Hmm. Announced in 2012. No screenshots or gameplay footage at the back end of 2013, pushed back to 2014. Smells like vaporware. Which is a shame (if that's the case), it looks pretty interesting.

Never played either game, but I heard plenty of good about them.

What I'd really love to see them do is a new console Pokémon RPG - it's a shame Colosseum and XD were so polarising, I personally found them to be extremely interesting alternate takes on how a Pokémon game could be structured. Not that I think the 'main series' (handheld) formula should follow suit, but having a more story-driven game with little to no multiplayer incentive.* Handheld Pokémon is increasingly prodding players towards the metagame, which is in no way a bad thing. But a solid Pokémon storyline without thinking about competitive strategy, and which more-or-less assumes you're already familiar with the basics, is really fun too.

Colosseum handled it fairly well, albeit with a few clunky mechanics - Shadow Pokémon was a fantastic idea that brought fundamental changes to long-established core mechanics, like catching Pokémon, but training them quickly became a chore. So they went away and refined the concept - fleshing the plot, polishing and improving the Shadow Pokémon mechanic, and tweaking a few other niggles - and came back with XD. It's lack of a proper Battle Mode and some area reuse I think turned people off it, which is a real shame. For my money, it has by far the most interesting and engaging single-player experience of any 'standard mechanics' Pokémon game, period (The magnificent writing in the PMD Explorers Of games have it beat, but those are a different kind of game). I like to hope that it's gained at least a cult following, and that that's enough to tempt Genius Sonority to dip their toe into the water again - even after the poorly received (deservedly, frankly) Battle Revolution - and come up with a new console-targeted single player Pokémon adventure.

• nb: referring to such a game's "story mode", such a title would still be well served having an additional "battle mode" dedicated to multiplayer but entirely removed from the story mode, a la Colosseum. XD cut out much of the battle mode, losing it favour, whilst Battle Revolution cut out almost the entire story, losing it even more favour.

Headline should've just been "SEGA MAKING CONSOLES AGAIN", so we can all hear James spit out his coffee.

Yes, all the way from Germany.

Loved me some Super Hang-On back on the Mega Drive. Picking up this for sure

If I'm not mistaken, that's the Fraps screen recording device FPS counter, so I'd assume that these screenshots were sent in by the developer, who took them whilst recording from the development PC.

I have less that zero interest in hunting games, but I do have to ask: why is the fairy ocarina here and what does it do (and why don't I remember Link having a double-barreled shotgun in Ocarina of Time)?

1 in 5 owners? Dang, that's an impressive ratio.

Very nice gesture. Hopefully it makes a whole lot of money

@2Sang - Yoshi 3DS is being handled by the undead leftovers of Artoon (the company that will not die despite Artoon itself having long since gone away, which Nintendo keeps letting make shoddy Yoshi games for some reason), so I wouldn't hold out much hope for that one, lol. The previews already have it down as pretty ropey.

Dang, how do these Kirby games always completely miss my radar? I love Kirby games, but I didn't even know about the second Wii one until I saw it on the shelves haha.

@Swiket Knight to E5

Nintendo's next album release should just be a 10-hour unskippable loop of Floccessy Ranch.

165 hours into Pokémon X and still going strong. I have no need of your newest trinkets, Nintendo :gentlemen:

Remove the 100 EVs cap on Vitamins. I see no downside to doing this. They've gone half the journey to making EV training not psychotically dull, now they can just go the rest of the way. That, or implement more / better EV training mini games.

Breeding is more-or-less fine as-is, now that nature is a 100% inherit with Everstone. Perhaps an item to make eggs hatch faster that stacks with Flame Body / Magma Armour, like XY's Hatching Power Level 3 (but without the time limit)

