Nintendo Pledges Full Catalogue for Revolution
Large selection already exists – third-parties still unclear.
Nintendo has pledged that every single game published in every single region will be available to Revolution owners via the firm’s back-catalogue downloadable games program, it has been revealed.
Speaking in the latest issue of Famitsu magazine (scans of which you’ll be able to find posted in our forum below) Nintendo head of Communication Yasuhiro Minagawa confirmed that every game from the NES, SNES and Nintendo 64 will be offered, augmenting the GameCube compatibility of the Revolution.
Thus far, 221 games have been readied for the Revolution, an impressive amount given the platform isn’t set to launch for another year or so. However, there is some bad news - Nintendo is unsure as to whether it will be able to offer third-party games from any of its systems. No doubt deterred by the legal nightmare of tracking down the various IP holders and then having to come to agreements with them all, SPOnG expects that few, if any, third-party games will be made available.
In our exclusive interview with Shigeru Miyamoto last month, we asked about any charges that might be applied to the Revolution downloadable catalogue. “As far as titles are concerned, we’ll have to choose what to make available. But I should underline that we can offer whatever we want to from the back-catalogue. It's simply a matter of selecting them and picking them out! As far as a fee is concerned, that hasn’t been announced or decided yet. Though if there is a fee, I can tell you that it will be minimal.” Yet according to Famitsu, first-party titles might well be made available free-of-charge.
As regular readers will be aware, SPOnG is one of the only outlets in the world to have already had hands-on access to Revolution hardware, impressions of which you can read here.
Speaking in the latest issue of Famitsu magazine (scans of which you’ll be able to find posted in our forum below) Nintendo head of Communication Yasuhiro Minagawa confirmed that every game from the NES, SNES and Nintendo 64 will be offered, augmenting the GameCube compatibility of the Revolution.
Thus far, 221 games have been readied for the Revolution, an impressive amount given the platform isn’t set to launch for another year or so. However, there is some bad news - Nintendo is unsure as to whether it will be able to offer third-party games from any of its systems. No doubt deterred by the legal nightmare of tracking down the various IP holders and then having to come to agreements with them all, SPOnG expects that few, if any, third-party games will be made available.
In our exclusive interview with Shigeru Miyamoto last month, we asked about any charges that might be applied to the Revolution downloadable catalogue. “As far as titles are concerned, we’ll have to choose what to make available. But I should underline that we can offer whatever we want to from the back-catalogue. It's simply a matter of selecting them and picking them out! As far as a fee is concerned, that hasn’t been announced or decided yet. Though if there is a fee, I can tell you that it will be minimal.” Yet according to Famitsu, first-party titles might well be made available free-of-charge.
As regular readers will be aware, SPOnG is one of the only outlets in the world to have already had hands-on access to Revolution hardware, impressions of which you can read here.
Read More Like This
Comments
imnotregret 6 Jun 2005 13:46
1/11
so what about 2nd party offerings?
Ditto 6 Jun 2005 14:23
2/11
The best Super NES games were from Nintendo, there were few good games on the N64 and I already have an excellent collection of Gamecube games. All on one console, ace!
Prehaps I can finally put my Super NES in the attic.
Since you seem to be able to twist Nintendo into telling you anything SPoNG, any news on those indie dev kits?
Prehaps I can finally put my Super NES in the attic.
Since you seem to be able to twist Nintendo into telling you anything SPoNG, any news on those indie dev kits?
more comments below our sponsor's message
TigerUppercut 6 Jun 2005 15:36
3/11
Radiant 6 Jun 2005 17:13
4/11
If they let me play Golden Eye, Paper Mario or Yoshi's Island I will burst like a stepped on milk carton.
If their back catalogue is free then Sony and MS can lie to me all they want with their sorcerers words, fake Real Time! demos and 60 quid games (I bought...The Bouncer for christs sake); Nintendo's little black box of [currently] nothing has me at hello.
Although this does mean that Nintendo's control pad wouldn't be as revolutionary as hoped, given that it would need to continue the D-pad, buttons and analogue stick traditions of nintendo controllers past.
Also is that controller ports on the side of the Box 'o' Nothing in the 2nd image that tiger uppercut posted?
Psah! Controller ports are so year 2000.
If their back catalogue is free then Sony and MS can lie to me all they want with their sorcerers words, fake Real Time! demos and 60 quid games (I bought...The Bouncer for christs sake); Nintendo's little black box of [currently] nothing has me at hello.
Although this does mean that Nintendo's control pad wouldn't be as revolutionary as hoped, given that it would need to continue the D-pad, buttons and analogue stick traditions of nintendo controllers past.
Also is that controller ports on the side of the Box 'o' Nothing in the 2nd image that tiger uppercut posted?
Psah! Controller ports are so year 2000.
tyrion 6 Jun 2005 18:07
5/11
Radiant wrote:
Also is that controller ports on the side of the Box 'o' Nothing in the 2nd image that tiger uppercut posted?
Indeed they are as previously mentioned
SPOnG wrote:
There are two flaps on the top, one which surprisingly houses four wired GameCube controller ports.
shearDS 6 Jun 2005 19:23
6/11
Radiant wrote:
If they let me play Golden Eye, Paper Mario or Yoshi's Island I will burst like a stepped on milk carton.
If their back catalogue is free then Sony and MS can lie to me all they want with their sorcerers words, fake Real Time! demos and 60 quid games (I bought...The Bouncer for christs sake); Nintendo's little black box of [currently] nothing has me at hello.
