E3 2010: Nintendo Keynote Impressions

Due to circumstances beyond our control at Just Stuff & Nonsense we weren't able to attend E3 this year, however thanks to the wonders of the internet it has been possible to watching the keynotes live online. Here are my impressions of the Nintendo conference. A little disclaimer before I start; I won't be previewing games such as Wii Party or Just Dance 2, this is not out of laziness, while they are an essentially the backbone to the Wii's sales and will probably gross more than the rest of the games on this list combined, they were so overshadowed by the quality of everything else on display they are barely worth mentioning. Apologies then, if you came to this post looking for these games to be previewed.





The Legend Of Zelda: Skyward Sword

Everyone knew that a Zelda game would be announced this year, the simple teaser image from last years E3 provided many with 365 days of entertainment meticuously analysing it for information, after about 200 days the internets top scholars came to their first major break through: the game would feature Link, and there was a 90% chance we could be playable. The problem with Twilight Princess was that (as with many early Wii games) it was very clearly a gamecube game with the button presses mapped rather hastily to random flailing, for a game that revolves fairly heavily on swordplay it seemed rather daft that swinging your arm in a sweeping arc garnered the same effect as tapping the controller gently against your palm. Miyamoto thought the same, his giant visage across the screen told us as much, he continued to explain that he implemented Motion Plus support into the game in a way that recreates using a sword and shield, it all sounded pretty good and the way he looked down on his on stage minion was pretty funny. Eventually he gave up trying to explain it to him and then cut through the screen and took control of the demo, things have indeed changed pretty dramatically in regards to the controls, everything in the game is controlled with one of four buttons and a corresponding realistic motion. It sounds fantastic in concept, and it probably will be in practice, sadly the demo was less than inspiring due to the controls looking laggy or unresponsive and an impromptu seemingly uncontrollable pirouette demonstration from Link, they laughed it off and blamed it on interference but it was a pretty rocky start for the Keynote. One area where the game didn't disappoint at all was in the visual department, the art style is somewhere between Wind Waker and Twilight Princess, the colours are rich and bold with everything looking like it has been hand painted, but the character models are edging on the side of realism. Enemies look to be designed to encourage experimentation with the new control methods, for example there was a 'piranha plat' style enemy that had a mouth split in two directions, to do any damage Link had to slash in the direction the mouth was open, there was also a door with an eyeball for a lock, the eye tracked the tip of the sword, my immediate reaction was "poke the eye with the sword" the correct (and far more clever) solution to the puzzle was to move the tip of the sword in a circle to make the eye spin uncontrollably, releasing it's grip on the door. Holding the sword in the air charges it with sunlight, allowing it be charged up with power. Every item in the game appeared to make sensible use of the motion controls, throwing a bomb with an other head throw, swinging the controller to swing the whip and the archery looks a lot like the way we all thought it was going to work in Twilight Princess. After the gameplay demonstration had somewhat unsuccessfully drawn to a close a trailer we shown for the game, it looked absolutely brilliant, and concluded with a cliffhanger... well.... a cliff tumble. Despite the issues that plagued the demonstration version of the game I still have exceptionally high hopes for Skyward Sword when it is released next year.

Golden Sun: Dark Dawn

Last E3 we were treated to the promise of a new Golden Sun game, and then everything went suspiciously quiet. Finally after a year of wondering we we had dreamed the announcement we got to see some footage of the game in action, and it looked like, well it looked like a Golden Sun game on the DS. Needless to say that's a good thing, the graphics look as strong as the little handheld can produce with its modest processing power, with some rather delightful locations on display, and impressive character design. Gameplay looks to be turn based and the touch screen's input looks to be reserved for casting spells and solving puzzles. Unfortunately it was just a trailer that was being shown which makes it a little harder to get a feel of how the final product will hold up, thankfully it's out this holiday season so we won't have to find out just how awesome it is.

GoldenEye

GoldenEye is a particularly tough sell for me, thanks to the now canned remake that was originally coming to XBLA and PSN until Nintendo decided to block game from being released, it was always going to be a difficult to accomplish thanks to the absolute mess of rights that surrounds the legendary N64 game, but to see it so close and then have it yanked away forever was as traumatic as a memory about videogame's release can be. My mind was set firmly to cynical when the video of a 'real focus group' started and a bunch of guys who seemed as passionate about games as we are here at JustSandNGoldenEye made them start whooping and hollering like overpaid Criss Angel stooges that the entire thing felt insanely staged. Thankfully a video of the game started swiftly after this and I had to check my cynicism at the door, the game looked really quite good, yes it's Daniel Craig and not Pierce Brosnan, yes the plot and locations look like they've been changed, but I'm a bigger sucker for 007 than the hundred of women he's seduced over the years, and when the theme song hit and a modern recreation of the action I remember so fondly began I was certainly excited. The graphics are pretty good, they're certainly not going to win any awards for pushing the Wii to it's limits but they are functional enough, to be honest it's really the looks that people will be thinking about in this game, nor the alternative reality take on the singleplayer story mode. The meat of GoldenEye is in the multiplayer modes, and the trailer promised four player splitscreen, as well as online madness, 16 essential modes are making a return so expect to be playing Paintball, Melee and You Only Live Twice all over again. Once the trailer had faded out to riotous applause we were told that we would be playing it this Christmas.