In terms of sheer volume of Pokémon, which is always tagged up by people as "too dang many", I'm actually in the other camp: more is better. Naturally, there's a few duff designs, but consider what got most of us hooked on Pokémon in the first place - the sheer variety on show. You and 5 friends could all be playing Red or Blue and all be using almost entirely different Pokémon teams. That was cool, it kept everyone on their toes. Now there's over 700 of the things. Imagine what that's like for someone brand new to the franchise - practically an entire ecosystem of critters, from which they're free to cherry-pick their favorites, safe in the knowledge that their friends probably aren't using any of the same things. That's pretty awesome. I don't buy that it makes the game any harder - the same logic applies as it did in Red and Blue. Water types look like they're made of or live in Water. Fire types are fiery. And so on - nobody needs to be an expert in all 713 creatures when the designs usually give a solid indication of what they are. There's a few oddballs that are hard to identify, sure, but that's not new, and it's part of the learning process. How many people were convinced Kangaskhan was Ground-type? Or wondered what on God's sweet earth Mr Mime was supposed to be (asides fantastically creepy)? I still always have to look up Drapion's type since I expect bug/poison and wonder why my psychic moves keep bouncing off it. But that's all part of the learning process, no different to how things were in Red and Blue.

@BlatantlyHeroic It's the Bulbagarden community, so many users, who'll all have either version :3

Nintendo shareholders everywhere just spat out their coffee.

In my 15 years of playing Pokémon a lot, I have never once encountered a shiny through random wild battles or breeding. The only shiny I've ever encountered (not including Red Gyarados) was through Poké Radar chaining in Pearl.

But that was an Absol, which is really cool, so I suppose that balances things out a bit :3

WHY HIT ROCK WITH HEAD HURTING ?BIG TURTLE BAD

@mega @Uberchu I've done a lot of reading on the Wonder Trade Bad Egg thing. Couple of points - Uberchu is right in that eggs can't be traded, but Bad Eggs are actually created when a Pokémon's data is corrupt (ie, if it fails the game's checksums, it turns the Pokémon into a Bad Egg). Despite a lot of people saying they've read about other people getting them or their friends have them, I have yet to read a single account direct from a user who has received a Bad Egg or Pokémon that has turned into a Bad Egg.

Wonder Trade, at this point, does not appear to be the method of transfer - it appears that the suggestion was put forward somewhere, and the internet has picked it up and run with it. Same as that the thought that Bad Eggs were caused by hacked 'mon, but people started finding Bad Eggs way before anyone had any idea how to hack the game.

It appears to have been a glitch, possibly specific to download versions (SD Card related issue) and almost certainly, it seems, fixed in the Lumiose City patch. As a case in point, Bulbagarden runs a huge #WonderTradeWednesday event each week. Not a single user has come forward to say they've encountered a Bad Egg during these events.

So I wouldn't worry about the Bad Eggs problem. It's most likely a glitch related purely to save file quality issues (and now fixed), and it's almost certainly not related to Wonder Trade.

@FiveDigitLP Click on Options in the GTS where you select what to look for, and you can filter out 'special' (legendary) Pokémon from ever appearing :3

I think I've Wonder Traded about half of that total It's fantastic for shifting a huge bulk of freshly-bred 'mon that you don't need. Sure, you get a few Caterpie and Bunnelby, but when you're wonder trading 20+, you're practically guarenteed a couple of gems and curiosities. Oftentimes you'll end up Wonder Trading with someone doing the same as you, and end up with some nice well-natured Lv1's ready to train or breed (I got a Japanese Lv1 Fennekin with good nature and decent IVs this way, which I trained into a hella powerful Delphox :3). Plus you earn Poké Miles (useful on the Global Link) and lots of trainer IDs for the lottery in Lumiose. Wonder Trade is easily my New Favourite Thing.

Unfortunate end for a fun little app, but absolutely the correct decision. I was a little concerned about the ramifications of being able to send photos and audio clips essentially to strangers, where the Friend Code system is less of a security guard than it is a small hurdle.

Should someone wish to contact a minor inappropriately, distribute offensive or outright illegal material, they would not find it difficult to do so. Social networking sites - Twitter, Facebook etc - get hit hard in the media a lot when stories of abuse and grooming surface, and their frameworks have much more robust functionality to report, block, ban abusers, or even pass information to local authorities where necessary. Nintendo's Friend Code framework has none of this - a fact that would quickly come to light in the event of media coverage, and cause huge damage to Nintendo's public image and family-safe perception.

Parental education should of course always be the first line of defense when it comes to what your children access on the internet, and educating the use of parental controls within the system is also key - I'm not for a moment suggesting that Nintendo is in any way responsible for parenting your offspring. If your children are allowed to roam the internet unsupervised and unprotected, it's not the job of the rest of the world to protect and supervise them for you. But in this situation, I'm not sure (I don't have children, so I haven't used it) that the 3DS's parental controls are granular enough for even the most tech-savvy and responsible parent to block inappropriate sharing through Swapnote, without blocking the entire online service.

