Topic: E3 2011 Predictions

[Chozo Ghost]

You guys are gonna make me take M:OM out of it's case for the 1st time and actually play it just to see how bad it really is.

Just make sure you watch out for that glitch where the door gets permanently locked. The glitch occurs when you attempt to backtrack and explore a certain area which is something veterans of past Metroid games are trained to do, but if you try that in this game you get permanently stuck at a certain point.

I would actually say that permanently closed door glitch epitomizes everything that sucks about Other M. Sakamoto's shitty ass design philosophy didn't just make a game that was piss poor, it actually broke the game and made it unplayable if you attempt to play it the way you would play any other Metroid game.

Then again, there is far less point to exploration and discovery in this game anyway so why bother backtracking? If you're going to play it I say just fly through it and if you grab anything just focus on the energy tanks, because missiles aren't really that important in this particular game. The Boss battles in this game are fun and exciting and challenging at times. There's nothing about the Boss battles that I would really complain about... well, except that you have to switch perspectives to use missiles and that can get you killed as you struggle to regain your bearings. But in general most enemies can be killed by just your beam weapons.

[BlackNMild2k1]

I've played a demo that was stuck in a room with a walk way up above that you had to go into a ball top reach. All you could do is go back to the previous room, but otherwise there was no way to advance from that point. Would that be where the glitch happens?

[Ian Sane]

I would actually say that permanently closed door glitch epitomizes everything that sucks about Other M. Sakamoto's shitty ass design philosophy didn't just make a game that was piss poor, it actually broke the game and made it unplayable if you attempt to play it the way you would play any other Metroid game.

Sakamoto makes a Mario game.  You try to jump on the first Goomba you see and the game locks up and bricks your Wii.

[Chozo Ghost]

I've played a demo that was stuck in a room with a walk way up above that you had to go into a ball top reach. All you could do is go back to the previous room, but otherwise there was no way to advance from that point. Would that be where the glitch happens?

No. The glitch happens after you get the grapple beam and just before you get the super missiles. Its in some lava level where you grapple across this wall and there's only one door there and if the glitch is in effect that door will be locked with no way it can ever be opened, and also you can't even reach the grapple points to go back the way you came so you are just stuck there forever.

The funny thing is the glitch itself is actually triggered VERY early in the game and you can spend probably 2 hours playing without even knowing the glitch is in effect. Its a huge waste of time and it took me awhile before I was able to work up the motivation to start the game over again. I kept holding out hope Nintendo would release a patch or something but they never did, and at this point its extremely unlikely they ever will. This was a serious bug though, not just because it broke the game but also because it was very easy to trigger it and a very large percentage of players were effected by it. I think if you are a veteran Metroid player you are more likely to trigger it because you have the instinct to explore to try to find good things. Unfortunately, the only thing you gain from exploring in this game is a door that never opens and no way to progress...

Sakamoto makes a Mario game.  You try to jump on the first Goomba you see and the game locks up and bricks your Wii.

Also when Mario runs into Bowser for the first time the game reverts into a cut scene where Mario screams in terror and curls up into a fetal position and starts crying until bad ass Luigi shows up and throws a tortoise shell at Bowser which buys Mario just enough time to get authorization from Princess Peach to allow him to use Fireballs.

[Kytim89]

Wii Winter Sports will be unveiled and announced at E3 of this year for a winter release. It will be motion plus enabled and include fencing and racquet ball.

[BeautifulShy]

Okay here is what I think will be at E3 this year.
Trailer for Skyward sword showing off more locations in the game and maybe some clue as to who that character is from the GDC trailer.
We will see The Last story and Xenoblade get a North American release.Guessing a November release for both.
Nintendo will also go over future 3DS games and Wii games and their release dates. By future I mean the second half of 2011.

[MV]

I would actually say that permanently closed door glitch epitomizes everything that sucks about Other M. Sakamoto's shitty ass design philosophy didn't just make a game that was piss poor, it actually broke the game and made it unplayable if you attempt to play it the way you would play any other Metroid game.

Haha, I agree completely, great way to sum it all up. I'm so happy I just rented that from Gamefly.