Epic Mickey

I've already ranted about my love for Deus Ex so it shouldn't come as a surprise that I'm pretty excited about Epic Mickey given that Warren Spector is involved so heavily in it. Characteristically for a game that has Spector's influence all over it is hard to accurately define Epic Mickey, the demo opened with Mickey wandering around an environment described as Wasteland a world for forgotten characters, he approached an NPC and the option to engage in conversation popped up, at this point it looked like a third person RPG. Later in the demo Mickey is jumping around tree branches and the game looked like it was a third person RPG platformer. Even later still and Mickey was using paint and thinner to solve small puzzles, so it was now a third person RPG platformer puzzler, which was all well and good until he entered a 'travel' section of the game it it turned into a traditional 2D side scroller. The beauty of the game is how many different approaches it offers to the player, Spector speculated (sorry) that each player will craft their own play style, one of the key gameplay mechanics is built around this concept; Paint and Thinner. I'm sorry if I'm the one to break this to you, Mickey Mouse's world is not real it is in fact painted, in the game this is acknowledged and Mickey has the ability to add to the world with Paint or take away from it with Thinner, for example you could solve a characters problem with Paint or could just erase them existence with Thinner. Warren explained that there are three types of zone in the game; Quest, Action and Travel, it was a 'travel' zone they were about to demonstrate, Mickey walked over to an old-fashioned projector and jumped into the screen, he was transported to a Steamboat Willy inspired stage which look absolutely fantastic, it genuinely captured the atmosphere and visual style of that cartoon and in a clever touch when Mickey jumped too high it was possible to see the edge of the film scrolling along the top of the screen. The graphics are fairly good in general, my main criticism being the slightly bland textures, but when the game jumped into the brilliant cut out paper conversation mode, or the stylistically impeccable Steamboat Willy stage I was so blown away I  could easily forgive a few small shortcomings. No release date was given but whenever it is it can't come soon enough.

Kirby: Epic Yarn

A brand new Kirby game where the titular character is made of string and can no longer swallow enemies? It looked really interesting, rather than just using the textile backgrounds as a quick re-skin and throwing the game out the door it looks like a lot of thought has gone into how the move to material will effect Dream World. Areas of the background can be unzipped to reveal new locations, if Kirby goes behind a sheet of cloth there is little bump in it that moves along to indicate where he is, if a gap is too big to cross Kirby can 'scrunch up' the background bringing everything closer together. Its a charming idea and one that looks like it will be a lot of fun to play, especially given the trailer indicated there would be co-operative modes. It is games like this where the Wii can really shine graphically, the colours are bright and vibrant, the textures look realistic but don't have to be super high quality thanks to the cartoony nature of things, it looks awesome. The ability steal skill Kirby usually possess looks like it is present but doesn't seem to be activated by swallowing a foe anymore, instead it looks like Kirby isn't completely tied together and can use his lose ends of string as a lasso to activate switches, swing around the environment and ensnare enemies. As with Golden Sun it is a shame that it was only a video on display, but as with GS it isn't long until the game is released; it'll be available this Fall.

Metroid: Other M and Dragon Quest IX
Both of these games are out in the very near future, information is available pretty readily on both of these titles and their section of the show was more to increase interest for their releases.

Donkey Kong Country Returns

A brand new Donkey Kong game is coming out this holiday season, and it's being produced by Retro Studios who produced all of the fantastic Metroid Prime trilogy. The trailer was a teaser of some classic Donkey Knong action, it's a side scroller and looks like it will be very similar to the Super Nintendo DK games as far as actual gameplay is concerned. The graphics are very solid particularly in regards to level design, it's not looking mind blowing just yet, although the sunset level with silhouetted characters is a nice touch. The character movements and weight behind them look like they've been lovingly lifted from the original titles, and there seem to be lots of classic elements included such as the barbells blasting the cheeky monkeys around and a mine cart section as well. The obvious thought is that Rare are now Microsoft owned, so there won't be any input from them on the title, but judging from the very brief trailer it certainly does look like Retro are big enough fans of the originals to pull of the ultimate homage.

That bought a close to the current gen presentation of games, but there was one major announcement left for Nintendo to make; the 3DS. For the sake of readability all information about the 3DS will be posted separately.