This all of course raises the entirely valid point that Nintendo absolutely needs to abandon friend codes and integrate an accounts-based system (like that found on the Wii U) into the 3DS if it wishes to continue growing and developing its online services on the console. Friend Codes were a mostly adequate - if already flawed - system on the DS and Wii where direct communications were minimal. Rude hand-drawn avatars and designs were a minor issue in Mario Kart DS and Animal Crossing, etc, but photographic content and messaging apps are an entirely different ball game. There is no way to effectively police friend codes - a user can delete someone from their own friends list, but they'll just find somebody else to attack. If Nintendo were even capable of globally banning a Friend Code, they could easily create a new one.

An un-monitorable service crawling with abusers and perverts is not something Nintendo wants to be labelled with, so, sadly, Swapnote has to go. Sorry, Nikki.

What? No B-Plus games, Phil? Play Bit Boy again, you know you want to :3

12 gym badges

You under-performer, Gary.

It looks like a one-man college lunch-time project done in Game Maker. Hopefully the gameplay stands out above its appearance.

Playing Pokémon X training my first competitive team in about 5 years. Super Training ftw~
Might pick up Deus Ex HR DC on Steam (if it's out yet / depends how much it costs)

If we're not going to get a new one, then F-Zero GX HD. Please.

I will buy a massive HD telly, huge surround sound system, and then sit so close to the glass with the volume so high that every "YOU GOT BOOST POWER!" will cause the skin on my face to ripple. /This wil suffice./

Normal and Pro classic controllers are identical under the chassis (aside the button spacing etc) and interface with the console in the same way, so if it's compatible with one, it's compatible with both

Edit: Ninja'd by Thomas

@Spuratis Yeah, it varies from place to place. Under this system what you're suggesting sounds like the build number which isn't generally made public (such as 1.1.0-12, where 12 is the build number). There's no one "master" versioning number system though, it depends entirely on your working environment.
Like with Firefox, they used MAJOR only for brand new versions of the browser, so we had Firefox 3.x.x for years. Then they changed the system to increment MAJOR with every release, and we've shot up to Firefox 24.0 in about 2 years

@Haxonberik @JaxonH It would've been cool, but it's most likely that Nintendo has a blanket policy on the version number. The system is typically:

Version MAJOR . MINOR . PATCH
(Version 1 . 1 . 0)

Where a MAJOR update typically includes new features that break compatibility with older versions (a major update would likely require the entire game to be re-downloaded, or break your save file), MINOR updates contain new features that don't break compatibility, and PATCH is solely for fixing bugs in a MINOR update.

(Before anyone gets excited, 'new features' in this case generally refers to back-end stuff like new optimization that you never actually see, not new levels or story arcs :3)

But creativity is haaaaaard D:

Paid DLC to unlock certain Pokémon / items would be a horrible idea, and it would have to be the "on-disk unlock" variety simply because of how the whole trading and battling systems (by far the vast bulk of the games) work.

DLC for the single-player side - extra areas etc - might work, but then Pokémon has never been sidequest-heavy, again as as a result of the core engine. Pokémon doesn't really have Infinity Plus One Swords or other super-powerful items due to the need to keep the metagame balanced (albeit into tiers, but even up in Ubers there's no one King Above All, everything has its counters and checks), so it would be tricky to justify asking users to pay for a few extra fields.

Micro-transactions would really be the only viable way to go - £0.50 to make eggs hatch faster for X hours, to boost Exp, etc - but then micro-transactions are also extremely unpopular. Compounding the issue is the recent spate of news stories of young children borrowing their parents' smartphones and inadvertently running micro-transaction purchases up into the hundreds. Will Game Freak really want to sail those waters with a franchise marketed strongly towards young children? No matter what parental controls they include or how they market it, it's going to be quite a difficult sell in the current climate. I'm not sure that's a risk worth taking.

Day 23: Through weeks of genetic analysis and failed concepts, finally we've successfully created a Mega Pikachu. There is still work to be done, but this at least proves the concept that Mega Evolution can be applied to all species of Pokémon. Mega Pikachu has been moved to Containment Unit #486 for further experimentation.