As for E3 this year, I doubt we'll see the new Wii successor, but we will see the finale of the Wii with a few great games. I'm betting Pikmin 3 comes soon after, as well as some new Mario franchise.

[Mannypon]

My prediction for E3?  Xenoblade and the Last Story ported to 3ds and launching this fall.  I would go bananas for that news lol.  Remember those videos of players jumping off cliffs in Xenoblade?  That'll be so sweet in 3d.  Back to reality though, I don't see any of those happening lol.  I'm just hoping for a any type of port for those games
 
If Nintendo were to just walk on stage and say both those games were being released in America this year and just walk off into the darkness with no further anouncements, I'd be happy lol. 

[Ian Sane]

Wouldn't it be considerably more work to port Xenoblade and The Last Story to the 3DS then to just translate them for the Wii?  I don't see any reason for Nintendo to do that.

[BlackNMild2k1]

New system, new audience and a chance to start the 3DS off as a RPG machine with games that are sure to be hits on a system with a limited selection in the genre and a game starved audience....


wait, part of that describes the Wii too. SO I don't know why they would do it, but they would still have to translate it.

[Mannypon]

Well, its just wishfull thinking in my part but Blacknmild did have a point.  I think it'll be important for Nintendo to reistablish the 3ds as THE system to go for rpgs just as the ds was and still is.  I know the Wii has a much larger installed base but I honestly don't see either game seller better on the Wii than it would on the 3ds.  Even with the Wii's large install base, there hasn't been any rpg yet to really sell like hotcakes.  I really don't think there is a very large rpg fanbase within the Wii's install base. 

[BlackNMild2k1]

OTOH, The Last Story and Xenoblade should have been the appetizer for DQX, but even though it wasn't really all that well received in Japan, I do think they could both find and audience on the Wii in the rest of the world, especially if The Last Story is marketed as Nintendo's Final Fantasy and Xenoblade is Nintendo's super grand epic free roaming quest of an RPG.

But they really might have a much easier time selling them both to the 3DS crowd as nw franchises tend to bo much better when launched on new hardware while it is still relatively new.

[Ian Sane]

The 3DS is probably going to sell on the basis of being the follow-up to the DS right now so I don't think there is quite the priority to port games to it.

The Wii has nothing on it right now.  Third parties don't give a crap and Nintendo's own release schedule is thin.  Now the Wii has already made tons of money but I would argue that the Wii userbase needs new games more than the 3DS userbase does.  Third parties are into the 3DS so the releases will build up as time goes on.  Taking that into account, plus the fact that it is way less work, I think Nintendo should bring them to North America on the Wii.

Hell, they should have localized them a long time ago.  So Wii owners make Nintendo rich and Nintendo moves our games to another system and leaves us hanging with nothing?  Don't they owe us a little better than that?

[Mannypon]

I agree with Ian in that I do believe that if these games have any chance of coming here, it'll be on Wii disks.  Unless Nintendo has a chunk of unanounced games to be revealed at e3, I don't see how they will fill out the rest of the year with quality Wii titles.  These games HAVE to be brought over here.  I don't even know what to think about DQX.  At this rate, it's going to release right near the end of the Wii's life cycle.  We haven't even seen a screenshot or recieved any info at all on this game which makes me wonder what exactly is going on with it. 

[Adrock]

You guys are gonna make me take M:OM out of it's case for the 1st time and actually play it just to see how bad it really is.

Other M really isn't that bad. It's "bad" for a Metroid game and it shits all over the rest of the series. Otherwise, it's pretty fun. Look fondly back on Super Metroid or Metroid Prime... then lower your expectations. You'll be fine.

Hell, they should have localized them a long time ago.  So Wii owners make Nintendo rich and Nintendo moves our games to another system and leaves us hanging with nothing?  Don't they owe us a little better than that?

How are you surprised? Traditionally, Nintendo's support slows down upon entering the 5th year on their home consoles. And I think it's a bit demanding to say Nintendo owes you anything. You're obviously the type that is never satisfied with anything. Even if Nintendo brought over both Xenoblade and The Last Story, you'd say they owed you something else... probably after trashing what horrible games Xenoblade and The Last Story are for not catering to your specific tastes.

