@Terranigma - I was talking about the time difference. Capcom was supposed to have released 1 game per month. Instead, we saw Megaman, a long drought, then Megaman 2 on Monday. If you check Monday's thread I predicted that MM9 would not come out next week.
Looks like I was wrong. According to the press release, Capcom didn't even put pressure on Nintendo. (PS3 is the 25th, XBLA is Oct. 1st) I still think it's a weird idea to release the preeminent game in the series (MegaMan 2) a week before the new game, but what do I know? (Obviously not a lot. )
@xSJx - Hey now, let's not be self deprecating. It was only a riddle. And one designed for those with an interest in history at that.
The answer is that Strong Bad is a total parody of the American Revolution. From the "email tax" (tea tax? stamp act? etc.) imposed by "King of Town" (analogous to "King George III") to Strong Bad attempting to unite various country-states in revolt (Colonies -> States) to even the flag he's flying! (The flag is a parody of the Gadsden Flag flown by the early revolutionaries. Snake + Tire == Don't Tread on Me. Get it? ) I'm sure there are even more parallels that can be drawn, but those are the obvious ones that stick out.
As for MM9, I still don't believe it's coming out next week. Nintendo has been playing fast and loose with release dates. Capcom might put pressure on Nintendo with fixed PS3 and 360 release dates, but feel free to flip a coin as to whether Nintendo will cave or not. (They don't seem to like having pressure applied to them.) Especially since the original plan was one Mega Man title per month, and not more than one title from a given developer per month. (Though one could argue that VC doesn't count. )
I doubt that Mega Man 9 would be released so shortly after Mega Man 2. My guess is that it will be a few weeks (October, most likely) before we see the new game.
On the matter of Strong Bad, I wonder if you have to pay the King's "totally unfair" email tax to use your lappy to send emails to your friends?
Speaking of which, here's a riddle for you guys: What does Strong Badia the Free have in common with the American Revolution?
@mrk - The starter pack has only one level. Even at 500 points, I can't see how that could possibly be a good value. Expansion packs consist of only two levels. Also have a hard time believing it's a good value. Finally, Taito is really telling us that there would have been only 7 levels in a retail release? Also doesn't sound like a very good value.
Now maybe the levels are more complex and varied than they're letting on. But until they prove it, I'm going to be extremely wary of this title.
Ike-Mike nailed it. I couldn't figure this out either until someone pointed that fact out to me. None the less, it seems like a pretty crappy use of brand recognition. Taito == Space Invaders in the minds of consumers. Why would you try to make them think that Squenix == Space Invaders? To lure in the RPG crowd?
While I'm cheering for MPR finally getting dethroned and WWG making it high up on the charts, the rocket launch of Strong Bad does have me a bit concerned. It's not that Strong Bad is a bad game, but I fear that it shot to the top based on name branding rather than actual merit.
One could say, "but wiirocks, Strong Bad was a highly anticipated game!" And I'd agree with you. Except that many other WiiWare titles have been highly anticipated yet never reached a very high standing. The fact that Strong Bad did reach a high standing and the other games didn't tells me one thing:
The majority of WiiWare buyers shop on impulse rather than information.
Since buyers are uninformed, you can shove them a frozen turkey sandwich and they'll buy it as long as it's in the shape of Maddox, the resident internet jester. Meanwhile, games that are solidly built, original, and ready to launch a new genre will be ignored by the average WiiWare consumer.
The one ray of hope is DYC. Not to keep harping on the issue, but DYC did prove that the only thing WiiWare shoppers like more than a brand name is a good deal. (Real or perceived.) So anyone who wants to succeed in this space without a brand name needs to drop prices FAST. And yes, that even means beloved games like Toki Tori.
On another note, I did just help edit a review for Strong Bad. If you're itching for a review and just can't wait for WiiWare World's, then go check it out. It can't compare to the wonderful penmanship of the WiiWare World editors, but it does cover the subject reasonably well.
(And yes, that is a direct compliment to you WW folks. Your mastery of the written word is one of the highlights that makes this site so enjoyable. )
Hrumph. I wonder how many developers actually try to make their games smaller? Not that I'm defending the fact that the Wii is woefully low on space (hindsight is 20/20, eh?), but a little bit of optimization can go a long way.
Having taken the (virtual) trophy for a 4 kilobyte game before, I know what is possible and what is not. And one thing I know is that there are ways games like this could be done if the developers are interested. Unfortunately, I don't think they feel that there will be enough of a return to make the work worth the effort.
@0-Watt sez - "they could not provide more than two levels per Wii Store download (40-something mb max, right?)"
Officially, there is no 40MB limit.
@Naturestee sez "$20 for a full game is still pretty good, provided that the content is good."
That's the problem, though. I didn't see anything during the retail announcement to convince me that this would be a game I'd want to purchase. But as a WiiWare title, they had my interest piqued. (Partly because of the lower cost of entry.) When they announced the Stage Pack plan, I figured we'd probably see something like 4 stages per pack. Never in my dreams did I imagine 1+2+2+2 all at 500 points each!
Sorry, that's just a ripoff. Taito can either sell me the entire game for 1500 points (the upper end of what I'll consider) or they can sell it to me piece meal (as they are planning), but in reasonable sized chunks. Selling one level of the game as a full title is the very definition of crippleware.
