Betagam7

Bass have to disagree with you on the VB "very few are worth playing" Considering only 14 games were ever released in the west and that Mario Clash, Red Alarm, Warioland, Vertical Force, Jack Bros, Space Squash and Mario Tennis are all well worth a go I'd say the VB actually has a pretty good quality to quantity ratio.
Never going to appear on Wii though. Look at Nintendo's revisionist "history" on SSBB in PAL regions and you'll see that it states that nothing was ever officially released for the system!

Very positive news. Always fancied ogre battle back in the day but wasn't an importer then hopefully it'll show up in Hanabi and super punch out is a game I will probably download too (wasn't it free with a GC game?)
Too play devils advocate though games getting rated shouldn't get anyone too excited its no indication that they'll ever come out, see pilotwings, beetle adventure racing etc.

Agree with you on Soulblazer, its the only one of the Gaia trilogy I didn't play originally but unless Nintendo hurries up I'll soon have my modded snes ready to get the cart of ebay.
Also would like to see Earthbound and Lost Vikings is a good call.
Couldn't care less about Yoshi's Island to be honest as its available for the GBA already...still at least you didn't put Majoras Mask on there, that's the game I'm sick of people asking for when they can quite easily get the collectors disk to play it on Wii.

Why is this still available for download? SHouldn't Nintendo have pulled it?
Anyone else think the problems with this may be affecting the release of C64 games for the future?

Not too bothered to be honest. The sooner the crap gets out of the way the sooner the better stuff can come out. Pity they couldn't throw in Wizball too though. Wonder what's happened to that. Perhaps its got lost in the draw Nintendo are keeping Beetle Adventure Racing and Pilotwings in.
Got to many VC games on the go at the mo anyway so happy to let the drivel come out while I chip away at those.
Will have a go at finishing Mystical Ninja, DoReMi and SMRPG instead and then maybe pick up Orbient now that the Nintendo Stars shop finally has a ready supply of cards available for points.
Strange that VC reviews doesn't have an outcry over a 2 game fortnight wheras every American release day is greeted with a predictable "You'll never guess what they've done"...as if they don't do it every week!

Not really, its fairer to compare to Wiiware as Microsoft's games while often retro older games ALWAYS have been worked on to run optimally and given extra modes and features, in essence meaning it takes time to put them out unlike Nintendo who just slaps a ROM on and doesnt even check to see if it works or not cough*LastNinja3*cough

If you really want to compare though, yes I have downloaded more VC games than Live Arcade games but Ive also had the Wii for two years longer than the 360 and if those games had been available on 360 I'd have bought them on 360 due to the fact that you don't have to play shuffle the deck just to get them up and running and you can try a demo first

It's been evident to me for a while that the VC has failed to become the gaming nirvana we all hoped it was when first announced.
Warning signs went out early to PAL gamers with the slapdash nature of early releases that didn't correct the age old border/60hz issue.
Compare this with a service like Live Arcade where all games not only run in 60hz but have added features and modes (at the same price) and you can see how in a bizarre role reversal Nintendo has become the lazy bang it out and make money company with Microsoft bizarrely emerging as the champion of gamers!

The second killer blow came when it became apparent that releases were going to be limited by a variety of licensing issues. This killed the dream some of us had of ebaying our collection of dusty carts and building up a virtual library.

Finally Nitendo's storage solution problem and utter lack of ability to deal with it when a fix would have been so simple as letting us run games of SD cards was the killer blow. What's the point in having a virtual library if it takes longer to get the game transferred and running than it does to hook up your snes and put a cart in?
Even if HD remix and REZ did come out on the Wii and I didnt own a 360 I wouldnt buy them on Wii becasue Id have nowhere to put them.
Nintendo has essentially returned us to an age of waiting for a game to load and, all sense of irony aside, this isn't meant to be the C64.

I've given up on it to be honest. I'm getting my SNES modded to run 60hz and multiregion and that will do for me.

