Chatty: Diablo III, Dragon's Dogma
In this week's edition, Chatty discusses more Diablo III, Dragon's Dogma, and...
8
FileShack: Unity of Command, Skyjacker
FileShack for the week of May 26, 2012 features a Unity of Command demo, a...
4
Daily Filter: Planetside 2, Deadlight
Today's Filter features an air combat trailer for Planetside 2, a plot trailer for...
7
Weekend PC digital deals: strategy-o-rama
Do you like strategy games? Then you'll love this weekend's sales at digital...
13
38 Studios, Harry Potter Kinect - Shacknews Daily: May 25, 2012
Join Garnett Lee on this episode of Shacknews Daily. Today’s stories: 38 Studios...
1
Minecraft for Xbox 360 dev working on 'Adventure' update
Minecraft XBLA is getting a small update (1.7.3) for pistons, and then developer...
5
Demon's Souls servers extended again
Its servers scheduled to shut down at the end of this month, Demon's Souls has...
10
Resident Evil: Chronicles HD Collection coming in June
Capcom announced today that the Resident Evil: Chronicles HD Collection will hit...
2
Sony patent would interrupt gameplay to display ad
Sony has filed a patent that would introduce in-game ads in a whole new way: by...
120
Weekend Confirmed 114 - Diablo 3, Max Payne 3, Lost Planet 3
Diablo 3 and Max Payne 3 continue to keep the Weekend Confirmed hosts talking in...
2
Nintendo has been slow to embrace new technologies, but the company is finally making more serious moves into the digital era. The latest baby step is in the form of patches, like fixing a game-breaking bug in Zelda: Skyward Sword, and now a new patch to stick it to those filthy Mario Kart 7 cheaters.
Nintendo has reported its results for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2012, and they weren't pretty. The company reported an annual operating loss of 37.3 billion yen (approximately $460 million), the first time in the company's history of reporting such a loss. This is a slight improvement from its adjusted forecast from January, which predicted a 45 billion yen loss.
In ye oldene dayes, if a console game was broken, it was stuck that way forever. Or, in the case of the Nintendo 3DS, in ye moderne dayes too. Not for much longer, though, as the handheld is getting support for game patches in a firmware update this week.
Nintendo recently released its financial figures, along with software charts that span the 2011 calendar year. Taking a closer look at the figures, an analyst points out that 3DS owners must have been starved for Mario, because games featuring the pudgy plumber surpassed all of the launch titles despite a much shorter sales window, creating yet another year of third-parties left in the dust.
With the holidays behind us and a new year begun, video game companies can get back to the important work of boasting about how great they are. Reporting a "great holiday season," Nintendo reveals that over 4 million Nintendo 3DS handhelds have now been bought in the US, while Super Mario 3D Land and Mario Kart 7 have raced past the million sales mark to become the fastest-selling titles in their franchises' histories.
Jeff surprises Xav and Garnett this week with tales of his first few nights fighting to survive in Minecraft. He's been hard at work with his virtual pick and shows signs of being in for the long haul with the game. Garnett took advantage of the holiday time to get into Uncharted 3. A discussion of authored stories versus interactivity follows that pulls in the far different approach taken in Skyrim as a contrast. Mario also gets good time this week with both 3D Land and Kart finding their way into Xav and Jeff's hands. The latest on plans for Mass Effect 3 and an upcoming patch to fix the patch for Skyrim top the news highlights and it all wraps up with Finishing Moves.
Long-time fans of the Mario Kart series might remember coins. Collecting them increased a kart's top speed, but they've only appeared as a gameplay element in two of the six Mario Kart titles. Now Mario Kart 7 is bringing them back, and Nintendo has changed its tune on how important they are to the legacy of the series.
Read more: 'Looking back now, I think they're an essential element' »
Mario Kart series producer Hideki Konno has revealed that production on Mario Kart 7 stalled when it became necessary for Nintendogs + Cats to be completed for the Nintendo 3DS launch.
The two titles had been co-developed by Konno's division, Nintendo EAD Software Development Group No.1, with both projects originally starting with an internal production staff of eight people. According to the latest edition of Iwata Asks, there was "an act of emergency" to complete Mario Kart 7 by the end of the year, forcing Nintendo to bring Retro Studios in on the project.
With Super Mario 3D Land, Nintendo introduced a firmware update to improve friends lists. Most notably, it added a "Join Game" feature to jump into a multiplayer game, which was an odd choice to include in a strictly single-player game. The first game to actually support the feature is the upcoming Mario Kart 7, so now we can see just how it works.
If you've seen footage of the new Mario Kart 7, you might have noticed a feeling of deja vu. The game has been keen to show off its new gliders and underwater sections, but in general it looks like a Mario Kart game. Apparently this is no accident; Nintendo's Shigeru Miyamoto acknowledges that the series formula is pretty static, and was content for this iteration to keep it that way.
Read more: 'Safe to have it evolve in a pretty staid and traditional manner' »
Nintendo's 3DS slate has been fairly light since launch, but heavy hitters, such as Super Mario 3D Land and Mario Kart 7, should help bolster the library this holiday season. While Nintendo could release more games on the platform this year, company president Satoru Iwata says they've strategically kept some games out of 2011 to maximize their sales potential.
Read more: This year 'so dense' that additional software sales would suffer »
Mario Kart has been a consistent hit for Nintendo's various platforms, and the company is hoping to replicate that success with the upcoming Mario Kart 7. Today Nintendo released new details on the latest kart racer, including new info on the online multiplayer, and StreetPass and SpotPass features.
There was one crucial omission to the Nintendo 3DS launch library: Mario. Nintendo is making up for his absence with not one, but two Mario games for the handheld this holiday season. The first is Super Mario 3D Land, the "first-ever true 3D Mario platforming adventure." Developed by Nintendo's Tokyo team, the same team responsible for the Super Mario Galaxy series, the game will take advantage of the gyroscope by allowing players to find secrets before they play a level. There's StreetPass functionality, too. Super Mario 3D Land will be available on November 13.
Next up is Mario Kart 7.
The impending 3DS price drop isn't a healthy sign for its sales, but Nintendo executives have been surprisingly candid about their missteps with the device. Now Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime is joining in acknowledging that the system simply didn't launch with enough strong software. Ambitious projections based on early excitement made the slower sales all the more surprising to the company.
As part of its Flame Red 3DS announcement today, Nintendo also dropped release targets for two of its most anticipated 3DS games. The company announced that Super Mario 3D Land will be hitting in November, and Mario Kart 7 will follow in December.
Comment on this story