Hey Taito, remember the shareware games? Remember how they had the first episode free, but you had to pay for the other 3 episodes? Remember how each episode was a complete game? Yeah, that was a good idea. It was called "shareware", and it appealed to game players despite (or perhaps because of) the rampant piracy of the day.
What's interesting is that the market also had a name for a game like yours. Rather than having the nice, pleasant, "first hit is free" shareware name, games like yours were called crippleware.
That's right, I just said it. Taito, you are selling crippleware. So you might as well take those dollar bills (Japanese yen?) you spent on development and flush them down the toilet.
@Bass X0 - More precisely it's caused by sprites overlapping on the same scan lines. The game engine can't display both sprites because the hardware lacks the necessary outputs. This led to a trick originally developed for the Atari 2600 whereby the sprites would take turns being displayed each frame. (Anyone remember Pacman fro the 2600? The ghosts flickered madly because the 2600 didn't have sufficient sprite hardware to display them all.)
As a result, flickering is actually a feature of the software. (Yes, I did just say, "it's not a bug, it's a feature!") Without that feature, the game wouldn't be possible in the first place. Of course, some games have so much flicker that it makes you wonder if they should have been ported in the first place. (cough*TMNT2*cough)
At the end of the day, though, I agree with Corbie. Flickering was a necessary evil, not something to celebrate. I'll be leaving that option in the solid "off" position.
@Mike - Simple answer: Some of us have played the ever-living daylights out of Link's Crossbow Training and would like something new to shoot at. That's where Wild West Guns comes in.
Rapadash6 has it. The impression I've had with these failed confirmations is that Nintendo is intentionally trying to gum up the works to discourage publishers from giving dates. Thus in effect, the publishers need to STOP GIVING EXACT DATES because they're hurting our chances of getting great games.
Heck, we still haven't seen Parodier thanks to this misbehavior. Like it or not, Nintendo runs the VC service and publishers need to play by Nintendo's rules. If everyone would stop trying to do an end run around Nintendo, life would be better for all of us.
Of course, there is another explanation that is far more sinister. If publishers have pre-announced a game that has everyone excited, then WiiWare customers are engaged into buying mode when Monday comes. Thus Nintendo can make better profits off of VC titles that wouldn't otherwise sell by swapping out the releases. Then when they get around to releasing the title that everyone WANTED, they would still make those profits.
Such business practices are rather shady though, so I would hope that Nintendo is not engaged in such ventures.
I'm looking forward to getting this when I get home tonight. Given that the game is so close in concept to Wii Play and Link's Crossbow Training, I imagine I'll manage to get my wife to play it with me. (Yay! It's hard to get her to play video games.)
Otherwise, this week feels a little... err... weak. Guess Nintendo wanted to focus on WWG. Nothing wrong with that I s'pose.
@Raptor78 - I understand what you say completely. Game makers need to realize that we live in a global community. All those communication barriers that used to exist are no longer an issue. The only thing separating Japan's market is a language barrier. Thus it's incredibly frustrating to see things so out of sync in the western world.
Unfortunately, the physical barriers of laws, currencies, and localizations are NOT going away. They're getting better, but these issues still present challenges to synchronizing game releases. I imagine that the first game company to figure out how to solve these issues will manage to capture a massive amount of goodwill in the market. (Of course, they can start by eliminating the EVIL known as region locking.)
On another topic, I am also happy to hear that you didn't get Pong Toss. Then we'd have to refer to Brits as "a bunch of tossers". (rimshot) Just like us yanks. (rimshot)
@sadpanda212 - I wouldn't put too much stock in anything Bahamut ZERO says. His posts have been rather random, inconsistent, and often contradictory. In this particular case, though, I think he was trying to say something positive. As in, "isn't it cool you guys are having a good week?" So don't be too hard on the poor chap.
@Symphonia King - I'm completely with you on this one. After the great reviews the game got over here in the States, I'm shocked that more Brits and Europeans aren't excited for this title.
On the bright side, I'm waiting patiently for Demon212's review. Should be interesting...
It's interesting to see that Taito is learning from those that came before them. They seem to have learned from DYC that a low price will generate impulse buys while simultaneously learning from FFCC:MLAAK that DLC is a great way to nickel and dime the consumer into paying more than they originally intended.
End result? Massive game intended for $30-$50 commercial release gets cut up into, say, 5 chunks costing $5 + 4x($3?) for a whopping total of $17. Which is actually quite smart. Rather than trying to charge heavily up front, they give consumers the opportunity to sample the product. If they like it, they can get more. If they don't, they're only out $5.
I hereby dub this business model the Apogee Shareware Model. [...] (Wait. What's that? Someone already came up with that model? Nuts. There goes my job as a brilliant industry analyst. )
@Bahamut ZERO - If you already have a Perfect Shot, then why do you complain that you should have got one? And that still doesn't answer why you're spending your time complaining about the Zapper (which apparently you're part of the minority that dislikes it) rather than being excited about a game that lets you use your Perfect Shot.
All you're communicating is that you want to complain.
@Vortex99 - 2 titles at a time is more like a guideline than a rule. Nintendo has regularly gone up and down with their numbers. Some weeks we have almost a half-dozen WiiWare and VC titles to choose from!
@Bahamut ZERO - I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that you've never actually tried the Wii Zapper. Despite IGN's complaints, the Zapper does work pretty well in real life. The remote's speaker and rumble provide more than enough feedback to compensate for any trigger issues. (Which are highly overrated anyway.)
