No Mario 128. No Revolution videos, screens or specs. The new Game Boy Micro, while tiny and cute, is not a PSP-killing next-gen superbeast. So why are many Nintendo fans still smiling, and not crushed with disappointment?
Perhaps the answer is that there was plenty at last night’s Nintendo show to get excited about. The Big N is, let’s face it, known for exaggerated claims that they are on the brink of revolutionising gaming. But despite this, there is something very exciting about some of the ideas surrounding their Revolution console. And a lot of this is because we are seeing the way that its most recent hardware, the DS, is continuing to evolve before our eyes, even if now it has been available for some time.
When Nintendo released the first shots of it, nobody was sure what to think. Looking like a cross between a Game & Watch and a GBA, it titillated Nintendo enthusiasts, but even they were unsure of the direction they could expect software for it to take. In other quarters, it was derided for its awkward looks and inferiority to the glossy PSP. Gradually new information came to light, or became clear. ‘It’s basically a portable N64, and analogue control is achieved by a touch screen,’ people started to realise. ‘Nice, but I still don’t really see the big deal. Sony have made a portable PS2’.
The next revelation came for people who went out to buy the console. The bundled Metroid demo, while sparse in content, left you in no doubt that here was a control system that - for the first time on a console - offered control comparable to that which keyboard-and-mouse PC gamers have been bragging about for years. Suddenly the idea of a handheld, wireless enabled console that would allow RTS and FPS gaming seemed rather attractive. A selection of excellent launch puzzle titles highlighted another of the machine’s strengths.
But the DS still has surprises in store. Last night Nintendo confirmed that its plan is to proliferate hot spots where people can use the DS to play games online as well as using direct WiFi link-up. If you have a wireless router in your home or office, you’ll be able to use it there too. Best of all, the service will be totally free.
Amazing news. Whilst the PS3 and Xbox 360 consoles will offer mindblowing graphics, and have the power to have more going on onscreen than before, users will be using them in the same way as they use their current PS2 or Xbox: in the living room, with friends, alone or online. This is merely a natural progression and development of features that the SEGA Dreamcast offered out of the box when it was launched more than six years ago. The honourable thing about Nintendo is that they continue to strive to innovate. Even if it sometimes eventually fails, Nintendo's efforts are still fascinating to watch and give the games enthusiast much food for thought.
Shigeru Miyamoto was on hand last night to demonstrate his latest creation, Nintendogs for the DS. Just like the DS, the game’s announcement was met with derision by no small amount of people. But a 40/40 rating by Famitsu magazine made those in the west sit up and take notice. This game is nothing less than an attempt to allow gaming to permeate other areas of life. Bedroom online gamers must sacrifice their social life if they wish to spend more time enjoying their hobby. Nintendogs is a game that will allow users to meet new people, not online, but in the real world.
Using the DS’s built-in microphone you can train your puppy to obey voice commands, and teach him ever more complicated tricks – that’s the meat of the single player experience. But it is the game’s ‘Bark Mode’ that is genius. Keep your DS turned on, and put it in your pocket. The idea is that sooner or later, you will cross paths with somebody doing the same thing, at which point your virtual dogs will bark to alert you to each other. You can then play mini games with each other wirelessly and instantly. We love the idea: could gaming make people more friendly rather than less so? This is very possibly the first game ever with such a lofty aspiration, a game that wishes to integrate into your life and improve it rather than merely provide a distraction from it. Very much like owning a real dog, in fact.
It’s this Nintendo magic that makes the DS an amazing machine, and magic is always more attractive than simple ‘shock and awe’ tactics. Some people will be saying that Nintendo has dropped the ball again after the conference yesterday. But if you look at it another way, it's justified the blind faith that many fans have in them for the first time in years.
Perhaps the answer is that there was plenty at last night’s Nintendo show to get excited about. The Big N is, let’s face it, known for exaggerated claims that they are on the brink of revolutionising gaming. But despite this, there is something very exciting about some of the ideas surrounding their Revolution console. And a lot of this is because we are seeing the way that its most recent hardware, the DS, is continuing to evolve before our eyes, even if now it has been available for some time.
When Nintendo released the first shots of it, nobody was sure what to think. Looking like a cross between a Game & Watch and a GBA, it titillated Nintendo enthusiasts, but even they were unsure of the direction they could expect software for it to take. In other quarters, it was derided for its awkward looks and inferiority to the glossy PSP. Gradually new information came to light, or became clear. ‘It’s basically a portable N64, and analogue control is achieved by a touch screen,’ people started to realise. ‘Nice, but I still don’t really see the big deal. Sony have made a portable PS2’.
