Dcubed

There will be no price cut, Nintendo can't afford it. Unlike the 3DS at launch, Nintendo are selling the console at a loss and don't have a profit margin that they can lop off. Doing so would be the worst thing they could possibly do; not only would it financially wreck them, it would also set a never-ending expectation that Nintendo devices always get heavy mark-downs shortly after launch (look at how many people are already expecting it after what happened to the 3DS!). It would become a phantom that would haunt them for generations to come! Otherwise for Wii U... I think sales will be solid but not spectacular. It's not a repeat of the Wii by a longshot, but sales will ramp up as the software library builds up. As for announcements, E3 will see a plethora of surprise announcements - designed to steal the PS4 and 720's thunder. Releases and announcements will be light until then (With the exception of maybe 1 more game, I think we're already looking at Nintendo's full Q1 and Q2 lineup - but their Q3 and Q4 lineup will remain a mystery until E3 and will include the Wii U version of DQX) As for 3DS, this is the year that it really hits its stride, as the west finally catches up with all of the big belated Japanese releases that we've been waiting for like Fire Emblem Awakening and MH3U (which will also be the most successful game in the series, by nature of finally being released on a non moribund handheld in the west - possibly even being THE breakout hit of the series in the west, depending on how good of a marketing push it gets). Bravely Default will get a western release courtesy of Nintendo, as will DQM 3DS, and DQ7 (Nintendo are too committed to the series to let it slide), along with Layton VS Ace Attorney, Layton 6 and Ace Attorney 5 (yes, all of them! - Layton 6 is due to come out in February, so it's possible that it could still release in the west this year, while the AA games have all come over reletively quickly before - if not, then very early 2014), SMT4, EO4, Fantasy Life, Inazuma Eleven Go (Go 2 will come out next year), Inazuma Eleven 123 (this one will also mark the series' first appearance in the US), Little Battlers Boost, Culdcept and Rune Factory 4. Some of the smaller titles like Soul Hackers and the upcoming Guild 02 games will also get a release over here but in eShop form only. The three big announcements at E3 for 3DS will be the original 3DS Zelda game, SSB 3DS's unveiling (the Wii U game wont be shown till next year) and Monster Hunter 4 for the west. Wii U will be Nintendo's main focus though, with the likes of Retro's new game, the release of the Wii U VC that same day and playable Bayonetta 2 amongst many other surprise announcements there (a Luigi game maybe? Shibata did say that "The Year of Luigi starts with Luigi's Mansion 2" after all )

Well, I think that we may be looking at the 720's main gimmick here! Granted, it has very few, if any, ramifications on gameplay (barring a game like Eternal Darkness; man, imagine the sanity effects they could pull off with this!) but it is pretty a cool concept nonetheless. I like the warbely effect from the gunshot in that video! Pretty impressive stuff! (the expanded FOV... I dunno. Looks too difficult to keep track of - and the floating gun in the middle of the display looks insanely stupid!) This is something that really needs a glasses free 3D projector (do those even exist?) to really work though, along with a glasses free HDTV. Also I question how well it would actually work in a real setting. It's all well and good showing it in a lifestyle ad, with a perfect living room (and unbearablely fake family to go along with it!), but I doubt that it would work nearly as well in my own living room. I don't even have enough space for Kinect to work, let alone a projector! (which is also why I don't have a projector setup in place of my HDTV - believe you me, I'd love to have one if I had the space!) Either way though, good on em for trying something different! Sony could learn a thing or two from MS and how to create something new and exciting without resorting to merely poorly imitating Nintendo! I shudder to think at how much it's gonna cost though... They want a beefy system that includes an enhanced Kinect camera AND a projector now!? (they'll at least make a killing on selling extra projector bulbs though. They cost a fucking fortune to buy!) Hope you're comfortable paying $599.99 with a 2+ year contract to pay off the rest of it!

It was. A welcome change from the usual over-shipping that Level 5 tend to pull off!

