@battleToaD Why would a fairly niche JRPG get German voice acting, when Xenoblade didn't? IIRC there are some youtube videos of the European version with German text, but the voice acting is still English. One thing we won't have to worry about then.

Have a look!

@Mok Don't! You will be reusing all your Wii controllers with the WiiU, if you eventually get one. At least for local multiplayer, as Nintendo strongly implied that the console would be centered around only one tablet at last E3.

Colors! This needs to happen.

I hope some of these days Nintendo realizes that it's a huge waste of time and resources to develop a new shop for digital purchases every time they introduce a new console. What they need is a general-purpose online-store that can manage downloadable software for all of their platforms. That would also go hand in hand with the concept of unified user accounts vs. the stupidity of tying digital purchases to the hardware. It just seems so much more efficient to maintain and extend one shop over time, than to reinvent the wheel with each new console.

Has there been any confirmation on how this works? For instance, will a message you send to someone in the friend-list be sent immediately and show up on their 3DS if they're online at the time, or will it be delivered by Nintendo's online service at some arbitrary later point?

The name "Letter Box" certainly doesn't imply "instant messaging", like pictochat was.

So, I get it, controls are perfect.

How is the game controlled though? Can you play it holding the Wiimote sideways like in NSMBW? Or do you need the Wiimote+Nunchuck/Classic Controller combo?

Thanks in advance to whoever can answer this!

@SanderEvers
Please let's not go there. If somebody was to play the game with a 10/10 in mind and where to find that there are several aspects, which they consider flawed, that can result in backlash both towards the game and the reviewers. And such aspects are definitely there in SS. If scores inflate too much (which has long happened), there'll be more and more backlash for good (8) or very good (9) scores, because everyone expects their game of choice to be perfect. And if flaws, such as the ridiculous hand-holding in the first hours of SS aren't pointed out in reviews, how are the devs to improve these aspects?

See, I really don't like Jim Sterling's "catch" of just spouting as much profanity as possible in his videos, but this is absolutely true (and comparably low on the profanity side, too).

Anyone else here who couldn't care less for recording poor quality 3D videos? Online pictochat, now that would be a nice feature.

Looks at least decent. The first batch of screenshots were horrible. Still, it's 40$/€ for a rather short game that's available for free on PC and for an appropriate price as DSi/Wii-download. And in the same time frame as Super Mario 3D Land and Mario Kart.

I can see a problem here.

Why the heck isn't this a 20$/€ eShop download? :-/

All these videos have been available in the Nintendo channel previously, haven't they? I know for a certainty I saw the MotoHeroz video when I checked the channel a couple of days ago.

Then again, who even knows there is a Nintendo channel. Nintendo's fault for not integrating the functionality into the shop channel from the start.

Heh, I'm always surprised at how much significance people attribute to Zelda stories. From a story point of view, Zelda games are simply poor. It's always game mechanics first, everything else later. In this case, they probably just needed an excuse for letting players fly around on birds in a sea of clouds. (Same thing with the trains in Spirit Tracks, the sea in WW and so on...)

That is not to say, the atmosphere can't be excellent and that's what I love about this intro and Zeldas in general. The music here really "tells" the story as much as what the text says.

"How can motion controls make a first-person shooter better?"

Motion controls can't. Pointer controls can. And have on the Wii.

Hey, while you're at it with pointless comparisons, how about you add this to the article:

"Zelda: Skyward Sword Bundle costs $95 in Europe."

At least that's what you get, if you take google's currency calculator and the 70€ which amazon.de will charge as a basis. And it's still more or less the same to us as if we'd be paying 70 USD and lived in the US.

I wouldn't complain about having to pay 70 USD here with the current exchange rate, but effectively USD prices (before tax?) have been translated 1:1 into Euro prices including tax for ages.

@uel: I know. They'll hardly tell left handed people to just live with it though. Now that the addon is there and the most obvious games (MH, MGS, RE) are confirmed to support it, the Kid Icarus devs will hardly stick their heads in the sand and go "LALALALA".

@TheDarkness I'd wait to call it that until you try to tie your fingers into a knot when playing Kid Icarus with the stylus.

