E3 2014

After giving the news some time to sit and digest, I think it's time I shared my thought on this year's E3.

While not quite as underwhelmed this year as I felt with last year's show, I still don't think I saw anything at this show that has me wishing the summer away for new game releases in the fall. There's lots to look forward to, don't get me wrong, but still nothing in this new generation of games to make me go absolutely wild like I remember going in the past.

I'll start with Microsoft. While I found their conference was probably one of the smoothest of the entire show, and their entire show was laser-focused on games, there still wasn't much that surprised me or grabbed my attention. I'm a big fan of the Halo series, and the teaser for 5 looked very cool, but not enough to completely tip the scales in Microsoft's favour just yet. The Master Chief Collection looks cool too, but wasn't a surprise. Definitely solid fan service though. I'm anxious to see the new live action series too.

Aside from Halo, Sunset overdrive seems like it's going to buck the trend a bit. When the trailer started, I'll admit they caught me hook, line, and sinker. As I watched, I thought to myself "Oh great, another gritty army dude shooting his way to victory. Next!" and watching the Sunset Overdive dude kick his way through the door and grind/parkour his way around the warehouse was really fun. I'd love to get a hands-on with the game and see how the motion and fluidity affect the gameplay, but I think it'll be interesting for sure.

Scalebound is another game that caught me by surprise. As the main character faced up to the dragon I thought "lovely, another game where you kill giant dragons... when are we going to get to team up with these things and take on even bigger monsters?" As if reading my mind, that's exactly what happened next, with the trailer revealing that the first dragon is indeed the partner/pet of the Beats-wearing protagonist. It looks like you can teacup with other dragon riders too, making this a gritty version of How to Train Your Dragon. I have high hopes, but will wait for more than a CG trailer.

The final thing that grabbed my attention at the Xbox One show was Crackdown 3. I admit, I skipped Crackdown 2. The first game was fun, and I really loved running and jumping around the city, gaining new powers and making my super cop stronger and stronger as I did, but I didn't want more of the same wight he second instalment. I just went back and played the first one again for a few hours and moved on with my life. Depending on how much they can add with the new hardware, Crackdown 3 could be an amazingly fun, destructive, open-world mayhem simulator that's a blast to play, or it could be a slightly prettier version of the first two games, and something I skip completely.

Moving on to Playstation 4, Sony's press conference was a little too long for my liking, especially airing so late on the east coast, and I felt that they had a lot of great points, but a lull in the middle, some weird missteps in focus, and some technical glitches made it the weakest show from a presentation standpoint. Content-wise, they were on the ball. Games like The Order and Bloodborne make Playstation the place to go if you never want to sleep again. Grim Fandango being remade brings high hopes that we'll see old adventure greats like Full Throttle get the same treatment. Full Throttle alone would make me purchase a PS4, no questions. Someone make that happen.

Since I didn't get a PS3 last gen, the HD remake of The Last of Us and GTA5 are appealing to me, and Rachet & Clank always seemed cool when my brother would play them, but I've never really spent much time on those games personally, so those new/old experiences might be tipping my interest a little bit more toward Sony for this gen. The new Uncharted makes me want to go back and buy a PS3 just to catch up on that series, because I feel like I'm missing out on some great adventures, and the new one, even from a short teaser, looks fantastic. Here's hoping they do an HD remake package of the first games before the next one comes out, as that seems to be the current trend to make up for lack of backwards compatibility.

Destiny was one of the games of the show for me. No matter what console I end up getting, I imagine I'll spend a significant chunk of time getting to know that universe. The white PS4 bundle and exclusive Playstation content are making it appealing to go with Sony, but again, it's not a completely deal breaker for me to miss out on a new gun or something if I went with an Xbox One. This leads in to my next topic, cross platform stuff.

When I compare the list of exclusives that interest me, Sony comes out on top, but only slightly, and partially thanks to not owning a PS3 and being able to experience games I missed last generation. Most of the games I'm really interested in for next gen are cross platform. Evolve, Assassin's Creed: Unity, Far Cry 4, The Division, Rainbow 6, Mortal Kombat X, Arkham Knight and, as mentioned above, Destiny, are going to be available no matter if I chose super gaming box 1 or super gaming box 2. There are other games I can add to that list, but those are just a few off the top of my head, and as they get closer to release and the REAL builds start to come out, my interest in some of those titles might increase, or as it is with a lot of games that have promising early showings at E3, they could end up as shitty games with awesome trailers.