Don't forget to check out our coverage of the Microsoft and EA Keynotes. We will of course be covering the Sony conference as well, and keep checking back for all the most interesting news from E3 throughout the week.

Sony chooses middle ground in motion wars

It's GDC time again, and while babies everywhere sleep easily knowing this doesn't stand for the Giant Dingo Convention, the rest of us are enjoying hearing the latest gaming news. The biggest reveal thus far has been Sony's motion controller, with a lot of footage and details released on the device itself as well as many games that will make use of it.

The peripheral is officially called Move after the trademark request on Arc was alledgedly denied, elements of the proposed name remain the form of suspisciously 'A' shaped logo which will no doubt receive a touch up to look more 'M like' before the final release. Visually Move has a very unique design, the obvious stand-out feature being the glowing orb that sits on top of the the device which changes colour based on the environment. Using a 3 LED array the orb will change to whichever colour stands at the best contrast to the background, like an inverse chameleon. Games are also able to adjust the colour of the orb, making it flash with the muzzle flare of an on-screen gun or match the colour of a spell being cast. Other elements are more in keeping with Nintendo's motion control set up, such as the second controller which features a control pad and thumbstick. Simplicity seems to be a key theme, the number of buttons is considerably less than those on the Wii remote and Nunchuck, and 1:1 motion detection is available out of the box without the need of any add-ons. A Playstation Eye camera is used to detect the movement of the device as are built in accelerometers, a nifty bonus over the Wii is the fact that these accelerometers are able to approximate the location of the controller in 3D space, the example being used by Sony is a player still being able to move the camera around in a shooter even if the orb is temporarily obscured. Since a camera is being used rather than an IR sensor the move will be able to track head movement and facial expressions, although we will have to wait until future games to see this implemented. How all of these features will work outside of a showroom environment is yet to be seen, the nerdier among you will no doubt recall that Sony don't have the best reputation when it comes to being truthful in their presentations, but if they can be trusted then the device looks like it has the potential to do everything the Wii does, but better.

Physical controllers may soon seem somewhat redundant if Microsoft's Natal hype is to be believed. Allegedly Natal will not need any physical controller at all, the device will be able to look at the person stood in front of it, recognise them as an individual, and react perfectly to every movement they make with exact precision, as well as being able to interpret their facial expressions as emotions, understand their vocal inputs and generally revolutionise everything we've come to expect from game as a whole. That said, the nerdier among you I mentioned earlier will once again be recalling that the grandest promises of the device have been made by Peter Molyneux, who has possibly the worst reputation in the entire gaming industry in the area of hype to delivery ratio. While the Move's technology may not be as bleeding edge as Natal's, Sony decision to be playing in the safes zone seems to be perfectly calculated, they've managed to beat the Wii at it's own game, but without breaking the mould from what people have come to expect their motion controllers to feature.

There are a couple of major stumbling blocks Sony still have to overcome as yet before they can official declare Nintendo flipped over with their weak-spot exposed. Firstly the Wii has established itself as the market leader and a name synonymous amongst mums everywhere with virtual bowling and fitness, Sony went to a lot of effort to separate itself from the more childish connotations of gaming, and now it has to backtrack over years of work to lure in the casual market. The other major point of contention will be pricing, the announcement was made that Move will cost less than $100, but they shouldn't have to announce it will be less than one hundred bucks, everyone is expecting it to be less than that, a LOT less. The wording of this statement has lead many to expect a $99.99 price point. Considering the target audience will be unlikely to own a PS3 already it will be hard to convince people not to just buy a Wii instead, especially as Nintendo's console already has a large back-catalogue of games already available.

Speaking of games, unsurprisingly these are what will make or break both Sony and Microsoft's attempts to venture into the world of mad flailing instead of button pressing. No matter how innovative a control method may be if there aren't any games to justify using it then it will never succeed. The Wii has an insane amount of shovelware, something Nintendo seem to be aware of as the 'Nintendo Seal of Quality' is now just the 'Official Nintendo Seal' and the requirements to earn said seal are far from strict. Is it worth disenfranchising your loyal customers by throwing open the gates of the kingdom to every shovelware producing publisher in the name of appealing to the casual market? Sadly the answer is a resounding "yes" judging by the profits being posted by Nintendo. If Microsoft and Sony can embrace the casual market while still focusing on providing their loyal fans with the quality games they have come to expect then they may well be able to have the best of both worlds. And while both Move and Natal have the potential to be fantastic gimmicks and could provide some interesting and innovative ways to play some types of games, to regard them as anything more than quirky experiments at this stage would be a big mistake.

I'm Calling It: new Nintendo handheld.

Sometimes you get a gut feeling about things, othertimes you get a leaked bit of industy news, and sometimes, well sometimes you get a lucky guess. I'd like to indroduce you to a new feature on the blog, albeit one I don't think we will see too often. I'm calling it is out attempt to take a stab at the future and predict an up coming event before it happens. Why) for the satistfaction of being able to say "I called that" when the event comes to pass. Of course sometimes it's possible we'll be wrong and in that case we'll be back here to defend our calls.

