This is no big surprise. It's odd that Bill is so coy about the feature, considering the game is probably all but finished by now. It'll certainly be interesting to see how the feature works in 3D and a much more open game. I never used Super Guide in NSMBWii, but I should try it out of curiosity.

I wonder what the status actually is.  I was surprised at how unfinished the build at the media summit was given its upcoming launch date.  I think there's a reason they didn't allow footage and it didn't show up at GDC.

Are you suggesting that it may be delayed?

I wonder how the target market reacted to the Super Guide.  I've never encountered anyone online who actually used it beyond curiousity.  But that isn't the target demo.  Gamers posting on forums aren't the sort of people that would use a Super Guide.

I guess I'm arguing that if the Super Guide is going to add extra development time to the game, I would hope it's actually proving to be useful for its intended audience.

I'm very curious as to how they're going to incorporate such a feature into a more non-linear design like Zelda.

Boycott.

They're wasting value time, money, and resource to make a win button AI that could be spent on other things that the other 99% of the gaming population would use and enjoy; like making the game good for starters.

Did you play NSMB Wii? The "help" feature wasn't intrusive at all, and unless you were a gamer that reads the news you wouldn't know about it until you died more than seven times on a level. And while the game is challenging it isn't impossible that you will die more than seven times. The game even asks you if you want to complete the level FOR YOURSELF once the AI completes it, so the decision of leaving the AI do the work for you IS UP TO YOU.

NSMB Wii was an achievement in level design and gameplay, featuring some of the best Mario levels yet and completely surpasses the DS version in every possible manner. So no, the fact that the help feature was in the game didn't hinder AT ALL its brilliance. So before you boycott anything it pays to investigate what you are boycotting, or else you'll end up looking like a fool with no cause to rebel against.

Actually even Miyamoto himself mentioned how Zelda Wii might not have a Super Guide for this reason.  I forget his exact words but the basic summary was that for a game like NSMBW it's easy to do but for a much larger game like Zelda, it could get trickier trying to implement it in the same way.

Maybe with Zelda they just make it do the bare minimum, so it doesn't go looking for extra heart pieces beyond the ones you get after a boss, and it only does sidequests when it is absolutely necessary to proceed with the game.  So in OoT for example I don't believe you truly need Epona until you head to Gerudo Valley so until the game absolutely requires you to go there, the Super Guide doesn't get Epona for you.  If you really needed to you could probably plan out a very linear path for beating a Zelda game using only the essential tools required to complete the game.  Or make the Super Guide works entirely on a dugeon-by-dungeon basis.  Those are typically the hardest parts.  What sort of jackass gets stuck roaming the overworld?

For overworld exploration, your fairy could just guide the way to the next place you need to go to move your quest along. Super-Guide (like you said) could just work in the dungeon and challenging areas.

I'm not surprised at all that the feature is in this game. I don't think it would be very difficult to create as the structure of Galaxy is still pretty linear, though if there are still hidden stars like in the first game then I wonder if it would find them for you?

For Zelda, wasn't it revealed through some patent that it would have demonstration videos available at all times?

I hope you aren't being serious and are just trying to get a rise out of people.

Mario Galaxy was a very "core" game, and Nintendo would like to make it sell more. If more people purchase because they can now actually have fun via the use of the SuperGuide, then your next sequel can be bigger and better.

The feature shouldn't even impose on your gaming unless you continually die, in which case I would imagine you would be grateful for the Superguide. I never saw the thing in NSMB Wii, and I was happy with how the game turned out.

Even though I'm pretty sure stevey is just joking with his rant, I'm going to post this anyway.

http://us.wii.com/iwata_asks/nsmb/vol3_page4.jsp

This is why every single person who considers themselves a gamer should love the Super Guide and hope it appears in every single Nintendo game from now on.  The Super Guide is what allowed NSMBW to be a much more challenging game then the DS NSMB.  Since the team didn't have to worry about trying to make the game playable to the lowest skill level like the DS version, they were able to make a harder game that was more rewarding for most players.  But since the Super Guide was there, they didn't have to worry about the game turning away the lower leveled players since they now had a way to get past any area's they were having trouble with.