Topics

1

Nintendo Gaming / Where are the adventure games?

« on: December 01, 2004, 11:01:34 PM »

Sam and Max, Loom, the Monkey Island series, the Indiana Jones games, Day of the Tentacle would all be BAD-ASS with a stylus, on the DS.

Lucasarts is clearly asleep at the wheel. Or else they're too busy pimping crappy Star Wars #3023 to recognise the potential here.
Seriously though, these games would own on DS. I was hoping the DS would spark an adventure revival, why aren't Revolution getting into it with Broken Sword, or whoever owns the Psygnosis properties with Discworld?

Use the top screen for the dialogue and the bottom screen with the stylus for control and the main action. The microphone and the stylus could be utilised for some stunning puzzles. When Tim Schaefer is done with Psychonauts, he should blow our minds with a point and clicker for the 21st century.  

This NEEDS to happen. It's nice to see Nintendo taking the lead with Another, it's just a shame to see no-one following.

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Nintendo Gaming / Rayman DS

« on: November 22, 2004, 09:15:06 PM »

Isn't it supposed to be a launch title? Anyone have it? If so, I'm curious to hear what you think, since the Rayman games were always solid but I've heard surprisingly little of the DS edition.  

3

Nintendo Gaming / New Unity Screenshots Revealed

« on: January 16, 2004, 04:16:56 PM »

Damn this game is shaping up to be seriously cool, I mean, you get to control a phoenix! I just hope Cube owners will buy it and prove the Gamecube is great for mature/arthouse developers to work on, it's a shame we haven't got any really neat music games. It's nice to see the developer, Jeff Minter call the Cube one of the better platforms he has worked on.

Expect it late '04/ early '05, apparently.

Screens here: http://www.yakyak.org/viewtopic.php?t=13754

[Hardware Design:]

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Nintendo Gaming / How would you Nintendo sell the N5?

« on: December 11, 2003, 03:11:14 AM »

What sort of style would you like to see Nintendo take on for the N5? Who do you think they could use in terms of designers, artists etc.

Here is my take...

Hardware Design: I mentioned this in another thread, but I believe Jonathon Ives from Apple would design a nice Nintendo. His works with Apple such as the G5 and iMac G4 are the sort of designs that make people desire them. They're revolutionary. The sort of designs people write articles about. The Gamecube is a gorgeous piece of work, no doubt (especially compared to the Xbox, but let's not even go there!) but it is rather kiddy with the purple. It would have been stunning if Nintendo released more kitch colours and even perhaps patterns. I must say I thought the hot pink one they had originally at E3 was exciting. The N5 should be cool. Consoles have changed barely at all in the past 25 years, smoother edges, brighter colours and that is about it. I want a console that on the outside at least makes it's competitors look like old hat, like yesterday's news and when I see it for the first time, redefines consoles for me just like the iMac G4 did for me and computers. Demanding for sure, but I can dream can't I?

Image Design/Artwork: Gamecube also has some nice logos with it and box design. But not exceptional and nothing that when you see it will make you marvel at it and want it. I would hire some decent designers. Get someone cool, someone like Designer's Republic. They made WipEout 2097 cool. It every other game look boring and unrefined. Don't let them touch the games, but logos etc. they could do a fantastic job. Nintendo's biggest problem is image - even most ten years olds think Nintendo is lame in my experience, wanting to emulate older siblings, the desire to grow up ecetra. I suspect once children are past the age they think Disney is cool, they're past the age they think Nintendo is cool and kids who think Disney is cool most likely find today's games to complicated due to their age. That is a massive over-generalisation but I think some of it holds true. With fantastic branding, Nintendo would sell alot more consoles and as a Nintendo fan, I figure that is a good thing. Other good designers who create cool things IMHO are Peter Saville and this guy, who I think is great.

TV Advertising: Greatest thing about the PS2 launch: getting David Lynch to direct a commercial for it. The world does not need more children running around pretending to be in FFT. Nintendo should have (they may have now) sacked their advertising agency long ago. Some of the most stupid ads ever came from Nintendo in the last few years. The FFT one being a prime example - they missed their target audience by two country miles. People like Spike Jonze, David Fincher, Jean Pierre Jeunet, Tim Burton, Ridley Scott (Apple again - 1984, legendary) are the sort of people I would like to see direct a Nintendo commercial.