Probably a good idea to seperate the discussion into its own thread really. Plus it gives us a place to talk about Wii U and 3DS stuff together! Wii U held on much better than I had expected BTW. It barely dropped at all! (As did the 3DS, continuing its rise to heaven!) Its software also has some nice legs growing there. I suspect that they'll stick around for a good while there! NSMB2 has bounced back quite a bit and Paper Mario SS is almost certain to become the best selling game in the series now! Fantasy Life's drop is reletively low too. Looks like Level 5 have found their saving grace after their recent run of bombas. Also where the hell did New Style Boutique come from!? It just came back out of nowhere! Nice to see a bump for MH3U 3DS and PKMD 3DS too (I wonder if we'll see a rise for that next week as a result of the Gen 6 announcement...) The only figure we have is for Animal Crossing New Leaf, which is now number 1 in the Japanese charts with over 500k sales.

I wonder how much extra heft it adds to the Gamepad. Nintendo were paranoid about keeping that Gamepad weight below 500g no matter what...

To be fair, the battle scenes do look very nice. Considering that Game Freak have never made a fully 3D game before, it's really quite impressive! Field needs work though. While I don't expect a huge jump in visuals for the field stuff, the framerate issues need to be sorted.

Goddammit! Another retailer with its lifeline cutoff Used them quite a bit myself (been a while since I used them last, but I still frequented the site) Very sad news. Amazon have precious little competition now (as far as generalist online stores go)

If they succeed in converging them though, they'll effectively be only one platform (running on many devices)

Well! This is a surprisingly relavatory interview! http://www.theverge.com/2013/1/8/3852144/gabe-newell-interview-steam-box-future-of-gaming So, multiple "Steam Certified" pieces of hardware (the "Best " boxes) and one that they make and sell themselves? (ALA Google and their Nexus phones) Interesting approach, especially when you consider their partnership with companies like NVidia who want to do local streaming and this following paragraph... So they intend to expand Steam onto mobiles as well at some point. Could Shield be the first step towards that future? (perhaps the Tegra platform and Steam will converge at some point!) So maybe this explosion of platforms represents a zeitgeist of experimentation, with the intention of future standardization and convergence? I wonder if it'll mean less platforms in total, or if we'll start seeing more platforms-within-platforms (platformception!) like TegraZone and stores within Steam. Edit: Looks like there's another article out now with more details! http://www.theverge.com/2013/1/8/3852692/valve-linux-steam-box-local-gaming-server Ok, so they ARE going down the Google route, but with 3 obvious tiers of hardware... Good = Streaming device (Roku, Onlive Micro Console, Shield etc) Better = Console with dedicated CPU/GPU that meets minimum specs, has no optical drive and comes with a controller (Valve's own official Steambox resides in this tier) Best = A PC in a box - could have any hardware they want for any price they want So perhaps it's a sign that these new platforms will be similar to Android and that they'll exist at an OS level, rather than hardware persay? In that case, could we be looking at this as a possible future... Nintendo Console Nintendo Handheld Sony Console Microsoft Console/Windows 8 & 9 (they're obviously trying to converge Xbox and Windows) iOS Google Play Facebook TegraZone Steam/Steam Certified devices Onlive

You obviously don't frequent Smogon... The battle machanics change hugely with each game (the sole exception being Black & White 2, for obvious reasons) To name the more blatantly obvious changes that anyone should notice... Gen 2: Two new Pokemon types (Dark & Steel), Separation of Defence and Special Defence, equipable items Gen 3: Double Battles, Tag Battles, Abilities, Natures, addition of cups and rules during linked battles Gen 4: Overhaul of Special/Attack damage system (It's not just based on type anymore, but rather is based on logic), Online battles, Auto-Levelling up/down Gen 5: Triple Battles, Rotation Battles, The Wonder Launcher, Online battling with randoms, Online Tournaments, TMs now have infinite use And those are just the tips of their respective icebergs!

That Piston surely looks too small to be packing that kind of hardware no? Either way, they did say that they wanted to release hardware every 3 years or so a whilesback I believe, so I could certainly imagine that happening. It would be like a middleground between elongated console lifecycle and the annual/subannual upgrade cycle of phones/tablets. Would surely be better than the inevitable yearly refresh of an Apple game/app console!

