Topic: IGN Nintendo Voice Chat thread, New episode! Moon has abysmal sales

[Spak-Spang]

I am confused about the Metroid Prime Remakes, are they going to be packaged together or separately? 

I think Nintendo would have been smarter to release the Pikmin's remade together in one package and the Metroid Primes together.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

Nintendo probably isn't nearly done porting Prime2 and Pik2.  They probably figured they'll make more money in the long run by getting the first games out sooner rather than releasing double-packs later.

[Flames_of_chaos]

I am confused about the Metroid Prime Remakes, are they going to be packaged together or separately? 

I think Nintendo would have been smarter to release the Pikmin's remade together in one package and the Metroid Primes together.

There are 7 games in the New Play Control series: Chibi Robo, Donkey Kong:Jungle Beat, Mario Power Tennis, Metroid Prime, Metroid Prime 2,Pikmin, Pikmin 2.

[Flames_of_chaos]

DSi price + date (US)

- $169.99
- April 5
- Was close to Matt’s prediction
- Craig thought it would be $149, Matt said it would be $179
- Was going to be $179 but Nintendo decided to change it
- Bozon thinks it might have been helpful that the price got out there and then people freaked out
- Recap: Has 2 built-in cameras, built-in memory, SD card slot to save photos + AAC files
- Craig thinks it’s a cool system
- $40 more than the DS Lite - Daemon thinks that’s reasonable
- You are losing out on the GBA port + DS games that use the slot
- Red Octane won’t miss the boat on DSi - Craig believes they’re working on peripheral for Guitar Hero franchise on DSi
- Probably won’t make it so you can play the ones that already came out on the DSi
- Should upgrade if you have the first DS
- Bozon loves the d-pad on the DSi
- There are cool little things on the DSi like the ability to swap cartridges, if you hold down the select button and hold up or down you can adjust the brightness within a game
- Can update firmware
- Will have to deal with the mini-fridge problem like the Wii
- For the most part Craig thinks the DSi is a good step up but it’s not mindblowing
- Matt says it’s worth it
- No differences between Japanese + NA DSi systems
- No white color for launch
- Matt wishes there was white
- Craig surprised that Nintendo is offering two colors
- Bozon loves the black DSi but there are scuff marks
- Interface is much slicker
- Haven’t announced any DSiWare games for NA - will probably be more announcements from Iwata at GDC
- Last week Craig was shown the Japanese version of Wario Ware + one of the Art Style games

Rhythm Heaven

- Coming out on April 5
- Version Craig was shown had some of the music changed
- Music is the same but lyrics now in English
- Tap/stroke screen to beat of the song
- A lot of fun, visuals stylish
- Has a lot of personality
- Already sold a million in Japan

Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon

- Remake of the original Fire Emblem game that wasn’t released in NA
- Same game with updated visuals + modern features + extra prologue chapters
- Turn-based strategy game
- Nintendo trying to ease new players into it
- Still a very deep and challenging game
- Has online play with voice chat
- Can only take 5 units into online battle
- Daemon thought the game was great
- Bozon wishes it had sprite art

Mario & Luigi 3

- Visuals the same as previous 2 titles
- Hard to figure out what’s going on because it’s in Japanese
- Craig really digs the concept
- Bowser sucks up all of the characters, Mario and Luigi inside Bowser
- Wander around and wake Bowser up, then can control Bowser on the top screen
- There is a tutorial but it’s easy to follow
- You can figure it out if you buy the Japanese version but you won’t get the humor
- Craig guesses a May release for NA - Thinks the game is localized already
- Bozon would pay $100 for Soma Bringer in English
- Game is original

Suikoden DS

- Bozon really likes it
- Wishes he could turn VO off
- Has more voice work than any other DS game Bozon has played on DS
- Has a ton of random battles
- Daemon not a fan of random battles but he’s looking forward to the game
- It’s a lot of fun, Bozon still needs to play more of it
- Some sidequests really short
- Promising game that readers don’t seem to care about