Thanks for trying Nintendo but you've failed miserably.

136 Jackolantern.

Now its you who's missing the point. In highlighting those games I wasn't saying that a 360 was an essential purchase over a PS3 (I have no PS3 so unlike some don't see how I can compare) I was saying that these are games you are NEVER going to get to play on the Wii (and calling the Wii "far superior" is frankly a joke, especially as like the other poster you admit to not owning another console to compare it with).
My point being that while its nice to have the Wii it should never be purchased as a MAIN gaming console if you want to enjoy the big cross platform releases as the Wii versions are dumbed down or graphically a joke.
If you prefer the PS3's choice of games over the 360 then fine however you are actually validating my point that any Wii owner who can afford it should have at least one other console to avoid missing out.
I have no experience of the Playstation Network so cant comment on how it compares to the VC. I can only judge the VC against Live Arcade where it fails hopelessly not through content but through the effort that is put into making that content work to its optimum value.

@83 Twighlight Crow

Then can I suggest that as you havn't heard of the games I mention you take the time to find out about them. Otherwise you arn't really qualified to write them off.
As someone who owns both platforms I think I'm in a better position to compare them than someone who only owns one and admits they havn't heard of some of the top titles for the other machine.

Sorry for you if the likes of Fallout 3, GTA IV, Bioshock, Beautiful Katamari, Braid, SF2 HD, SWOS, Dead Rising and others don't interest you. Not to mention decent storage solution so you can actually keep the games you download. You say the 360 has limited releases but look at what the releases actually are. They're ususally arcade perfect (not NES imperfect) with new features and improved graphics for the same price so its not fair to compare the time it takes to put them up with nintendo's already available, no work done, untested ROM factory.

A snes release is usually always a good one but I fear we won't get to see the more obscure stuff like Pop'n'Twinbee, Pocky and Rocky, the gambare goemon series and Spike McFang. That's why I'm modding the SNES to run 60hz and seeking out the carts

Earthbound, Pilotwings, Uniracer and BAR all interest me but the first will probably be a Hanabi, the second and third use some sort of chip which seems to be causing problems, is there a VW licence holding up the third? Also didn't Clayfighter get rated?

How many people on here actually buy (or would buy) more than one game a week out of interest?

Am I the only one who found the original Kirby to be completely lacking in challenge then. I had assumed that was the whole point of the series.

Wii-C-Kid, your definition of garbage choices has many American and Australian VCers jealous.
Have you actually played any C64 titles or are you judging on graphics? I didn't believe paradroid could be any good till I played it on VC and I owned a C64 first time around.

Only problem with Dead Rising on the 360 is the horrible tiny fonts if you don't have an HD TV. I'm fed up with Wii games looking worse than GC games. It'll be interesting to see how the rumoured rogue squadron remake looks.

Face it, the Wii is a toy (nothing wrong with that in essence but its not a serious machine if you want to play new crossplatform games) and the VC not what it promised to be in any way. I've had the Wii since launch and have only felt moved to buy 16 disk releases for it. If I'm honest half of those were titles I probably would have overlooked if decent quality software became available.
The VC instantly got off to a bad start in PAL territories with the conversions and its downright insulting American territories.
I've made the decision to just mod my old yellowing snes and buy the carts. I now wish I hadn't sold the ones I have hoping to build up a virtual library that's never coming.
God I'm glad I've got a 360 and that's something I never thought I'd say.
I've also got a modded xbox and a disk with every snes game ever burnt onto it that I could use but I foolishly perhaps wanted to give Nintendo my money. Now ebayers will get it instead.
I'll still use the VC for the odd hard to get download but its clear its never going to offer any sort of serious alternative to a physical collection.

I loved every moment of Lostwinds and thought that even despite the shortness of the game it was worth it. Might give it a second playthrough soon to get all the hidden items.
World of Goo appeals to me but it has the same problem as many Wiiware games, its huge block size. Would have snapped up a retail release but this will sadly have to go on the backburner while I free up some space by finishing some other vc games.
Meanwhile I'm intriqued by Orbient, it looks like a very interesting concept and for only 600 points might be a purchase soon.

