Topic: This Week's Virtual Console

[NWR_Karlie]

Two NES games this Monday. Yoshi's Cookie and Bases Loaded provide delicious puzzles and dual viewpoint baseball.
 http://nintendoworldreport.com/newsArt.cfm?artid=15713

 This week on Virtual Console we see two games that allow for 1-2 players. Yoshi's Cookie is a puzzle game of the matching multiple items type. Fill a row or column with the same type of cookie by shifting them around the screen and that line will disappear. There are around 100 stages to beat, or you can compete against a friend in two-player mode to see who can match the most cookies.    

Bases Loaded is an arcade-style baseball game. Several options are available with twelve teams and thirty players, so you can choose from the different strengths of each. Controls go between choosing a pitch, covering all field positions, and batting. There  are two viewpoints shown while in play, behind the home plate and from the pitching mound.    

Both games are available for download now for 500 Wii points.    

WII-KLY UPDATE: TWO NEW CLASSIC GAMES ADDED TO WII SHOP CHANNEL    

 April 7, 2008  The arrival of April means springtime fun is officially back in season. To get Wii™ Shop Channel patrons in the spirit, we're pleased to offer a pair of lively NES® favorites. One is a breezy, puzzle-busting fantasy, the other a classic baseball title to keep sports fans fired up for a new season of nine-inning excitement. Whether your tastes run toward cookies or ballpark snacks, you'll find hours of gaming enjoyment right at your fingertips.    

Nintendo adds new games to the Wii Shop Channel at 9 a.m. Pacific time every Monday. Wii™ owners with a high-speed Internet connection can redeem Wii Points™ to download the games. Wii Points can be purchased in the Wii Shop Channel or at retail outlets. This week's new games are:    

Yoshi's Cookie™ (NES®, 1-2 players, Rated E for Everyone, 500 Wii Points): Take one part puzzle game, combine with intuitive game play, add a pinch of multiplayer action and top with a layer of everyone's favorite dinosaur. Mix together and let set for roughly 100 stages' worth of time. If that sounds like a winning recipe to you, then step into the kitchen and get ready for a batch of fast-paced puzzle action. Hunker down to move rows and columns of randomly placed cookies in an effort to align all the cookies of the same type. Successfully assemble a row or column to make the line disappear, then move to a new one. If you're good enough, you may even be able to make a Yoshi cookie appear! Feel like taking on a friend? Fire up the two-player mode, where you can attack your opponent while competing to match as many cookies as possible. Be careful, though—if your timing is off, you could end up attacking yourself. Who knew dinosaurs had such a weakness for puzzle games and sweets?    

Bases Loaded (NES®, 1-2 players, Rated E for Everyone, 500 Wii Points): Bases Loaded is a baseball game with an arcade feel and plenty of options from which players can choose. Select one of 12 teams, set your lineup from the 30 players available (each with different strengths), then play a single game or try to win the pennant. During game play, the screen shows two different viewpoints: one from behind home plate as you're batting, and the other from the pitching mound in a television-style shot (unique for its time) as your team plays in the field. Strong play control and excellent graphics add to the excitement as you decide what pitch to throw (you can even try to provoke the opposing batter into charging the mound), control all positions on the field, or do your best to get a hit. So step to the plate and find out why this is one of the most popular baseball games on the NES. Can you pull through in the clutch?    

For more information about Wii, please visit wii.com.    

[Ian Sane]

Nintendo has done a fantastic job lately of releasing titles on the VC that are of little interest to anyone.  I've never actually played Yoshi's Cookie but I hear it's decent so it certainly deserved to be released on the VC at some point.  But sh!t it's like these obscure titles that weren't even considered big releases at the time have been it for over a month.

And what's with releasing the NES version of Yoshi's Cookie when there's a presumably superior SNES version?  They did the same thing with Wario's Woods.  Is this a deliberate attempt to maximize sales of the "inferior" version or is whoever's making the call here too lazy/ignorant to know better?

[animecyberrat]

I think the idea is to release every game they can, you know to maximize profits. Maybe Bases loaded didn't interest you, but considering the cost and how many people have a Wii, I'm sure someone out there who remembers that game will notice.


I'm all for this cuz otherwise 90% of the TG16 games would have been ignored and there are still lots of obscure no name titles I'm waiting for.

[Ian Sane]

Oh I agree that the more games the better.  I don't want them to neglect the obscure stuff.  But they're still sitting on tons of classic stuff that a lot of people want to see and yet week after week has gone by and it's nothing but titles of only moderate interest.  I guess it's just a matter of pacing.  They should make a good effort to balance out the classics, the sleepers and the blatant rip-offs like Urban Champion.

There is however no excuse for releasing the NES versions of those puzzle games and not the SNES ones though.  The NES and Gameboy versions of Yoshi's Cookie can be considered relics of the time with the SNES version being the definitive one.  The only reason to even offer the other versions is either for completeness sake or to try to scam an extra buck.

It's like how from a historical point of view 3-level NES Donkey Kong should still exist but it's completely unacceptable that that version is constantly re-released while the definitive arcade version is completely unavailable for legal purchase.  If only one version is to be available it should be the best and most definitive version.  Either do that or make ALL versions available.  In fact I'm more in support of the all option merely because I don't trust videogame companies to put in the due effort to pick a definitive version.  Time has shown that videogame companies just don't give a f*ck about doing retro releases right provided they do it good enough to get our money.

[animecyberrat]

Kinda like how the arcade version of Mortal Kombat has never seen a proper console release.

I think their logic is this: releasing two or three games a week makes it easier to showcase those two or three games verses releasing a ton of games that people may or may not know about. They trickle the good stuff out with the crap. Both of these two games were actually pretty good and likely have fans. And Eventually they should get to the SNES versions I would suspect cuz it's not like Nintendo to pass up on an opportunity to re-sell old Mario games.

As for DK, have you considered this, is it possible they arcade roms, the original code or whatever don't exist anymore? Or in a way that they could easily convert them to a newer format? I mean if they redid DK now, let's say that have the code. They would be better off doing it for Wiiware as an upgrade then porting it to SNES hardware and releasing a VC game that never had a release on the original system.

[NWR_pap64]

I said it once and i'll say it again; this is all due to the flood of titles invading the Wii.

Something similar happened last year at around the same time. The VC was getting nothing but crap, save for the occasional gem here and there. Then after there was a major gaming drought Nintendo started releasing bigger and better titles so that players could cope with the lack of big titles.

After all, we got Zelda 2, Mario Bros. 3 and Japanese imports during the late summer and fall periods.

So I expect the same thing to happen. Not to mention that with WiiWare coming up they might want to focus on the new titles coming to the service and the retro titles.

[KDR_11k]

As for DK, have you considered this, is it possible they arcade roms, the original code or whatever don't exist anymore? Or in a way that they could easily convert them to a newer format? I mean if they redid DK now, let's say that have the code. They would be better off doing it for Wiiware as an upgrade then porting it to SNES hardware and releasing a VC game that never had a release on the original system.

There's so many ports of DK that I'm sure one of them would work on the VC. I've got the C64 version and that system is emulated.

[animecyberrat]

So they can do that version then instead of re-writing the NES code.