moomoo

How is Zelda 2 on this list?

Also, Wind Waker and Skyward Sword are overrated.

Got it for my Vita. It's an excellent game. Definitely worth playing if it looks like something you'd like.

He actually makes a pretty good point. They only have so much staff. Might as well take the risks in a sector that has a better chance of still standing on its feet in 4 years.

I don't get the people that say that NOA isn't advertising this game. I see it advertised in every Gamestop window that I see, and have for quite a while too.

No one is going to buy a Wii U to play GBA games. It does not make business sense to not also have these on 3DS, period. Nintendo needs to do what Sony does with their older library of games; make it integrated with one another and simultaneous.

Context, context, context.

I just beat this on my Vita the other day. Really good metroidvania game. I'm sure there are lots of Wii U owners that will love this game.

Not releasing any of their first party OSTs besides Smash Bros makes no sense to me. It's basically free money.

/licks lips.
@Jared1984 Seeing that the trailer had Japanese voices and had no release date at the end, it's looking unlikely that you'll see it this year.

I'm still not convinced on this one. Looks really derivative, and the art style doesn't look as good in this as the SNES game.

Hopefully, I'm wrong and it's amazing.

For what it's worth, I saw way more advertising for this game on 3DS and Wii U. I didn't even know it was on PSN until I checked the store randomly one day. There also isn't as much competition on either eshop, considering its price point. There's tons of indie games on PSN and Steam that are around the same price point and are also much better (and in the same genre to boot).

Then there's what everyone else said about the appeal retro platformers will have on Nintendo audiences, which I'd have a hard time arguing with too.

The idea that a system can be successful without 3rd party support is ludicrous. Loyalties off of 3rd parties is the biggest money-maker for a console maker. To say it's not important is foolish.

At the very least, the Wii had 3rd party support. It was different support, but it was there in tremendously large quantities. With the Wii U, that's not the case, and it's not looking likely to change.

I feel like all of the continuations of series that are on this list have run their course. I don't see much need for a new Advance Wars or Wave Race from a perspective of new ideas. The only cool idea on here would be a Pokémon fighting game.

As for Earthbound, it's pretty much the worst JRPG I've played when it comes to game mechanics, so it can die in a fire.

The fact that we don't have a wider variety of VC games really irks me.

Why not just put VC games on iOS and the like? They clearly aren't a selling point on the Wii U and 3DS; just look at how poorly the service is handled on those systems.

You can still play with buttons on the Wii U and 3DS, and I have a feeling people are going to go for those versions over touchscreens. This just allows for them to make way more money, since they expand their audience while also advertising their franchises.

It's Nintendo's fault for breaking the patent. They broke the law, so they should pay.

I like how we say X and Bayonetta are coming 2014 when we actually have no clue.
Didn't keep me from voting for X, mind you. That game looks fantastic.

The readers had a better list!
I must be dreaming... I only have minor nitpicks here. Solid list all around. It's also nice to see such a niche game like Fire Emblem get so much community praise. 3rd place for overall game of the year isn't too shabby when you have the insanely recognizable Zelda and Mario ahead of it.

Castlevania?... Okay then...

Well, here's hoping the reader's list is better.

I really hope Nintendo sold way more in Europe and the US, because there's no way they're hitting their sales targets if sales aren't astronomically high.

Go Fire Emblem!

This is easily one of the best games of the year, and arguably the best SRPG ever made. Wonderful game.

Not having stuff translated into Polish is enough reason for people to not want a game. I know I would rather play a game in English than any other language.

Is "Fruit Salad" by the Wiggles one of the songs in this game?

Darn it. I actually really liked Swapnote. I loved seeing all the things that my friends would write.

I get why they did it, but jeez, couldn't they have been a bit less drastic and just get rid of the ability to not send pictures and audio clips? It's not exactly easy to draw a detailed picture of inappropriate body parts on Swapnote. Most wouldn't be as obvious as the stuff Georgia O'Keefe made, and she was able to get away with calling them flowers.

I mean, I get the other things, like sending in phone numbers and such, but seriously, did you honestly think that some people wouldn't abuse this, Nintendo?

Actually, now that I think about it, Pokémon is probably the reason why they did this. In the meta game, the Friend Safari can't be used unless if you have friends, so kids who may not traditionally go on message boards due to their age may go on to get friends for that purpose. Nintendo must have been afraid of people that young using Nintendo's online features and being exposed to risk.

Very cool.

Dang. That Vita bump is massive.

I already own the game on the 360, so I wasn't going to get this version unless if it was cheaper anyway. It's unfortunate, too, since I really want to play it on the Wii U. I guess I'll just wait for the inevitable price drop.

@Onett ...but it's not new. There's a good chance that most of the people on this site have already played it all the way through.
I mean, there's other games that could have been mentioned instead of Wind Waker. Pikmin 3, Wonderful 101, Rayman Legends; it just seems weird to mention a game that came out 10 years ago of all games is all.

I don't quite get the author on this one. It's fine to not be into GTA V. But where did the Wind Waker thing come from? If you wanted to replay Wind Waker, you could just do it on the Gamecube. I don't see why it needed to be brought up.

TVii is pretty bad, in my opinion. It's just sooooo slow. It feels like it's in Beta.

Everyone should keep in mind that this is for the entire video game market, not necessarily Nintendo. With mobile gaming (an incredibly large portion of the industry) being made up entirely of downloads, this isn't very surprising.

This game looks delicious.