And the AAA battery is probably necessary to make communication between the "cradle" and the 3DS possible in the first place. The 3DS has no USB-ports where this can simply plug in, so they're most likely using the IR port somehow.

Blind guess here: #1 was the 360?

@newlykate Which is the whole point of it. Creating these sprites is an art in itself and they've still got a lot of fans. On a low-end console like the DS they're even preferable to 3D-graphics in many ways.

@WaltzElf You're nicely ignoring my post, whatever.

You're blind if you believe Apple would acquire Nintendo, open their treasure vaults for them and otherwise leave them to develop games or even consoles at their own pleasure. Apple wants to push their own products and that would automatically mean they'd mandate Nintendo to develop for platforms Nintendo wouldn't otherwise and under constraints Nintendo wouldn't have otherwise. And as Nintendo mainly develops their software in Japan, Apple would have to coordinate all that across the globe on top of that. Doesn't sound like something the people at Nintendo Japan, who like to take years for a single game until it's done, would enjoy. Sounds much more like an environment were the important people would leave.

So, it's the rumor of a big game announcement and you're hoping for Fire Emblem? Well, if you interpret "big" as "most niche", you're probably spot on.

@WaltzElf Stop getting all dreamy-eyed about how Nintendo being acquired by another western company - no matter which (because you're not an Apple fan, right? Maybe google wants a piece of the gaming pie, too?) - would somehow magically solve Nintendo's problems and result in a cure for cancer in the process.

Half of Nintendo's success can probably be attributed to the way they stubbornly do their own thing - as well as half of their problems. Why would Apple grant an acquired Nintendo access to their resources, so Nintendo can try to create something unique and possibly risky? What's Apple's motivation to grant Nintendo's devs the budget they need when creating a big title over a 5-year-span? Why wouldn't Apple just mandate Nintendo to churn out yearly Mario and Zelda games for some of Apple's devices that weren't conceived to support those games instead? Why would Apple even have any tangible interest in continuing some of Nintendo's lesser series?

What indicates that Apple and Nintendo would even be able to work together well? Microsoft certainly wasn't able to hold some of their studios together, although they're a Western company themselves.

The answer is: We don't know. You certainly no more than anyone else.

@Oddy @Iz20XX
Unified Sunday releases across Europe would be slightly problematic due to the fact that in some European countries shops are closed on Sundays.

@Megatron2000
It is a first party game. Nintendo owns the controlling share of Monolith Soft, which makes them effectively a Nintendo dev studio.

The very best homebrew DS application gets an official release for the 3DS? A big thumbs up for that!

@Akatsuki
It gets even better. Colors! saves a complete replay of the image you painted, which you can upload to their gallery together with the image. There is a neat little application embedded in the gallery, which lets you watch the replay. If you want to see how the avatar picture was painted, click the little "play" button below the image.

I did my part. Well, at least when Amazon.de ships my special edition, I will have done my part.

@Birdman13
There is just a tiny difference between THQ and Activision: THQ has less mega-hits in their portfolio.

Sad news indeed. Never played the De Blob games myself, although I was interested in the first one for a time. Had and still have too many games to play with higher priority, so it fell under my radar. But I hope all the talented people behind the games find a new enjoyable place to work!

@Environ: They probably just feel like royally ripping Club Nintendo members off and that's it. Heck, if you buy the bundle and sell the included Wiimote+ on ebay, you should get the game for less as a result.

If you have old Wiimotes with Motion Plus addons and have a use for this collection, I'd get this in your place and sell an old combo. You should get about 20$ for an old Wiimote including the Motion+ addon on ebay. This nets you 30$ for a brand new Wiimote+ and the game.

If you've already got Wiimote+, this is less desirable, of course.

@ZachKaplan: Which retailer is that?

Amazon.com has the game only listed as packaged with a Wiimote+ for about 50$ as far as I can see. As has ToysRus. If Nintendo's official site for the game is to be believed ("includes a Wii Remote Plus Controller"), it should be only available in this form at retailers.