So basically, if you were launching the N5 how would you sell it?  

5

Nintendo Gaming / The Console Wars: Game On - Article in TIME Magazine

« on: December 10, 2003, 10:26:27 PM »

ARTICLE HERE.

I think the article is dead-on and fantastic. From what (little, admittedly) i've seen of Iwata, I don't think much. Although Yamauchi was the butt of many jokes around the internet, he clearly was a shrewd businessman, making Nintendo what it is (was?) today. Although he did perhaps fall away from the times in his last few years, with a few silly mistakes, he seems to have been a strong, great leader. Perhaps they should have looked outside the company for a successor. Nintendo does need to get with the times, and Iwata quote in the article about online makes me think he isn't seeing the big picture - you may not make money off online directly, but knowing it is an option will make more people buy your console, and in the long term I suspect it will pay off for Microsoft (and Sony to a lesser degree). I agree with the slant the author is pushing of Nintendo needing to get with the times, the lack of DVD playback on the Gamecube, the cartridges on the N64, the mini-DVDs (fantastic as they are result in the Gamecube missing some games, i'm sure) as well as the lack of built in networking in the Cube and optical audio output all IMHO, mis-steps. I hope Iwata learns the lesson from this time: people want extra functionality, people want the standard, and people don't like purple. Gamecube may not contain extra functionality because it is meant to play games, according to Nintendo. But it appears people want more than to play games - so they should a) Team up with consumer electronics companies (ala 3DO), b) Start delivering more-in-one, matching Sony and Microsoft or c) Get out of the hardware game.

Anyway, what do others think of the issues this article raised?  

[1) Use Windows, support the Xbox]

6

General Chat / Why you should drop Windows...

« on: December 10, 2003, 03:06:04 PM »

In the vein of "Why you should drop IE...", here is why you should drop Windows and move to Linux or a BSD (such as Apple Darwin, FreeBSD or NetBSD). Why stop at IE? I've been using Linux since 1999 and it has now become excellent for desktop users.

1) Use Windows, support the Xbox
It is common knowledge that the way Microsoft funds the Xbox is through the sales of Office and Windows alone. Out of their 7 (I think) divisions those are the two that are profitable. By contributing money to Microsoft, you're propping up the Gamecube's competition. Remember, loyal Nintendoites, the more money Microsoft has, the more money Nintendo uses to fight them. PlanetGamecube's servers even run on Windows! Sort of ironic, right?

2) Open standards
Windows is closed software, meaning Microsoft don't let anyone play with or use the underlying code. In contrast, open source software can be modified, and sold by anyone, in almost anyway.

3) Stability
Although the odd application may be unstable, the Linux kernel (and the BSD kernels) are very stable. Generally, even when an application crashes, it won't bring the whole system down. No more blue screens (just kernel panics , joking).

4) FREE!
Most Linux (and as AFAIK all BSDs) are completely free to download, legally. Plus there are thousands of fantastic free applications. Including The GIMP (Photoshop replacement), OpenOffice.org (Office suite), Mozilla (Web browser), K3B (CD/DVD Burner, Nero replacement), Rhythmbox (iTunes replacement), Bluefish (superb web design app), Evolution (Outlook replacement) and many, many, many, more - practically all free.

5) Secure
Never get hit by nasty Windows virii again. Even if someone decides to write a bunch a Linux virii, the impact is minimised by the sheer amount of different distributions and that damage should only be restricted to the account you're running, not the whole system.

Anyway, there is some food for thought. Mull it over. You can try Linux wih out even touching your hard drive with a live cd such as Knoppix or Gnoppix. Good distributions for your hard drive if you are a beginner include Fedora Core (formerly Red Hat Linux), Mandrake and Ark Linux, as well as many others.

Some good websites include

http://www.distrowatch.com
http://www.pclinuxonline.com
http://www.gnome.org
http://www.knoppix.net
http://www.linux-mandrake.com
http://www.debian.org
http://www.arklinux.org