Dead Space Extraction

- A little different from many were expecting
- It’s on-rails
- Will play like House of the Dead: Overkill (House of the Dead Space)
- Developed by Eurocom and EA
- Matt a big fan of Eurocom - have worked on NightFire, Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy
- Footage looked pretty good
- Someone watched it in the office and thought it was a Dead Space 2 trailer
- Matt thinks they’ve made a competent engine, character models look good overall
- Starts the storyline from first game
- A lot of people complaining about it being on-rails - might be trying to avoid comparison to 360
- Matt thinks it’ll be the best shooter on Wii when it arrives
- Daemon generally doesn’t like on-rail shooters - House of the Dead was an exception
- Want to make sound and story a big deal
- Coming out this year - Fall or Autumn game
- Matt would rather have an on-rail shooter Dead Space than no Dead Space on Wii
- Game’s producer said the game will have flying enemies
- Has been in development for a long time - more than a year already
- The game hurts just Wii-only owners

Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop

- Not all that excited, but when Daemon played it he found gameplay from 360 version still there
- Doesn’t look that great
- Not as many zombies as 360 version
- While you’re running, zombies just pop up out of nowhere
- Zombies stand around sometimes
- Now have multiple save slots
- Can’t take photos of zombies - weird gaming mechanic to remove
- Not as satisfying to tear zombies apart - blood not rendered as believably
- Would be better if it was an on-rails shooter (joke)
- More moderately priced as $40
- Some weapons have waggle control

- PR guy wants to show them a sweet new game

Life Force

- One of Daemon’s favorite shooters
- Spiritual sequel to Gradius
- Level design was awesome
- Awesome boss fights

Evasive Space

- High Voltage cranking out WiiWare games
- Better than the racing game
- Yukes publishing it
- Not a bad game
- Not a shooter
- About not running into things
- All infrared-based controls - ship flies to reticule - control feels lose
- Execution isn’t so good
- Never really know where you’re supposed to go
- Some people will like it
- There are online leaderboards, offline multiplayer mode
- Animales de la Muerte will be a retail game
- High Voltage probably has a little team working on WiiWare games

Onechanbara

- Totally average game
- Succeeds at being a guilty pleasure
- Bozon wishes motion wasn’t used for attacks
- Translation lazily done
- Don’t explain features
- Game fine for what it is
- Wii game getting average scores, 360 game getting terrible scores (they are different games)

Phantom Brave

- Officially being ported to the Wii
- Came out on PS2
- Adding new features, updating the graphics
- Coming out in June
- Can move units around freely within a circle

Knights in the Knightmare

- Atlus announced they’re bringing it over
- Bozon can’t wait
- Atlus going crazy about bringing games to the US

- Valkyrie Profile preview coming soon

MadWorld

- Have been playing it at a fair pace
- Definitely longer than 3 hours - About 5 hours in so far
- Matt loving it
- Everyone in the office who sees it does a double take
- Artistic and way gory
- Game gets pretty tough
- There are some major boss fights in the game that are challenging
- Matt recently beat a boss with a sliver of life left
- Great beat-em-up
- Game of the year contender
- Matt more excited about playing MadWorld than Resident Evil 5
- Publishers are absolutely watching this game
- If the game bombs, gamers are in trouble
- Matt will hate you if you can afford to buy the game and you rent it instead
- A sequel is possible if it sells well - sequels not always possible, even if it does sell well

Reader questions

- Should spend money to upgrade to DSi if you have original DS
- Will be doing full reviews for New Play Control games
- Retro Studios won’t enhance multiplayer for NPC! Metroid Prime 2: Echoes
- Day and night cycles longer than Harvest Moon 64 + have more energy
- Editors at IGN can tell what a 60 FPS game is by looking at it - just takes experience
- Kirby Wii still showing up on release lists
- Nintendo will never remove friend codes but third parties will
- Bully like GTA without all of the language + sexual content

[KDR_11k]

- If the game bombs, gamers are in trouble

We're in trouble then. The game buying public doesn't want zany graphics or excessive gore (of course there's a chance that it'll do well and I'm wrong but I think that's unlikely). The publishers should probably look at The Conduit instead.

