Teppo Holmqvist

Source?

My humble Gamecube collection: 1080 Avalanche Animal Crossing Army Men: Real Time Strategy Baten Kaitos Battalion Wars Beyond Good & Evil Densetsu no Quiz Donkey Kong Jungle Beat Donkey Konga Doshin the Giant Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance F-Zero GX Geist Harvest Moon Killer 7 Kururin Squash Legend of Zelda: Collectors Disc, the Legend of Zelda: Four Swords, the Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker, the Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour Mario Kart: Double Dash!! Mario Party 4 Mario Power Tennis Mega Man X Collection Metal Gear Solid: Twin Snakes Metroid Prime Metroid Prime 2: Echoes Midway Arcade Treasures Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance Nintendo Puzzle Collection Paper Mario: The Thousand Year-Door Peter Jackson's King Kong Pikmin Pikmin 2 Prince of Persia: Sands of Time Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones Prince of Persia: Warrior Within Resident Evil Resident Evil 4 Resident Evil Zero Rogue Leader: Rogue Squadron II Rogue Squadron III: Rebel Strike Skies of Arcadia: Legends Soccer Slam Soul Calibur 2 Star Fox Adventures Star Fox Assault Super Mario Sunshine Super Monkey Ball Super Monkey Ball 2 Super Smash Melee Bros Tales of Symphonia Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2005 Timesplitters 2 Ultimate Spider-Man Wave Race: Blue Storm Viewtiful Joe Viewtiful Joe 2 WWE: Day of Reckoning X-Men Legends X-Men Legends 2

Actually, name of the studio is "Grasshopper Studios", and no, they aren't particularly affliated with any certain game company. And yes, at least this moment this is Wii exclusive. And no, this won't be out before end of 2007 (and that is earliest possible release date).

Actually, I'm suspecting that there won't be japanese dub, because Killer 7's japanese version also had only english voice acting (but also less distorted voices).

If I remember correctly, this is actually very old patent and no related to gaming at all. I can't, however, find it from US Patent Office. EDIT: Hmh, there isn't any kind of patent that would fit to GoNintendo's description on US Patent Office.

Hmh, it is possible that Wii's price and european launch date has been leaked. Konsolifin, finnish videogame shop has started to take preorders for Wii and price has been set to 229 euros. Actual release date has been set to 6th of November. What gives Konsolifin more credibility is that here at Finland you can't simply adjust pre-order's price as you want, because consumer protection laws are relatively tight. That's why they must be pretty sure that price will be 229 euros. It must be also noted that we have 22 % VAT on consoles. If you take VAT away, price is around 190 euros. If converted to dollars, VAT:less price is 240 bucks. SOURCE: http://konsolinet.fi/tuotekortti.php?path=34/39/2482

Better quality version of Wii picture: http://ve3dmedia.ign.com/ve3d/image/article/717/717847/call-of-duty-3-screenshots-20060711000731783.jpg

They probably started Wii project right after RE4 was released.

I don't remember where I saw it, but someone asked about same thing from Nintendo's representative during E3, and the answer was that they would be used to simulate N64's Z-button. I personally suspect that there isn't any big secrets behind them. Those two buttons are there just for situations where "normal" button layout isn't comfortable enough to be used in specific game. Plus you also have enough buttons to support any console with sole exception being Atari Jaguar .

Sports Illustrated for Kids says that Wii will launch 6th of November. CNNMoney, in other hand, excepts late september / middle october launch. http://gonintendo.com/?p=3440 http://money.cnn.com/2006/07/05/commentary/column_gaming/index.htm?section=cnn_tech

The general terms and conditions for getting Wii developer status (and possiblity to buy dev kit) are following: 1. Developer Qualifications: An authorized developer must have demonstrated the ability to develop and program excellent software for Nintendo video game systems or for other video game or computer systems. In addition, an authorized developer must have a stable business organization with secure office facilities, equipment, personnel and financial resources in order to insure the security of Nintendo proprietary information and in order to ensure an effective environment for working with Nintendo and/or its licensees. Home offices do not meet this requirement. Nintendo provides authorized developers with highly proprietary information and many of Nintendo's licensees also rely on recommendations and referrals to authorized developers. For these reasons, Nintendo exercises a very high level of care in approving only a select number of authorized developers. SOURCE: http://www.warioworld.com/apply/wii.html

Nope. Never has been and never will be. Wii version does just get most attention.

