in a long time, it has to be something massive. Pokémon’s 20th anniversary is next year, and a Pokémon Red and Blue 3D Classics/3DS remake of Red and Blue/Wii U remake of Red and Blue/some crazy new third version of X and Y that involves Kanto would be big enough and specific enough to justify it.
Unfortunately, that probably means that we wouldn’t be getting the game this year, but if that tease is real, a Pokémon game will be announced at or around E3. You might ask, “Why wouldn’t Nintendo save that for the Digital Event?” to which I direct you to that time when Nintendo revealed what might be the only gameplay of Zelda Wii U we see for the next year at an unproven awards show. Nintendo wants their wares shown in as many avenues as possible, and putting the reveal here to lead into a massive E3 wouldn’t be so out of character.
This whole thing seems fishy though. Look at this list of guests mentioned in the video:
Hideo Kojima
Gabe Newell
Satoshi Tajiri
Michael Morhaime
Olivia Munn
Masaya Matsuura
Sara Underwood
Will Wright
Shigeru Miyamoto
Kevin Pereira
Chris Hardwick
World Premieres By:
Nintendo
Naughty Dog
Infinity Ward
What’s Gabe Newell, Michael Morhaime, and Will Wright doing at this show without a World Premiere? Why are Olivia Munn and Kevin Pereira, two people who aren’t hosting it and haven’t been heavy game personalities for a long time, doing here? Better yet, why is Sara Underwood, another ex-Attack of the Show host who is now a career Playboy Playmate, being featured? Why is Infinity Ward getting a World Premiere when their Call of Duty isn’t until next year? Why is Kumail Nanjiani listed as the host in the video but Joel McHale listed in the breakdown?
Until we see an official tease, I’m cautious that some (or all of these) are placeholders. Maybe they just saw a list of games being teased and filled in the blanks (“Oh, Call of Duty? Must be Infinity Ward!”). Maybe the studio made them up. Maybe all of these names are just filled in pre-emptively and some parts are moving around. Or, maybe it’s all real.
On the other hand, a new Pokémon Mystery Dungeon game was just announced for release in the same time period that a normal Pokémon game would be released (AKA the end of this year in North America). Maybe this dashes everything...or maybe it doesn't. If anything, should a new game be announced at the show, it would likely be one for next year.
As of right now, I feel like (read: hope) that Satoshi Tajiri listing came from somewhere more than simply “out of thin air,” and I feel like something is going to be teased for either this year or next. There’s no way to tell due to all of the moving parts, but I feel it.
Chances: Slightly, slightly leaning towards yes
What do you think? Are we getting a Pokémon game announced at this year’s show? Will it come out this year or next? Would it be a third version of X and Y, sequels, or something better?
Where are these super frustrating parts of Xenoblade Chronicles that everyone keeps talking about?
Near the end of the game, the difficulty spikes up on the bosses. Of note is one where the game introduces poisonous floors along side a boss that hits hard. As a player who did much of the side content and was over-leveled for much of the game, even I noticed the spike in difficulty at the end of the main story.
Focusing more on the middle, there are a major points of story telling that could be a drag for some players. The first notable one for me are the events upon reaching the Bionis' head. Others include Sword Valley and what happens after. I can imagine these points being exhausting and restricting for some players.
D'awww. Always enjoy your kind words, Enner.
And yup. Poison floor boss is so bad that I might have quit the game had I not been reviewing it.
I understand not voraciously indulging in all of the pre-release coverage, especially the Japan ramp-up. I recognize that I'm kinda crazy in seeing every bit of pre-release stuff for the game.
With regards to the music, there is a sampler of the game's soundtrack available on YouTube. Hiroyuki Sawano's style from anime such as Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn, Guilty Crown, Kill la Kill, and Attack on Titan is on full force here. You can take a listen and see how much you lament the loss of ACE+. I enjoy Sawano's music so I'm looking forward to the game's soundtrack. If I have one lament it's that Sawano hasn't showed much breadth for a few years now, either by choice or order.
The talk of the game being delayed to 2016 really scares me. With Zelda U most likely slipping in to 2016, I can't fathom the NA/EU/OC release of Xenoblade Chronicles X following suit. More than ever, Nintendo needs Xenoblade to come out of Japan in time for Christmas.
Thanks for bringing that to my attention, friend. And yeah, the 2016 thing is kind of terrifying when you think of what else they have this holiday season.
Not sure what happened in the previous post of mine...
Kevin Larrabee is the man! It was so great to hear another recent episode of the Back-in-my-Play podcast, and it was equally awesome to hear him as a guest on here. Excellent episode, gentlemen!!!
Thank you! I always love feedback of all kinds, and I'll try to have him on again.
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