[ShyGuy]

I think I will go preorder the Conduit to support Sega and spit in the face of EA.

[Deguello]

Dead Space Extraction

- The game hurts just Wii-only owners

Yeah, it's not like there's many of them, right?

[Flames_of_chaos]

Personally I'm excited for a bunch of the games mentioned in the podcast: Madworld, Dead Space Extraction, Knights in the Knightmare, Suikoden, Mario and luigi 3, life force(getting it on VC soon),rhythm heaven and I'm excited for the features that the DSi will bring.

Also Deg we all know that your disappointed with Extraction just let it go man, if you don't like it then don't buy it.

[Peachylala]

Dead Space Extraction

- The game hurts just Wii-only owners

Yeah, it's not like there's many of them that have stayed with Nintendo through the dark times, right?

Fix'ed.

Remember, the Wii somehow makes 3rd parties stupidity aspect flourish. It's what fuels our wacky sarcasam.

[Deguello]

Also Deg we all know that your disappointed with Extraction just let it go man, if you don't like it then don't buy it.

Entirely different issue here.  It's not like the Wii is some kind of small niche console nobody owns.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

Let's be realistic, Oprah and her army of grandmas aren't going to buy Dead Spinoff.  When the game bombs, Wii owners will be better off as EA will be hurt even more, not earning enough cheap profits.  That way retailers will have less confidence in EA, more EA games will just fall off retailer shelves, making more room for Mario & Sonic and the Snow Games, a real 3rd party winner.

[Flames_of_chaos]

What are you talking about Pro, EA is one of the few publishers that put a good amount of effort on their Wii games, sure they have a bunch of duds but EA makes a lot of games each year and not all of them will have glowing reviews.

[ShyGuy]

EA lost all their cred with Dead Space: Zapper edition

[Luigi Dude]

- If the game bombs, gamers are in trouble

We're in trouble then. The game buying public doesn't want zany graphics or excessive gore (of course there's a chance that it'll do well and I'm wrong but I think that's unlikely). The publishers should probably look at The Conduit instead.

Even if Madworld or The Conduit does well, a lot of these companies will still ignore the Wii.  Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition and Umbrella Chronicles both sold over 1 million copies and yet that didn't change anything.  If Madworld does well, they'll just say wait until The Conduit is released.  If that does well, they'll just say wait until the next M-rated titles is released and so on.

A lot of these third parties are pretty much waiting for a high profile M rated third party Wii game to bomb so they can finally justify their reasons for not supporting it.  It's pretty much like the Gamecube all over again where they keep looking for a reason not to support the system until they can find it.

Then they'll do the usual, "See, only Nintendo and family titles sell on the system so there's no audience for us".  Of course, once again ignoring the fact that the Resident Evil games have all been million sellers on both the Gamecube and the Wii.  Showing there is and always been a large sized market for M-rated games on a Nintendo system.

[Adrock]

On the bright side, Capcom is at least entertaining the thought of a new RE on the Wii. Yeah, that could mean anything, including nothing.....

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

Maybe the real RE4?

[Peachylala]

Even if Madworld or The Conduit does well, a lot of these companies will still ignore the Wii.  Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition and Umbrella Chronicles both sold over 1 million copies and yet that didn't change anything.  If Madworld does well, they'll just say wait until The Conduit is released.  If that does well, they'll just say wait until the next M-rated titles is released and so on.

A lot of these third parties are pretty much waiting for a high profile M rated third party Wii game to bomb so they can finally justify their reasons for not supporting it.  It's pretty much like the Gamecube all over again where they keep looking for a reason not to support the system until they can find it.

