Archive for the ‘Gamecube’ Category
August 30, 2007
Metroid House
Get a rare inside look at Retro in this video feature.
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Once upon a time, back when the GameCube had just hit the market, Retro Studios was one of a handful of developers committed to making games exclusively for Nintendo’s fledgling console. The Austin, Texas-based studio was founded in 1998, two years before the GameCube’s unveiling at the August 2000 Space World event. The studio had a fairly low-key profile among the various heavy hitters that had already committed to develop for the hardware, but it managed to garner some interest due to a suite of titles slated for the new console. Retro’s profile rose considerably when it was revealed as the developer of Metroid Prime, announced for the GameCube at E3 in 2001. Although the game now stands as one of the finest GameCube titles–not to mention a smart, slick revision of the classic franchise–public opinion was a bit different at the time. The studio withstood a seemingly never-ending volley of shots from fans convinced that Metroid Prime was going to go horribly wrong as a first-person shooter.
Fast-forward to this past week, when Metroid Prime 3: Corruption hit the Wii amid a bevy of anticipation from the massive Prime fan base that has accumulated over the course of two GameCube games, the original Metroid Prime and its sequel, Metroid Prime 2: Echoes. The critical and commercial success of both games cemented the Prime series as another in Nintendo’s impressive stable of franchises that have made the company phenomenally successful. More importantly, they proved Retro had the skills to handle one of Nintendo’s top properties.
Though the nearly nine-year-old studio is now a bona fide player, it’s still a bit of a mystery to many. While Retro’s games have been among the highest-profile titles on Nintendo’s systems, not much has been heard from the studio itself. We recently had a chance to take some of Retro’s precious time as it wrapped up development on Prime 3 for release outside the US. During a rare visit to Retro’s modest offices, we heard from the team as work wound down. Over the next two days we’ll be running interviews from that visit to give you insight into the team at Retro and Metroid’s unique development process.
-If Its Games
August 21, 2007
Winning Eleven 6 Final Evolution (Pro Evolution Soccer) was the latest version of the PES franchise to be released on the Gamecube. However, to the annoyance of many a GC gamer, Konami made a decision to only release the title in Japan only and consequenlty Japanese languages were all over the game. But fear not, after all this time, one gamer has managed to trananslate the menus, team names and option menus into ENGLISH. PES lives on for Gamecube gamers! Read more here.
July 8, 2007
AP - Microsoft Corp. will not say what went wrong inside of its Xbox 360 video game consoles that could lead to $1 billion (euro740 million) in repairs, but bloggers and their online readers seem to have their own answer:
July 8, 2007
According to Smarthouse of Australia, Asian Xbox 360 manufacturers have hit out at Microsoft stating that a numer of MS controlled factors are at the heart of the Red Ring of Death problem. They include - poor console design, cheap components and a lack of testing coupled with an obsession to beat Sony.
July 8, 2007
Although it wasn\’t being billed as a blockbuster some fans will be saddened by the news that forthcoming GameCube title, Radio Allergy, has been laid to rest. O3 Entertainment said that, \”Radio Allergy for the Nintendo GameCube has been cancelled in North America\”. They added, \”Due to the transition to new gaming platforms, retailers are no longer interested in stocking GameCube titles.\” The title had been released in Japan under the guise of Radilgy on the Sega Dreamcast.
July 8, 2007
As sorry day, the full-price GameCube and full-price Xbox charts are no longer being covered by ChartTrack in the UK. “There\’s just not enough titles selling any more to warrant doing those charts.” said a ChartTrack representative. Interestingly tough, Nintendo has said, “We are still producing GameCube hardware and software - all you can read into that is that Chart Track are not covering GameCube charts any more.” Fair play.
July 8, 2007
Avoid shopping at EBGamestop this month is todays piece of advice. It seems that the adverts they have on loop across their tv\’s spoils the ending for The Legend Of Zelda: Twilight Princess.
July 8, 2007
In a recent interview, a Nintendo exec confirmed that the company will not be releasing anymore games for the Gamecube. Such a move is echoed by the move of Super Paper Mario to the status of a Wii only title.
July 8, 2007
Divineo.cn has now slashed the price considerably of the Viper GC ($14.95) and Magic Mushroom Mod (M3) for PS2 ($14.95) . The Viper GC is a solid solution for modding your GC and the M3 is a comprehensive mod compatible with all PS2 versions, not to mention it is in the shape of a mushroom :).
July 8, 2007
Next-Gen takes a look how the Gamecube is providing some great low cost and low risk opportunities for small time game developers to unleash their talents.
July 8, 2007
Some new promotional material for a party to celebrate the game Rock Band has ignited speculation that the title will be a time based Xbox 360 exclusive as there is no sight of the PS3 logo on the respective poster, just an Xbox 360 logo is showing.
