McHaggis

I don't understand why Nintendo don't try and do more to attract third-parties. Offer incentives like 1 year free licensing or something. Or visit the major franchises that are skipping the Wii U and offer either a guaranteed return or developers from Nintendo that can do all the porting work.

It just seems like they could be doing more than just working on first party games to try and make the console more desirable.

I sat through 2 Wii U advertisements at the Cinema last night when I took my kids to see Despicable Me 2. One for Lego City Undercover and another for Disney Infinity. I thought that was a pretty good method of advertising, because you pretty much have no choice other than to watch those adverts. They could have used a funnier trailer for Lego City Undercover, though.

I don't understand why people are assuming you'd have to pay out a lot of money if the game went freemium. Lots of freemium games can be played and completed, with every item unlocked, without paying a penny. The only people who pay are the impatient/uncoordinated who have to have the best stuff from the start or need a little boost to get them further.

Granted, there's the bad side of freemium, like the iOS version of Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy, where it would cost £100+ to get all the tracks and characters that are included with the £15-£20 3DS version. But that's just because Square Enix are greedy mofos who have lost their way.

If Nintendo want to consider the latter kind of freemium (where you have to pay to unlock certain features of the game), they should at least make the game fully-featured for around the RRP of a boxed game from the start.

@RestlessPoon right, but we have to just take it when NA gets games like Fire Emblem: Awakening over 2 months before Europe.

I'd hazard my guess that Europe will get the game around the same time anyway. NoE have been on the ball with release dates for Nintendo games recently and we've seen most games launching within just a few days of each other. Fire Emblem was the exception, probably because of the additional censorship requiring a couple more months of red tape.

With digital distribution getting better on Nintendo all the time, I'd hope that any cuts to the roster would be reintroduced in DLC packs.

It seems unlikely that all the previous characters will be returning, in any case. I'd guess they'll swap out Ike with Chrom and keep Marth, as an example. Which is a shame really, because Ike was my favourite character in Brawl.

Rock Band 3 is still my most played game on the PS3, but I have a proper V-Drum set I can hook up. It's an amazing game, but the DLC you want are so few and far between.

I think people are naive when they say that it would never get back to the glory days. I think Harmonix would be pretty stupid not to reboot the franchise in 5-10 years. By that time, I think most people would be hyped to play a Rock Band game again.

@Rafie read the context of my comment again

"An RPG with Capcom characters and they leave out Ryu from their biggest RPG?"
From their biggest RPG indicates I'm referring to the Ryu of Breath of Fire fame rather than of Street Fighter fame. Breath of Fire III being one of my all time favourite RPGs, and all.

An RPG with Capcom characters and they leave out Ryu from their biggest RPG? I'd have at least liked to have seen a Kaiser dragon in there somewhere, regardless of how awesome it looked

Boohoo.

I always had a hard time getting into Advance Wars, even though I love Fire Emblem. I'd be happy to give it another chance though.

@SilentHunter382 $1 was an exaggeration, but the value of the IP is well worth covering THQ's legal fees involved in the transfer, plus a small amount more. It's not going to break the bank for any of the big publishers.

All I'm saying is that I don't think anyone should be worried that the IP will disappear.

@theblackdragon 'him taking it could absolutely land the company in hot water if the local newshound whistleblowers catch wind of Best Buy taking these items under the impression that their components will honestly be recycled and that's not what's done with them at all.'

But reuse is a form of recycling, arguably a greener one than conversion. They could possibly sell that to the public/press if they had to. Looking at the condition that system is in, though, I can't help but wonder if the employee's interest is actually less heroic than this article implies. The box looks to be in perfect condition, so it could be worth more than the NES itself (which looks like it has a bit yellowing going on), but the whole kit together will be worth a fair bit in a few years.

Didn't they say they were selling off the remaining IPs later this year anyway? I doubt the franchise would just disappear into oblivion, someone's going to pick it up. I'm sure the company handling THQ's liquidation would happily sell it for $1 if they thought it wasn't going to sell for more!

This is obviously going to be an unfair survey, isn't it? Many of GAME's customers won't have been around for the NES era, and the previous generation would have many consumers seeing their first home console. Not to mention it will be the freshest in their minds.

So, obviously a pointless exercise in my book.

This looks like a great improvement. The current load times are a little annoying, but at least they're trying to do something about it. What I'd really like to see is the System Menu shown in game so you can quickly switch between running software beyond the browser and eShop. In the meantime, though, this cuts down the annoyance when trying to switch games.

Who, the creator of what now?

I keep trying to download the demo but I'm never on my Wii U during the ridiculously annoying permitted download times on the eShop.

No surprises there. I'm not bothered, though, I still have to find time to complete Arkham Asylum, then I'm getting Lego City Undercover. Those should keep me going until some more good games appear.

Good stuff, hopefully that will encourage them to localise more in the future. I'm still annoyed that FE 12 never got localised and we had to rely on fan translations and flash cards to play it.