So, for all intends and purposes, this is a 10$/€ "bonus" that comes with a Wiimote+ and should be rated/reviewed with that in mind. As such, the package is not a good deal, but the only regular way to get this. Whoever paid more for the game alone - whichever way they got it - has had themselves ripped off, I'm afraid.

"Nintendo has said recently that it wants to work more closely with third parties, but here it's taken eight of them and together created what amounts to about half of a game."

...and sold if for 1/4 of a game. Buying this means spending about 10€ more than for the "naked" Wiimote. Less, if you catch a good offer.

I rather liked the mini games in this. Every game has little twists and is charmingly and for the most part flawlessly executed. It's not a game you'll want to play alone all evening. It's the perfect game to play however, when "non-gaming" people are around.

It's absolutely worth the small premium compared to the standalone Wiimote. That is, if you're looking for another Wiimote in the first place and have use for a charming "expanded audience" mini-game collection.

@tinman Yes, it certainly appears to have a rating. Don't know either what would prevent them from releasing it...

If anyone wants to verify: This is USK's the search page for rated titles. It's in German, but you'll find the rating by entering "La-Mulana" into the search form on the right side.

@BetelgeuseWC77 Then think of Majora's Mask!

@tealovertoma
Let's stay realistic here: It's about 90% footage from the E3 trailer.

Do you want that penguin thingy with open or with closed tail?
open
half closed
closed

This time, they cut out the two frames where you could see its tail open.

@SunnySnivy, @warnerdan
Don't count on any Pokemon games on the 3DS' VC! Having the originals available on the VC might somewhat dampen enthusiasm for remakes like Heartgold and Soulsilver. I don't think that's in Nintendo's / Gamefreak's interest.

I've tried the WiiWare demo for Rumble and it was surprisingly compelling. It's a bit like a Pokemon-Diablo mashup. How I'm feeling about a 40$(€) retail game depends on how much content this has, but the potential to make this a full blown and worthy retail title is there.

Also: "instant Pokémon gratification" is nice marketing speak for "instant fix for Pokemon junkies (before we get the actual main games ready)".

To those who are calling for boycotts - stop fooling yourselves!

More importantly: To all people living in the Americas who really want to play these games: You actually can, if you want to look it up for yourselves.

If you're serious about playing these games, import the games from Europe. Do under no circumstances download/pirate the games! That would not hurt NoA, but instead NoE and Monolith Soft, Mistwalker etc. would suffer the damage.

@MAddogz You already saw the press release on the German site. This means the bundle will be available in Germany, too. Unless they made a mistake, but that seems unlikely.

I want that red CC Pro.

@Rift It can be played with theWiiMote/Nunchuck combo as well as the classic controller. Thinking about it, I'm not aware of a single Wii retail game featuring Classic Controller support that doesn't offer other controller options. Devs just cannot assume everybody owns a classic controller.

@GuardianAcorn Thanks, the link is fixed.

Some things might be lost in translation here, but this statement:

"Wada responded that Square Enix must consider making the game compatible with both the Wii and its successor, the Wii U."

...sounds to me as if they'd look into something like a "WiiU enhanced" game. Don't know if it's technically possible, but the thought that the game could run on the Wii and with the same disc on the WiiU (+ graphical enhancements) is cool.

Just having the game rendered in 1080p + AA on the WiiU would be fine. It does wonders for other stylized games, like Mario Galaxy (only 720p screens).

@SKTTR From a business perspective, you would not make it WiiU exclusive. When DQX is released, it's likely that there won't be a significant enough install base. From a business perspective you go for the largest install base you can find. In that sense, having a game that runs on the Wii and still has advantages when played on the WiiU means you can cash in on Wii owners while WiiU owners get a bit of extra incentive. Sounds like a plan.

Now the big question is: When will the other network updates follow?

Nintendo can't have created a friendlist for no other purpose than.. having a friendlist? Where's online pictochat? That's a "killer app" right there. Where is voice chat? Easy communication is also a feature that ties users to their devices.

Towards the end of the year when Mario Kart hits, I hope to hear a bit about those things from Nintendo. At least it seems Nintendo is going to maintain the 3DS' OS this time. What they did with the Wii was just poor, probably due to the static way the system was built.

