Saturday, August 24, 2013

My 5 Wishes for the Next Animal Crossing


I'm going to put this on the table now: Animal Crossing New Leaf is one of the best game I've played this year. It's been a month since I've written the review and I still haven't even scratched the surface. It's safe to say that it's the best AC so far, bar none, but I feel some improvements can be made. Like...


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Thursday, August 15, 2013

Last Week's Nintendo Direct(s) impressions.

After the end of  the first half of Summer '13, Nintendo fans all around the world have already been pleased with some of the... uuuh... hottest titles for the season (no pun intended), with more yet to come in the near future. On top of that, a double Direct appointment has been spread around the world last week, focusing more on what we'll be getting in roughly the next three months for now! One is our regular-sized Nintendo Direct feature, while the other one is a 20-minute feature about The Wonderful 101, Platinum Games's incoming new game for Wii U. The American version of both the videos can be seen below:





Much like for the pre-E3 Direct, I watched all the three editions of the regular Direct presentation, but this time our focus will be only with the stuff in common in all the editions, with some exceptions. The reason behind this choice is because I would end to talk about some topics I already discussed the past time (eg. not-JP games in the JP market, localization difficulties for most of the JP-exclusive games and so on), thus losing focus from the main things.

So, without further ado, let's dive right into Nintendo's latest news-based marathons and see what's new on the table this time.

THE AWESOME


Look over there! Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's a...

Cross-over localization: The biggest bombshell this time wasn't brought by a new game, but instead by a welcomed import of Level-5 and Capcom's Professor Layton Vs. Phoenix Wright, which is set to release in NA and Europe next year, after the last Professor Layton game. But when a puzzle-addicted university professor and a well-respected attorney merge their forces, hilarity ensues in the not-Japanese directs. Just look at Satoru Shibata above!

The Wonderful 101 Direct: This special edition about a single game alone is worth of a space among the Awesome stuff in there. As we have already seen in the past, Nintendo hasn't make the world aware about this title as well as they already did with other titles, and last Friday's feature presentation was definitely a step in the right direction.

THE GOOD


You know if your catchphrase works if you crack up a smile when a digital yellow dog uses it.

Home-console Majors Unite: Another relatively-big thing introduced is a new free channel about the Animal Crossing universe, simply called Animal Crossing Plaza. With the opportunity to daily meet a large selection of the game series's anthropomorphic villagers and discuss about them on Miiverse with the rest of the world, this add-on is another welcomed addition to what it's shaped to be the ultimate portable Animal Crossing game of all times.

Release Dates Roundabouts: Once again, the majority of the presentations was an update about the already-announced games with tentative release dates, both for Nintendo games (Zelda on 3DS/Wii U, Pokemon Rumble,...) and third-party/independent contributors, like Sonic Lost worlds and that February game which we will be able to try "only" in about 3-4 weeks from now... Anyway, since it manages to touch both the physical main releases and the eShop/Virtual Console markets, this over-ally results in a complete look of the gaming horizon for ol' N's gaming machines.

A Wonderful Spoiler...?: These Direct-related posts on N5S don't tend to have something like a "THE MIXED" section to talk about, but I want to discuss anyways about the 7-minute trailer which ended the Wonderful 101-themed Friday presentation. While it's great to see more of a future game which had very little content revealed before, said trailer feels more like a fast-forward wrap-up of the majority of the game's plot, which is good for a common movie trailer but for a video-game this may spoil the fun for who wants to fully discover it by simply playing it. My tip is to totally skip said trailer, if what you already seen of the game before is enough for you guys to buy Platinum Games's latest opus.

THE BAD


... we also would like to introduce a brand-new game mechanic: B-button special moves!

Painfully Obvious: As nit-picky as this title sounds, we can't deny that these two Directs had their little flaws that have been received from the viewers as an insult to their intelligence. The Net has already been swarmed by dumb, whiny comments like "Oh, Luigi is coming back to Smash Bros YOU DON'T SAY" or "Yes, tell me once more W101's release date! It may be changed drastically after TWO MINUTES", but for an event so anticipated and suddenly-revealed like a new Nintendo Direct, people usually expects to hear something more of what almost every random fanboy can "predict" with their home-made magic 8-balls.

Slow-Paced Forecast: In a period when industry, reporters and random gamers are continuing to bash Kyoto's gaming industry for well-polished topics about Wii U's poor start and "Why Nintendo should do the Sega gaming approach or totally move into the mobile market" (even if it's probably because most of the reporters seem to have only mobile-related stocks), a Nintendo Direct packed in this way still seems more aimed to already-interested people to Nintendo consoles than actually the whole gaming community. While the Wii U its still waiting for this year's biggest games, this Direct doesn't seem to persuade other people to change their mind by supplying new content about well-known incoming games.

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FINAL DIRECT: 3/5 STARS

Overally, do these iterations speed-up or slow-down the player's hype for Nintendo's products? Once again, this is not the case of any rhythm change. Even if little to no ground-breaking reveals occured this time, this Direct simply holds the good pace of the past iterations, proving once again to be a fast and fine update compilation for an average Nintendo player. But will the next ones be able to drag an even bigger audience?

