Sheikah

In which case, same question to you: is there evidence that the iOS/Android versions of Rayman Jungle Run impinged upon the sales of the console Rayman games? They're already using tablets to play their Minecraft Pocket Edition and Angry Birds, so the audience is there. Put interesting software using a strong brand in front of a large and listening audience and you're in with a very good shot.

If I'm being clearer, I mean the risk is so small/unimportant as to not be worth considering. It will cost them next to nothing to make, as apps are generally pretty cheap, and can hardly hurt their image. They already loan Mario's face to everything. I'm still expecting Mario does the ironing to release at some point. Money. Fucking lots of it, if they use their strong brand and tailor a game to the mobile audience. It can be done, and they're in a great position to do it. Mario and his games are well known, but for how much longer if they don't continue to engage today's audience? A lot of kids don't even have/bother with the devices to play Mario games these days, opting for an iPad or some other device with cheaper and free options, so whether they know about the character is less important. If they don't even get the devices to play these games (and I'm sure that's many kids these days) then they're not going to know much more than the character, ie. the games themselves will be lost on them. Incorrect on one of those, Minecraft is available on a variety of mobile platforms. Either way, my point was that kids are more and more opting for these sorts of games instead, some of which are on mobile formats. It doesn't have to boost sales. It just has to not impinge on the sales of the other games, while also making money itself.

What gamble? What are they staking? These games don't cost much to produce, probably a drop in the ocean for a company like Nintendo. It'd just be something like a Mario runner game tailored to phones, not a full fledged super Mario title. It'd promote the Mario brand to people that aren't otherwise exposing themselves to Nintendo. It's mostly about Angry Birds, League of Legends and Minecraft for kids these days.

I imagine they did pretty well. Square Enix have also decided to port Dragon Quest games to mobile. As bad as that sounds, why would they do it if money wasn't there? They can just outsource this shit to someone and watch the money come in. You're also overlooking that Mario is potentially much more lucrative, much more well known and far more adaptable to phones.

They don't though. Tapping a screen is just fine, so long as nothing precise is happening (as in, if there were multiple buttons that you needed to differentiate between, or if you needed to feel like you'd pressed certain buttons, then you would benefit from feedback). Because it's just one button, there is no need for feedback, because in simply making contact with the screen you get your feedback that you have pressed 'the' button. There's also no reason why a Mario type runner would be punching or doing anything else crazy (Mario punching?), not that it felt particularly difficult to pull anything off. Great games that are addictive and tailored well to a mobile device do well though. Nintendo should have the confidence to make those.

Not so - think about it, it's just one tap to do a jump (and holding a tap to propellor). There's no precision required, a tap anywhere produces a jump. A button has no advantage here, unlike in a game where you need a D-pad or analogue stick. I say this from having both completed the levels on the Android version as well as having completed the Vita version of Origins and Legends. There is no advantage! As well as the lower res and battery, the 3DS and Vita are also much bulkier and contain many unnecessary buttons/features that aren't needed to play this kind of game. The mobile or tablet is essentially a device streamlined to play this type of thing. What do you mean, they have to strike it lucky? They already know how to make great games, they've made plenty of them before. Essentially what you're saying is that you don't have enough confidence in them to make games people want to play?

Flappy Bird made a reported $50K a day, for what probably took barely any time to make. That would be 18.25 million per year, from one simple app. Just putting that out there.

So the free game promotion, essentially devaluing a host of games, bundled with Mario Kart 8 didn't drive sales?

Not if you're Nintendo selling a game with a mascot that is possibly the most famous video game character in the world.

The ideal outcome would be for Nintendo's handheld consoles to still sell in large volume and continue to have their mainstay series released on them. At the same time, they could release games that don't clash too much with their handheld content, such as a game with a Jungle Run style focus. Of course, if handhelds fall out of fashion outside of Japan in future generations then they might need to reassess.

Actually the statistic is that 80% of app store revenue is made from 20% of developers. Which isn't a shocking statistic at all, when you factor in all the free app and novice developers. They could easily make beast amounts of sales by selling to the mobile market.

