andPOP » E3

andPOP At E3 North With Nintendo

Josh Salem — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 16:42:17 +0000

Posted on andPOP:

Jenn and Josh take a romantic visit to E3 North where they learn about the next latest and greatest from Nintendo. They have a look at 4 player Mario, New DS games, Wii Sport Resort and more!

Gamer’s Mind Blog: E3 of the North, a peek at Nintendo’s upcoming titles

Josh Salem — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 18:00:46 +0000

Posted on andPOP:

There are three things I love about this job: being able to talk about gaming all the time, getting a chance to play alot of the newest titles and write about them, and special events. Now, these special events…well, they’re very special. They could be as big as going to E3 (maybe next year?) or as small as a demo station in a hotel lobby. Either way, it’s a break from the ordinary and it can lead to very unique experiences (such as playing NHL 10 with Patrick Kane and John Tavares likes we did earlier in the week).

Recently we were invited to another special event, the E3 of the North as they called it. We got a chance to not only sit down with Matt Ryan of Nintendo Canada (along with other members of the Nintendo family) but we also got an opportunity to try out some of the biggest titles that were revealed at this year’s E3!

Lets start with the DS titles.

Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box was available, and while I only had a chance to play two puzzles (and complete them successfully might I add) I felt that this was very similar in puzzle solving and style to the first title, which by all means isn’t a bad thing. Who wouldn’t want more puzzles to play on the bus or on their couch? And hey, if you finish all the puzzles quickly, you can always download more as Nintendo will be providing more puzzles for free as the weeks go on!

You mess with me, you mess with my Phantom... and my choo-choo

I was also fortunate enough to try a demo of the upcoming Zelda title, The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks. This demo, while only sporting three scenarios to play with, showed me a number of things. First off, this Zelda takes place 100 years after The Phantom Hour Glass (the last DS title). One interesting new feature in Spirit Tracks is the ability to use the Phantom (a bady guy from the last DS title) as a partner to help Link get through the game, by drawing a path for your phantom to follow, you can use him to help you fight against new monsters, or protect you from the elements such as fire. As well I had the opportunity to play against a giant bug boss in which you utilize a new wind weapon to blow poisonous gas away from the bug’s rear (yes, we may all chuckle) to expose it’s weak spot. I found Spirit Tracks to be a beautifully animated title, which no doubt expands on the last Zelda game with everything you loved in the first one, brought up to a whole new level.

DSi ware was also on hand as players had a chance to try out Mario Vs. Donkey Kong: Minis March Again, the third in this series, what’s new about this title is that as of now at least, you cannot actually purchase it in stores. Minis March Again is a downloadable only game for the DSi from any wi-fi hotspot and loaded straight onto your DSi. By solving puzzles and figuring out how to proceed to the next level, players can create their own levels and put them online for others to see and play as well! Also in the DSi ware I had a chance to experience Flipnote studio, an application that allows gamers with an artistic flare to create short cartoons complete with artistic features in a flip book style creating one frame at a time. Now while I have zero artistic capability, I saw some previous examples of what was made, and with a little time and skill you would be amazed at the amount of detail this DSi unit can provide for animation!

Now moving onto the Wii, while I had the chance to try Wii Fit Plus, Wii Sports Resort, AND Super Mario Brothers Wii, I missed out on actually playing the Wii Sports Resort, which, with the Motion Sensor Plus, looked like a blast giving 1:1 movement for every swing and waggle of the Wii controller. In Wii Fit Plus I was able to cross off one of my things to do before I die because, yes that’s right, I got to fly across an ocean as a giant chicken! No, there isn’t any metaphor there, one of the Fit Plus games has you flapping your arms and leaning to fly and land on specific targets with the final goal of landing on a boat before the time runs out. While I was skeptical regarding how flapping my arms on the Wii Balance Board would work, it actually did as every flap of my own arms was registered into the game and even flapping backwards to slow my speed worked! Now, while I landed near centre of every target and was told I did a great job, I later saw a toddler who couldn’t have been older than 6 years of age shatter my North of E3 chicken flying record with ease… my how the mighty have fallen.

Sure it looks cool... but where's the giant chicken?