Besides, if you like the Perfect Shot so much (which isn't necessarily a bad thing) why don't you buy it rather than complaining about the Zapper? It's not like games are only compatible with one or the other.
I'm actually excited about this game. My Zapper doesn't have nearly enough titles for it. Link's Crossbow Training and Ghost Squad are both great, but they do eventually get old. Hopefully we'll get this in the states next Monday.
Whoa, back up a moment. Is Hothead telling us that the game is larger than the ~40MB limit that Nintendo says they don't impose on developers, or is HotHead saying that the download is greater than 200MB in size? (In which case it would have trouble fitting in the Wii's available space.)
Whoops! Fixed that. I was typing rather quickly before having to nip off to Church.
Really, you should review the game. I'm willing to bet you'll end up liking it. I didn't originally want it either (having played the flash game), but ended up purchasing it on a lark because it was so cheap. Best $5 I ever spent on a video game.
Geez Demon, give a guy a chance to get out of bed and respond! You seem to forget the US is several hours behind you guys.
Here are the differences (THAT I HAVE POSTED HALF A BILLION TIMES ON THIS FORUM ahem):
Graphical changes improve playability by making it easier to see characters in a crowded game.
Four player support allows for massive party gaming
Smooth framerate even when the action gets insane. This allowed the developers to revamp how the difficulty system works. They can have more enemies on the screen at a time.
Additional enemies like catapults
Ability to save your progress.
Simplified and smoothed out upgrades system
Better controls. (In the Flash game you had to pretty much had to smash the enemies against the ground because the mouse was unreliable. The Wii Remote works much better for flipping guys into oblivion)
Better audio
Here are some subjective differences as well:
The flash game is simply not fun, IMHO. The Wii version is.
The humor is better in the Wii version. From lolcat references to graffiti, the Wii version is guaranteed to amuse.
The question is DEMON212, who WOULD you listen to about this? Who, in your opinion, would be enough of an expert on both the Wii and Flash games to make a good judgement in your opinion?
@fortius54 - It would also be what we in the industry like to call "a support nightmare". Consoles have a reputation for "just working". You put the game in, and it starts. No hardware to muck around with, no configuration options to change, no drivers to update. (Though the firmware upgrades tend to get a bit tedious after a while.)
This is the exact opposite of a computer where things often require tweaking, rejiggering, waving a rubber chicken, and other troubleshooting aspects. Getting the latest game to run can be an entire game in itself!
From that perspective, Nintendo would never support the idea of being able to plug in any ol' drive. It's almost a guarantee that users would try to plug in a cruddy $10 laptop drive adapter from China that wouldn't work, be difficult to make work, or possibly would even fry the Wii. And even if they do get it working, how do you explain to consumers the concept of formatting their hard drive for the Wii such that it ends up incompatible with their computer? How many people won't understand how it works and have all their data eliminated by the format?
Not only would Nintendo's support lines wind up over saturated with tech support calls, but their reputation would also take a dive. Their strong commitment to quality in both product and service would be reduced to a simple: "They're just like all the other console makers". That's the last thing that Nintendo wants to happen.
As such, I doubt we'll see an external hard drive solution at all. The most likely solution will be the SD Card slot. It's taking time because of Nintendo's commitment to quality and a solid release. They'd hate to pull a Sony and have to pull a firmware release because of insufficient testing.
I often wonder what's holding Nintendo back from using the SD slot. Especially since the SD cards were obviously supposed to be the memory cards for the Wii prior to the addition of the 512MB internal flash. (Anyone remember the pre-release box that showed the "Wii OS Disc" as part of the contents?)
My feeling is that there are two primary issues:
1. Performance. SD Cards have massive variations in their data performance rates. This can make transfers unpredictable, possibly affecting gameplay for some titles. I'm thinking this could be resolved with a smart caching system that keeps the running title on the Wii's internal memory.
2. Interface. For better or for worse, Nintendo released the console with limited SD Card support. This means that most Wii owners already have data spread across their SD Cards and internal memory. Nintendo's SD Card scheme would need to be intelligent about when to show channels (e.g. Would duplicate channels on the internal memory AND SD Card be shown twice?) and how to treat such a situation with a caching scheme like I mentioned above. Should Nintendo introduce APIs for developers to work with the cache (thus enabling games >512MB in size) or should they try to do as much automatically as possible? And what about downloading? Do consumers have to download to internal memory then move to SD Card, or should they be able to download straight to SD?
Further questions are posed by the current 2GB limitation on the Wii's SD Card support. Supporting larger cards would require supporting file systems other than FAT. Should they support FAT32? And would a remote upgrade of the reader's firmware to support SDHC addressing mode be safe? Or even possible?
@Mickeymac - I only mentioned because quite a few posters seem to see this as a major breakthrough. In fact, it is a breakthrough for public relations, just not for the storage problem at hand. Otherwise I'm as ecstatic as anyone else that Reggie is giving a more positive response than his colleague over in Europe.
Not to put a dampener on things, but I hope everyone realizes that Reggie et al. are not doing anything to solve the problem. The development of the Wii's software is happening in Japan, controlled by the Japanese arm of Nintendo. Reggie has no real power to change that development process other than to ask nicely.