[rlse9]

Wii Winter Sports will be unveiled and announced at E3 of this year for a winter release. It will be motion plus enabled and include fencing and racquet ball.

This actually wouldn't surprise me at all.  There's been at least one "Wii" game every year since the Wii came out.  And I'd rather see this than Wii Music 2.

[broodwars]

Wii Winter Sports will be unveiled and announced at E3 of this year for a winter release. It will be motion plus enabled and include fencing and racquet ball.

This actually wouldn't surprise me at all.  There's been at least one "Wii" game every year since the Wii came out.  And I'd rather see this than Wii Music 2.

The only thing that makes me think Nintendo won't do this is that Sega's already put out their Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games game.  Nintendo, being as paranoid as ever at the thought of doing anything someone else has already done, probably wouldn't do a game that superficially similar on the Wii.  On the Wii 2, that's a different story.

[Chozo Ghost]

Other M really isn't that bad. It's "bad" for a Metroid game and it shits all over the rest of the series. Otherwise, it's pretty fun. Look fondly back on Super Metroid or Metroid Prime... then lower your expectations. You'll be fine.

I agree. The game isn't really worse than most generic games out there. The reason people were so disappointed and pissed off was that it failed to live up to the standards set by previous Metroid games. Every other Metroid game had been an A or A+ title, but Other M was a C- or D+ title. Its like 90% of the generic easily forgettable filler titles that come out all the time, its not a failing grade but its the sort of title you would only want to play once or just rent rather than buy.

I guess its like the movie Batman Forever. The first two Batman movies which were directed by Tim Burton set a really high standard for the franchise, but the third movie was not directed by Tim Burton and took a very drastic turn from the dark atmosphere of the previous titles. As far as Action movies go, Batman Forever wasn't probably that bad in and of itself, but since the bar had been raised high with the first two movies people were very disappointed and so the movie got a lot more hate from critics than it probably would have otherwise.

Wii Winter Sports will be unveiled and announced at E3 of this year for a winter release. It will be motion plus enabled and include fencing and racquet ball.

This actually wouldn't surprise me at all.  There's been at least one "Wii" game every year since the Wii came out.  And I'd rather see this than Wii Music 2.

The only thing that makes me think Nintendo won't do this is that Sega's already put out their Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games game.  Nintendo, being as paranoid as ever at the thought of doing anything someone else has already done, probably wouldn't do a game that superficially similar on the Wii.  On the Wii 2, that's a different story.

Please, let's not talk about Winter Sports games or anything having anything at all to do with Winter. We are finally now entering spring and I want to leave that shitty time of year behind. I want to discuss this as much as a burn victim wants to discuss a hypothetical Dante's Inferno 2.

[Ian Sane]

And I think it's a bit demanding to say Nintendo owes you anything.

We buy the system to play games on it.  Until they release a successor or discontinue the system I would say that Nintendo has an obligation to try to ensure a steady stream of new releases.  Obviously they're not in control of third party games but they are in control of their own titles.  If they CAN release a new title and instead choose to do NOTHING and just leave us hanging I would consider that taking advantage of us.  Everyone buys a videogame system under the assumption that it will be supported.  You aren't really just buying a piece of hardware, you're buying a basic service of games being available to purchase over the next several years.  Thus they owe us that basic service as a console maker.  It is part of their job.

[Chozo Ghost]

I don't know why Nintendo would willingly decide to hold back on releases when the whole point of being a business is to make a profit. You can't make a profit if you don't have products to sell. I'm sure they are making some profit on the hardware sales alone, but why just make a little profit when more could be made off the software as well? Not to mention the fact that software boosts hardware sales, so even if their logic is to only make profit on the hardware they would still want there to be software in order to push the hardware.

Either way, I'm thinking 2011 is going to be a turning point year where the Wii sales are going to slow whereas the sales of competing consoles are going to rise and probably some point within the year there will be a month where the Wii is in third place for that month, and possibly also in YTD sales. If Nintendo refuses to put out software that's probably going to happen a lot sooner, but on the other hand if Nintendo makes a massive effort to boost the software of the Wii then there's a chance it might not happen this year at all.