Its obviously not as long as SMW with its 96 "exits" but that's not really the point, alot of SMW feels samey wheras DoReMi originates on every level as the guy above says. The focus on music in each is particularly interesting

@ Bass X0
"As it once was, so shall it continue to be. They were like that originally so thats what we get"

Then how do you account for the fact that SNES and the majority of N64 games have been fully or partially optimised. Honestly, don't be so accepting of the crud they try to give you.

I don't mind admitting that I've given up on the VC as ever being what it was made out to be. I really wanted to be able to get rid of all my carts (not to mention playing games on a modded xbox emulator) and have the games handily available on the Wii but the memory issues, PAL conversions, interface and generally slow release schedule are making me give up on it. I'll still pick up the odd hard to find, otherwise expensive game but it's back to ebay and the orignal carts with a 60hz switched SNES for me from now on.
Somehow I don't think I'm going to regret it.

Here's my wanted list:

1. Soulblazer (SNES) - surely a decent chance with Square Enix on board
2. Waverace 64 60hz - I already own the inferior 50hz borderfest cart, not going to pay 1000 points to play the same thing with new adverts.
3. Beetle Adventure Racing (N64) - how long has it been listed for now?
4. Pop'n Twinbee (SNES) - game I always wanted
5. Any of the Goemon (Mystical Ninja) sequels (Snes)
6. Adams Family (SNES) - with live pause I might finally be able to finish this.
7 Plok (Snes) see above, awesome platformer no ablility to save!
8. Pilotwings 64 60HZ (N64) - Nintendo you stuffed up me buying Waverace from you again, please fix the horrendous borders on this before you release it.
9. Jurassic Park (SNES) another cool game that was spoilt by no ability to save or continue from where you left off. Live pause will fix that
10. Hunters Moon (C64) like a multidirectional uridium with puzzles
11. Future Knight (C64) because it just popped into my head.

DoReMi fantasy has got me realising all over again that there were alot of great SNES imports that I missed out on. Because of the delay I'm thinking about just chipping my SNES and fitting a PAL 60hz switch and getting the carts off ebay

Still a bit naff when its a professional outfit putting the game out for a retail release. Poor show and kind of illustrates the slapdash nature of the VC as opposed to a superior service like Live Arcade.

I got Mario Strikers Charged free by hastling BT for a broadband offer I didn't technically qualify for, hahaha, persistance pays off.

No reason to download this now Brawl is out. Glad I sold it a few months back for a decent amount.

Would have to disagree strongly that Mario RPG is "the best VC release period". Even as a European who appreciates getting to play it for the first time I can see that its a quite basic RPG that while laying the groundworks for what was to come doesn't do anything special by todays standards.
Although I havn't downloaded it yet due to a large backlog I'm also suprised Mana didn't feature.
Top marks to DoReMi though, this is exactly what the VC should be bringing us games few of us know about that are hidden gems. Got it for my secret santa (thanks Tull) and I don't think I've played such a creative and genuinlly original and intersting platformer since Super Mario World.
My biggest dissapointment of the VC 2008 has been Sega's VC team still churning out those awful 50hz bordered PAL conversions.
It means I'll continue to avoid buying megadrive games in 2009 wherever possible. A shame as , with it being a machine I never owned it could have become my favorite VC machine. Same with the Neo Geo.
Runner up for bad news has to be Hudson planning to abandon the VC. The TG16 has been one of my most enjoyed VC channels due to running 60hz and having a catalogue of titles that were practically all new to my eyes.

Maybe Hudson feels it now has enough software on the VC to make the kind of money it wants. The TG16 is one of the best supported channels behind the Mega Drive/Genesis.
It's particularly dissapointing news for EU gamers as the TG16 is the only VC channel that consistently supports 60hz.
The Mega Drive could have 500 titles available for all I care, I wouldn't buy them barring the odd must have due to the appalling conversions.
Hudson will really be missed.