It's too bad for them then, it's the cheapest console to develop for (even if it is under-powered) and it has a fanbase that will semi-give you a chance with an IP that takes advantage of the Wii's advatages.

I guess third parties love to lose money then. Outside of Boom Blox, I can't think of one American made game that peeked my interest. It also doesn't help I have a small dislike to FPS games (they are sometimes too popular for their own good... oh well).

[Stratos]

Maybe the real RE4?

Do you mean the real RE5 as in what RE5 should have been? Or were you hearkening back to the old RE4 demo from the early Gamecube days?

Either of those would be interesting to see realized on Wii. Though I like the current rumors floating around of an RE2 remake in the RE4 style for Wii.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

Old RE4 based on the old broken RE mechanics, to be specific.

[Stogi]

The clip was awesome. I remember it being very creepy.

[Spak-Spang]

I really am not a fan of the new direction RE is taking.

4 Controls well, and I believe it is the best playing Resident Evil game, but I want the creepy Monsters, and Zombies gameplay back.  I don't want to be terrified by several Zombie Like people after me...although there is still place for that...but I like the idea that one creature is deadly enough to take you out easily. 

Yes, I know I don't play these games, but I do like to watch and experience them...and I was always a bigger fan of that it only takes one to kill you.  Swarms, mean you just have to be more bad ass to survive. 

[Flames_of_chaos]

I really am not a fan of the new direction RE is taking.

4 Controls well, and I believe it is the best playing Resident Evil game, but I want the creepy Monsters, and Zombies gameplay back.  I don't want to be terrified by several Zombie Like people after me...although there is still place for that...but I like the idea that one creature is deadly enough to take you out easily. 

Yes, I know I don't play these games, but I do like to watch and experience them...and I was always a bigger fan of that it only takes one to kill you.  Swarms, mean you just have to be more bad ass to survive. 

This is why I loved Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles and why I believe in Dead Space: Extraction.

[Flames_of_chaos]

Handhelds

- Article up going through all of the Nintendo handhelds
- Nintendo been updating handhelds every 1-2 years
- GBA and DS were supposed to coexist but that didn’t happen
- Bozon feels more could have been done with GBA before moving on to the DS
- TMNT game that came out on consoles wasn’t good but one on GBA was a lot of fun

Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop

- An average but fun game for Wii
- Had to cut a lot of corners to put it on Wii
- Cut out the ability to use camera
- Daemon still has fun mowing down zombies
- Average but totally average and playable game
- Short game - under 10 hours
- Will probably be a rental for most people
- When you use certain weapons zombies just wait to be killed
- Game is really easy - might have scaled back the difficulty
- The point: Daemon had fun playing it, could have been a lot worse, could have been a lot better
- Zombies pop up out of nowhere
- Using the RE4 engine but doesn’t look as good as RE4
- Craig thinks it’s strange to use the RE engine for Dead Rising - different kinds of designs

Blue Dragon Plus

- A lot like Heroes of Mana
- RTS feel
- CG work is amazing - around 30 minutes
- Level up after each battle
- Don’t get to finish level until you kill anything so it’s weird to have level ups
- Really fun but basic
- Review coming up tomorrow

Magician’s Quest: Mysterious Times

- Animal Crossing clone
- Set up village, go to the shop, etc.
- Can see stuff coming from a farther distance because of both screens
- Some slow down and frame issues
- It’s a cool game
- Wireless, chat, event days, competitions, catch bugs/fish,
- Magic system to communicate with NPCs
- There’s a fart spell

Moon

- Game sold very few units in launch month (NPD numbers)
- Can’t say exact number
- Didn’t sell 1500 units in launch month
- Daemon finds that shockingly low
- Brand probably worked against it
- No marketing for the game
- It’s the kind of game you really want to support
- Could be better but it’s a great game
- Hurts more that Renegade Kid has done 2 titles, now the second game didn’t sell very well at all
- How will they convince publishers to give them money to work on the next game?

