LEGO Satoru Iwata looks at a giant carrot.
August 4th, 1997: Nintendo became self-aware.
John Barnes
Today will be a day long remembered. It has seen the death of Shigeru’s List, and will soon see the end of the Nintendorks.
Well that isn’t a very nice attitude to have now is it 8-Bit Vader? The truth is that me and my pals here at the List have been invited to help put the final nail in the coffin provide our old friends over at Nintendorks.net with our invaluable insight and expertise on all things Nintendo (and maybe even some other stuff) from now on. Now what does this mean for you my dear, faithful reader? Well…nothing really. We aren’t going anywhere and I’ll continue to update regularly until the police find my lifeless, nude corpse at my computer desk surrounded by empty bottles of discount I.P.A. You can look forward to the same high quality self indulgence that we’ve blessed the internet with these past few years only now under both the Shigeru’s List url and the legendary banner of Nintendorks. In fact, I’ll probably be cross posting all of the larger pieces such as news and reviews on both sites but keep the random little mini updates exclusive to my little baby here.
I know, I know. It all sounds too good to be true but please, try and contain yourself. You’re embarrassing us.
Art Trumps Science: Brain Age speedrun is neat, especially for Nintendo fans
In old news, today I stumbled upon this tool-assisted “speed”run of the 100 math problems portion of Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day, wherein the handwriting recognition built into the game is abused with amusing results. To say more would be pointless and give the whole thing away; the video speaks for itself and is worth the six minutes, so just go ahead and watch it now.
The (Real) Final Howard and Nester Comic unveiled!
When Howard Phillips left Nintendo in 1991, ten years after joining the company and becoming part of the team that steered it through the arcade crash and the ensuing launch and wild success of the NES, one of the things that went with him was Howard and Nester. The comic ran from the first issue of Nintendo Power through volume 25, skipping a couple along the way, and featured a cartoon version of Howard cleverly dispensing tips for popular games to readers in the form of humorous dialogue with the rambunctious and clueless Nester as they traipsed through various game worlds in the style of Captain N. Nester continued his adventures for a while alone after Howard literally rode off into the sunset in volume 25, as depicted above.
As it turns out, though, that wasn’t the REAL end of the story… READ MORE
Super Smash Bros. now available for purchase on Club Nintendo through 9/16
Club Nintendo has been rotating the available downloadable game codes with greater frequency for a couple months, with a new game being available roughly every two weeks. This time at bat it’s the original Super Smash Bros., originally released for the Nintendo 64 in 1998 and downloadable on the Wii Virtual Console. Spending 200 coins, or roughly what you get for registering a 3DS system and a game with your Club Nintendo account, nets you the ability to beat the crap out of your friends as Link and Kirby, who were forever after nerfed as the series went on. Pikachu’s always been the tits, though. Anyway, if you want to throw Pokéballs like a maniac on top of the Silph Co. building to cause a cacophonous clusterfuck, and don’t feel like spending 1000 Wii Points, you have until September 16th- next Saturday- to cough up those coins you’ve been holding onto in the faint, desperate hope that the Super NES Classic Controller would ever come to the NA Club Nintendo store, before Nintendo switches it out with some other game, probably a worse one.
Meanwhile, at the Olympic Games…
… and no Sonic and/or friends in sight. (click image for larger)
(From the first issue of Nintendo Power. Scan from Retromags.com)
Mr. Hands-On: NintendoLand, the Pac-Man Vs. of E3 2012
Nintendo devoted five demo stations with rather large TV screens at their Gaming Lounge to showing off NintendoLand for the Wii U. It was also the final game shown in their E3 press conference this year, where it elicited responses ranging from, “… okay, that’s nice, I guess,” to “What in the fuck is Nintendo doing?” Well, one thing they appear to be doing for certain is pushing the game fairly aggressively, if such prominent positioning betrays anything. What they also appear to be doing is repeating the Pac-Man Vs. situation, where a very fun but unspectacular (meaning not much of a spectacle) game was used as the keystone of the conference. Oops, did I just give away my impression before the body of the article? I’m a terrible writer! Read on for more!
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Mr. Hands-On: New New Super Mario Bros. Double Feature
Following up on my hardware impressions, it is time to dig into the actual games (and, later, one non-game) I played at the Nintendo Gaming Lounge, which was located in the hotel ballroom next to the convention center and Comic-Con proper. What better place to start than with the soon-to-come one-two punch of New Super Mario Bros. 2 for the 3DS and New Super Mario Bros. U for the Nintendo Vs. Arcade System Wii U?