Lokamp out.
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Thursday, August 1, 2013

3 Ridiculous Petitions for Smash Bros. Wii U/3DS Characters

Since the reveal of Smash Bros 3DS/Wii U in June, the internet has predictably erupted into an all-out roster discussion frenzy of which characters need to stay or go, and spamming CAPS LOCK at everyone that says Ridley is too big to be a playable character, because this is what happens when you take out SmashDojo and replace it with random gameplay images for us to maul every detail as if we'll find spoilers in stock footage.
GHOST PIKMIN CONFIRMED FOR SMASH BROS 4 CHARACTER ROSTER SAKURAI JUST SPOILED THIS GAME FOR EVERYONE!!!! 
But then there's the fans that are tired of waiting whether their characters make it into the game, and created petitions to get their voices heard. Which is awesome...until you see what madness they're trying to get in SSB4 like... 
3. Digimon 


At least half of the internet took the news of Namco Bandai co-developing Smash Bros out of literal context, and assumed that every Tekken, Tales Of, and Tomogachi character has a shot at being at least featured in SSB4. Which is like saying that since J.J Abrams is the director of the new Star Wars trilogy we're going to be seeing the Cloverfield monster speeding through Tatooine on the Enterprise. Sora Sakurai is already losing sleep over adding third-party characters, and we'll be lucky if we even get Pac-Man as a rep let alone having Ivy as an assist trophy glazing her sexist breasts against the screen like a humping NintenDog. But apparently no one told that to the 10 poorly misguided Digimon fanboys who signed this petition to get Argumon in SSB4.
Yes, some people want Digimon. In Smash Bros. 
 Don't like Digimon in Smash Bros? Your Argumon is invalid! HA! (I'm very sorry)
 
The petition hasn't had any new signatures since July 22nd, so it's probably safe to say Digimon in SSB4 is a no go, but you have to admire this guy's enthusiasam; albeit he might be a bit too obsessed judging by his FB page:
"Question of the day: If Agumon was in Smash Brothers. How would you want him to handle? What sort of move set would you want for him? Recolors, final smash, voice actor(s). Let us Know!"
"Anyone else ever think Movie Yoshi looks more like Agumon than Yoshi? Too bad the movie predates Digimon by quite a while."
"Admin here; just started playing Project Xross Zone, and I'm hooked. I love it; but the lack of certain characters bugs me. Lets hope they make a sequel and put some more bandai characters in there next time. I personally would love to see Agumon fighting along side Megaman."
Practically every post this guy makes mentions Argumon, and if it doesn't involve Argumon, it's a post begging everyone to help localize Digimon World Re:Digitize Decode. I'm guessing his next move is to legally change his name to Argumon Pereira. 

2. Mike Jones  



This might seem like a weird petition to diss on, since StarTropics was a first-party NES title, so there's a slight chance that he'll appear in SSB4- but do we really want him? To be fair, the petition just dismisses it as a second thought next to asking Nintendo to make a new StarTropics (A.K.A. a game few people today even know exists) for the Wii U, but obscurity aside would you really want this guy in the next Smash Bros:

It's like Donkey Kong and Tin Tin had a nightmarish eyebrow child.

He'd literally be a medium weight Lucas with a similar moveset (StarTropics indirectly referenced Earthbound) and look at that face- LOOK AT THOSE GLOBDAMN EYEBROWS. Maybe I'm being a little unfair- Pit didn't look exactly like his prior NES counterpart after all- and we've already have Wii Fit Trainer to prove that obscurity isn't a hurtle, but still, this is like having Slippy Toad as a playable character. Captain Rainbow would make more sense as a playable character than- 

   STOP IT! 

NopeNopeNopeNopeNopeNopeNopeNopeNope. 

1. Reggie Fils-Aime


Ask anyone what CEO/president of a video game company they would like to play as in a video game, and you'll probably get a blank stare and a resounding "what, why?", which is one of the many reasons why you won't be playing as Peter Moore in a future EA Sports title any time soon. So it's baffling that there's a petition to include Reggie Fils-Aime (The American COO of Nintendo) as a playable character in Smash Bros. 

And it already has over 24,000 supporters, and growing consistently as I write this. Gabe Newell couldn't get that praise even if he gave away free copies of Half-Life 3 and sold his fortune to end world hunger. 

This is relevant. 

Let me rephrase that: an average Nintendo COO that accidentally became a famous internet meme is now part of an on-line petition to include him in a fighting game that features a walking pink marshmallow and electric mice- and it has over 24,000 people backing it. This is what we've become. Oh, and Reggie is seriously going with it: 


Of course Sora Sakurai has the final decision of the character roster, but the mere fact that this could very well happen and that it's under consideration is baffling, especially coming from a gaming company that has never taken fan feedback seriously at all. 

"You want a new F-Zero you say? Well that's just silly, no one wants that." 

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