I really hope it isn't true about Hudson abandoning the VC. Along with the C64 Turbografx games are the ones I'm most interested in as nearly everything is new to me unlike a certain Majora's Mask which you'd think was some unplayed and hard to find gem by people's rabid fervour for it.

I got this in the VC forums secret santa. What a great present, so far I'm really enjoying it. Inventive and colourful. Suprised it never got a western release.

I'm more interested in the turbografx content. Love the rastan games. Not sure what Championship wrestling is like but the genre is finally being catered for through TG

@Mickeymac.

Sorry my "how do you know this" wasn't aimed at you. It was a question about the source of the article. I see now its come from a German magazine.

Firebrand, the so called "red ring of death" should not be a reason to put you off.
I've yet to experience it and as a result, instead of tearing my hair out over Wii's disc based release shovelware, I've experienced the worlds of GTAIV and Fallout 3. If I get annoyed by the VC and the poor Pal conversions then I can just fire up the Xbox and enjoy perfect versions of Sensible World of Soccer or Rez HD.
Nothing I like on Wiiware this week? Then I'll lose myself in a bit of Braid or maybe download a demo and try out one of the new releases without worrying about wasting my points or having to delete half my library first.
Choice is the key, and "red ring of death" or not, give me the best of both worlds anyday.
Microsoft had a lot of work to do to win over gamers but for me its done it with this generation, innovating and showing a genuinely interested attitude that puts the lazy, sloppy work of Nintendo, once the gamers choice, to shame.
Far from being dissapointed with Banjo's appearance on the system I only hope it can secure more past classics. Maybe Nintendo might buck up its ideas a little.

How exactly do you know this?

Phantasy Star IV - on a complilation already
Mega Man 3 - on a complilation already
Secret of Mana - still hasn't arrived in the PAL regions
Shining Force 2 - on a complilation already
Super Turrican 2
Mega Man 2 - on a complilation already
Super Mario RPG - had to pay "import tax"
Samurai Shodown 2 - appearing on a complilation soon
Ys Book 1&2
Samurai Shodown - appearing on a complilation soon
Metal Slug - on a complilation already
DoReMi Fantasy - had to pay "import tax"
Super Turrican
Harvest Moon
Lords of Thunder
Super Street Fighter 2 - would have been nice if hadn't been tricked into buying earlier version!
StarTropics

Only six of those titles emerge without justified criticism and I could add inferior PAL conversions to all but 2.

Wesbert, you're right Banjo Kazooie alone isn't worth it.
However I find that the ARCADE (not console) perfect conversions, proper PAL conversions as well as the extras that are always added to even the lowliest port are MORE than worth it.
If you're going to give people the rundown on Live Arcade at least give the positives and not just the negatives. Oh and the arcade conversions are nearly always games that people actually want rather than NES volleyball etc.
I'd happilly sittle for one great game, properly PAL converted, with a bundle of extras and designed to run with optimum capacity on my TV than three 50hz megadrive ports with no extras and, as they are on the collection anyway, no incentive to download. Lets not even get started on the daftness of comparing the frequency of Xbox original releases to the frequency of NES ports.
The fact that I can download pretty much anything at any time on the Xbox without having to worry about "making room" is a further bonus.
The whole VC experiment, while a marvelous idea in principle has become a relative disaster. Any ideas people had about building up a virtual library to finally get rid of all those dust covered carts will surely have been abandoned long ago, while PAL gamers hoping to finally play the correct speed versions of there games also suffered dissapointment.
The storage situation, meanwhile remains a joke that Nintendo is not only not able to laugh at but seemingly unable to comprehend.
The only decent VC related thing Nintedo has done to shake itself out of its stupidity is to finally relealise that the import market isn't its enemy and that just because it once refused to release a game in a certian territiry it doesn't have to be like that for the rest of time (unlike its infuriating stance on the PAL conversion issue), however even then it cynically used it as a moneymaking opportunity to ramp up the price by and extra couple of hundred points!
Nintendo has blundered its way thorugh three years of this idiocy, for anyone to try and even attempt to promote the VC as a superior service to Live Arcade is frankly ridiculous in the light of what we've seen.