@Kriedler Reggie isn't the one that makes hardware decisions. If anyone should be fired it should be the people in Kyoto making ridiculous decisions.

Wouldn't the Xbox One completely outclass the Wii U in every regard when it comes to what this is advertising?
Also, that was really creepy...

@NorthLightSuplx Rayamn Legends, Pikmin 3, Wonderful 101. These were supposed to be launch window games. Instead, they released right before or will release right before the price drop. Those games were the reason I bought a Wii U early, so to have them release so close to a price drop really makes it leave a bad taste in the mouth.

@SkywardCrowbar You know, I'd disagree with you if games would have come out when they were supposed to. But all of the worthwhile Wii U games that have or will release are coming out at around the same time of the price drop. Pikmin 3, Wonderful 101, and Rayman Legends were all supposed to be launch window titles, but they didn't come out until about a month or less to the price drop.

I really hope there's some sort of compensation, because when you promise software in the first 6 months and don't deliver, it's natural for the userbase to be ticked.

I really hope that there's ambassador games, because I really regret buying a Wii U in its first year. Pitiable release lineup as of today.

I don't even know what to say...

@Realgamer4life People can indeed read directions. I don't know how many people that do read directions, though. I know I don't, but I do my research. Most consumers, however, probably want things to be as simple as be.

Since the hardrive isn't mandatory, many people won't go for it, as they won't see the point in taking advantage of the great things a hardrive would offer. If it was so integral, why not just include it? They just want to play some games off of the discs they buy.

How many people who bought a Wii U actually use an external HDD for their system? Even if it's a high percentage of the userbase, you won't want to take chances and mandate it on your game. It's too risky.

@Realgamer4life If you're a parent who isn't familiar with the video game industry and don't follow Nintendo online, then you're not going to know. Let's say that your child wants a Wii U for his birthday, along with a game. You give that Wii U to your precious child along with that game, only to discover that that game needs to be installed, and the space on your system isn't enough.

Wouldn't that suck?

There's lots of people who don't follow Nintendo a lot that may want to buy their system. Regardless of whether Nintendo recommends an external Hardrive, many people aren't going to hear, because they just want to buy the system and some games.

With a Pokémon and Monster Hunter Combo, it seems attainable. Zelda will add a bit as well.

@Hylian_Scholar How many Wii U owners actually have an external hardrive?
If there are few people who have a hardrive to do installs on, it doesn't make sense for a publisher to mandate it when the install space required would be larger then the maximum amount of space on the basic Wii U model. It's too risky.

This will be a major problem when it comes to 3rd party stuff in the future. It's looking ever likelier that the Wii U will pretty much only play Nintendo games.

Most of the people here seem to be blaming Ubisoft for the lack of graphical prowess in this game when compared to other versions.

From what I can see, this may very well be Nintendo's fault. The fact that games can't be partially installed onto the hardrive for disc games means that everything has to be loaded from the disc. This results in stuff like pop-in, frame rate issues and the much longer loading times. So for any games that are trying to make a very large world with a lot of stuff going on (Assassin's Creed 3, Splinter Cell, and Lego City Undercover, a Nintendo published game) then its going to be plagued with these kind of problems.

I don't care how you slice it; if a game running on 2012 hardware is being outdone by a machine made in 2005, that's not a good indicator of what the Wii U is capable of. Nintendo seemed to be so focused on innovating with the Gamepad that they didn't focus on just making a system that could play games of a very large variety in good quality. This looks like it will be a machine where you can only really play Nintendo games.

Regardless, I plan on getting this soon. I love stealth games, and off-TV play alone makes this the best version for me. Also, I doubt these problems (outside of loading times) won't really be noticeable without a side-by-side comparison.

The people denying themselves of this game because it was delayed are fools. This is probably going to be the best game on the Wii U this year. It also looks to be one of the best platformers ever made.

I'm hoping that the main character isn't as boring as Connor was as in 3.

Regardless, this series really impresses me. For a series where there's a game every year, the amount of stuff the developers do each year is remarkable.

Considering these "vintage" games didn't come out that long ago, I think it's safe to say that it's the fault of the people who didn't buy them that there's any problem. We knew Xenoblade was good from European reviews, and Metroid Prime Trilogy was a collection of games consumers already knew were good.

All this does is encourage people to buy games soon after they come out, rather than getting them to wait for them to get cheaper. I think that's a good thing for this market.

@Windy You've been added. In the rare instance when someone knows what my avatar is from, a smile comes across my face.

@element187 If you have the system on-hand, then yes, you can (if you've get a repair from Nintendo. Or if you just do a system transfer when you have a fully working system). But if your system is stolen, lost, or broken to oblivion then you're screwed. Your purchases are tied to a system, not an account.

Here's a little thread with an email to NOE: https://www.nintendolife.com/forums/wii-u/just_to_let_you_guys_know

@Moshugan Indeed. Especially with the weird button-mapping in this game. Why would they make the L button automatically check? L should do what A does. And why leave the y button all alone? I just don't get it.

I am trying so hard to like this game, but I'm really not impressed with it. Compared to other SNES RPGs at the time, this game has some incredibly archaic gameplay mechanics and design choices. I like the humor in the game, but everything else in it just isn't good to me. Everything that makes it a video game are mediocre at best, from the battle system to the exploration to the story-progression.

It's good that others are enjoying it, though. I'll keep playing to the end to see if it clicks with me. I'm about 8 hours in, by the way.

Also, I recommend fiddling with the controls in the game. I made the A button do what L did and set the A button to Y.