Actually it wouldn't. The fact you're constantly running makes the game challenging, so you don't need a control stick for it. With that out the way, the smaller, higher res device that everyone already owns makes it the champ for playing this kind of game. Rayman Jungle Run. :p

For me it's one of those things where as I watched the series in order, I got invested in the characters' quirks and appreciated the comedy (and the science/geek focus). I remember seeing random episodes here and there years back and not finding it funny (rather, I thought it was a bit OTT). When I sat down and watched through it I was hooked though. I now think Sheldon and Amy are two of the series' best characters; similar to Rimmer in Red Dwarf, the guy playing the sort of quirky antagonist/asshole ends up being the funniest for me.

I think you could do that with loads of things that you're accustomed to people laughing at, it's just weird and awkward when people aren't laughing if you're used to there being laughter. Like Red Dwarf - that was just darn weird when they removed their laughter track for one of their recent things (can't remember which series or whether it was back to Earth). Never did the laughter track stop me enjoying the earlier series either. Also with Big Bang it's an audience of people laughing rather than a track, so it doesn't really feel forced/stupid. I think as well, if you went to see a funny comedian but for whatever reason absolutely nobody laughed at any of their jokes, I think that'd create a weird mood and a perception that they weren't funny, since you sort of expect people to laugh at them. Even if what they were saying is funny to you, it feels a bit weird if you expect laughter but there isn't any. Tl;dr: I think it's funny, and the background laughter is one of their tools that you can't easily cut out once you've rolled with it.

Their home console is going to shit, so they need their handheld to make lots of money. Going with mobile is an obvious choice, since nearly everyone has a mobile, and app gaming is so very popular. I prefer their handhelds to mobile games but I'm super disappointed with the 3DS. Crappy resolution, uncomfortable shape and lack of proper analogue sticks. If/when they do another handheld I want it to actually be somewhat impressive and not feel like a relic from a bygone era.

Nah, 3DS is going downhill now, we can all see it happening. It's all about mobile now, the 3DS will never do what the DS did, nor will the next handheld. They also can't justify the £30-35 price tag, a lot of people just don't want to pay that much for handheld content.

Maybe if they released a cheap compatible controller for iOS/Android then it would overcome the control issues. That way they'd have popular software on popular hardware.

Maybe awesome is too strong a word, but I certainly enjoyed watching this. Takes me back to the days when I was trying to get all the eggs and ice key in Banjo Kazooie.

That's because they're significant figureheads and presumably doing it as a nice thing for people who normally don't have time for it. This is not the same, it's a guy effectively being silenced because they don't trust him. Ironically, this kind of thing is intended to prevent bad PR, yet itself is rather bad PR. Yeah, I doubt it has anything to do with the many issues with the console that he and many others have spoken about for several months now.

I was also thinking...what the fuck? :p

Dragon Age is a wait and see for me. Liked the first one more than the second, either way I'd like to get some opinions on it before buying.

Regarding setting N-Europe as your "clan" (seemingly a requirement for some of those trophies), it seems like only me and Map have done it. Once you join the N-Europe group, make sure you're logged in an it should have an option here- "Set as PlayStation clan". I hated how much gravitas vehicles had in Halo. While you could take them down, it was pretty easy to get gunned/rocketed down by a 3 man warthog, while in the first game on PC the banshees were ridiculously OP. I'd be happy for them to nerf the vehicles more in Destiny (or hopefully they'll make standard powers more important as you level), especially that big bulky rocket firing thing.

One of the few games I bought the special ('Wizard's') edition for. Such a cool pack too, a Drippy doll and an actual Wizard's Handbook with all spells and alchemy in. Sells for a tidy sum, too. :p

Same, great game. The stuff that carried over made it even more fun than Spelunky for me.

No because in the case of casual players, they don't bother getting platinums or buying games for platinums. They simply don't care. In fact I'd be pretty surprised if anyone had money to waste buying games just because earning a platinum was easy. That's pretty darn tragic.