The E3 fun kicked off with a rather large bang at Microsoft's E3 press conference, and next up was Nintendo's turn to serve up its own Wii and DS revelations.
And revlations it had; Super Mario Galaxy 2, a new Metroid from Team Ninja, New Super Mario Bros. for Wii Ware. It's more than enough to have the fans jumping from their seats.
For the full transcript, news and videos from Nintendo's E3 show, read on...
Press conference begins. Cammie Dunaway on stage. She's talking about NPD sales data.
Mario video rolls! Here we go... New Super Mario Bros. Wii announced. 2D sidescroller with support for 4-players (Mario, Luigi, Toads). You can pick up and throw other players. Item blocks drop an item for each player. Propeller Suit is a new item.
There's a lot going on and the screen pans out to show more of the action. Players get a ranking at the end of each level.
New Super Mario Bros. will be out worldwide Christmas 2009
Wii Fit Plus announced. It's "easier to apply to your everyday life". Six new Yoga activities. You can combine them in any order that you want. Keep track of the calories you burn. 15 new balance games; juggling, skateboarding. It's "Brain Age for your backside".
There's a Mario-esque game you can play with the Balance Board.
Wii Fit Plus will be out this autumn, both as a standalone game and packed in with the Balance Board.
Reggie on stage. He's talking about Wii MotionPlus. Promises "a new sense in realism" for games. MotionPlus video rolls. Lots of models jumping about with Wii Remotes. Wii Sports 2 shown with table tennis, archery, canoeing.
Wii Sports Resort being played on stage. It knows "all there is to know about where and how you're holding your controller". Game starts by jumping out of an airplane. Sky diving with the Wii Remote; you can twist, grab other Miis or speed straight down. Nintendo says this introduction will help users understand the MotionPlus.
Archery on screen. Left or right handed. Press the A button the grip the bow, hold down the Z button to draw back. There's a wind gage on the top right-hand corner of the screen. Nintendo says it's completely dependent on your own skill.
Basketball on screen. There's a two-player game going on. It's a competition to throw the most balls in the hoop. "Reach down, grab the ball and shoot". Reggie wins with 19 hoops to 17. Glad to see he's been working hard.
Wii Sports Resort is out in North America on July 26.
Trailer for Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles Crystal Bearers on screen. Square Enix follows it up with a Kingdom Hearts DS trailer.
Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story for DS on screen (called simply Mario & Luigi 3 in Japan). It will come to US and European shores this autumn.
Golden Sun DS announced. Video shows lush 3D environments, monsters, gods and battles. It's out in 2010.
Cammie's back. She's talking about DS. Women's Murder Club - Games of Passion revealed (we're not joking). Cop - The Recruit from Ubisoft too; you play as an anime copper out to stop terrorists bent on wiping out the city. It looks quite good.
1 million DSi's have been sold in North America. Flipnotes Studio will be available to DSi owners this summer.
Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Minis March Again for DS announced. You can make your own levels and upload them for other players to download. It's on DSi Ware on June 8 (next week)
New Wario Ware for DSi. You can make your own mini-games and upload them to the net. It looks very in-depth.
From this summer you'll be able to upload pictures from your DSi to Facebook.
Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks is playable at E3. That's all.
Cammie off, Satoru Iwata on. He says Nintendo has split gamers into three groups; those who play games, those who never play games and those who might. They're after the might money. 295 million people are currently playing games, he says. 195m people might.
"Wii Fit, Brain Age... What's next?" Asks Iwata. The Wii Vitality Sensor, of course. It clips onto your finger and detects your pulse. We look forward to seeing a game made out of this device. He says it has tons of potential, such has helping gamers fall asleep. Hmmm.
Super Mario Galaxy 2 announced. Footage on screen. It looks like Mario Galaxy with Yoshi. Gravity flipping still part of the gameplay. Strange wooden people. A Snow world. A water world that can be frozen. More Bee Mario. Slowing down time. Giant Goombas. Bullet Bills.
Reggie says he reads the blogs and he knows we want more. Apparently the more comes from third-party developers. The Conduit trailer rolls. Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles follows. Finally Dead Space: Extraction fills the screen.
Nintendo has its own "edgy" game... with Team Ninja. Trailer rolls. Explosions in space. Anime-style characters. It's Metroid! 2D sidescrolling with 3D elements. It looks iiiin-credible. "Metroid Other M" out in 2010.
"A Metroid game unlike any you've seen before" says Reggie. It'll investigate Samus' back story.
i just hope they do not start willy waving and boring everyone with sales data and charts. i think MS did well to stay clear of it yesterday and hope Ninty and Sony follow suit.