What Reggie CAN do is that he can report the efforts to the American public already reported by Iwata-san, but in a light that is seen as more positive by Americans.
@Wii Ownz All - I'm surprised you can't find something to look forward to? My short list is Megaman 9, Gradius Rebirth, and Shante. I fully expect that all of those will be worth a download.
So chin up, fellow. Not every week can see a blockbuster release. You just need to get used to doing a little cherry picking.
The Japanese do tend to transpose R's and L's, which did give rise to the idea that Gradius was a mistranslation of Gladius. However, this appears to be just an urban legend. "Gradius" appears to be a loose translation of the Japanese name "Guradiusu". As far as I understand, the word has no particular meaning in Japanese.
Damien sez... If you favour a more full-frontal attack you can fix them to fire forwards, or if you want to protect your rear, backwards.
Reminds me a bit of another Megadrive shmup: Hellfire. Like Thunderforce/Lightingforce, Hellfire allows you to toggle the shot direction during gameplay. Where things get interesting is that the shots can not only go forward and back, but also vertically, horizontally, and diagonally! This really tested your coordination as you tried to switch between firing modes without dying. (Did I mention your ship was rather huge for a shmup? The weapons spun around the ship in a cool way, though. )
I wonder if we'll see more Megadrive shooters? So far the Wii has been the best platform in history for shmups. Let's hope the trend continues!
@alex1893 - Exactly right. Bensei was quite confused. Gladius was the weapon carried by Roman infantry, usually a short and wide stabbing weapon for use from behind the shield wall. Gradius is the made-up name of the home planet in the shoot 'em up series of the same name.
Computing based on "100 levels!" sounds like a pretty weak argument to me. Usually when there is "100 levels!" in a game, it means that every level is a minor variation on the last. Either that, or the levels are simple enough to where they sap relatively little time from the designer and player.
Even worse, with puzzle games you often run into levels you can't figure out. Then the "100 levels!" quickly becomes irrelevant. If you can't get past the 10th level, it might as well have been 10 levels long.
I think there is still a MASSIVE burden of proof for the developer to show us that the game is worth 1500 points. For that much money on a download service, I expect a game that would be competitive on store shelves at $30.
@DEMON212 - The WiiWare revision of the game is vastly superior to the Flash version of the game. It has better graphics, smoothed out gameplay, different enemies, four player support, the save slots, and many more features not found in the Flash game.
In result, calling a 500 point version of the game "a ripoff" is misinformed at best, disingenuous at worst.
And trust me, I know a thing or two about the Wii Browser and what it is capable of. WiiWare is a still a superior solution. Thus it's not surprising that the WiiWare revision of DYC is a superior game.
I've been waiting for another excellent Zapper title. I already have Link's Crossbow Training and Ghost Squad. Since zombie games don't appeal to me (especially with little ones around the house) this game sounds tremendously appealing. I just hope it delivers!
@Corbie - That's disappointing. I didn't expect much, but I was hoping. (Apparently against hope.) WiiWare really needs more good titles. The early titles were awesome. I'd hate to see it turn into another cesspool of XBLA hits and misses. (With more misses than hits.)
Comments 551
Re: USA WiiWare Update: Mega Man 9 and Plättchen
FYI, the complete DLC list and schedule for Mega Man 9 is now available.
Re: Mega Man 9 Confirmed For US Release On Monday!
@Terranigma - I was talking about the time difference. Capcom was supposed to have released 1 game per month. Instead, we saw Megaman, a long drought, then Megaman 2 on Monday. If you check Monday's thread I predicted that MM9 would not come out next week.
Re: Mega Man 9 Confirmed For US Release On Monday!
Looks like I was wrong. According to the press release, Capcom didn't even put pressure on Nintendo. (PS3 is the 25th, XBLA is Oct. 1st) I still think it's a weird idea to release the preeminent game in the series (MegaMan 2) a week before the new game, but what do I know? (Obviously not a lot. )
I look forward to monday!
Re: USA WiiWare Update: Potpourrii and Strong Bad Episode 2
My pleasure, Stratos.
Re: Review: Strong Bad Episode 2 - Strong Badia the Free (WiiWare)
Whoa. That was impressive! Preview copy or not!
Re: USA WiiWare Update: Potpourrii and Strong Bad Episode 2
@xSJx - Hey now, let's not be self deprecating. It was only a riddle. And one designed for those with an interest in history at that.
The answer is that Strong Bad is a total parody of the American Revolution. From the "email tax" (tea tax? stamp act? etc.) imposed by "King of Town" (analogous to "King George III") to Strong Bad attempting to unite various country-states in revolt (Colonies -> States) to even the flag he's flying! (The flag is a parody of the Gadsden Flag flown by the early revolutionaries. Snake + Tire == Don't Tread on Me. Get it? ) I'm sure there are even more parallels that can be drawn, but those are the obvious ones that stick out.
As for MM9, I still don't believe it's coming out next week. Nintendo has been playing fast and loose with release dates. Capcom might put pressure on Nintendo with fixed PS3 and 360 release dates, but feel free to flip a coin as to whether Nintendo will cave or not. (They don't seem to like having pressure applied to them.) Especially since the original plan was one Mega Man title per month, and not more than one title from a given developer per month. (Though one could argue that VC doesn't count. )
Re: USA WiiWare Update: Potpourrii and Strong Bad Episode 2
I doubt that Mega Man 9 would be released so shortly after Mega Man 2. My guess is that it will be a few weeks (October, most likely) before we see the new game.
