Tuesday, January 04, 2011
The Multiverse Celebrates Mario's 25th
Universe A
Despite Internet rumors that Nintendo was planning a special release to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Super Mario Brothers, the anniversary has come and gone, leaving hard-core Nintendo fans empty-handed. C'mon, Nintendo, throw us a bone. Would it be that hard to at least throw Super Mario All-Stars on the Virtual Console or something? Even if it came at a premium price to discourage competition with the NES games, it would be better than nothing.
Universe B
Nintendo fans have been wondering for months what it would take to get the Big N to remember the Virtual Console service. The answer: Mario's 25th anniversary. To mark the occasion, Super Mario All-Stars has been released for the Virtual Console service at a shocking price of 1200 Wii Points -- more than the price of most Nintendo 64 games. While most people expected the inflated price to keep the other Super Mario games on the service competitive, it comes across as a slap in the face to Mario's hard-core fans. Why couldn't we get something like a special collector's edition? It wouldn't be hard to put the ROM on a disc and bundle it with some extra content to really celebrate Mario's history.
Universe C
And what do you get for your $30? A dinky little SNES ROM tucked away in the corner of a giant Wii disc, ten music tracks taken straight from the games, and a thin art book with quick blurbs about each game. Why not an updated version with New Super Mario Brothers graphics? Why not include Super Mario World, Super Mario 64, and maybe even Super Mario Sunshine? Why not full interviews to give it a real sense of history, or fully orchestrated remixes of the game music?
Universe D
New Super Mario All-Stars: Anniversary Edition just comes across as another opportunity for Nintendo to cash in on a retread of its properties. While it's really cool to see how Super Mario Brothers 3 looks with fully 3D characters, the novelty wears off pretty quickly, and you're left with the fact that these are the same games you've played for the last twenty years with a new paintjob. And seeing Super Mario 64 in the new style just makes you appreciate how much better the Super Mario Galaxy games are. The bonus CD features 18 beautifully-orchestrated remixes of classic Mario music, and it's interesting to thumb through the 125-page "History of Super Mario Brothers" book, but the prohibitive $100 price tag is sure to turn off all but the most hard-core Mario fans. Maybe Nintendo should stop trying to milk their back catalogue like this and focus their efforts on bringing us some new games instead.
Universe E
Super Mario Galaxy 2 arrived to critical acclaim this holiday season, but it was all but lost amid high-profile releases like Microsoft's Kinnect. Reportedly, the game had been done since the spring, but Nintendo held off so they could release it to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Super Mario Brothers. Maybe it would have been best if they'd just released it in the spring like they'd planned instead of trying to put together a release to coincide with a milestone.
Despite Internet rumors that Nintendo was planning a special release to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Super Mario Brothers, the anniversary has come and gone, leaving hard-core Nintendo fans empty-handed. C'mon, Nintendo, throw us a bone. Would it be that hard to at least throw Super Mario All-Stars on the Virtual Console or something? Even if it came at a premium price to discourage competition with the NES games, it would be better than nothing.
Universe B
Nintendo fans have been wondering for months what it would take to get the Big N to remember the Virtual Console service. The answer: Mario's 25th anniversary. To mark the occasion, Super Mario All-Stars has been released for the Virtual Console service at a shocking price of 1200 Wii Points -- more than the price of most Nintendo 64 games. While most people expected the inflated price to keep the other Super Mario games on the service competitive, it comes across as a slap in the face to Mario's hard-core fans. Why couldn't we get something like a special collector's edition? It wouldn't be hard to put the ROM on a disc and bundle it with some extra content to really celebrate Mario's history.
Universe C
And what do you get for your $30? A dinky little SNES ROM tucked away in the corner of a giant Wii disc, ten music tracks taken straight from the games, and a thin art book with quick blurbs about each game. Why not an updated version with New Super Mario Brothers graphics? Why not include Super Mario World, Super Mario 64, and maybe even Super Mario Sunshine? Why not full interviews to give it a real sense of history, or fully orchestrated remixes of the game music?
Universe D
New Super Mario All-Stars: Anniversary Edition just comes across as another opportunity for Nintendo to cash in on a retread of its properties. While it's really cool to see how Super Mario Brothers 3 looks with fully 3D characters, the novelty wears off pretty quickly, and you're left with the fact that these are the same games you've played for the last twenty years with a new paintjob. And seeing Super Mario 64 in the new style just makes you appreciate how much better the Super Mario Galaxy games are. The bonus CD features 18 beautifully-orchestrated remixes of classic Mario music, and it's interesting to thumb through the 125-page "History of Super Mario Brothers" book, but the prohibitive $100 price tag is sure to turn off all but the most hard-core Mario fans. Maybe Nintendo should stop trying to milk their back catalogue like this and focus their efforts on bringing us some new games instead.
Universe E
Super Mario Galaxy 2 arrived to critical acclaim this holiday season, but it was all but lost amid high-profile releases like Microsoft's Kinnect. Reportedly, the game had been done since the spring, but Nintendo held off so they could release it to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Super Mario Brothers. Maybe it would have been best if they'd just released it in the spring like they'd planned instead of trying to put together a release to coincide with a milestone.
Labels: news
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Third Party Failure Completely the Fault of Nintendo Wii
In the wake of another year of shitty sales, third party developers across the board are just super pissed off at Nintendo for having an audience that just won't buy their games.
"Nintendo just doesn't know how to bring in the hardcore gamers," said Nigel Percival, supreme overlord of THQ. "We staked our commitment to the Wii on Deadly Creatures, and we were really disappointed by the reception. I mean, it's a game where you're a fucking scorpion. That shit sells itself -- if we put it on any other platform, that would have been a platinum seller. Nintendo raped us, man."