Super Mario Brothers. A name so famous, if you asked 100 people I would wager at least 75% of them knew of the Super Mario Brothers, and as such, Nintnedo has found yet another way for us gamers to enjoy their company. This time however, Nintendo has found a way to mix the old with the new. In what seems to me to be a mix of the recent DS New Super Mario Brothers title and the Wii Capabilities, Super Mario Brothers Wii is a 2D side scrolling title very so much like the original Mario games of the NES days with new bad guys (as well as old favourites), new powerups (as well as old favourites), and new motion controls (shake the wii-mote to make your character do a spin jump). This New mario title however, has something no past Mario title has before though… are you ready for it? wait for it… here it comes, FOUR PLAYER CO-OP! and not in the sense that four players can wait and take turns playing like past Mario games, but that four players can play together AT THE SAME TIME! Now, this leads to very new and exciting dynamics in the game as players can work together to progress through the title, or compete with one another to get the most points by jumping on each other, throwing each other, or with the help of everyone’s rideable dinosaur, eat each other via Yoshi tounge! Playing with Matt from Nintendo, his associate, and Jennifer from andPOP we got right into the four player chaos holding the Wii-mote on it’s side like an old school NES Nintendo controller, we soon found out that this was as far from old school as possible as Mario, Luigi, Blue Toad, and Yellow Toad starting running around in a chaotic motion trying to outplay each other and survive to make it to the end of the level. 20 minutes flew by before we relized it and one thing was certain, this game was fun for everyone… and addictive as I didn’t want to stop playing any time soon. As each level ends, players tally up their scores to see who played best for bragging rights as well as to target that player in the next level as a threat to your all time high score. By far in my opinion Super Mario Wii was the highlight of this event and I can’t wait for some good old four player chaos on my couch with some competitive buddies.

So there you have it, the inner workings of a gaming sneak preview. Full of all the whimsy and magic gamers expected from closed door gaming events, I would be lying if I said it wasn’t a blast to be there, but hey, it’s only a preview and before we all know it, these games will be hitting retail shelves across North America!

Outer Panel Haven. 2

sarge-ak47 — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 23:36:13 +0000

Posted on andPOP:

Alright let me stress this, I LOVE andPOP.com!! I LOVE THEM!!
E3 came and went and we did not go. Every game writer here knows how dear E3 is to any gamer.
Especially Josh!

We were amazed at this years offerings and cant wait to see these games get released.

Anyhow for the sake of the comic, let’s pretend it’s pre- E3 and this is how things went down.. it only makes it funnier!
And now enjoy my skewed distortion of reality!!!

As before, to see the web comic in it’s full size glory, all you have to do is click on the image!

SONY E3 Press Conference Wrap up

sarge-ak47 — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 22:07:44 +0000

Posted on andPOP:

Alright, hot off the presses we have Sony and their E3 announcements

For starters the PSP Go (the worst kept secret) has been officially announced. The unit will retail for approximately CDN $249.99 MSRP. The system is said to have a more digital storage focus, with a 16 gig flash memory and the options to add your own memory stick. With an array of new applications to take advantage of it, such as “SensMe” a mood based music application used to manage and create playlists depending on you mood. Along with that we now have a central application Media Go! allowing transfer of digital content via your PC to the PSP. Launching along side The PSP GO will be the loooong awaited Gran Turismo for the PSP both of which are coming this October.

Its important to note that the PSP G0 wont be replacing the PSP 3000 model. Sony plans on supporting the UMD centric model as well as its new flash drive counter part; offering applications and services that will work for both units.

But that’s not all folks, you see, at the E3 press conference we learned that 25 PS3 exclusive titles are on their way, add that to the list of multi platform third party titles and you have tons to play. With exclusives like Uncharted 2 – Among Thieves, God of War III, MAG (256 player online war game!), Ratchet and Clank Future – a crack in time, to titles like ModNation racers- user created racer that is all about customization, right down to the track itself. Oh and we had a glimps of Gran Turismo 5, only this time there seemed to be damage!!

And then there were the titles we really didn’t see coming, Metal Gear Solid : Peace walker, an official sequel to MGS3: snake eater, announced by the man – Hideo Kojima -himself. Resident Evil for the psp, Another is Rockstar’s The Agent, a gritty take on the world of espionage. And just when you thought it was safe to play Final Fantasy 13… in comes 14. Final Fantasy 14 strictly online and exclusive for the PS3.

Finally a new tech demo was showcased, combining the existing eye toy and a new peripheral to create immersion in a new manner. The controller basically takes real world information, replicates your movement in the digital world 1:1 and then using the eye toy you can view the amalgamation of your world and the game world with effects placing objects seemingly around you.
Still in its prototype phase, the tech demo showed off sword fighting, bow and arrow, precision drawing and other motion based implementations.

If you ask me the industry is really taking this motion thing to some new and scary heights.

Besides that people can expect to see The DUALSHOCK 3 come out in deep red and metalic blue.

Whew!!! that’s a lot of info. So basically Sony has got your back and wants to assure you, the public, that there isn’t any shortage of supporting the Playstation brand and its 3 viable platforms.