Yeah, it is kinda similar in that respect I guess. What's really weird to me is that the battles look so much better than the field visuals that it's just crazy. It's like they're running on two different engines, with the field stuff running on Golden Sun Dark Dawn's engine (just beefed up slightly) and the battles running on the Pokedex 3D engine (albeit with cel shading turned on) I'm not the only one who sees the really glaring similarity between PKMN XY's field and GSDD am I? (Even the interactions like the vine swinging look like they were ripped straight out of it!)

Wow! Didn't think the game's graphics were that amazing! So. Do you miss the sprites? (Hate to say I told you so but... :p)

BTW, I'm starting to doubt that Pokemon Z... The logo has a DNA Helix in there (very small, but it is there...) Now I know what the logical thought behind it would be (Pokefusion), but there's no way it could be that; certainly not in the way we'd expect (they would have to make literally billions of variations of Pokemon!) At the very least, it'll be related to the storyline (it's not like it's new to the series - [cough]Pokemon R/B, Pokemon B&W2[/cough] and perhaps integrated into the gameplay in a very limited fashion (maybe only a handful of Pokemon, or maybe even a new "Fusion" type!)

Me too. I've already rung em up twice to light a fire under their arse and I've still not gotten it yet!

The battle graphics look great though! (and as far as visuals go, that's the part that it matters for)

LOL! My thoughts exactly Maybe they'll stick a boxing glove on its tail?

Is this running on the Golden Sun Dark Dawn engine outside of battles!? It looks so similar it's actually creepy! Could Camelot have given Game Freak their DS engine? (maybe even co-developing?)

SIMULTANEOUS WORLDWIDE RELEASE!? FUCKING FINALLY!!! PRAISE THE LORD!!! (I wonder if they're outsourcing some of the localization to overcome the resources issue) The Celshaded visuals look great! And the environments look VERY Golden Sun esc! (actually, the field visuals remind me of GS Dark Dawn too!) He's cock teasing us with holding back on the new feature announcements too... Pokemon Z is so obviously coming BTW!

HERE WE GO!!! Gen 6, LET'S ROCK IWATA!!!

This is true. I've made it a bad habit of mine to tackle multiple games at once many times before and it always results in me not really being able to enjoy all my time fully with each; as my attention gets stretched too thin across multiple titles) Paper Mario SS is the only 3DS game I'm playing ATM and it's really nice and refreshing to do so! Though nothing beats having one main single player game that you're powering through and one "go-to" game to play when you want to take a break and play something else. For me, Mario Tennis N64 and Majora's Mask share that kind of weird symbiotic relationship (I got them both for Xmas back in 2000 and I always enjoyed playing both at the same time )

Confirmed, THQ's assets will be put up for bid in piecemeal fashion on Jan 22nd! Supposedly two of the confirmed 5 bidders are EA and Warner Brothers (the other 3 are still unknown; though since it's a public auction, anyone could potentially bid I guess...) Who knows how this'll affect the release of Stick of Truth?

One is a cheap spinoff made by a B Team, the other is a big mainline title with 3 years worth of development. The one point of concern I have with this is Gamefreak's lack of experience in developing 3D games (yeah the DS titles had 3D environments, but still had 2D gameplay). Mind you though, Creatures have gained experience from the PokePark titles and there's nothing stopping Nintendo from throwing their own staff and tech into the fray to bulk up Game Freak's arsenal... Potentially, it could really bring a whole new dimension (literally even!) to the exploration element of Pokemon's gameplay, with dynamic and interactive environments Alternatively, how about a Paper Mario style game?

Me too, but the Pokedex 3D models are so good that it would be a crime not to use them really. Besides, it means that the can do much more with the environment design now (assuming that they ditch the tile format and go with full 3D environments like in Zelda or Pokemon XD/Colloseum)

Well the release gaps have been shortening with every release (B&W2 now holds the record with just a 4 month gap between its JPN and western release), so this'll probably continue that trend. Oh imagine if we could actually see the first ever simultaneous worldwide release of a Pokemon game!