Spot on. It's better than last years so far due to a handful of intresting looking games but they still seem to be making the same mistakes with the presentation as they did last years, ie. boring everyone senseless!
Nintendo I prayed & prayed that you would give me games that I want to play!!!
I have been with you since the NES days; we had the highs with the SNES. I was there when you wanted to keep carts for the N64. I was first in line for the GameCube & Wii. I even have the Virtual Boy.
As much as I dislike M$hite, this is really a poor showing from Nintendo. At least M$ had definitely purchase of one game from me in the form of Crackdown 2 and a possibility of Alan Wake as well. Nintendo have no games I want at all other than the ones that are still out there for me to get or the games that everyone wants: Pilotwings, F-Zero, Star Fox and Kid Icarus
Well, so they've now matched M$'s two games with Metroid and Mario Galxy 2, that I'd buy as well...
But I still don't think its enough. I expect more from them. Why are we getting more of the same franchises and not any of the others? If they're thinking of sales, well Punch Out!! was never a huge franchise for them and no one's buying the new one either (shame). Yes its a cheaper game to make, but come on!
All those above (you know who you are!), you should be f**king ashamed! - New Super Mario Bros, Super Mario Galaxy 2 and 2D Metroid! - The big N delivers!
How anyone can describe that as a poor showing is beyond me, when the majority of Microsoft's show consisted of non-exclusives and a device that requires twice as much flailing about as the average shovelware party-game.
nintendo are still harping on about wii fit and quite frankly no one cares they did this last year, announced loads of stuff that 75% of their audience dont care about, who actually WANTS a zelda on DS? the only reason people buy it is because its zelda, 100% of zelda fans would prefer a proper wii zelda nintendo had their 2 year stint with the wii, but since microsofts cofnerence yesterday, nintendo are going to be steamrollered
Really bad conference to be honest. The silence was deafening. They squeezed all the actual games in ten minutes. I don't even align to Nintendo anymore, but I felt shame.
It's just not enough. Oh, and the New Super Mario Bros. thing looked pretty lacklustre.
The SMG2 trailer looked like a SMG trailer. The inclusion of Yoshi does not warrant another game, so there better be something special.
Appauling. The Vitality Sensor was probably the lowest moment in gaming I've witnessed.
nintendo are still harping on about wii fit and quite frankly no one cares they did this last year, announced loads of stuff that 75% of their audience dont care about, who actually WANTS a zelda on DS? the only reason people buy it is because its zelda, 100% of zelda fans would prefer a proper wii zelda nintendo had their 2 year stint with the wii, but since microsofts cofnerence yesterday, nintendo are going to be steamrollered
I want Zelda on DS! I'm also delighted to be getting a new iteration of Golden Sun, one of my favourite RPG's of all time.
By the way, if you think that Microsoft is in the ascendancy after yesterday's conference, then you are living in a dreamworld. They have interesting tech, but on completely the wrong console.
My only disappointment with Ninty's showing was that they didn't show or big-up Red Steel 2 or indeed Monster Hunter 3. Well, that and the fact that I'm still waiting for Pilotwings.
Also, the fact that Wii Fit is still hovering around the top of the charts, over a year after its release proves that people 'do' still care. - Maybe not you, maybe not me or the majority of 'core' gamers, but a hell of a lot still do and would be interested in its follow-up. Just as they would with any fitness-related peripherals.
Nintendo now have a fan-base that demands them to strike a balance between types of gamer. My opinion is that they got it wrong last year.- They had it spot on this year, but some people will never be satisfied.
Nintendo can only develop so much quality IP stuff during the course of a year.
All those above (you know who you are!), you should be f**king ashamed! - New Super Mario Bros, Super Mario Galaxy 2 and 2D Metroid! - The big N delivers!
If Nintendo's idea of delivering to core gamers is more Mario games and very little else, then they're in real trouble.
My real concern about the conference was Nintendo's response to a lack of games for core gamers at last years E3. Instead of producing new IP aimed at the core gamers (which they used to be capable of doing), instead they release a bunch of Mario games instead (Mario & Luigi, New Super Mario Bros Wii, Super Mario Galxy 2). It's the equivalent of throwing a dog a bone to quit him from barking.
Don't get me wrong, I loved Mario Glalxy, but that doesn't mean I want every core game being released a Mario game.
while the majority of the show was s**te, the last 20 minutes really was great and i think they have microsoft beat by far. you lot moaning about galaxy 2 being more of the same? why f**king not... the first game was the best game of this current generation and definitely warrants more of the same gameplay with added YOSHI! ... i'm going to be watching that trailer over and over come the night time.
also, metroid looks killer. hell, team ninja behind it can only mean it's going to be hard as nails, fast and deadly. consider me satisfied.