At this point what I think is happening is Nintendo is reserving all of its creative energy in preparation for the the Wii 2. The reason we aren't hearing much about future Wii games is probably because Nintendo's various studios are hard at work on Wii 2 software and probably the only Wii software we will continue to see is that which has already been in the pipeline for awhile. Its hard to imagine Nintendo putting their limited talent like Miyamoto at work on a Wii title at this point which wouldn't even be ready anyway until 2 or so years down the road. If anything further is coming to the Wii it has to be titles that have been in development for awhile but just haven't been announced yet.

[broodwars]

I don't know why Nintendo would willingly decide to hold back on releases when the whole point of being a business is to make a profit. You can't make a profit if you don't have products to sell. I'm sure they are making some profit on the hardware sales alone, but why just make a little profit when more could be made off the software as well? Not to mention the fact that software boosts hardware sales, so even if their logic is to only make profit on the hardware they would still want there to be software in order to push the hardware.

Reggie has already been on record as saying that Nintendo is "pushing back" Wii projects due to focusing on Pokemon and 3DS this year ("juggling two balls", as he put it).  IMO, they've already abandoned the console and their duty to support it.  I'll be pleasantly surprised if we see anything worthwhile on the Wii from Nintendo this year outside of Zelda (if we even see that this year, and I don't think we will).  Nintendo knows the easy money is on 3DS, they don't need the Wii this year, and most of us who don't like it already migrated to another console a long time ago.

[NWR_insanolord]

In Nintendo's defense, releasing major Wii games in the same timeframe as Pokemon Black and White and the 3DS launch would have had a negative effect on their sales. Nintendo knows that their base is the only thing keeping the Wii alive, and that those same people are also likely to purchase the 3DS at or near launch. Like I said in the other thread, I'd wait until E3 to decide whether Nintendo's abandoned the Wii. Remember, we didn't know about Kirby's Epic Yarn or Donkey Kong Country Returns until E3 of last year.

[Chozo Ghost]

But with Nintendo's "Blue Ocean" strategy they should be able to support both their console and their handheld at the same time. They shouldn't be forced to decide which one to support. Not everyone cares about Pokemon, and of those who do I don't think most of them are so destitute that they can only buy one game per fiscal quarter. If Nintendo wants to maintain its market leader position then they need to start acting like they're the market leader and stop being conservative about game releases.

[NWR_insanolord]

If it were just Pokemon I doubt Nintendo would have this response; the 3DS is the main issue here. People spending $250 on new hardware plus more for games are a lot less likely to buy other games at the same time. I'm pretty sure the issue isn't that Nintendo isn't capable of releasing games right now. This seems more like the Super Mario Galaxy 2 situation, where Nintendo pretty much said they could have released it in late 2009 but pushed it back to May 2010 so it wouldn't get overshadowed by New Super Mario Bros. Wii.

[Chozo Ghost]

But Nintendo's "Blue Ocean" strategy is supposed to be about expanding the market. How can they expand the market when they are artificially restricting the amount of games that get released? Its like wanting to get a plant to grow but then severely restricting the amount of light, water, and fertilizer it receives. It doesn't make any sense at all. If you want the market and more importantly your marketshare to grow then you have to make sure your hardware has all the support it needs. Holding back is retarded. This is why things like the 32x failed.

Obviously, at this point the Wii is already a huge success so pulling support for it can't make it a failure, but that doesn't mean it can't severely impact its future success. For example, I think it would be very nice if the Wii could meet or beat the LTD sales of the PS2 which is something that could have been achieved if Nintendo backed it properly, but by severing support for the Wii that's far less likely to happen. So again, the Wii is a hugely successful console and nothing can change that at this point, but that doesn't mean its final LTD sales figures and ultimately its legacy can't be severely damaged by this. 10 years from now what are people going to think about the Wii? Are they going to remember it as a system with a large library of critically acclaimed games like the N64, or will they remember it as the system with easily forgettable casual shovelware? Right now thats still up in the air.