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Mr. Hands-On: 3DS XL and Wii U Gamepad
Yesterday I had the opportunity for hands-on demonstrations of the Wii U and the Nintendo 3DS XL. Before digging into individual game impressions I’m going to talk a bit about hardware. The long and the short of it: the armchair Internet bitching and speculation about discomfort is largely baseless. Read on for more! READ MORE
Back to BASICs with Petit Computer.
More like BA-SICK!
Coming this Thursday [EDIT: actually, July 19th, error mine] to DSiWare (and thus also to the 3DS), Petit Computer promises to have everyone partying programming like it’s 1980. The program lets users laboriously type in commands using the touch screen keyboard to program in a version of the BASIC programming language to do… well, pretty much whatever the BASIC language is capable of, I suppose. There are several sample programs included to give an idea of what’s possible, including, apparently, an old-school RPG and a scrolling shooter, as well as several non-game applications and demos. Perhaps the greatest feature, and the one most people (especially lazy ones) will likely be interested in, is the ability to share programs as QR codes, letting users download programs simply by aiming the 3DS/DSi cameras at an image of the code in the now-familiar way. There’s a trailer behind the break.
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Now that it’s out of print, go buy Ghost Trick.
Because it’s awesome.
Capcom’s Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective came out a year and a half ago in North America on the DS, and I played the demo and fell in love about six months before that. Because human beings are terrible at making decisions that make them happy, though, I didn’t make it a priority to pick up the game on release and only bought it this past week (and finished it last night), despite being impressed with the demo, and furthermore despite loving Shu Takumi’s other famous creation: the Ace Attorney series.
Before I go into detail I’ll say this: If you loved Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, you will in all likelihood adore Ghost Trick. Please at least play the online flash demo.
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The Last Blade hits Wii Virtual Console yesterday!
This all appears in English in the US release, I just grabbed what looked like a decent video.
After I write this I’m submitting a proposal to change the blog title to “Yesterday’s News.”
The Virtual Console floodgates remain open this week as SNK’s OTHER Neo Geo samurai fighting game series, The Last Blade, makes an appearance, with the first game in the series now available for download at the usual 900 points/$9 American price point. I’ve played the second (and to date final) game in the series on Dreamcast, and while I am crap at fighting games it was certainly a fun (and gorgeous) one, and has a devoted group of fans among those who know what they’re talking about.
This isn’t quite the first appearance of the series on a Nintendo system: Capcom vs. SNK 2 EO on the Gamecube featured Last Blade 2’s Hibiki as one of the selectable fighters. There was also SNK vs. Capcom: Card Fighter’s Clash on the DS but we don’t count that game because it was bad (or so I hear) and also a card game. If it was good and a card game then we’d probably count it but alas. It came second anyway so the point is rather moot. I’ll stop typing now.
Pikmin 3 leads off Nintendo E3 presentation, snail reports
Nintendo’s E3 press conference (the real one) yesterday opened with a bang, as Shigeru Miyamoto walked on stage with some plant-like guests in tow. Pikmin 3, the long-awaited continuation of Miyamoto’s most high-profile original series on the Gamecube was indeed announced and shown off in trailer form for Wii U, kicking off Nintendo’s game reveals at E3. Miyamoto had previously stated that Pikmin 3 would be revealed at the show, and was quoted in an interview after the presentation as expressing his relief that he would not have to “fall on [his] sword back at the hotel room tonight after all.”* READ MORE
Wii U information to be revealed in a new Nintendo Direct broadcast today 6/3
With E3 and its associated pre-show trainwreckpress conferences mere days away, Nintendo has deemed it appropriate to hold another in their now-regular series of Nintendo Direct live Internet broadcasts just a Twin Peaks marathon ahead of the larger media circus, on Sunday, June 3rd at 3 PM Pacific/6 PM Eastern (do the math, Denver and Chicago.) The topic of the presentation? “Watch the latest Nintendo Direct as Global President Satoru Iwata reveals new information about Wii U.” How much and what type of information will be revealed is a mysteryFriend of Shigeru’s List Jbond64 alerted me to a post on the Nintendo Facebook page confirming my guess, which was in this space before I did any research, that the focus will be on “the concept behind Wii U,” with detailed game info coming at the pre-E3 press conference proper. At any rate, way to sneak in a shot ahead of the competition, Iwata.
You were still beaten by Konami, though. Oh hey by the way guys, a 3DS Castlevania game is on the way… based on Lords of Shadow. Ray just died inside.