On the matter of Strong Bad, I wonder if you have to pay the King's "totally unfair" email tax to use your lappy to send emails to your friends?
Speaking of which, here's a riddle for you guys: What does Strong Badia the Free have in common with the American Revolution?
Re: USA WiiWare Update: Helix
@BuzzDee - I heard that only geeks and otaku want Super Mario RPG.
Ah, who am I kidding? NOA better get the lead out!
Re: Alien Crush Returns & Space Invaders Get Even In Japan
@mrk - The starter pack has only one level. Even at 500 points, I can't see how that could possibly be a good value. Expansion packs consist of only two levels. Also have a hard time believing it's a good value. Finally, Taito is really telling us that there would have been only 7 levels in a retail release? Also doesn't sound like a very good value.
Now maybe the levels are more complex and varied than they're letting on. But until they prove it, I'm going to be extremely wary of this title.
Re: Top 20 WiiWare Games in America (20th August)
@Link79 - Mega Man 9 will do fine. It has major brand recognition, which is one of the key factors to success on the WiiWare service.
Re: Square-Enix Gets Invaded!
Ike-Mike nailed it. I couldn't figure this out either until someone pointed that fact out to me. None the less, it seems like a pretty crappy use of brand recognition. Taito == Space Invaders in the minds of consumers. Why would you try to make them think that Squenix == Space Invaders? To lure in the RPG crowd?
Re: Review: My Aquarium (WiiWare)
Nice review. Great to see that WiiWare's first non-game program gets a high score!
Re: Top 20 WiiWare Games in America (13th August)
@Bahamut ZERO - I'm not sure whether that was intended as a compliment or not, but thank you! I think.
Re: Top 20 WiiWare Games in America (13th August)
While I'm cheering for MPR finally getting dethroned and WWG making it high up on the charts, the rocket launch of Strong Bad does have me a bit concerned. It's not that Strong Bad is a bad game, but I fear that it shot to the top based on name branding rather than actual merit.
One could say, "but wiirocks, Strong Bad was a highly anticipated game!" And I'd agree with you. Except that many other WiiWare titles have been highly anticipated yet never reached a very high standing. The fact that Strong Bad did reach a high standing and the other games didn't tells me one thing:
The majority of WiiWare buyers shop on impulse rather than information.
Since buyers are uninformed, you can shove them a frozen turkey sandwich and they'll buy it as long as it's in the shape of Maddox, the resident internet jester. Meanwhile, games that are solidly built, original, and ready to launch a new genre will be ignored by the average WiiWare consumer.
The one ray of hope is DYC. Not to keep harping on the issue, but DYC did prove that the only thing WiiWare shoppers like more than a brand name is a good deal. (Real or perceived.) So anyone who wants to succeed in this space without a brand name needs to drop prices FAST. And yes, that even means beloved games like Toki Tori.
On another note, I did just help edit a review for Strong Bad. If you're itching for a review and just can't wait for WiiWare World's, then go check it out. It can't compare to the wonderful penmanship of the WiiWare World editors, but it does cover the subject reasonably well.
(And yes, that is a direct compliment to you WW folks. Your mastery of the written word is one of the highlights that makes this site so enjoyable. )
Re: Braid Is Too Big For WiiWare
Hrumph. I wonder how many developers actually try to make their games smaller? Not that I'm defending the fact that the Wii is woefully low on space (hindsight is 20/20, eh?), but a little bit of optimization can go a long way.
Having taken the (virtual) trophy for a 4 kilobyte game before, I know what is possible and what is not. And one thing I know is that there are ways games like this could be done if the developers are interested. Unfortunately, I don't think they feel that there will be enough of a return to make the work worth the effort.
Re: Space Invaders Get Even - Stage Pack Details
@0-Watt sez - "they could not provide more than two levels per Wii Store download (40-something mb max, right?)"
Officially, there is no 40MB limit.
@Naturestee sez "$20 for a full game is still pretty good, provided that the content is good."
That's the problem, though. I didn't see anything during the retail announcement to convince me that this would be a game I'd want to purchase. But as a WiiWare title, they had my interest piqued. (Partly because of the lower cost of entry.) When they announced the Stage Pack plan, I figured we'd probably see something like 4 stages per pack. Never in my dreams did I imagine 1+2+2+2 all at 500 points each!
Sorry, that's just a ripoff. Taito can either sell me the entire game for 1500 points (the upper end of what I'll consider) or they can sell it to me piece meal (as they are planning), but in reasonable sized chunks. Selling one level of the game as a full title is the very definition of crippleware.
Re: Space Invaders Get Even - Stage Pack Details
Taito just failed. Big time.
Hey Taito, remember the shareware games? Remember how they had the first episode free, but you had to pay for the other 3 episodes? Remember how each episode was a complete game? Yeah, that was a good idea. It was called "shareware", and it appealed to game players despite (or perhaps because of) the rampant piracy of the day.
What's interesting is that the market also had a name for a game like yours. Rather than having the nice, pleasant, "first hit is free" shareware name, games like yours were called crippleware.
That's right, I just said it. Taito, you are selling crippleware. So you might as well take those dollar bills (Japanese yen?) you spent on development and flush them down the toilet.
