News Article

These Nintendo Demakes are Adorable or Awesome or Both

Posted by James Newton

You decide

Remakes are big business these days – NBA Jam and GoldenEye 007 are just two on the way later this year – but demakes are growing in popularity. These old-school versions of modern franchises are often mocked up just to look awesome, and talented Way of the Pixel member junkboy has a skill to top most.

Created for Swedish gaming magazine Level, games as diverse as Batman: Arkham Asylum, Killzone and Noby Noby Boy have had the 2D treatment, but Nintendo fans will be most impressed by the pixel-perfect recreations of Pikmin, Metroid: Other M, Super Smash Bros. Brawl and more.

Sadly these are still pieces of art rather than playable titles, but they're still beautiful in their own right. Head over to Way of the Pixel to check out more.

3D might be the next big thing for Nintendo, but for its fans, 2D will always be king.

Even cuter in pixel form

Even cuter in pixel form

 Sin and Punishment 2. Oh yes.

Sin and Punishment 2. Oh yes.

[via wayofthepixel.net]

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User Comments (31)

ToastyYogurt

#3

ToastyYogurt said:

Nice. The only one I don't really understand is Mario Kart. Seriously, a Top-Down Mario Kart? The series always had a behind-the-kart perspective, Super Mario Kart even used Mode 7 to make it at least psuedo-3D

ReddLionz

#5

ReddLionz said:

Aww, man those all look so awesome! I wish I could play the Smash Bros., the Metroid, and the Pikmin ones (especially Pikmin).

Adam

#8

Adam said:

2D Pikmin looks fantastic. Not like the game really makes use of 3D too much. It would probably be much the same except easier to see everything.

Hokori

#9

Hokori said:

I love it especially RE5 and MGS4
this also reminded me this may be the last time we see a new game thats pixiled like this because 3DS probably wont do SNES style games of pikmin and SSB :( our only hope is Wiiware and mabey 3DSWare.

greenellow

#10

greenellow said:

wow those look great, but to be honest i only went to this page thinking that there would be a link to play a flash version of brawl

TheSovietChairman

#11

TheSovietChairman said:

And you know what, greenellow? I think I liked those better than a flash version of brawl :).

I adore pixel art, and jnkboy's great.

Klapaucius

#15

Klapaucius said:

You can imagine what these games would have been like if made earlier :)
Pikmin looks great in SNES mode.

maka

#16

maka said:

There are a couple of homebrew versions of SSB in 2D for the DS... They're incomplete as far as I know but playable...

GumbyX84

#17

GumbyX84 said:

Very nice. Wish he/she listed the games next to the art though. Had a hell of time figuring out what game the Killzone pic was from and thought the OtherM pic was from Metroid Prime 3 (View the actual image URL to figure out what they are)

@maka The hombrew "conversions" of SSB are all looking good. Best on I have seen is Smash GP (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCfiKjVLmug; best vid I can find). Was made for GP32 and ported to PSP.

JamieOStaff

#19

JamieO said:

That Sin and Punishment art is the best thing that I've seen today. Stupendous! :)

SwerdMurd

#21

SwerdMurd said:

man his art style is beyond awsome...so few colors and still so much depth....very impressed.

Ryon

#22

Ryon said:

WOW! the pikman game looks like it could have been a gameboy color game, or at LEAST a GBA game at worst.

MakeMyBiscuit

#23

MakeMyBiscuit said:

Those were AWESOME!

Now this is what I would have liked to have for DSiWare.

Come on Nintendo, make it happen and give us that firmware update for the DSi so I don't have to swap games out with my SD card.

Rensch

#24

Rensch said:

you usually don't see like that in the NintendoLife Pixel Art thread.

Bassman_Q

#27

Bassman_Q said:

Man I'd KILL for a chance to play 8-Bit Starcraft or 16-bit FF XIII or 16-bit Pikmin!

Smileoscar

#28

Smileoscar said:

Ever since I started to subscribe to LEVEL, I've always looked forward to see Junkboys "demakes".

JohnWalrus

#29

JohnWalrus said:

I love demakes. Still, it doesn't look "adorable" to me most of the time because I like 8-16 bit graphics better than 3-D. It looks... better :D

Imerion

#30

Imerion said:

Wow! These are really awesome! I remember a competition was held somewhere on the net with the goal of making a game like this. A few similar things were actually in development, but I forgot about it and never checked what came out of it. Perhaps I should try to find it again. These pictures really made me want some classic 2D gaming!

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