Nintendo announced their new console at E3 earlier today, and we were there to witness the unveiling. Read our impressions below…
Paul:
Nintendo held a conference at E3 today… There’s a brand new console coming out, and it’s not necessarily a hand-held! It’s called the Wii U; not the best product name I’ve ever heard, but it’s certainly an interesting product!
Matt:
Yeah they finally revealed their successor to the Wii.
I say ‘finally’, they’re the first out of the three big companies to reveal anything for the next generation.
So its pretty big news.
Paul:
It’s pretty big news indeed – though I have to admit at first glance I wasn’t very impressed, in fact I was kind of disappointed. The stupid thing is I don’t actually know what I was expecting out of the announcement, so really I don’t have reason TO be disappointed.
In fact, I didn’t even realise it WAS the console announcement. I thought it was just an advert for a new Wii peripheral.
Matt:
It’s E3! What did you expect? I liked it myself. It doesn’t seem as gimmicky as the wii-motes, but its certainly off-the-wall-batshit-crazy typical Nintendo… how would you describe that new gamepad?
Paul:
I’d describe it as a white iPad with analogue sticks, or at least that’s the first thing I thought when I saw it. I honestly had no idea it was part of a new console, probably because the announcement trailer didn’t even show the console itself once.
Matt:
I think it did after we left. It looks like a Wii on its belly, with curved edges…we’ll post a picture below. But yeah, its essentially a gamepad with a big screen on it that links to the console itself…pretty cool in theory. I think one of the big selling points was that you can carry on playing your game on the screen while somebody else watches tv.
Paul:
It’s good to know that if you’re really into that battle with Bowser or Ganon that you could still play on the bog. Not that I would…
But does it even work on that? I’m not actually aware of the range on the controller.
Matt:
Yeah they said the console transmits the picture wirelessly to the device, they probably said how far it goes but I wasn’t paying attention. We should probably have double checked the facts before we started this discussion, right?
Paul:
Yeah but we’re crazy fools who live life on the edge with reckless abandon! Who needs research these days anyway. Fact is, there’s a giant controller with a screen on it and it seems to play a pretty cool role in a variety of games. Serving as a dedicated inventory / menu device for Zelda, or as some kind of scope for a gun in a sniper game, there are some nice ideas that could make good use of it. I couldn’t help but feel it works like a giant DS as well though…
Matt:
Yeah its all about the implementation, really. I just hope they do bring out some decent games this time. Maybe now the graphics are promising to rival Sony and Microsoft, some proper third party developers will make some more interesting games rather than bloody mini-games and party crap.
Paul:
So. Much. Crap.
It’s the reason I never wanted a Wii. I did finally get one of course, but it was mainly for the fitness stuff, and I gave up on that pretty quick. Hooray for laziness!
But if we get some games with graphics akin to the newer CoD series, with some really good use of the screenmote (you saw that name here first!), then I could be convinced to get my hands on it.
Matt:
Yeah I’ll wait and see for now. I don’t even know when they plan to release it. But I’m sure a date was mentioned…we really should check these things first, dude! At least we know what Nintendo’s plan is, now we just have to wait and see what the other two do in response.
Paul:
It’s supposedly between April 1st and December 31st next year. Nice and specific eh! Christmas next year is going to be hectic for the electronics retailers.
And if the past is anything to go by, Sony will probably release a new controller with a big screen on it and phallic analogue sticks, and Microsoft might develop a screen that you don’t need eyes to see or use, maybe a smell-controlled system.
Matt:
Ha, yeah totally. Got a while to wait for any news from them though I’ll bet. Roll on tomorrows continuous flood of E3 trailers, I say…
Paul:
We’ll be ready!
Dome Keeper is an excellent little spin on the tower defense game, in which you play the role of a jetpacking miner defending his base from swarms of aliens, whilst searching for a hidden relic buried somewhere beneath him. And now, with this huge free update, you can play it with friends.
I want to talk about Cloudpunk, a game where you get to be a flying-car delivery driver in a futuristic cyberpunk city. Its world is an incredible achievement of environmental design, and while the gameplay itself may be basic, the city of Nivalis is a thing of beauty to behold. Nivalis is built out of hundreds of hand-modelled cuboid buildings; there’s nothing procedural about it. Apparently it took 3 years for the devs to design the city, and it really shows.
I do love me some quality pixel art, and it doesn’t get much better than this. Cast n Chill is a cozy side-scrolling fishing game by small indie dev team Wombat Brawler, with absolutely gorgeous visuals. It’s simple to play, and you you can dip in and out of it at your leisure, making it a fine addition to our collection of coffee break games.
One of my all-time favourite gaming memories is playing Haunting Ground with my mates at the flat in Baldock for 16 hours straight. It was me holding the controller for almost all of those 16 hours. It’s a bit obscure, so if you haven’t heard of it, it’s a survival horror game by Capcom, in which you play as a pretty little fragile girl called Fiona, who must escape from a huge labyrinthine castle. Oh, and you can’t fight. Your only option is to run away and hide from the nasty people that are out to get you. You do have a companion throughout though, the best dog in gaming, a white German Shepherd called Hewie.
I’ve got an enormous backlog to catch up with, so my gaming time has been pretty varied lately as I jump from one thing to another. I’m squeezing every spare moment I can in between work, life, and fatherhood duties, and enjoying some side-scrolling platform action, blasting zombies in one of the best remakes around, and scaling a literal mountain.
Is bingeing bad for us? It seems an obvious question, but I have been thinking about it lately, while revisiting Lost, the tv show that started 22 years ago (cripes, I feel old). Back when it was airing, my friends and I watched it religiously every week, talked about it in great detail, eagerly awaiting the next episode. It was the definitive show of its time, sparking debates and endless theories. It felt great to be a part of that, the sense of all experiencing the same thing together over a long period of time – most seasons had over 20 episodes, which is way more than most shows get these days – and they aired one by one, every week for several months. In today’s age of bingeing a show from beginning to end, I wonder what we are missing by not taking our time.
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