For me, and, after talking with my brother a bit on the subject, some other people as well, waiting seems like the best option at this point. That's sad to say a year after these new consoles were launched. I'm certainly not tempted to get both Xbox One and PS4. Maybe, just maybe, if Destiny is amazing, I'll consider grabbing the white PS4 bundle in the fall, but otherwise the only game that was making me itch for a fall purchase (Arkham Knight) has been pushed back to 2015. With all of these cross-platform games, I'm waiting to see what friends are doing too, because with so many multiplayer and coop games, I'd like to be able to play with people I know. Until then, I'll stick with my Wii U and my largely unused Xbox 360 and play the waiting game.

Speaking of Wii U, let's segue in to Nintendo's conference presence. I can't say their presentation because they did a digital event again this year, but that was only part of their overall approach to E3. The live streamed stuff the ENTIRE TIME! While it was impossible to keep up with it and watch it all, I really loved the approach they used and enjoyed tuning in when I could to see what the heck was happening at any given point on the show floor. It's the next best thing to being there, I think.

I enjoyed their Digital Event, and thought the Robot Chicken introductions, the epic battle between Reggie and Iwata, and other little odd bits were vastly different from the super serious "we're so powerful" feel that often comes through in competitors shows. Nintendo's whole thing felt fun. We saw Smash Bros, which got pushed back for 3DS and got a more solid "holiday season" release window for Wii U. I honestly don't mind the push for 3DS as long as it's a solid experience. As much as I would have loved to chill out at the cottage after a day of swimming and stuff and enjoy some Smash on the go with my brother and cousins, I wouldn't want that experience to be buggy.

The holiday 2014 release for Smash Wii U makes sense, and I would assume they are going full steam to make sure they hit that. With the announcement of Amiibo, Nintendo's answer to Skylanders and Infinity, they need to get both the figures and the game (which will be the first one to utilize the figures) out and in the hands of parents looking to grab stocking stuffers. I've posted about Nintendo doing something cool with NFC and figures before, so I'm very excited to see some really cool Nintendo figurines. I'm not entirely sure if I'll want to use them in Smash Bros, but I'll get the figures for display purposed if nothing else. They look really great.

For the rest of Nintendo's show, games like Yoshi's Wooly World and Captain Toad's Adventures look like cute, classic Nintendo fun, and from what I've heard about both, I'm very excited. Bayonetta looks very cool, and I'm happy to see Nintendo loan out character costumes. This is a tactic I think could work really well for other third party games, and I hope we'll see more things like this and Hyrule Warriors in the future. Games like Devil's Third and Splatoon seemingly came out of nowhere, and I'm looking forward to both, although cautiously, especially for Devil's Third. More games for the Wii U are a good thing though.

Of course, the big highlight, and the game of the show for me, was Zelda Wii U. Without an official name, details on gameplay, or a release window of any sort, Nintendo built up and got me so excited for this new Zelda that nothing else really mattered. Starting by talking about open worlds and exploration, trial and error, and the excitement of being able to chose a path and see where it takes you was such a great way to build up the game. Zelda has always been about this. The first Zelda allowed players to go in any direction and discover things. Often times you'd run in to a monster you couldn't defeat yet, forcing you to run away (or die) and come back when you had better gear, but as consoles continued to grow, technology limited the scope of the worlds and made them surprisingly more linear, instead of more open. Recent games like A Link Between Worlds brought Zelda flack to its roots, both by using the same over world as Link to the Past, but also by letting people chose the order they explored the dungeons in. I think that was a small taste of what this game is going to offer, and I can't wait to see more. Nintendo, for me, won the show based on that promise alone. It wasn't a perfect show for them. Code Name Steam wasn't the game I wanted them to focus on for 90 freaking minutes as a new 3DS game. I wanted Mario Galaxy 3D, or something of that AAA calibre. Splatoon finished their show on a weird note, but people are saying good things. I think voice chat could make or break that game online, and with Nintendo's hesitation to allow voice of any kind except with trusted friends, I can't see cooperative multiplayer being engaging when it's all silent. There are also not a ton of games to look forward to in 2014. Smash excluded, it's pretty bare. Mario Kart 8 and other backlogged games will keep me going for a while, but my fall could be pretty boring if Smash gets pushed back or I don't buckle and buy a new console.