@erv: A light version is not what you should hold out for when it's about battery life for you. A XL version is what you need. Have a look at teardowns of 3DS systems and battery comparisons between the DSi(XL) and the 3DS! There isn't much downsizing they'll be able to do.

@composerzane

The whole Wii Sports/Play/Party/Music/Fit stuff are new IPs. Xenoblade is a new Nintendo IP (Monolith is first party), Excitetruck / Excitebots are new IPs, Pandora's Tower is a new IP (japan only by the looks), so are Endless Ocean and Another Code R. There should be some more I'm not aware of and some which will stay in Japan.

They have a whole lot of new IPs, but most people look only at the most prominent examples - mainly Mario and Zelda - and fail to see this. It's understandable, as these classic IPs eclipse most newer things in terms of critical reception and mass appeal, but the "no new IPs sentiment" is still a misconception.

@longfingers You bet!
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2011/6/10/

@WaltzElf:
If by "featured" you mean that there are a million different hats, shoulder pads and mounts to buy, then yes, they are potentially infinitely better "featured".

But half of the appeal of such things comes from the MMO nature of many free to play games. That is to say: These games are designed to be a hobby in the first place. Most Nintendo franchises aren't. They are timely limited experiences that are more or less wrapped up when the credits roll. And in regular intervals, Nintendo will sell a new iteration of these experiences. It's a proven business model for them.

The two Nintendo franchises that might arguably fit into a free to play, MMO or microtransaction model, are Animal Crossing and Pokemon. But as these two franchises have been successful in the past and there is no indication that this might change, it's a completely valid choice not to imitate what Cygna and similar companies are doing. As Iwata says: Just because many other people are thinking that way, we aren’t thinking that way.

That interview is an interesting read, but comes from a strange angle. The site seems dedicated to current online trends, social networking, smartphones etc., but not to traditional gaming. As a result the questions are mostly "why don't you get into this market" and "how do you compete with this market you're not even a part of".

That interview has two parts. The first was labeled "Nintendo’s Iwata Hopes the Wii U Will Steal Back Couch Time From the iPad". Fairly enough, they discussed what Iwata has been saying a long time now: How Nintendo has to consider anything that takes people's free time as competition for their products. They mentioned tablets in general, but the iPad never appeared once in the whole article. Greedy bastards caching in on hits.

From my experience with "free-to-play", aka "pay-to-win" or "grind-your-free-time-to-death" games, I don't mind if Nintendo stays out of it all.

@GEOFF: That's the problem. Some don't.

@50:
"The Wii U is said to be able to run it just fine."

Where did you get this nugget from? Crytek is porting their middleware to the WiiU - meaning: Cryengine 3, which is also running on the PS360.

Nobody ever claimed the WiiU would run Crysis 1.

You better stop daydreaming about how the WiiU is anywhere near a modern gaming PC right now. It will only prevent you from having outlandish expectations which will inevitably lead to disappointment.

If you want to see what kind of power a modern PC GPU consumes under load (=gaming), have a look:

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/graphics/2010/11/09/nvidia-geforce-gtx-580-review/8

That is probably more than three times as much as the complete WiiU will consume (going by the tiny case) and that's for the PC GPU alone.

@armoredghor
Reggie has stated that "it is" 1080p and 60fps, great! So is my five years old Laptop - heck, even my netbook - when I hook it up to my TFT - if it only runs Word in Windows XP. What he said can really mean anything and nothing.

For instance: Digital Foundry has had a look at the real time graphics demos Nintendo showed at E3 and had concerns about framerate and suspected that they were running in 720p:
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-vs-e3-nintendo

Yeah, it's early unoptimized code and all and it certainly looks great - but it isn't exactly miraculous or way beyond anything that has been seen. And these 50% more powerful rumors certainly reinforce that impression, because it's just not a big leap, as great as it is for a Nintendo machine.

@21.
You should not generalize like that. Europe is getting Xenoblade this very year and there were rumblings about The Last Story coming here.

North American Nintendo gamers meanwhile have no clue if they will ever get any of those games.

You know, I enjoy reading nintendolife, but this article isn't exactly down to earth guys. Knock Sony's PlayStation 3 into a cocked hat? Come on! I'm a Nintendo fan, but not even I am so blind: That's a minor improvement at best.