So I proudly present:

I'm calling it: Nintendo to announce a new handheld by E3 2010
Why: the DS has been a great seller for nintendo for many many years now, esspecially in Japan, where the console has become an almost essential accessory. However with the DSxl nintendo has shown that they're really at a loss as to what to next do with the DS brand. The lite was a good improvement, streamlining the admitedly bulky first generation version to a far more convinient size. The DSi was a rather impressive improvement, although far from revolutionary, and was considered by some to be a step backwards for the system. The DSlx is just... Bigger... The well is clearly running dry.

The next console nintento release may well have dual screens again, the company after all is very good on supporting backwards compatibility, and will almost certainly feature some form of built in motion controls.
I wouldn't expect much as far as graphics are concerned probably just a minor improvement over the DS current standard, maybe at a push bringing them into line with the PSP.
Compatibilty with the Wii is unlikely, and deffinately won't be the focus in the same way say the PS3 and PSP have been in recent years. I wouldn't be surprised however if it would be possible to use the console as a controller for the wii.
MP3 playback will probably replace the Ill advised AAC only system the DSi introduced, although I doubt there will be a heavy focus on multimedia support.
Built in wifi support is a certain, as is Bluetooth technology for multiplayer.

Please note that all of this is of course opinion only, and while I have great confidence in the accuracy of the call nothing mentioned has been concerned.

I'll see you back here after E3.

Top 5 Brown Games

Brown has a bad reputation, which probably has something to do with connotations to a less than pleasent body function that this blog is way too mature to talk about. Dookie aside, brown is usually considered to be a dull and uninspiring colour, having been relegated to feature on the sides of trees, non-brand coffee lables and those beat up cars from the 70's and 80's that just sit on the roadside never to be driven again, owned by people too lazy to scrap them.

But the game development world is fighting back against the demotion of this colour, they know that in the far future everything with be a muddy colour, and they love and embrace this fact. To celebrate the unsung hero of the visable spectrum I have compiled this list that I like to call 'The Best Of Brown'... unfortunately James Brown's lawyers have informed me that this name is already taken so I'm pleased to present you with...

The top 5 games that don't skimp on the brown palette!

Command And Conquer 3



Shade: Dry Earth

C&C 3 isn't a completely brown game, the stark out croppings of green tibirium steal away from what in places could be an exceptionally bleak landscape. The GDI have been at war with the evil NOD for such a long time that their trademark bright yellow paint has almost completely ran out. Being a resourseful bunch they have stretched the supplies by watering down the paint with muddy water, so now all their vechiels sport a rather charming pale beige. A low saturated pallette of course is extremely realistic, and in this game about a war between the governments of the world, a cult and an alien invasion force, realisim is a key factor.

Fallout 3

Shade: Moist Bark

When innevitably the bombs fall and we're all left scurrying for shelter, remember in your haste to grab a few crayons as they'll come in far more useful than any of the guns and ammo you could carry. When 200 years later you venture into the wastelands which once consisted of your neighbourhood you'll wish you had something to brighten your day, not only that but the crayon to caps exchange rate will probably work exceptionally well in your favour. Fallout 3 is an exact simulation of the end times, right down to the glitches, so if Fallout says the apocalypse is going to be mostly brown, then you can pretty much gaurentee it'll be right!

Condemned 2

Shade: Old Coffee

Forget what you may have heard about yellow being the colour of madness, Condemned knows the truth is that yellow's filthy cousin is the real indicator of insanity. No other game on this list lets you get as up close and personal with the #964B00 side of society as much as condemned 2 does, with the populace of the game so excited with the various shades featured on their attires they instantly feel the need to rush up to your character so he can enjoy a full view. Alas, all attempts to find an embrace button have failed, and instead you end up beating upon these otherwise normal people. Shame on you Condemned 2, you otherwise up-beat game.

Gears Of War

Shade: Bloody Mud

Gears is a game developed on one of the most advanced videogame engines ever dedicated solely to creating environments with overwhelming mocha tones; the unreal engine. Unreal is a poor choice as far as naming was concerned however, because, as I stated earlier, nothing is more real than dull earthy tones. It should be noted however that Gears does attempt to break away from the constraints of a single colour with liberal use of brown's more popular cousin; red.

Silent Hill

Shade: Poisoned Chocolate

Up until recently Silent Hill was defined by warping players to a hellish brown parallel world, although I was unaware this was the case until someone pointed it out to me as the alternative world looked so much like England. Silent Hill takes it's brown usage seriously, leaving not a single shade of the colour untouched, and on many occasions going out of its way to try and squeeze as much of the brown spectrum into even a single enemy.