"The Wii is a difficult market to crack," admits Ron Cereal, tsar of Capcom. "First we released a cartoon point and click adventure with a cover that makes it look like a shitty licensed Nickelodeon game, and nobody bought it. Then we tore half the gameplay out of Dead Rising so that we could release an emasculated version on the Wii a year after everyone who cared about the game already bought a far superior version for another system, and again, no takers. I just don't see what we're doing wrong."
"Nintendo really needs to start going to bat for their third party developers," agreed Jack Mortgage, emperor of Electronic Arts. "There is no reason whatsoever, in this market, why a lightgun game based on Dead Space cannot find an audience. The only possible conclusion is that Nintendo is just being a bunch of pricks."
Jamie Severson, princess of Nintendo, declined comment, stating only that she was too busy overseeing development of the Wii Stethoscope.
"Nintendo just doesn't know how to bring in the hardcore gamers," said Nigel Percival, supreme overlord of THQ. "We staked our commitment to the Wii on Deadly Creatures, and we were really disappointed by the reception. I mean, it's a game where you're a fucking scorpion. That shit sells itself -- if we put it on any other platform, that would have been a platinum seller. Nintendo raped us, man."
"The Wii is a difficult market to crack," admits Ron Cereal, tsar of Capcom. "First we released a cartoon point and click adventure with a cover that makes it look like a shitty licensed Nickelodeon game, and nobody bought it. Then we tore half the gameplay out of Dead Rising so that we could release an emasculated version on the Wii a year after everyone who cared about the game already bought a far superior version for another system, and again, no takers. I just don't see what we're doing wrong."
"Nintendo really needs to start going to bat for their third party developers," agreed Jack Mortgage, emperor of Electronic Arts. "There is no reason whatsoever, in this market, why a lightgun game based on Dead Space cannot find an audience. The only possible conclusion is that Nintendo is just being a bunch of pricks."
Jamie Severson, princess of Nintendo, declined comment, stating only that she was too busy overseeing development of the Wii Stethoscope.
Labels: news
Sunday, September 28, 2008
DS Redesign Rumor!
Man, these Nintendo DS redesign rumors just keep getting more and more exciting! Two prominent internet people came forward this morning with exclusive information about this top-secret game system that Nintendo has been preparing.
The new model DS is rumored to boast some features that really put the current DS Lite to shame. When fully compact, it will be smaller than a U.S. quarter, but it will fold out to reveal not two, not three, but fifteen touch-sensitive screens! Each screen will measure 15" long, and they will be brighter and with a higher resolution than the original DS screens.
Also revealed, the battery has been given an upgrade, with an estimated 200 years of playtime from a single five-minute charge. That time is based on having all screens on the highest brightness setting and the volume playing on maximum. This is good news for gamers who want to "keep it portable"!
The rumors that the GBA slot would be removed from the new design have been squashed; in fact, the new Slot 2 will be compatible with all classic Game Boy and Game Boy Color games. In fact, new ports have been added for compatibility with Virtual Boy, Sega Game Gear, Neo Geo Pocket Color, PSP, and Pokemon Mini (!) games. In addition, the new model will feature a hard drive and allow players to download software from the Wii Shop Channel, including all Virtual Console and Wii Ware games.
And I guess Nintendo decided to throw in a bunch of random crap that always seems to show up in these rumors. Camera, phone, DVD player, MP3 player, printer, toaster, time machine, etc, all that kind of stuff.
When will Nintendo unleash this new design? It's actually out right now! In fact, it's been on sale for over sixty years as of this writing! And in addition to compatibility with all existing and future game systems, this game device has its own library of over 25 million games that really take advantage of all of its features.
This is probably the most exciting news that anyone has ever posted on the internet! Now all we have to do is wait to see how much of it is true. Keep visiting my blog over and over again in the run up to Nintendo's big conference, where we'll have detailed impressions of Nintendo's new DS Lite provided any of it is actually true.
The new model DS is rumored to boast some features that really put the current DS Lite to shame. When fully compact, it will be smaller than a U.S. quarter, but it will fold out to reveal not two, not three, but fifteen touch-sensitive screens! Each screen will measure 15" long, and they will be brighter and with a higher resolution than the original DS screens.
Also revealed, the battery has been given an upgrade, with an estimated 200 years of playtime from a single five-minute charge. That time is based on having all screens on the highest brightness setting and the volume playing on maximum. This is good news for gamers who want to "keep it portable"!
The rumors that the GBA slot would be removed from the new design have been squashed; in fact, the new Slot 2 will be compatible with all classic Game Boy and Game Boy Color games. In fact, new ports have been added for compatibility with Virtual Boy, Sega Game Gear, Neo Geo Pocket Color, PSP, and Pokemon Mini (!) games. In addition, the new model will feature a hard drive and allow players to download software from the Wii Shop Channel, including all Virtual Console and Wii Ware games.
And I guess Nintendo decided to throw in a bunch of random crap that always seems to show up in these rumors. Camera, phone, DVD player, MP3 player, printer, toaster, time machine, etc, all that kind of stuff.
When will Nintendo unleash this new design? It's actually out right now! In fact, it's been on sale for over sixty years as of this writing! And in addition to compatibility with all existing and future game systems, this game device has its own library of over 25 million games that really take advantage of all of its features.
This is probably the most exciting news that anyone has ever posted on the internet! Now all we have to do is wait to see how much of it is true. Keep visiting my blog over and over again in the run up to Nintendo's big conference, where we'll have detailed impressions of Nintendo's new DS Lite provided any of it is actually true.
Labels: news