New Play Control! Metroid Prime

- Came out last week
- 480p widescreen
- GameCube already ran with progressive scan but not widescreen
- Cut-scenes are cropped (widescreen on Wii) - minor issue but noticeable if you’ve played the GameCube version
- Craig would much rather play this game on Wii
- Much better than doing lock-on stuff on GameCube
- Advanced controls are PC-like
- Basic lock-on is like GameCube game, more advanced - cursor doesn’t automatically lock-on to character
- Everything done in Metroid Prime 3 applied to NPC! Metroid Prime - makes it a much better game
- Still holds up 6-7 years later
- Looks better than Dead Rising
- Voice-over at beginning of the game - really cheesy - apparently European version had it

Overlord: Dark Legend

- Not a port of the original
- Play as Overlord
- Kind of like evil Pikmin
- Group of minions do your bidding
- Daemon impressed
- Looks really good
- Pointer controls to control minions - works really well
- Daemon had a lot of fun playing it

Overlord Minions

- On DS, skeptical of Overlord Minions - Gave it a kiddy style
- Overlord doesn’t make an appearance - only 4 minions
- All touch-screen controls
- More of a puzzle game
- It’s okay but not as impressive as Overlord: Dark Legend

Gauntlet

- Might be canceled
- Craig knows for a fact it has been in development for a long time
- Originally was a tech demo
- Was impressive to Nintendo but weren’t willing to put money into developing it fully
- Eidos came in and gave money, then finished the game
- Has been finished for at least a year, Eidos has been having some problems
- Warner Bros. calling the shots
- It was flawed but fun
- Game still in limbo
- Craig is guessing the game will find itself in some other company’s hand

Puzzle Quest: Galactrix

- It’s good
- Another match-3 game and gems are hexagonal
- Gems can replenish from any side of the playing field
- Very addictive
- Still has RPG elements
- Tons of stuff to do in the game
- Game a lot bigger than the first Puzzle Quest
- Doesn’t run all that smoothly for some reason
- Will enjoy it if you liked the first Puzzle Quest

Peggle DS

- Turned out great
- Like Pachinko mixed with pinball
- Tun of luck in the game but also need to be skillful with choices that you make
- Also an addictive game

DICE news

- Nintendo announced first DSiWare game - Moving Memo
- Create own animations and share them
- Can be edited by other users
- Upload them to a website
- Didn’t say if they would charge for it or not
- DSi comes with 1000 Nintendo Points in Japan, haven’t announced that yet for NA
- Developers haven’t been sent out DSiWare dev. kits - only a few people have kits

- Picross 3D coming out next month in Japan - will probably release in US later this year

Valkyrie Profile

- Another turned base strategy game
- Only have 4 units in party - each one mapped to different face button
- When you attack an enemy, any party members in vicinity will join in on the attack
- Daemon impressed with it
- Comes out March 17

My Pet Shop

- No one should care about this game
- Would still choose it over Petz: Horses 47

Reader questions

- Nintendo releasing the blue DSi in NA probably to appeal to women - Craig prefers the black DSi
- Other sports that should be in Wii Sports Resort: Frisbee golf, javelin, candlepin bowling, batchi ball, horseshoes
- Should start out with Chrono Trigger as first RPG experience out of Chrono Trigger, DQV, The World Ends With You
- THQ probably not publisher of Scribblenauts
- Fully charged DSi runs for about 6 - 7 hours - full brightness and using Wi-Fi - little less than DS Lite
- Software that justifies buying a DS: Elite Beat Agents, Lock’s Quest, Moon, Call of Duty titles, New Super Mario Bros. Picross, Zelda, Mario Kart, etc (list goes on too long)

[Spinnzilla]

WTF.  I'll have to buy a copy of Moon when I get my DSi.

[bustin98]

What hurts is that you can't find Moon in Walmarts. I've been to two looking for it. Kmart didn't have it either. Hard to buy if the retailers aren't supporting it. Walmart also doesn't have Deadly Creatures. Someone is dropping the ball.