Topic: Radio Free Nintendo: Episode 63

[Karl Castaneda #2]

Suspense. Romance. Murder. None of which on this week's RFN!
 http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/newsArt.cfm?artid=14144

 Episode 63: Ridiculous Penetration    

What makes a game a 10/10 for me? MONEYHATS, BABY!    

 
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It's another three-man show this week, as Windy couldn't make it to recording. Jonny Metts is back, though, and together, he, Mike, and I bring the heat something special. After discussing some New Business, we jump into a special Forum Edition of Listener Mail, where we respond to some of the feedback from last week's episode. Boy, you guys had a lot to say!    

After that, it's time for Virtual Console Mondays, followed by a very cash-centered News segment, where we talk about everything from Dragon Quest remakes on DS to Pokémon: Diamond and Pearl hitting 10 Million worldwide to Wii owners being more "upscale."    

As if this wasn't enough, we bring it home with a discussion on what makes a game a 10/10 for us, and why that doesn't necessarily make a game perfect. We also reminisce on what games we've actually bestowed the legendary score upon, so you definitely don't want to miss it!    

Once you're done with the show, don't forget to Digg the podcast at the link above, as well as subscribing to and reviewing us on iTunes. Thanks much, and see you guys next week!    

Credits:    

This podcast was edited by Karl Castaneda.    

Music for this episode of Radio Free Nintendo is used with permission from Jason Ricci & New Blood. You can also purchase their album directly from the iTunes Music Store

[Ceric]

Sweet you actually read the forums.  Sometimes I don't think you guys care.

They all did release back to back to back.

Who said Battalion Wars wasn't good. *holds Pitch fork and begins mob*

Fire Emblem: You like it or not.

Miyamoto's Mysterious New IP.Banjo Adventures: Tales from the South

Yes all the new IPs are geared towards their new focus.

I will also say that some of that is because they now can.

Professor Layton: W00t.

Waiting for the hardware Revision.

I hope the new Mario Kart will have a DD mode.

Hey, I thought you were going to talk about more then just one post.

Abadox lol.

I'm surprised its the original on DS.  Which will delay my need to get a 360 longer.

They also have an engine that they are happy with on the DS and don't have to make a new one.

But aren't all the original versions 2D?  I mean that would be just moving the assets.

You don't even read are sales threads...

But the original Pokemon games had an arguably smaller user base to draw from.

NSMB...blah...

I agree.  Though I think that Rockband will have much much longer legs.  Especially because I think there will be more expansions and maybe a way to use it in actual concert type setting.

Yeah.

So you guys need more money?

I played EBA during my wait for the Wii.  I will always remember it.

The moral of the story: Anything will break your guitar.

The new Blasphemy  measure is GOooooo.

Next Week, Next Week.

You barely paid attention to us but you said you would a lot.  

[Karl Castaneda #2]

We definitely read the forums, Ceric, and I think I comment pretty often (mostly in Talkback, though). Anyway, as for why we only read one post, it was a sentiment echoed by a lot of you, so we were able to cover a lot of ground without reading a dozen paragraphs. We try to keep things clean and brief, so we can't read every response (though I do enjoy it).

[Nick DiMola]

Fire Emblem love represent!  Fire Emblem is like chess which is probably the only board game I can endure. Fire Emblem is a ton of thought and strategy(go figure) which is something I can get behind. November 5 I'll be all over this.

[Mashiro]

Yay Johhny for crossing 100 hours in Pkmn! (I clocked over 350 lol).

Completely agree about the built in storage. It's annoying. Not owning a SD card it was a bummer when I brought Wario Ware to my cousins house and realize that multiplayer would be locked due to lack of a save file. Lame.

Not to nitpick but doesn't RE4 "fake" the whole wide screen thing or am I mistaken for it faking something else?

lol far jokes and spam listener mail.

I played Advance Wars (the first) as well . . . and I never beat the last stage lol.