Re: USA VC Releases: Star Parodier and Break In
@STEADY MOBBIN 22 sez -- "MORE SHOOTERS PLEASE!!!!!!!"
I agree wholeheartedly! Shmups rock!
Re: Mega Man 9 - Flicker Included!
@Bass X0 - More precisely it's caused by sprites overlapping on the same scan lines. The game engine can't display both sprites because the hardware lacks the necessary outputs. This led to a trick originally developed for the Atari 2600 whereby the sprites would take turns being displayed each frame. (Anyone remember Pacman fro the 2600? The ghosts flickered madly because the 2600 didn't have sufficient sprite hardware to display them all.)
As a result, flickering is actually a feature of the software. (Yes, I did just say, "it's not a bug, it's a feature!") Without that feature, the game wouldn't be possible in the first place. Of course, some games have so much flicker that it makes you wonder if they should have been ported in the first place. (cough*TMNT2*cough)
At the end of the day, though, I agree with Corbie. Flickering was a necessary evil, not something to celebrate. I'll be leaving that option in the solid "off" position.
Re: USA WiiWare Update: Wild West Guns
@Mike - Simple answer: Some of us have played the ever-living daylights out of Link's Crossbow Training and would like something new to shoot at. That's where Wild West Guns comes in.
Re: USA VC Update: Sonic (Master System) and Splatterhouse 2
Rapadash6 has it. The impression I've had with these failed confirmations is that Nintendo is intentionally trying to gum up the works to discourage publishers from giving dates. Thus in effect, the publishers need to STOP GIVING EXACT DATES because they're hurting our chances of getting great games.
Heck, we still haven't seen Parodier thanks to this misbehavior. Like it or not, Nintendo runs the VC service and publishers need to play by Nintendo's rules. If everyone would stop trying to do an end run around Nintendo, life would be better for all of us.
Of course, there is another explanation that is far more sinister. If publishers have pre-announced a game that has everyone excited, then WiiWare customers are engaged into buying mode when Monday comes. Thus Nintendo can make better profits off of VC titles that wouldn't otherwise sell by swapping out the releases. Then when they get around to releasing the title that everyone WANTED, they would still make those profits.
Such business practices are rather shady though, so I would hope that Nintendo is not engaged in such ventures.
Re: USA WiiWare Update: Wild West Guns
I'm looking forward to getting this when I get home tonight. Given that the game is so close in concept to Wii Play and Link's Crossbow Training, I imagine I'll manage to get my wife to play it with me. (Yay! It's hard to get her to play video games.)
Otherwise, this week feels a little... err... weak. Guess Nintendo wanted to focus on WWG. Nothing wrong with that I s'pose.
Re: Euro Update: Wild West Guns and Defend Your Castle
@Raptor78 - I understand what you say completely. Game makers need to realize that we live in a global community. All those communication barriers that used to exist are no longer an issue. The only thing separating Japan's market is a language barrier. Thus it's incredibly frustrating to see things so out of sync in the western world.
Unfortunately, the physical barriers of laws, currencies, and localizations are NOT going away. They're getting better, but these issues still present challenges to synchronizing game releases. I imagine that the first game company to figure out how to solve these issues will manage to capture a massive amount of goodwill in the market. (Of course, they can start by eliminating the EVIL known as region locking.)
On another topic, I am also happy to hear that you didn't get Pong Toss. Then we'd have to refer to Brits as "a bunch of tossers". (rimshot) Just like us yanks. (rimshot)
@sadpanda212 - I wouldn't put too much stock in anything Bahamut ZERO says. His posts have been rather random, inconsistent, and often contradictory. In this particular case, though, I think he was trying to say something positive. As in, "isn't it cool you guys are having a good week?" So don't be too hard on the poor chap.
Re: Euro Update: Wild West Guns and Defend Your Castle
@Symphonia King - I'm completely with you on this one. After the great reviews the game got over here in the States, I'm shocked that more Brits and Europeans aren't excited for this title.
On the bright side, I'm waiting patiently for Demon212's review. Should be interesting...
Re: Space Invaders Get Even To Come With Bargain Price Tag
It's interesting to see that Taito is learning from those that came before them. They seem to have learned from DYC that a low price will generate impulse buys while simultaneously learning from FFCC:MLAAK that DLC is a great way to nickel and dime the consumer into paying more than they originally intended.
End result? Massive game intended for $30-$50 commercial release gets cut up into, say, 5 chunks costing $5 + 4x($3?) for a whopping total of $17. Which is actually quite smart. Rather than trying to charge heavily up front, they give consumers the opportunity to sample the product. If they like it, they can get more. If they don't, they're only out $5.
I hereby dub this business model the Apogee Shareware Model. [...] (Wait. What's that? Someone already came up with that model? Nuts. There goes my job as a brilliant industry analyst. )
Re: Wild West Guns - Fact Sheet, New Images And Video!
@Dazza - Do you really want us to answer that?
Re: Wild West Guns - Fact Sheet, New Images And Video!
Hmm.... This looks like a weird cross between Wii Play and Link's Crossbow Training...
pause
I'M TOTALLY GETTING THIS GAME!
Re: Wild West Guns Coming To Europe This Friday
@Bahamut ZERO - If you already have a Perfect Shot, then why do you complain that you should have got one? And that still doesn't answer why you're spending your time complaining about the Zapper (which apparently you're part of the minority that dislikes it) rather than being excited about a game that lets you use your Perfect Shot.