The next revelation came for people who went out to buy the console. The bundled Metroid demo, while sparse in content, left you in no doubt that here was a control system that - for the first time on a console - offered control comparable to that which keyboard-and-mouse PC gamers have been bragging about for years. Suddenly the idea of a handheld, wireless enabled console that would allow RTS and FPS gaming seemed rather attractive. A selection of excellent launch puzzle titles highlighted another of the machine’s strengths.
But the DS still has surprises in store. Last night Nintendo confirmed that its plan is to proliferate hot spots where people can use the DS to play games online as well as using direct WiFi link-up. If you have a wireless router in your home or office, you’ll be able to use it there too. Best of all, the service will be totally free.
Amazing news. Whilst the PS3 and Xbox 360 consoles will offer mindblowing graphics, and have the power to have more going on onscreen than before, users will be using them in the same way as they use their current PS2 or Xbox: in the living room, with friends, alone or online. This is merely a natural progression and development of features that the SEGA Dreamcast offered out of the box when it was launched more than six years ago. The honourable thing about Nintendo is that they continue to strive to innovate. Even if it sometimes eventually fails, Nintendo's efforts are still fascinating to watch and give the games enthusiast much food for thought.
Shigeru Miyamoto was on hand last night to demonstrate his latest creation, Nintendogs for the DS. Just like the DS, the game’s announcement was met with derision by no small amount of people. But a 40/40 rating by Famitsu magazine made those in the west sit up and take notice. This game is nothing less than an attempt to allow gaming to permeate other areas of life. Bedroom online gamers must sacrifice their social life if they wish to spend more time enjoying their hobby. Nintendogs is a game that will allow users to meet new people, not online, but in the real world.
Using the DS’s built-in microphone you can train your puppy to obey voice commands, and teach him ever more complicated tricks – that’s the meat of the single player experience. But it is the game’s ‘Bark Mode’ that is genius. Keep your DS turned on, and put it in your pocket. The idea is that sooner or later, you will cross paths with somebody doing the same thing, at which point your virtual dogs will bark to alert you to each other. You can then play mini games with each other wirelessly and instantly. We love the idea: could gaming make people more friendly rather than less so? This is very possibly the first game ever with such a lofty aspiration, a game that wishes to integrate into your life and improve it rather than merely provide a distraction from it. Very much like owning a real dog, in fact.
It’s this Nintendo magic that makes the DS an amazing machine, and magic is always more attractive than simple ‘shock and awe’ tactics. Some people will be saying that Nintendo has dropped the ball again after the conference yesterday. But if you look at it another way, it's justified the blind faith that many fans have in them for the first time in years.
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Comments
jumpman 18 May 2005 13:51
1/5
Blimey.
Its nice to see someone being positive and praising towards Nintendo, everybody else seems to think this will be thier "last stand before they go the way of Sega". Well, I for one am totally satisfied with my DS, and the idea of free online? Wow.
Its nice to see someone being positive and praising towards Nintendo, everybody else seems to think this will be thier "last stand before they go the way of Sega". Well, I for one am totally satisfied with my DS, and the idea of free online? Wow.
Ditto 18 May 2005 14:43
2/5
jumpman wrote:
Blimey.
Its nice to see someone being positive and praising towards Nintendo, everybody else seems to think this will be thier "last stand before they go the way of Sega".
Its nice to see someone being positive and praising towards Nintendo, everybody else seems to think this will be thier "last stand before they go the way of Sega".
I think this is really interesting. For first E3 I can remember people are not discounting Nintendo's hardware straight away as kiddie, and are actually looking forward to it's games.
Just going by looks the Revolution is totally different to the Gamecube. Nintendo have also modernised with support for online play, yet they've kept their innovation. If they can pull in some third party games and support their system with adult titles, I think that they could go a long way this generation.
In fact, this is the first E3 that I can look at and say "Nintendo don't look as if they're going to make the same mistakes again".
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Radiant 18 May 2005 23:16
3/5
Essentially the possibility of making the same mistakes are there.
I love Nintendos stuff but there is all this talk of a DS rts but I think only one has been announced and it's not likely to be released this month.
I'm still seeing the disastrous strategy of releasing one game every 2 months or so which, regardless of quality of the game, is ridiculous.
Especially if those games are centred around the same 20 year old IP.
Say you don't like that IP?
Or say that IP is perceived to be for children only?
I know I'm being blasphemous by saying Nintendo's franchises are limited.
But to be honest they are.
Game for game the PSP has some well talked about games for it (RR, Wipeout,Untold Legends, MGS:Ac!d, Ape Escape etc) and those are just the titles sitting on my desk.
The DS even though it has come out before the PSP has only really two games you'd like to play on it.
Touch Wario and Touch Yoshi (I've already completed Mario on the N64) and maybe Zookeeper (but I can play that online as bejewled at popcap.com).