July 8, 2007
The Bleach anime is relatively new to North American shores, appearing for the first time on Cartoon Network’s late-night block known as Adult Swim last September. But that doesn’t mean it hasn’t been around. More than 10 games based on the series have landed on Japanese gamers’ systems, spanning six different platforms. North American fans of the anime will be pleased to know two games will launch in time for the show’s second season, and for a change, the anime adaptations won’t be handled by Namco Bandai.
Sega sends word today that Bleach: Shattered Blade on the Wii and Bleach: The Blade of Fate on the Nintendo DS will be available this fall. Both Bleach games will follow the anime’s 15-year-old protagonist, Ichigo Kurosaki, as he fights to protect Earth from spectral beings known as “Hollows.” In the past, the megapublisher has been responsible for all Nintendo-platform versions of the game in Japan.
In Bleach: Shattered Blade, players will arm themselves with the Wii Remote and Nunchuk, and use slashing, jabbing, and lunging motions to attack enemies. The game’s storyline features 32 characters, and players will be able to repeat passed episodes with characters unlocked throughout the adventure. Shattered Blade will also feature a competitive offline multiplayer mode.
The DS version, Bleach: The Blade of Fate, will be a 2D action game featuring 28 characters from the anime. Blade of Fate will also incorporate spirit card decks, which are cards that can be used in battle to give special power-ups or cast unique spells. The DS version offers cooperative local online play for up to four players.
July 8, 2007
Some titles beg to be remade or rereleased; Hoshigami: Ruining Blue Earth, the PlayStation strategy role-playing game, is not one of them. It’s not that Hoshigami Remix is bad, but it’s wildly inconsistent and harshly demanding even on normal difficulty. It’s also not a very good choice for a gamer on the go: Battles are long and the learning curve is steep, so short sessions are not only unsatisfying, they are often impossible. There are some good ideas at work here, but the game asks a lot of you and doesn’t give a lot back, which makes playing it feel more like work than fun.
The main character of Hoshigami: Ruining Blue Earth Remix is Fazz, a mercenary who receives a surprise request for help from the king of Nightweld. The kingdom is under attack by the Valaimians, and he needs a hand from Fazz and his soldiers for hire. As it turns out, there is more to the invasion than meets the eye, and it’s up to you to keep the powers of the ancients from falling into the wrong hands. It’s nothing new to the world of RPGs, though Fazz turns out to be a bright and resourceful hero, and he’ll stay interesting long after you stop caring about the plot. There are also some branching story paths that will determine which characters can join your party, as well as a number of alternate endings. It isn’t the greatest tale, but there’s something to be said for keeping things non-linear.
The RAP gauge is one of many complicated factors to consider.
The basic plot outline may not be too complex, but Hoshigami’s core gameplay is quite intricate. At first, it will seem simple enough to anyone that’s played a turn-based strategy game before. At the onset of battle, you place your mercenaries on the battle grid, and each one takes turns moving to available squares, attacking an enemy, or performing other available actions. From here, the game breaks free from prevailing standards, most noticeably in how turns function. Each character has an RAP gauge, which stands for
July 8, 2007
It’s a safe bet that most Nintendo DS owners are probably too young to have ever played Midway’s popular touch-screen games that are found atop bars across the country. But that hasn’t stopped Midway from releasing Touchmaster, a nice compilation of 23 of its best touch-screen games. Most of the games are quite good, work well on the DS, and are simple yet fun enough to be enjoyed by players of all ages.
Since they were designed as touch-screen games from the get-go, each one of the 23 games works fine on the DS, even if the screen sometimes feels a bit cramped. Touchmaster won’t wow you with its presentation, but the simple menu screens are easy to navigate with the stylus. The in-game visuals and sound effects are adequate, though hardly stunning. The games are organized into three categories: cards, skill, and puzzle. Most of the seven puzzle games are knockoffs or slight variations of well-known puzzle games, but at least they’re all good knockoffs. Two of the better games are Crystal Balls, a Bejeweled-like game where you try to match three or more balls in a row by color or number, and Mahki, a puzzle game that tasks you with matching like-colored tiles as fast as possible, with the goal of erasing all of the tiles from the screen. There’s also a fun Wheel of Fortune clone called Wordz, an addictive game called Times Square, and the classic Mah Jongg Pairs.
Your parents’ love of big band music is finally good for something.
There are nine card games in all. One of the better games is Target 21, a sort of hybrid of blackjack and solitaire in which you’re dealt five hands and the objective is to get 21 in each hand. Another fun game that’s also similar to solitaire is 3 Peak Deluxe. Here the cards are arranged in three pyramids, and you erase those cards by playing cards that are one higher or lower than the deck card. Triple Elevens, Uplift, Solitaire Classic, Go Wild, Double Take, Phoenix 13, and Power Cell round out the list of card games.