"You won't believe it...a lot of people were expecting..."

Er, YES we will and NO they wern't. Its quote obvious that Nintendo only now intends to release one game per week in the USA. There's really no need to act so shocked when it happens every Monday.
The shock would surely be if it released more than one game.
I'm not saying its a situation you have to be happy with, but the faux-disbelief is starting to get a bit old.

Other than the dizzy titles I can't remember many C64 games that I ever managed to complete they were either so long or ridiculously hard that they defied all efforts. The VC's live pause mode is a godsend.
Whoever wrote SNES Jurrasic Park must have been a fan of C64 games.

those jumps are a nightmare. I ended up having to take a notepad and meticulously document every jumping pattern so that I could get past it. Most levels took me an hour! Then I found out via a guide that I had forgotten to pick up a key item in one of the earlier levels that was needed for the final level!!! Argh, back to the start for me and painstakingly looking through the notepad.'
My god, why on earth were games so torturously difficult back then!

They have now officaly acknowledged it. I'd get a cheeky complaint into Nintendo and they might reinburse the points. I'm almost tempted to get it and do the same to see if I get some free points

Well I've updated and I just tried moving Gradius 2 to the SD card. It took the usual 3 minutes!
Update does nothing as far as I'm concerned.

IS this still getting a commerical disk release as I'm not sure about the size of the blocks for a download?

I wouldn't trust the analogue stick for making those %&**ing jumps over the rivers (why can't ninjas swim!). I found the classic controller D-pad to be alot better and more responsive for Last Ninja than the Wiimote (plus you don't have to keep accessing the online keyboard as the other controls are mapped) but it's good that you at least make the effort to play with a possible VC controller as I'm not sure other reviewers always do and some games suffer badly (particularly N64) from the button layout of the GC.

Nobody's saying they shouldn't review the ROMS or originals initially, just that they should be honest and open about it and call it a preview. Once they get the chance to play the VC version they should update the review with any issues, altering the score if necessary.
We all know why they do what they do but that doesn't mean greater clarity wouldnt go amiss. Nobody will desert the site for showing greater journalistic integrity.

That's fine by me Kelvin. As Captain Konami points out we are only trying to suggest ways to improve the accuracy of reviews which at the moment are not really reflective.
If a game was released with a poor PAL conversion these days you can be sure that the paper magazines would find it both relevant AND worth commenting on and it would affect there review score.
Could you also put my suggestion to the "board" of VC-reviews that they have a page where each game is listed and its PAL conversion described briefly. Wikipeida used to have this but it mysteriously disappeared.
Thanks for listening

According to the forums this game is faulty and locks up on the 2nd level, anyone else experienced that?

Well I believe one of those two has already commented that they felt "people didn't care".
Sadly they are probably right which is how Nintendo and others get away with it.
I still maintain though that a review is only a review if it covers the actual product, not something that closely resembles it. The latter is simply a preview and so it looks as though that's what most of the reviews here amount to as I don't see any evidence of them being changed to reflect later knowledge gained from playing the actual VC release.
You say this happens but I can direct you to the review of Mayhem in Monsterland and show you that despite people finding out about the sound and colour problems there is still no mention of that in the review or any reduction in its score because of it.
This means that the review, however well written, is fundamentally inacurate. Its like reviewing for a PS3 mag but basing your reviews on the Xbox360 version.

unfortunately if the EU shop is anything to go by, there'll be nothing left when you've finished watching the rush. I'd get them while you can as in Europe the quality items are gone fast and then not replaced for months.