All those above (you know who you are!), you should be f**king ashamed! - New Super Mario Bros, Super Mario Galaxy 2 and 2D Metroid! - The big N delivers!
If Nintendo's idea of delivering to core gamers is more Mario games and very little else, then they're in real trouble.
My real concern about the conference was Nintendo's response to a lack of games for core gamers at last years E3. Instead of producing new IP aimed at the core gamers (which they used to be capable of doing), instead they release a bunch of Mario games instead (Mario & Luigi, New Super Mario Bros Wii, Super Mario Galxy 2). It's the equivalent of throwing a dog a bone to quit him from barking.
Don't get me wrong, I loved Mario Glalxy, but that doesn't mean I want every core game being released a Mario game.
So what did Microsoft do but deliver yet another Forza, another Halo, an Alan Wake sequel, another Splinter Cell and a few non-exclusives that I'll have on my PS3. - You can bet your life that Sony's showing will be riddled with sequels and long-running franchises too. - Of course, it's only Nintendo that get criticized and ridiculed for this.
As others have said elsewhere (and critics also), Galaxy is possibly the best game this gen (on any system) and there are enough ideas and possibilties with the gravity/planet concept to more than justify another outing.
Hmm. Admittedly MS apparently put on one hell of a presentation yesterday, so it was a tough act to follow for Nintendo. I realise people's tastes differ and that's fine, yet speaking from my personal perspective on MS's and Ninty's presentations so far as a PC gamer who has yet to commit to any of the current three consoles, I'm far more taken with what MS had to offer. I think MS's Project Natal puts what Nintendo introduced with Wii Motion to shame and asides from the next Metroids game expected in 2010 in that line-up it seemed a bit lackluster. Granted, I'm not a Mario fanatic though I did enjoy the originals back during the NES days.
It seems to me that Nintendo focused more on their DSi than on the Wii which holds zero interest for me personally. Gauging by some of the remarks above I reckon it might not have gone afoul for Nintendo to throw some more meaty bones to the Wii crowd and equalize the balance which currently seems to favour the DSi.
Let's see what Sony has to offer. If MS's presentation is going to be met, or surpassed, it'll have to be from the boys n' gals at Sony.
I think we have the accept that the big players will obviously stick to sequels of well known franchaises. It's only natural. The only reason Nintendo get so much stick is because they reply far too heavily on them and tend to create a mountain of spin-off games using Mario, Zelda etc. Sure, these are gaming icons, but you've got to at least throw in a new IP every so often. Nintendo have shown they can do this but with the casual market. Why not do the same but for the core fans, the people who stuck by Nintendo through thick and thin and kept them in the game? The answer is because Nintendo have found a new market where they can milk the profit without any real financial investment or real effort. Instead, we are kept quiet by getting another Mario Galaxy, which looks exactly like the other but with Yoshi! Like someone has stated, the times are changing, and it's not for the good for loyal Nintendo fans. Sadly we'll have to wait until 2010 for 2 games...
It's certainly better than last year's. A lot of games people knew about, but two new proper Mario Games announced, a new Golden Sun announced, a Metroid announced. In contrast, did Ubisoft show anything we didn't know about? Hell, it seems like Nintendo's was the only one with real, totally surprising announcements - everything else was leaked!
Nintendo are very eco-friendly -- lots of recycling!
Half-bottomd rejigs of old material.
Of course, absolutely no one else ever releases sequels or milks franchises. Another Forza. Another MGS. Another FF. Another GoW. Another GT. Another Halo.........YAAAAWWWWWNN.
You can bet your life that Galaxy 2 will be stuffed to the hilt with imagination and new gameplay twists on the formula.
I'm of the opinion now that it doesn't matter what games Nintendo anounce, be they core or otherwise, there will still be those proclaiming that they've been deserted and betrayed.- Go and look at the new Metroid for God's sake! It's beautiful.
Well all of the big three had good showings this year not phenomenal but good enought to keep me happy untill they announce the next killer games. But 360 probably won it for me with the service expansions and the exclusives they have announced plus they kept ME2 as a console exclusive. That being said the other companies had some good portable announcements and PS3 did manage to get FFXIV exclusive and Ninty had lots of Mario this time.
Mario, mario, a new metroid, mario, a new zelda, mario, warioware, then a wii fit and wii sports resort...Yawn...But then again the PS didn't fare much better. Xbox owned, then Ninty second and Ps last. I hate to say it because I have a PS3 and a Wii...
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