Although this does mean that Nintendo's control pad wouldn't be as revolutionary as hoped, given that it would need to continue the D-pad, buttons and analogue stick traditions of nintendo controllers past.
Also is that controller ports on the side of the Box 'o' Nothing in the 2nd image that tiger uppercut posted?
Psah! Controller ports are so year 2000.
If their back catalogue is free then Sony and MS can lie to me all they want with their sorcerers words, fake Real Time! demos and 60 quid games (I bought...The Bouncer for christs sake); Nintendo's little black box of [currently] nothing has me at hello.
Although this does mean that Nintendo's control pad wouldn't be as revolutionary as hoped, given that it would need to continue the D-pad, buttons and analogue stick traditions of nintendo controllers past.
Also is that controller ports on the side of the Box 'o' Nothing in the 2nd image that tiger uppercut posted?
Psah! Controller ports are so year 2000.
controller ports need to be there to play the gamecube games nintendo have already said this the GC controllers will be used to play the old games as well am guessing
revolution controller will be completely wireless and unique that is why gamecube controller ports are needed
Joji 6 Jun 2005 20:07
7/11
Personally this is great news, 221 games from the past is a lot of gaming most likely out of the box. It almost brings a tear to the eye (sniffle) of days gone by when we'd buy a console and get a game with it, only ten times better because we can select and store those games most likely on the Rev.
The issue with 2nd and 3rd party games will be ironed out by launch, apart from Sony product I expect the rest will welcome some of their old games bringing in money again.
The two most exciting things about the whole downloadable games part and Nintendo is 1: the possibility of old Sega MS/GG/MD/MCD/32x/SS games appearing on Rev (should be interesting to see if MS or Sony get to their back catalogues first if at all, either way it spells more income for Sega) and 2: the possibility that exposure of the most popular downloaded games could trigger a revival effect which could see old licenses come back for brand new games on the Rev or other next gen consoles.
Add old arcade games (if Nintendo decide to go in that direction too, and why not) and I would seriously be buying a Rev first (I already am anyway because I know it will be the easiest on my wallet). Who knows, perhaps downloading old arcade roms could be the saviour of that arcade industry yet. It's a damn good way of getting feedback from your customers.
Now this would be cool as I'm eagerly awaiting a new Rocket Knight game from Konami and new Captain Commando game from Capcom.
I find all this lot very exciting indeed. Bring it on, Nintendo.
The issue with 2nd and 3rd party games will be ironed out by launch, apart from Sony product I expect the rest will welcome some of their old games bringing in money again.
The two most exciting things about the whole downloadable games part and Nintendo is 1: the possibility of old Sega MS/GG/MD/MCD/32x/SS games appearing on Rev (should be interesting to see if MS or Sony get to their back catalogues first if at all, either way it spells more income for Sega) and 2: the possibility that exposure of the most popular downloaded games could trigger a revival effect which could see old licenses come back for brand new games on the Rev or other next gen consoles.
Add old arcade games (if Nintendo decide to go in that direction too, and why not) and I would seriously be buying a Rev first (I already am anyway because I know it will be the easiest on my wallet). Who knows, perhaps downloading old arcade roms could be the saviour of that arcade industry yet. It's a damn good way of getting feedback from your customers.
Now this would be cool as I'm eagerly awaiting a new Rocket Knight game from Konami and new Captain Commando game from Capcom.
I find all this lot very exciting indeed. Bring it on, Nintendo.
kid_77 7 Jun 2005 08:36
8/11
If you want to play retro games on a telly in your lounge, there's been a perfect solution around for a couple of years: XBOX
Of course, this is for those of dubious moral fibre... everyone else; feel free to tender your cash all over again, for games you already bought 10-20 years ago.
Of course, this is for those of dubious moral fibre... everyone else; feel free to tender your cash all over again, for games you already bought 10-20 years ago.
Ditto 7 Jun 2005 12:46
9/11
kid_77 wrote:
If you want to play retro games on a telly in your lounge, there's been a perfect solution around for a couple of years: XBOX
Of course, this is for those of dubious moral fibre... everyone else; feel free to tender your cash all over again, for games you already bought 10-20 years ago.
Of course, this is for those of dubious moral fibre... everyone else; feel free to tender your cash all over again, for games you already bought 10-20 years ago.
I will never buy anything game-related fro M$ and I will never do any illegal emulation. I have morals! ;)
These games could be free or low cost - I don't mind paying up to £5 for games I already own for convience, and for unreleased in Europe titles such as Earthbound and Mario RPG.
MetalPhoenix79 7 Jun 2005 14:39
10/11
Has anyone seen the list? Notice anything? I saw Duck Hunt on there. Wonder how they will pull that off.
PreciousRoi 10 Jun 2005 06:41
11/11
I hope they default to the best versions of the games in question, i.e. Arcade versions over NES. Maybe Nintendo will be able to some to an agreement with SNK too...one of my favorite SNES titles (and indeed one of the only baseball games I could ever stand to play) was Baseball Stars, of course there would also be the possibility of NeoGeo as well...
Plus, Capcom has a very good relationship with the big N don't they?
the Revolution could rule fighting games like the XBox rules FPS
backwards compatibility isn't something I see as relevant or even all that desireable in a gaming console, but what Nintendo is doing with the Revolution has the potential to be really nifty. I might even buy one, depending on the new controller...
Plus, Capcom has a very good relationship with the big N don't they?
the Revolution could rule fighting games like the XBox rules FPS
backwards compatibility isn't something I see as relevant or even all that desireable in a gaming console, but what Nintendo is doing with the Revolution has the potential to be really nifty. I might even buy one, depending on the new controller...