Time, and availability, will ultimately tell.
In about 5 years of the EU STARS equivilent the only decent thing I ever found to buy was a Legend of Zelda soundtrack. Other than that it was all complete tat or gone in 60 seconds.
I hope you get a better service but I doubt it. The best thing we can spend STARS on now is wiipoints and again they only become available in ludicrously useless amounts like 100 points once in a blue moon.
The Japanese seem to have the only decent service.

Mayhem in Monsterland was a recent case in point where a thorough playtest would have revealed some quite appalling glitches in sound and music that may not have been present on a ROM but I'm not generally talking about PAL optimisation for C64 games. I'm talking about SNES, Mega Drive and N64 in particular where the optimisation is completely random or universally terrible.
To give a few examples: reviewing the ROM of Waverace 64 doesn't tell me that the game hasn't been optimised to reduce the borders in the way that other N64 titles have, similarly reviewing the ROM of SF2 turbo doesn't tell me that unlike most SNES games Capcom hasn't bothered to optimise it. Similarly some titles like Sonic 2 really suffer from the reduction in speed while others like Super Probotector don't and this should be pointed out in a review.
Contrary to belief there is no universal rule over what does and doesnt get optimised so it would be a useful thing to put in your review. If you were, as you say, adding this to the review later , then fair enough but the fact is that although it used to be a staple of your reviews this has now been dissapointingly dropped.
Frankly, the ability to find out about the PAL conversion was one of the main reasons I used to check this site when there was an update as, well written as you reviews may be, I already know how most of the games released played originally.
Do you think its something VC-reviews would consider putting back in its reviews as there appears to be no such definitive list on the internet now. Even a seperate page people could scroll down and check on (like the one that used to be on wikipedia) would be helpful.
Regarding answers. Have vc-reviews also tried getting answers from Sega about why their Mega Drive releases are so universally bad on VC when they take the time to fix them for Live Arcade?
Have you tried asking Commadore Gaming for reasons why they can't enter the Australian market, these are two companies who seem far more approachable than Nintendo and might be open to discussion.

And no I don't own any Che Guevara T-shirts on the grounds that people who wear Che Guevara T-shirts are first class imbeciles who don't understand that becoming an icon of consumer culture was ultimately something he would have despised.
Still nice attempt at the sort of dramatic generalisation you alledgedly love...

Apparently It's a site that has time to write articles on Club Nintendo which has nothing whatsoever to do with the virtual conole or VC reviews, why then can't it fight the corner for the mistreated VC fans by asking Nintendo for some answers. While were on it wouldn't you like to hear a reason why you can't download C64 games? Why can't VC reviews put that question forward to Nintendo and Commadore gaming on behalf of its large readership and try and get an answer.
I'm guessing this is now the most widely read VC website so doesn't that give it some weight?
Would it hurt? The so called "big" sites don't want to put anyones noses out of joint and scupper there freebies by asking the questions that matter but if VC reviews isn't getting any freebies then why not.
Causes are only lost because people, apparently like yourself, are not prepared to try.
This site does alot to promote and help with Nintendo's sales indirectly, it should be able to ask them for some answers and not be afraid to challenge them.

To answer your question though, when I read a review I would like to know if my version of the game is going to suffer because of slower running speed or massive borders. If I'm just going to read a generic Rom review I may as well not bother as I could download and try that for myself but it likely won't be the same experience that I'll be playing on VC.

VC reviews used to at least comment on the PAL conversion/optimisation, now they don't even bother.

@ Drake post 83 Why would we wait for the VC version when we can just review the original right away?

Because as a PAL gamer I want to know if the game has been optimised and how the PAL conversion plays, not how some ROM plays...but it seems VC reviews has lost all interest in commenting on or pursuing this. What a pity as with its userbase it could have made a difference and tried to get some answers. I guess it isn't in your sites interest to make a fuss over something that might discourage sales of VC titles. That's pretty dissapointing guys.