Just to ask, when was the last "hardcore" IP made by Nintendo? Let's honestly sit down and think about that. From Nintendo, first party wise, what new IP did Nintendo make on the Cube that was hardcore? Pikmin?

Yay 20 dollar price drop for Xbox 360.

Meh NWRs "the sky is falling" attitude is lame. Where is Windy when you need him? (Honestly, we know nothing outside of 2007 for Wii aside from Wii Fit and Mario Kart, lets see what pops up in the upcoming months and then start worrying). It's very unfair to compare MS and Nintendo and then blame Nintendo entirely on lack of "hardcore" games.

How many MS 1st party made games are filling up their game schedule? Nintendo can't force 3rd parties to release X games for the system, it's unfair to lay blame entirely on Nintendo's shoulders for lack of hardcore games from 3rd parties.

God if there is one thing I hate this gen it's friend codes . . .

Lol Square-Enix is the master of re-re-re-re-releasing games that's for sure. I tried DQ 7 I think and it was terrible lol.

Oh wow they're really redoing FF 5 and 6? My friend will be super happy he loves FF6 and says if they bumped up the graphics it would be like the best game ever.

LOL! "Making up exaggerated hyperbolic statements" . . . awesome.

GUITAR SMASH!

Elite Beat Agents was phenomenal. It was the first game that made me really happy to buy a DS. Can't wait for EBA2.

I'll just copy what Ceric said because he put it best: "The new Blasphemy measure is GOooooo." lol

LOL! Evan refuting the last 6 episodes would be hilarious.

Didn't touch on our comments as much as I thought you would from what your previous post said but it was an ok show.

[nickmitch]

I DEMAND that Evan be on the next podcast. We should all PM him and find other ways to pester him to be on the podcast.

[Caliban]

The first part of the podcast had a whole lot of pessimistic speculation on Nintendo's part, fair enough. Well I would get a 360 too but you know with its poor quality hardware it is quite risky to invest on a system that is indeed coming with a few good titles.

[ShyGuy]

Evan vs. the world podcast would be fantastic.

[Jonnyboy117]

It's not that I think Nintendo is unwilling to dish out a lot of games for its devoted fans in 2008...I think they will be far less capable of doing so than this year.  As Obi said on the podcast, development studios need some time to recharge and prepare the next game.  And Nintendo is devoting fewer studios than before to games geared specifically at "gamers".

By the way, that's all I meant by "hardcore".  I shouldn't even use that word, as I hate it so much.  When we're talking about casual games vs. X games, that "X" is the kind of stuff that everyone posting on this forum wants to play and has played for years and years.  We're talking about traditional games, the Marios and the Final Fantasies and the Zeldas and the Halos.  Whether Super Mario Galaxy is a "hardcore" game is irrelevant and kinda silly to discuss anyway, because the Super Mario games have a wide appeal across virtually every segment of game consumers.  

[Kairon]

But isn't it conventional wisdom that no matter what, we'll get the next Mario Kart, the next Animal Crossing, the next Mario Party, the next Zelda, the next Mario & Luigi RPG, the next Warioware, the next F-Zero, the next Fire Emblem, the next Samus, the next Mario game... no matter what happens?

It's hard to contemplate Nintendo abandoning its core when it's taken for granted that they'll release sequels for all their selling franchises.

[Ceric]

I don't know if I want a next Mario and Luigi Rpg.  After playing both I think they had the right idea just doing the first one.  They could have explained the advance stuff, I never got it, but it was a better game then the second one.  The second one wasn't bad but it wasn't as good as the first.  Much like Phoenix Wright.

[Jonnyboy117]

Kairon, if Nintendo ONLY offers sequels to the traditional gamers, then I would argue that they are indeed taking that market for granted.  This goes back to the original discussion on RFN.  Nintendo fans have clamored for new IPs for years and years.  Last gen, Nintendo's answer (aside from Pikmin) was to bring over a few series from Japan, like Fire Emblem and Advance Wars.  Barring Earthbound, they have run out of such options at this point.  Virtually all new IPs from Nintendo are now geared towards the casual market.