All you're communicating is that you want to complain.
Re: Wild West Guns Coming To Europe This Friday
@Vortex99 - 2 titles at a time is more like a guideline than a rule. Nintendo has regularly gone up and down with their numbers. Some weeks we have almost a half-dozen WiiWare and VC titles to choose from!
@Bahamut ZERO - I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that you've never actually tried the Wii Zapper. Despite IGN's complaints, the Zapper does work pretty well in real life. The remote's speaker and rumble provide more than enough feedback to compensate for any trigger issues. (Which are highly overrated anyway.)
Besides, if you like the Perfect Shot so much (which isn't necessarily a bad thing) why don't you buy it rather than complaining about the Zapper? It's not like games are only compatible with one or the other.
Re: Wild West Guns Coming To Europe This Friday
I'm actually excited about this game. My Zapper doesn't have nearly enough titles for it. Link's Crossbow Training and Ghost Squad are both great, but they do eventually get old. Hopefully we'll get this in the states next Monday.
Re: Review: Frat Party Games - Pong Toss (WiiWare)
And for those of you actually weird enough to still be considering this game, save yourself some money and try the free Flash game instead:
http://www.wiicade.com/gameDetail.aspx?gameID=400
The motion controls are mostly a bit of mouse acceleration computation, but at least you don't pay anything for the... um... experience?
Re: Penny Arcade Adventures Too Big For WiiWare
@Mickeymac - Thanks for answering that. This sounds like the perfect opportunity for SD Cards to step in and save the day. Here's hoping.
Re: Penny Arcade Adventures Too Big For WiiWare
Whoa, back up a moment. Is Hothead telling us that the game is larger than the ~40MB limit that Nintendo says they don't impose on developers, or is HotHead saying that the download is greater than 200MB in size? (In which case it would have trouble fitting in the Wii's available space.)
Re: Defend Your Castle Coming To Europe Next Week
BTW you mentioned the save twice.
Whoops! Fixed that. I was typing rather quickly before having to nip off to Church.
Really, you should review the game. I'm willing to bet you'll end up liking it. I didn't originally want it either (having played the flash game), but ended up purchasing it on a lark because it was so cheap. Best $5 I ever spent on a video game.
Re: Defend Your Castle Coming To Europe Next Week
Geez Demon, give a guy a chance to get out of bed and respond! You seem to forget the US is several hours behind you guys.
Here are the differences (THAT I HAVE POSTED HALF A BILLION TIMES ON THIS FORUM ahem):
Here are some subjective differences as well:
The question is DEMON212, who WOULD you listen to about this? Who, in your opinion, would be enough of an expert on both the Wii and Flash games to make a good judgement in your opinion?
Re: Defend Your Castle Coming To Europe Next Week
@DEMON212 - I dare you to do a video review of DYC. After having some time to play it, go ahead and tell your audience that it's not worth 500 points.
<biff>What's wrong McFly? Chicken?</biff>
Re: Reggie Says Storage Issue Isn't Only For Geeks And Otaku!
@fortius54 - It would also be what we in the industry like to call "a support nightmare". Consoles have a reputation for "just working". You put the game in, and it starts. No hardware to muck around with, no configuration options to change, no drivers to update. (Though the firmware upgrades tend to get a bit tedious after a while.)
This is the exact opposite of a computer where things often require tweaking, rejiggering, waving a rubber chicken, and other troubleshooting aspects. Getting the latest game to run can be an entire game in itself!
From that perspective, Nintendo would never support the idea of being able to plug in any ol' drive. It's almost a guarantee that users would try to plug in a cruddy $10 laptop drive adapter from China that wouldn't work, be difficult to make work, or possibly would even fry the Wii. And even if they do get it working, how do you explain to consumers the concept of formatting their hard drive for the Wii such that it ends up incompatible with their computer? How many people won't understand how it works and have all their data eliminated by the format?
Not only would Nintendo's support lines wind up over saturated with tech support calls, but their reputation would also take a dive. Their strong commitment to quality in both product and service would be reduced to a simple: "They're just like all the other console makers". That's the last thing that Nintendo wants to happen.
As such, I doubt we'll see an external hard drive solution at all. The most likely solution will be the SD Card slot. It's taking time because of Nintendo's commitment to quality and a solid release. They'd hate to pull a Sony and have to pull a firmware release because of insufficient testing.
Re: Defend Your Castle Coming To Europe Next Week
Bully for XGen and all you folks from Europe and the UK! I hope you enjoy this title as much as we have here in America.
Re: Reggie Says Storage Issue Isn't Only For Geeks And Otaku!
I often wonder what's holding Nintendo back from using the SD slot. Especially since the SD cards were obviously supposed to be the memory cards for the Wii prior to the addition of the 512MB internal flash. (Anyone remember the pre-release box that showed the "Wii OS Disc" as part of the contents?)
My feeling is that there are two primary issues:
1. Performance. SD Cards have massive variations in their data performance rates. This can make transfers unpredictable, possibly affecting gameplay for some titles. I'm thinking this could be resolved with a smart caching system that keeps the running title on the Wii's internal memory.
