Post by: Shaymin on March 27, 2015, 04:27:51 PM
Before Zelda Wii U got the tea table treatment, there was actual news. We swear.
http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/news/39938/nintendo-newsletter-wait-something-else-happened-today
A new Iwata Asks headlines the last Newsletter of the working week.
Nintendo Reveals Interesting Facts About Xenoblade Development, Sales
According to Nintendo, the original release of Xenoblade sold better in Western territories than in Japan.
A new Iwata Asks interview was published last night with MonolithSoft Executive Director Tetsuya Takahashi. During the course of the interview, Iwata mentioned “The overseas sales would never be higher than the Japanese sales unless that was the case” when discussing the original Wii release’s reception in the west.
The full interview also touches on Takahashi’s inspirations including Star Trek, Gundam and Thunderbirds, as well as how MonolithSoft attempts to balance story and gameplay in JRPGs and an incident in which a young Takahashi was apparently hung upside-down in a closet as a child for disassembling stereo equipment.
Our Take: "Takahashi’s father would fit right in as a Nintendo World Report forum moderator. In all seriousness, that RPG continuum is a really intriguing concept..." - Donald Theriault
Major US Retailer Begins Selling eShop Credit Online With Email Delivery
Thanks to Walmart, impulse eShop credit purchases may be just a couple of clicks away.
Walmart has begun selling eShop credit codes on their website with email delivery of the code, as found by noted deal hunter @Wario64. The site offers all four of the main denominations of eShop credit ($10/20/35/50), and Paypal is available as a payment option.
Since the credit is from a US retailer, a US billing address is required as well as a US Nintendo Network ID. No word on when this functionality will come to other countries.
Our Take: "I could do so much damage with this if I wasn't in the wrong country." - Donald Theriault
Europe May Be Getting Azure Struck Soon
A now-deleted listing on the German Wii U eShop indicates that Azure Striker Gunvolt may be coming to Europe as soon as this coming Thursday.
The listing (pictured) shows the game with a 2 April release date and a launch price of €12.99. The inclusion of bonuses such as the 3DS themes or the 8-bit demake Mighty Gunvolt is not shown in the image.
For more information on the game, check out the NWR review from Neal (based on the North American version) or this gameplay video from our own Daan Koopman:
Our Take: "Sorry for the delay Europe, but you're getting a really good game here." - Donald Theriault
The Big Finish:
- Youkai Watch prints money, and it hasn’t even come west yet: The ghost-chasing series from Level 5 recently crossed the 7m mark for game sales in just Japan, as well as over 100m medals being sold. Their replacement plans will become clear soon, as the Level-5 Vision event will be livestreamed – in Japan only, through the NicoNico video service.
- We have updated yesterday's newsletter to reflect that the Paper Mario 3D leaker has outed himself.
- Finally, the ESRB rating for Sega’s upcoming Hatsune Miku Project Mirai DX has been released, and despite Miku being REALLY down to party and an offscreen guillotining, the game pulled an E10+.
Post by: Mop it up on March 28, 2015, 06:54:44 PM
Post by: NSM on March 28, 2015, 11:12:18 PM
It makes sense to me that Xenoblade would sell better in NA, if not for the design of the game then because NA has a larger Wii userbase.
I think you're selling the statistic short.
This is a game that came out when the Wii was pretty much dead in the water and only had limited copies sold at one major chain (GameStop) and online. After which it pretty much disappeared from everywhere except Ebay. It had pretty much no marketing to speak of, and launched on a console whose audience tended not to be interested in these sorts of games.
For the game to sell better here despite all of those factors is frankly kind of amazing. NOA should be thanking Operation Rainfall for recognizing (and perhaps even creating) a demand that they otherwise likely would have ignored.
Post by: fred13 on March 30, 2015, 11:41:06 AM
Even if they had kept it as a GameStop exclusive and just printed a bunch more copies they would have sold a bunch more copies.
This game was off the charts good. It's literally a tragedy that they didn't print more copies especially considering how cheap it is to just print more copies.
All I can say is I'm relieved that in 2 weeks anyone that wants the game will be able to buy it (even if the cartridges sell out they can still download it.
Post by: Ian Sane on March 30, 2015, 01:16:23 PM
I questioned the wisdom of having the key New 3DS exclusive be such an obscure game but now it doesn't seem like that bad of an idea. A game like this is never going to do Mario numbers but there is clearly a dedicated customerbase for RPGs and they're a loyal one. Why else do you think American branches of companies like Atlus and NIS stay in business?