Everything that doesn’t quite fit into the card or puzzle genre is lumped together into the skill section. There’s a little bit of everything here; a few of the games are good, but it’s probably the weakest category. One of the more recognizable games is Hot Hoops, where you tap one of five basketball players lined up across the screen to shoot at a hoop that moves back and forth across the screen. Trivia is, shockingly, a trivia game that covers a wide variety of subjects including sports, music, television, history, and general knowledge. In Trivia you can play all categories at once or pick and choose the ones you want to play. There’s even a “kids” category, which is nice. Kids will also enjoy using the stylus to circle words in Word Search and Pond King Checkers, where the checkers are replaced with frogs and the board is replaced with a pond and floating lily pads.
Many of the games are simple, but you’ll still find yourself playing them over and over.
Each game can be enjoyed single-player, and most of them allow two people to play either by taking turns or wirelessly, if each person has a cartridge. If you don’t have anyone to play against, you can still scratch the competitive itch by uploading high scores and entering tournaments. These are both great additions in theory, but they’re poorly executed. Instead of automatically uploading your score after a game ends, you must go through the several screens to upload it manually. If you actually want to see how your score stacks up, you’ll have to finish uploading, back out of that menu, and go through another series of menus. Entering a tournament is even more tedious. Midway decides when there will be a tournament and what game will be used. There’s no option for creating your own tournament; nor is there an option to search all games for ones that have tournaments–you have to go to each individual game and search. Using a PC it’s possible to go to Midway’s Web site and check your high scores as well as see what tournaments are being run, but when the fastest way to find out if there’s a Pond Kings tournament is to put down the DS and get on the computer, you know things aren’t easy.
Touchmaster is strictly no-frills, but it’s a great value, and nearly all of its games are challenging and fun enough to keep you coming back for more.
July 8, 2007
Bloody Wolf is a “run and gun” shoot-’em-up that was originally released for the TurboGrafx-16 and shares a great deal in common with games like Commando, MERCS, and Ikari Warriors. You play the part of a lone mercenary sent to rescue the president and a bunch of POWs from a fortified island occupied by a terrorist army. Each of the game’s eight stages consists of multiple areas that scroll horizontally or vertically as you move through them. Using a machine gun, a knife, and some grenades, the general idea is to slaughter the multitudes of enemy soldiers that appear, without running into too many of their bullets and bombs. The screen is usually hectic with all the bullets and explosions, and the heavily armed bosses waiting at the end of each stage further increase the intensity level.
In Bloody Wolf, you shoot the bad guys and rescue the hostages socked away in shacks and caves.
If you’ve played games like this before, Bloody Wolf will seem like familiar territory at first. The isometric viewpoint, eight-way movement, and “run and gun” gameplay borrow from the same playbook that games like Commando and Ikari Warriors established, and the various medical kits and limited-use weapons function as you’d expect them to. The speedy motorcycles that you can ride also work just like the tanks in Ikari Warriors. However, Bloody Wolf isn’t simply a carbon copy of its progenitors. It brings a few sweet ideas of its own to the run-and-gun formula. Besides shooting everything that moves, you’ll occasionally have to jump over gaps, duck underwater, scale fences, and climb trees to reach enemies or proceed through the stage. You’ll also frequently come across buildings, caves, and trucks that you can enter and explore. These smaller areas usually contain a few enemy soldiers, hostages, and weapon crates. Hostages also sometimes give you items such as keys and flippers, which can ease the process of opening crates and swimming, respectively.
You can only take a few hits before you die, and you’ll definitely watch yourself die frequently as you learn the layout of each stage and figure out how to exploit the bosses’ weaknesses. Thankfully, that brutal difficulty is offset somewhat by the ability to continue as often as you like. Dodging bullets and gunning down evildoers is extremely satisfying, so you probably won’t mind the learning curve. The tiny enemy solders move fluidly and die with a flourish, while your own character has a variety of macho animations for actions like running, shooting, and chucking grenades. You won’t be impressed by many of the human bosses you face, but some of the larger tanks and helicopters look downright menacing with their multiple gun turrets. Along the way, the militaristic music and different jungle backdrops provide the appropriate mood and scenery. The amount of detail and depth is about what you’d expect from a 16-bit game made in 1990. There are some nice little touches, though, such as explosions leaving marks on the ground and windows that break when you shoot them.
The motorcycle has a front mounted gun, but it’s more fun to just plow through enemies.
The game’s main problems are the large hit zone that surrounds your character and the lack of a two-player option. You’ll get used to the large hit zone pretty quickly; all it really means is that you need to move an extra step or two to avoid bullets and explosions. There’s usually plenty of wiggle room anyway. Of more significance is the absence of a two-player option. Hacking through an entire army solo like the video game equivalent of John Rambo is fun, but the thrill starts to wear off after a couple of plays.
All told, Bloody Wolf is worth the 600 Wii points ($6) it’ll cost you to play. You won’t be able to shake the feeling that the game would be more fun if you could play alongside someone else, but the lengthy levels and explosive gunplay should still keep you gleefully occupied long enough for you to feel that you got your money’s worth.