First off: I have no idea what "50% more processing power" means and neither have you. Do they refer to the GPU or the CPU? To both? Is those data reliable at all? I'd qualify it as a rumor at best with the bottom line: the console is a bit more powerful than the PS360.

In order to do a generation leap, you'd have to make a system that's in theory several times as strong as the PS360, as is any mid-range gaming PC today. Don't even dream the WiiU will be able to output today's average game in 1080p and run at 60fps if it's only such a minor improvement over the PS3.

The people spurting about how this should run games at 1080p should start to do a little math, now! How many times more pixels per frame does a console have to render with a 1920x1080 resolution (1080p) compared to a 1280x720 (720p) resolution? The anwer is: more than 4 times as many! 50% increase? That's not going to cut it. If we're lucky, ports of multiplatform games will run at 720p and a solid 30fps (maybe 60fps!) framerate, at best!

Now, if Nintendo can get a 720p Zelda running on it at 60fps, that's all I need. And that's what is realistically to be expected from the WiiU.

The console will probably be only available in a single color within a year after launch.

Whatever they chose, it should be a neutral color that fits into every home setup with DVD/Blu-Ray players, TVs, Speakers etc. without looking like the peacock of the lot.

That pretty much leaves black, white or shades of gray. They can still do funky colors at any later point, but it's important to not turn off people from the beginning. And if they go for stupid colors, they have to offer alternatives.

Purple... urgh Great way to sell your console to an older audience when it screams "child's room".

@23 Nothing prevents you from making a fake twitter account with your spam-email and use it for this one purpose only.

It's not the cover I've chosen. I really prefer the second option with the painted artwork vs. this one - although this would be my second choice. This just looks like slightly touched up ingame visuals and although the world looks freat for a Wii game, it doesn't look cover-great. That's why I'd much rather have the painted artwork.

In any case, it's not one of the two boring covers and it's only the cherry on top of the game coming to Europe.

@13 Agreed!

They can keep any cheap pieces of plastic for themselves. Just give us a decent 3DS Zelda 25th anniversary bundle.

@12 That's a photo, you know?

Before you all jump to the conclusion, that this is going to be the definite version of cave story and settle with possibly paying 40 bucks for this remake, take a break and head over to IGN's screenshot section of the game:

http://ds.ign.com/dor/objects/100256/cave-story-3d/images/cave-story-3d-20110428012355709.html

I do neither know from when those wip screenshots are (IGN posted them yesterday), nor how far the game has progressed from there. Now, if these were pre-alpha shots of a running prototype, that might be ok, because although they look hideous now, that would mean they had enough room for improvement. The trouble is the release date.

I don't think there is even room to argue, that this is not actually what we would expect from a full price remake of Cave Story. It's also not even near what their concept art of the levels looks like in terms of atmosphere. At this point, I'm not completely faithful, that Nicalis can turn this into a quality remake before the release, even with the delay.

Here is hoping they don't this up. But with the release rather close and their track record of taking ages for bringing Cave Story to WiiWare (and even that was bugged), I'm doubtful at the very best.

Unless they push this to the end of the year or possibly beyond, we're probably in for a massive disappointment.

@26

Forget it. I'm guessing it's not going to be cheaper than 400€ here (400$in the US) if they're indeed trying to make it potent enough to run run games at full-HD and 60fps (meaning: moderately stronger than the PS360). If they want 3rd party support, they have to. The 3DS is rumored to have aggregated component cost of around 100$. There is a whole world between the 3DS and hardware capable enough to run modern games in full-HD resolution and at 60fps. Add the whole tablet-controller stuff, and you've got some more expensive components. Even if they would manage to keep the component costs as low as 250$, that'd translate to 350$ or more likely to 400$ at retail.

Factor in, that Nintendo - unlike Sony and MS - are hardly going to subsidize their hardware with profits from other product branches other than consoles and games (which they don't have).

Basically, Nintendo isn't going to throw around HD hardware for just 50 bucks more than they are asking for their recent handheld. This would be an outlandish expectation.