[vudu]

I don't think Bill listens to the Podcast, but if he did he would be the one to remind you that Nintendo never talks about games that aren't releasing this year.  Twilight Princess doesn't count because (a) it was supposed to be released in 2005 and (b) it's not like they had anything else worth talking about. You'll have to wait until 2008 to find out what is coming out in 2008.  

[TrueNerd]

I noticed the segment where my post was quoted and talked about at length and the segment where you used a picture of a fat nerd were one in the same. I'm sure it was purely coincidental and not at all a commentary on my nerdy whining, right?

... Right???

Anyways, I was arguing about purely this year and the games that will appeal to the hardcore in that time. Next year probably won't be as great as this year for the hardcore, but could it be any worse then most years with the GameCube? And if the answer is no, then why just recently has this topic become a paranoid fear of Nintendo fans? I'm entirely unconvinced that Nintendo's new focus on casual games is hurting the hardcore stuff in comparison to the recent years leading up to the casual shift. At the same time, I do think it would be just tremendous if Nintendo introduced a couple of new IPs geared towards people who have been playing video games for more then 8 months.

But really, I smiled when Karl starting reading my post. Thanks for that.  

[Kairon]

Quote
Originally posted by: Jonnyboy117
Kairon, if Nintendo ONLY offers sequels to the traditional gamers, then I would argue that they are indeed taking that market for granted.  This goes back to the original discussion on RFN.  Nintendo fans have clamored for new IPs for years and years.  Last gen, Nintendo's answer (aside from Pikmin) was to bring over a few series from Japan, like Fire Emblem and Advance Wars.  Barring Earthbound, they have run out of such options at this point.  Virtually all new IPs from Nintendo are now geared towards the casual market.

But in one of the questions asked Miyamoto in Time magazine, he said that he develops "new experiences" instead of new characters. If that experience works with an existing character, SLAP him on! (very, very, paraphrased of course). If not, then Miyamoto will make new characters.

Nintendo doesn't deal in IPs. They deal in experiences. This has been a chief talking point of Nintendo fans FOREVER. One ounce of a Nintendo sequel contains more concentrated innovation than 10 random new IPs. (exageration, but you get the idea)

We shouldn't be worried about whether Nintendo will continue the superficiality of creating new characters and IP, they're concerned about creating experiences that'll feel new no matter the layer of paint they slap on top of it.

[Jonnyboy117]

Quote
Originally posted by: vudu
I don't think Bill listens to the Podcast, but if he did he would be the one to remind you that Nintendo never talks about games that aren't releasing this year.  Twilight Princess doesn't count because (a) it was supposed to be released in 2005 and (b) it's not like they had anything else worth talking about. You'll have to wait until 2008 to find out what is coming out in 2008.

Last year, they showed a dozen Wii games that they knew wouldn't be out in 2006, plus a lot of DS games too.  This year, they showed Wii Fit and Mario Kart.  Nintendo has ALWAYS shown games at E3 that wouldn't be out until the next year.  They do traditionally focus on games that will be out before the next E3, with rare exceptions like Zelda, as you mentioned.  By this tradition, the only first-party Wii games Nintendo has announced for January - July 2008 are Wii Fit and Mario Kart.  That's a pretty lean schedule, even by Nintendo's standards.  I do expect at least one 2007 game to get delayed until that period, and they may bust out something semi-surprising like Animal Crossing or Kirby, but so far there is no indication that will happen.  Meanwhile, there is a very real chance that they'll push Wii Fit back all the way to Christmas 2008 to make it the megaton release of that season.

[Kairon]

All bets are out the window though due to the unbelievably watered down E3... from all companies, not just Nintendo.