These beautiful sweet games on the DS take their beautiful sweet time to get to us (to hell with us if we live in Europe!).
When do you think we'll get Advanced Wars?
When do you think we'll get Nintendogs?
I'd be amazed if it is before Autumn.
If we get the same treatment with a Revo,then regardless of innovation it will be relagated to be the 'console I also bought' which will break, my admitidly stone cold, heart.
/looks at the sky and screams
"I can't take it anymore Miyamoto you girly man!"
I love Nintendos stuff but there is all this talk of a DS rts but I think only one has been announced and it's not likely to be released this month.
I'm still seeing the disastrous strategy of releasing one game every 2 months or so which, regardless of quality of the game, is ridiculous.
Especially if those games are centred around the same 20 year old IP.
Say you don't like that IP?
Or say that IP is perceived to be for children only?
I know I'm being blasphemous by saying Nintendo's franchises are limited.
But to be honest they are.
Game for game the PSP has some well talked about games for it (RR, Wipeout,Untold Legends, MGS:Ac!d, Ape Escape etc) and those are just the titles sitting on my desk.
The DS even though it has come out before the PSP has only really two games you'd like to play on it.
Touch Wario and Touch Yoshi (I've already completed Mario on the N64) and maybe Zookeeper (but I can play that online as bejewled at popcap.com).
These beautiful sweet games on the DS take their beautiful sweet time to get to us (to hell with us if we live in Europe!).
When do you think we'll get Advanced Wars?
When do you think we'll get Nintendogs?
I'd be amazed if it is before Autumn.
If we get the same treatment with a Revo,then regardless of innovation it will be relagated to be the 'console I also bought' which will break, my admitidly stone cold, heart.
/looks at the sky and screams
"I can't take it anymore Miyamoto you girly man!"
The_Moss 20 May 2005 01:09
4/5
I wouldn't deny that the PSP is a lovely piece of kit. But the battery life's a real issue for me. And gorgeous as the graphics are, you're still just playing a handheld console. In terms of cerebral game playing action, I don't think I'd enjoy it a whole lot more than I did my gameboy aged 10 (which was a lot). It irks me that over 15 years later, all it's added to the mix is better graphics and a the ability to dispense with the link cable. The movie playing functionality is a non-starter too. The transition from VHS to DVD has been traumatic enough, I'm not interested in buying films that will work exclusively on a device that i'll forget in a few years. And if I want to watch a film, I'd much rather set aside a couple of hours and watch it in the comfort of my darkened sitting room, without having to press my head against whoever happens to be watching it with me.
Nintendo have really got me thinking this E3. The bark mode on Nintendogs is overlooked when really i think it's one of the most revolutionary ideas ever. After fifteen years sitting on trains, buses, in the back of cars, on lunchbreak playing handheld games, I find the idea of a feature that will alert you to possible gaming partners nearby really exciting. If Nintendogs doesn't float your boat, imagine an FPS or racer with the same feature.
Revolution has me intrigued too. I know I'm not the first to speculate about this, but what if the machine's wireless controller had a screen and was a next gen handheld in its own right. What if all those games you download onto the console could be transferred to that and taken with you wherever you go? I'm grateful to Nintendo just for leading me to the possibility that that could be the case.
Unfortunately, I fear that anything less than that will not be enough to make the spec-obsessed gaming world sit up and take notice. There's only two ways the Rev can go - it'll be Nintendo's triumph or their swansong. But I'm not sure how interested I am in an industry where all we have to look forward to is superior graphics with each passing generation.
Nintendo have really got me thinking this E3. The bark mode on Nintendogs is overlooked when really i think it's one of the most revolutionary ideas ever. After fifteen years sitting on trains, buses, in the back of cars, on lunchbreak playing handheld games, I find the idea of a feature that will alert you to possible gaming partners nearby really exciting. If Nintendogs doesn't float your boat, imagine an FPS or racer with the same feature.
Revolution has me intrigued too. I know I'm not the first to speculate about this, but what if the machine's wireless controller had a screen and was a next gen handheld in its own right. What if all those games you download onto the console could be transferred to that and taken with you wherever you go? I'm grateful to Nintendo just for leading me to the possibility that that could be the case.
Unfortunately, I fear that anything less than that will not be enough to make the spec-obsessed gaming world sit up and take notice. There's only two ways the Rev can go - it'll be Nintendo's triumph or their swansong. But I'm not sure how interested I am in an industry where all we have to look forward to is superior graphics with each passing generation.
Ricky 9 Dec 2007 18:46
5/5
Nintendogs is brilliant, It's not exactly a game, its like a virtual pet but i still give it 10 out of 10.If you haven't bought nintendogs yet i suggest you buy it now. IT'S MAGNIFICENT!!!! I think it would suit all kinds of ages. It is a must!!