I wouldn't honestly be surprised, because in march there was this leaked Ubisoft release list going around net. List was commonly deemed to be fake and even Ubisoft denied authenticy of that list. Interestingly enough, list was made before Ubisoft had announced any of its next generation projects, but the list has shown to be extremely accurate. Here is the list as it was posted to the net: July 2006: Enchant Arms (Xbox 360) * November 2006: Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six 5 (PS3, Xbox 360, Rev, PSP) * November 2006: Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter (PS3) * November 2006: Rayman 4 (PS3, Xbox 360, Rev, PS2, Handheld) * November 2006: Blazing Angel 1.5 (PS3, Xbox 360, Xbox) February 2007: Brothers in Arms 3 (Xbox 360, Rev, PS2, NDS) February 2007: Brothers in Arms 2: Earned in Blood (PSP) March 2007: Tom Clancy's Firehawk (PS3, Xbox 360) March 2007: Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon 4 (PS3, Xbox 360, Xbox, PS2) March 2007: Naruto (Xbox 360) * March 2007: Assassin (PS3, Xbox 360, Rev, PSP) * Spring 2007: Game 5 (PS3, Xbox 360) Spring 2007: Ninja Turtles (PS3, Rev, Xbox 360, Handhelds, current gen consoles) * TBA: Lumines 2 (PS2, PSP) * TBA: Alive (PS3, Xbox 360) TBA: Dark Messiah of Might & Magic (PS3, Xbox 360) * TBA: Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter Mission Pack (PS3, Xbox 360, PSP) * * Has actually been officially announced and/or released

That list is from Nintendo's E3 press kit and is little out of date.

Here is the whole page: http://img159.imageshack.us/img159/1803/egmscan8wy.gif

Originally Retro had planned Kraid to be in Echoes, but tight scheducle dropped him off from the game. Retro had even made model for the creature. http://www.gen-n.net/dyk/media/002b.jpg

Unfortunately only in Japan. Game was only in japan section of Nintendo's own official release list for fiscal year 2006.

If I remember corectly, Kiyoshi Saruwatari's blog was one of the first fake Wii blogs on the net. So you could say that blog's owner is pioneer in this field.

People should understand that every console will be sold out in launch. There has never been launch where Nintendo, Sony or Microsoft couldn't sold their initial stock completely. Therefore it doesn't really matter if they launch around same time. It would matter, however, if Nintendo would launch 6 months after PS3. Monster headstart? 3.5 million units sold since december. Not really that big gap to cross. Microsoft did it and failed pretty badly. They had very average launch with bunch of half-assed Xbox to Xbox 360 ports, mediocre Kameo & Perfect Dark Zero and little rushed Project Gotham Racing (that actually runs in 600p and is scaled to 720p).

Seriously... if Wii's GPU is based on Gamecube, where in the hell shaders would disappear? Of course you can tell us that Wii's GPU will be more primitive than any 3D-card that was released after 1998. Because that is what you are saying and you must understand how stupid, not "realistic" that sounds.

Do you have direct link? Abstract isn't usually best place to understand what patent actually means.

I'm sorry about wrong terminology, I'm not that big tech head. But I will believe you get the idea. People are just mixing integrated shaders and programmable shaders together. Cube didn't have programmable shaders, it just had integrated shaders. But what is integrated shader? Every modern 3D-card has lots of different kinds of shaders integrated to the board. Some classic examples are; emboss mapping, bump mapping, projected shadows, self-shadowing, projected reflections, layered fog, etc. Programmer can use and mix these shaders to get desired, cool looking effect in the game. PS2 and Gamecube didn't feature programmable shaders, but Xbox did. Programmer could create their own custom tailored shaders for the game and therefore were less dependant on what different shaders were on the GPU. Of course, many games didn't use custom shaders because GPU's own shaders were more than enough in most cases. So... it looks like with Wii Nintendo has decided (once again) to only have integrated shaders. This gives less freedom for programmers, but it really does make it easier to optimize GPU.

Filed under G. "Gundam". Ninth title from the top.

Thanks to Gamefront.de, I now have translation for Japanese release list: Biohazard Bomberman Land Chou Shittou Caduceus Neo (Trauma Center) Densha de Go! Dragon Quest: Swords Elebits Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles Final Furlong Gundam Necro-Nisia Sengoku Action Sonic Wild Fire Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz Super Swing Golf Pangya Tamagotchi Soo... No Trauma Center for USA during this fiscal year. Translated list can be seen here.

Nope. The list for Japan can be found at left corner of same page where the western release list is. Japan gets 16 titles*, western market gets 15 titles. Document also has list of Japanese 1st party titles for this fiscal year (page 5, table on the right corner of page): Disaster: Day of Crisis Excite Truck Fire Emblem Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess Metroid Prime 3: Corruption Project H.A.M.M.E.R. Super Mario Galaxy WarioWare: Smooth Moves Wii Sports * I don't know what these titles actually are, because all names (except for Elebits) are written with these funny looking crow footprints. Note: EA isn't probably first company that would bring wide plethora of different titles to console which you can't port stuff from other consoles. Madden is good start.