Didn't this happen a few weeks ago? Anyway, I paid more than this for my premium bundle, so clearly I'm entitled some kind of Ambassador certificate on my Wii U along with 20 Virtual Console games - 10 from the N64 and 10 from the GameCube will do nicely.

@L-Lawliet: I know sarcasm is pretty hard to detect in text, but you can't get much more obvious than @Haywired's comment.

I've been looking forward to this game since before launch. Glad to see some established British comedians taking on some of the voice acting roles too.

Interesting how they're interested in keeping the brand. I wonder if that is so prices between the two brands can remain separate. Asda would be able to keep their loss leaders whilst HMV have the high street price.

Pachter is the anti-fanboy. Instead of being blinded by love of a particular console, he's blinded by hate. I mean, it must be obvious by now that he really has something against Nintendo. Still, it's always a good laugh reading the aftermath of things he says.

'PETA'―stops reading

@softserve: the point was that the Wii U's sales were widely reported as being poor, but this news suggests that the sales might not have been much lower than January's when you factor in the fact that retailers have not had to purchase as many from Nintendo. Yeah, it makes no difference to overall sales―the Wii U isn't doing great and everybody knows it―but it puts the recent news about February's sales in a different light.

Can't quite place it. Those slider analog nubs look familiar, though. I wish the 3DS had something like that.

Nothing for me this week. The only thing that interests me is Castlevania, after playing the demo. I'm going to see how I fare in the competition before using my gift code to buy it where it's £7 cheaper―on Amazon.

@Captain_Balko, re: "I'd also like to point out that Batman Arkham City: Armoured Edition is considered the definitive version of the game. It runs as smoothly as the PS3 version (I've played both), and has far less glitches and problems."
―Not to mention higher resolution textures, better lighting, better draw distance and other graphical improvements. http://wiiudaily.com/2012/06/batman-arkham-city-wii-u-vs-ps3-comparison/

I could actually get behind one of @Molotov's comments―about EA wasting money to bring it to the Wii U―if the article didn't actually say that the team had the game running on the Wii U already and almost ready to launch. That means that EA's costs would be significantly lower than actually commissioning the game to be ported to the Wii U because that's already done. The only expenses would come through publishing, e.g. ordering copies of the game and marketing. Still, it's a risk, but not as much of a risk as what you're making out.

Yeah, no thanks.

Well it's about bloody time Now, where the frigging hell is Bravely Default?

@TheAdza, @Joshers744 and me. I'd really like to support this game to encourage localisations, but I know that I'd never played it. I gave the demo a chance on the Wii U and I've tried a couple of the games in the past and just can't see what's so great about playing a game that's basically just a huge grind.

@WaxxyOne: who said it has to be complicated or have the potential to brick? Take a look at the PS3 security - on paper it is solid as a rock. Sure, they messed up big time with the key generation algorithm, but new consoles are unhackable without paying a lot of money for a drive emulator.

The Wii however, doesn't have good security even on paper. It's riddled with holes, and Nintendo have never made more than a tiny effort to fix the holes. Even the Wii U's Wii mode is completely hackable since launch, and they had a good chance to completely clear Wii piracy on the Wii U. Piracy on Nintendo consoles is down to their own incompetence more than anything else, and that they're asking the US government to bail them out? What they need to do is invest more into security on their consoles.

The more difficult it is to pirate, the less likely people are to do it.

Dear Nintendo,

Try to build your console security a bit stronger than a house of cards.

Sincerely yours,
The Government

They might want to change the colour scheme from Canadian Mounted to British Bobby

Damn straight you better recall it! There's too much Americanization in this country these days...

Hell yes, I was hoping for a special edition 3DS XL.

I prefer standard controls to motion controls, but I think the Wii Remote + Nunchuk combination is much more natural to hold than other controllers. I love being able to relax my hands in whatever position feels comfortable without them being handcuffed together. The GamePad kind of takes a step back in that respect, but I guess we all grew up with our hands tethered together by our controllers, so...

I don't think the Wii U will be as popular as the Wii. I think its popularity will grow on people, but I think there's some misconception that casual gamers will keep updating their hardware. Some clearly will, but I don't think most will. The Wii U is a nice family console, and Nintendo probably put Wii ahead of Playstation as a household brand name, so perhaps I'm wrong but I just can't see it happening with the Wii U.

I'm buying two 3DS XLs for my daughters later in the year (birthday presents), and I'm crossing my fingers as tight as I can in the hope that we'll get these too.

I have 4 games so far. I've budgeted myself to 1 Wii U game per month since the launch at the end of November, which I think is reasonable since I don't get a lot of time to play games these days and have a backlog of titles to finish.

Outside of the four that I have, though, I'm not particularly interested in many others. I'll probably get AC:III next, or maybe ZombiU. I'm mostly waiting for some big releases from Nintendo.