2. Interface. For better or for worse, Nintendo released the console with limited SD Card support. This means that most Wii owners already have data spread across their SD Cards and internal memory. Nintendo's SD Card scheme would need to be intelligent about when to show channels (e.g. Would duplicate channels on the internal memory AND SD Card be shown twice?) and how to treat such a situation with a caching scheme like I mentioned above. Should Nintendo introduce APIs for developers to work with the cache (thus enabling games >512MB in size) or should they try to do as much automatically as possible? And what about downloading? Do consumers have to download to internal memory then move to SD Card, or should they be able to download straight to SD?
Further questions are posed by the current 2GB limitation on the Wii's SD Card support. Supporting larger cards would require supporting file systems other than FAT. Should they support FAT32? And would a remote upgrade of the reader's firmware to support SDHC addressing mode be safe? Or even possible?
@Mickeymac - I only mentioned because quite a few posters seem to see this as a major breakthrough. In fact, it is a breakthrough for public relations, just not for the storage problem at hand. Otherwise I'm as ecstatic as anyone else that Reggie is giving a more positive response than his colleague over in Europe.
Re: Reggie Says Storage Issue Isn't Only For Geeks And Otaku!
Not to put a dampener on things, but I hope everyone realizes that Reggie et al. are not doing anything to solve the problem. The development of the Wii's software is happening in Japan, controlled by the Japanese arm of Nintendo. Reggie has no real power to change that development process other than to ask nicely.
What Reggie CAN do is that he can report the efforts to the American public already reported by Iwata-san, but in a light that is seen as more positive by Americans.
Re: Reggie Says Storage Issue Isn't Only For Geeks And Otaku!
You forgot the last part of his speech: "And that's why they call me The Regginator!"
Re: USA WiiWare Update: Pirates - The Key of Dreams
@Wii Ownz All - I'm surprised you can't find something to look forward to? My short list is Megaman 9, Gradius Rebirth, and Shante. I fully expect that all of those will be worth a download.
So chin up, fellow. Not every week can see a blockbuster release. You just need to get used to doing a little cherry picking.
Re: Pilot the Vic Viper Once More in Gradius Rebirth
The Japanese do tend to transpose R's and L's, which did give rise to the idea that Gradius was a mistranslation of Gladius. However, this appears to be just an urban legend. "Gradius" appears to be a loose translation of the Japanese name "Guradiusu". As far as I understand, the word has no particular meaning in Japanese.
In Europe, the game was named "Nemesis".
Re: Gley Lancer
Damien sez... If you favour a more full-frontal attack you can fix them to fire forwards, or if you want to protect your rear, backwards.
Reminds me a bit of another Megadrive shmup: Hellfire. Like Thunderforce/Lightingforce, Hellfire allows you to toggle the shot direction during gameplay. Where things get interesting is that the shots can not only go forward and back, but also vertically, horizontally, and diagonally! This really tested your coordination as you tried to switch between firing modes without dying. (Did I mention your ship was rather huge for a shmup? The weapons spun around the ship in a cool way, though. )
I wonder if we'll see more Megadrive shooters? So far the Wii has been the best platform in history for shmups. Let's hope the trend continues!
Re: Pilot the Vic Viper Once More in Gradius Rebirth
Drool
WiiWare's first complete shmup. I can't wait!
@alex1893 - Exactly right. Bensei was quite confused. Gladius was the weapon carried by Roman infantry, usually a short and wide stabbing weapon for use from behind the shield wall. Gradius is the made-up name of the home planet in the shoot 'em up series of the same name.
Re: Bplus Interview #2 - Plättchen - Twist 'n' Paint
Computing based on "100 levels!" sounds like a pretty weak argument to me. Usually when there is "100 levels!" in a game, it means that every level is a minor variation on the last. Either that, or the levels are simple enough to where they sap relatively little time from the designer and player.
Even worse, with puzzle games you often run into levels you can't figure out. Then the "100 levels!" quickly becomes irrelevant. If you can't get past the 10th level, it might as well have been 10 levels long.
I think there is still a MASSIVE burden of proof for the developer to show us that the game is worth 1500 points. For that much money on a download service, I expect a game that would be competitive on store shelves at $30.
Re: Defend Your Castle On Its Way To Europe Soon
@DEMON212 - The WiiWare revision of the game is vastly superior to the Flash version of the game. It has better graphics, smoothed out gameplay, different enemies, four player support, the save slots, and many more features not found in the Flash game.
In result, calling a 500 point version of the game "a ripoff" is misinformed at best, disingenuous at worst.
And trust me, I know a thing or two about the Wii Browser and what it is capable of. WiiWare is a still a superior solution. Thus it's not surprising that the WiiWare revision of DYC is a superior game.
Re: Mega Man 9 Will Cost 1000 Wii Points
1000 points is pretty much what I expected. It's not great, but it's not bad. The game should do fine.
Re: Wild West Guns - First Screenshots
I've been waiting for another excellent Zapper title. I already have Link's Crossbow Training and Ghost Squad. Since zombie games don't appeal to me (especially with little ones around the house) this game sounds tremendously appealing. I just hope it delivers!
Re: USA WiiWare Update: SPOGS Racing
@Corbie - That's disappointing. I didn't expect much, but I was hoping. (Apparently against hope.) WiiWare really needs more good titles. The early titles were awesome. I'd hate to see it turn into another cesspool of XBLA hits and misses. (With more misses than hits.)