Day 35: Mega Pikachu's strength is growing stronger by the day. Our analysis is showing fascinating results: there lies within potentially limitless power. Already we have had to move our creation to a more secure area. Behavioural analysis shows Mega Pikachu is becoming more aggressive, staff have been advised to avoid approaching it.

Day 42: Mega Pikachu is becoming difficult for the handlers to deal with. This is the third time we have had to chemically sedate it. Our executives fear we may have to terminate the experiment if the situation does not cool down. The test subject has been moved to our strongest vaults.

Day 52: It is out of control. Sedation is ineffective and our attempts to terminate have thus far failed with several casualties reported. It is still deep within the facility but it is now only a matter of time before it reaches the surface. Here we will make our last stand. It must be stopped.

[diary ends]

@Coldfirex44: You don't need to see the old guy or complete the game. Just head to North Lumiose City, and go into the building to the right of the market stand selling cookie things. Take the lift to the second floor, and prepare to be freaked out :3

I used to love AOSTH. Brilliantly done, offbeat, madcap fun. Never saw any of the others - I do like the vibrant, crisp anime art style of Sonic X though.

"We believe some are having some trouble accessing Club Nintendo"

No surprise there. The UK/EU Club Nintendo is the most painfully slow, buggy, badly optimised web application I've ever come across. Often takes minutes for pages to load, and when entering codes often takes over half an hour to allow you to enter a new one (it thinks you're still registering the previous game for that long or more after you're actually done). I love Club Nintendo, but their site is just embarrassing.

In any case, I think I'll attempt to claim one of these tonight. _{I have a few hours to spare :3}

Funnily enough, Nintendo UK themselves broke the street date by an hour: the title was available on eShop for about 15 minutes at 11pm on October 11th, before someone evidently noticed and pulled it until midnight

I missed the accidental 11pm launch, but my friend managed to grab the digital copy early

@peach64 It's probably the speed of saving they were discussing - it's almost instant now. Previous games would take about five seconds, whilst Diamond/Pearl onwards would take considerably longer ("Saving a lot of data...") if you'd moved Pokémon in or out of storage. Diamond and Pearl in particular had incredibly long save times - up to 30 seconds sometimes - which they thankfully improved in the games that followed.

And if you save on the coastline, Missingno. reaches out of the console and devours your pets.

Haha, looks like the Remake Candidate of the Year Reference Hunt is on again. I don't think the references really tell us anything - all the games since Gold and Silver have had characters chat about their home regions - but if they are going to remake the Hoenn games, I have but one request:

Throw some landmarks into that massive ocean section. Much as I loved Emerald, all that surfing was tedious. Wild Tentacool appeared! Again!

Pokémon X. I'll most likely end up picking up Y by the end of the year though, lol

That Zelda 3DS looks amazing. I still want Japan's Eevee 3DS though.

DAT URBAN CHAMPION

Quite interesting, considering they're counted as two separate titles and people are likely to buy one or the other, but both are essentially the same game. I'd be interested to see where they'd sit if sales from both were combined (let's say take 5%-10% off the total to account for the odd few who bought both). Enough to knock GTAV from its throne? Impossible to tell without real figures, of course, but would be good to see.

Well-deserved spots, regardless. Pokémon's never been better.

The present train simulator that keeps popping up on Steam always makes me chuckle. It has nearly £1800 in available DLC packages. It's insane.

Lorule. Ouch.

Awful pun world naming aside, this is looking good~

No lie, this is my favourite thing on the internet ever. Or at least today.

Percentage rises are always rather dubious without context.

But I guess it's good news nonetheless

I was sure Charizard was taller than that.

Edit: Huh. Perhaps not.

Dodgy bootlegs are pretty much the only thing actually available for Windows Phone.

_{/windows phone user}

Welp. I'll make a note to avoid anything published by Maximum Games in future, then.

Much more impressive-looking title, definitely more excited for this now. My only 'problem' is the recycled koopa kid boss (I forgot his name) in what seems to be exactly the same spinning-top form we fought him in SM3DL about 5 times. I hope every mid-castle stage isn't just a variant of him again, lol (although I guess it's still a better battle than fighting those rhinos-on-a-carousel NSMB2 subjected us to about half a billion times)