@brandonbwii on the flipside of the coin, are you just going to be a doormat for a company that treats its loyal consumers this way? They're delaying a completed game just because they don't want to upset PS3 and 360 owners, which clearly shows that they don't give a damn about Wii U owners.

Why buy from a company that doesn't give a damn about you or your business? Like I said before, I'll probably buy the game, but it will be for £15 or less either pre-owned or on sale.

@Bankai you just don't get it, do you. This isn't a tantrum. I don't care that the game is going multi-platform. I just don't like the way that Ubisoft are trying to make it sound like they're doing this for the outspoken fans, but nobody asked them to delay the Wii U release.

I never intended to buy the game for me. My kids absolutely love Rayman, and when I told them the game was released in March, they were really excited. I was actually on the Amazon site ready to place my pre-order with a gift code I had when I read the news. Now I've got to explain to my kids that the game's not coming out for another 6 months and I feel like a jerk for getting them excited about something.

Ubisoft could have released the Wii U game on schedule and nobody would have batted an eyelid if they released for the PS3 and 360 later. I voted that I wouldn't be buying the game now, but I probably will. But I'll buy it pre-owned.

I just bought my fourth game today ― Darksiders II. Aside from NSMBU, I've waited until each game I buy drops below £30. I got Batman Arkham City from Amazon UK for ~£22 which I thought was an awesome deal. Glad to be doing my bit to help Nintendo's figures now that game prices are more reasonable.

That is possibly the last thing I'd ever have expected anybody to spend their precious time doing.

@UmbrellaHQ "Fact is that the markets have changed. Gaming handhelds have a lot of factors going against their survival at present. No longer do they have a monopoly on gaming on the go. Smartphones and tablets have replaced them with the great majority of mainstream gamers. So the handheld gaming user base has been reduced significantly as a result."

I don't agree with that statement. The GameBoy and GameBoy Color variety of handhelds sold 120 million units combined over 14 years. The Nintendo DS and DSi variety of handhelds has sold 150 million in just 8 years. That's 25% more owners in just over half the time. The 3DS' sales figures are roughly on par with that of the DS over the same period of time, so I don't see how you can have the view that smartphones are replacing handheld consoles. It's just clearly not the case.

@Tony_342, I think you have a somewhat valid point, but your argument is flawed. There's a certain exclusivity when it comes to developing for a proprietary handheld console such as the 3DS. There can't be more than a couple of hundred licensed developers. On smartphones, it's easy to get a license, just pony up $100 (for iOS, Android doesn't really have that). So let me put it this way: if there are 25 million fish in a sea and there are 250 fishing boats, each boat is going to be able to catch a lot of fish. If there are 100 million fish and 160,000 fishing boats, some fishing boats will have a much harder time catching fish. So, earning a living on smartphones isn't necessarily going to be easier than earning a living on the 3DS.

Not everything is as black and white as comparing numbers. Just sayin'.

Dang... for a second I thought there might actually have been some Electric Six in this game. That would have sparked a nuclear war on my dance floor. Solo!

@LZBirdboi, you said
"By your logic Hugo, is it okay for me to steal expensive clothes because I can't afford them otherwise?"

That is clearly a poor analogy because, if you steal a real product from a bricks and mortar shop, that's something the shop has bought from a manufacturer with the intention of selling on to consumers for a profit. So, that's theft in a real sense, because that shop will have to pay to replace that sweater. Piracy doesn't cause the same damage... when you download a game off the internet, it doesn't require that another copy of the game be produced to replace it.

Compare this with the actual theft of 7,000 Wii U units that happened recently. Those consoles in total were worth around $2.28m, and it will cost somebody somewhere in that region to replace them. It also means those 7,000 Wii U consoles were no longer available for consumers to buy. Compare that with the illegal download of 7,000 copies of Mutant Mudds―those copies do not have to be replaced and 7,000 people aren't going to be disappointed that they couldn't purchase a copy.

@HugoSmits is absolutely correct; 1 illegal download is not equal to 1 lost sale. I do think that illegal downloads are equal to some lost sales, but the logical part of my brain tells me that it can't surely be anywhere near what game companies would have you believe. With regards to the whole region and unavailable games thing, I think there's a point here, too. If people can't access games in their region legally, why does anyone really care if they access them illegally? There's definitely no lost sale there, right? The way I see it, as long as there's enough people in the world putting food on the developer's table, then why not let some less privileged people have the same enjoyment without the burden of the expensive price tag? With digital products, that's the only time it's a viable option. If somebody, somewhere in the world without the means could get free energy because I'm paying for my house to be heated, that would just be fantastic.

I would love a Xenoblade Chronicles-esque game for the Wii U. Hell, I'd even buy a rehashed "new play control" version of the game.

"She seems nice" ― lol

Game looks pretty cool, might try it out if it's a reasonable price.

Congrats to the winners. I kept running out of ink whilst trying to draw mine, but these entries seemed fine. Oh well, mine wasn't very good anyway