So there you have it. My thoughts on this years E3. What did you think? I know my brother and the rest of the guys over at BFGC did Podcasts and thought on all of the press conferences. You can find and subscribe to their podcast here
https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/the-bfgc-podcast/id856606332?mt=2

Follow them on Twitter too @the_bfgc and for the hell of it, check out their Youtube Channel.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-dUF4q5mGsWEubdRWfXosQ

That's it folks! Until next time, follow me on Facebook at my Joystick Monkey page and on twitter @markcarabin

Gimmicks Shmimicks

With the announcement that Microsoft will be releasing a version of Xbox One without Kinect at $100 less than the current retail package, I'm going to go ahead and say the customers have spoken, and gimmicks aren't going to sell systems.

We've actually been seeing this coming for a while. Even the Wii, which was hugely successful, was a disappointment for a lot of people. Not because it was underpowered and standard def when everyone else was going HD, although that was disappointing enough, but because we never really got that 1:1 experience we all expected to have, where we swung the remote around like a real sword fight and our on-screen counterpart did the same. Instead we mostly got to waggle the controller around a bit and hope we didn't develop tennis elbow. That's not to say the Wii was without any quality software, but most of the games I enjoyed either used very little motion control, or let me plug in a Classic Pro and drop the Wii Remote completely. One area I did enjoy the Wii Remote was FPS games, using the pointer for pixel-perfect aim, and they released somewhere around 2-3 decent ones through the entire console's life. Go figure.

The 3DS was priced too high when it was released and people lashed back, saying they didn't want glasses free 3D anyway, so they weren't going to pay a premium for the technology. Nintendo answered first with a price drop, and more recently with the 2DS, which drops 3D from the system altogether. Personally, I like 3D in most games, and think it adds a bit of depth and makes the experience more immersive in some cases, but I figured I'd make the point that the 3D gimmick was NOT a system seller. It wasn't until the system built a library of some of the best games on the market that people started buying the it. Games sell systems, not gimmicks.

Nintendo is falling prey to this line of thinking once again with the Wii U. "Hey, we have a Gamepad with a touch screen and some cool features" they're saying, while not releasing a single piece of software that sells anyone on the tech. So far the best use of the Gamepad I've seen has been off screen gaming, which is fantastic if, like me, you like to play while someone else is watching TV, but useless if you have a dedicated TV for gaming or something like that. It's been cool to have a map in my hands, and there have been some neat uses for inventory and stuff like that, but there's absolutely nothing about it that screams "you need this to play games!"

Microsoft, as they tend to do, saw another company's success and said "me too!" What they didn't seem to realize was the Wii was an anomaly, and priced to kill when it was released. With Kinect, they have some cool ideas for sure, but 9.9 times out of 10 people are going to opt for the simple press of a button rather than flailing around their living rooms like a spider just landed on their face. And talking to your TV never makes you look cool. If I can quietly press a button to do the same function as yelling at a little black box, I'm going to chose the button, for fear that the men in white coats will come after me. I haven't played around with an Xbox One, but I'm sure the voice commands work wonderfully in a quiet setting, but I have a feeling I'f use them once or twice, then forget about it and go back to a controller for input.

Sony seems to have caught on to this, and just released a super powerful system with a standard controller that just works right out of the box and plays and controls like every game system before it but just looks better. And that brings us to the problem...

After all my ranting and ripping companies apart, what does this all mean for gamers? Personally, I think it's both good and bad. On the good side, I think when developers don't have to worry about integrating gimmicks in to their games, especially cross-platform games, they can focus on just delivering quality content and more resources can go to things like story and graphics. The same thing can be said for the console makers. When they don't have to spend time and money coming up with gimmicks, they can focus on making top quality consoles that are powerful and less expensive. Clearly, with Microsoft cutting a full $100 off the price of their console just for taking out Kinect, there is some room to save costs when you're not paying for a product you're likely not going to use much anyway.

On the bad side, it kind of kills the innovation. If Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony all stop gimmicks and put out ultra powerful consoles with pretty similar looking, standard controllers, where is innovation in the industry going to come from? Is all innovation just going to be graphical? If so, I think we're hitting a bit of a limit. I remember the jump from SNES to N64 and being blown away by real 3D graphics. I remember the jump from N64 to Gamecube and PS2 that smoothed out those rough edges and blocky textures and made things feel more real. I remember the jump to HD with Xbox 360 and PS3 that upped the realism and made things look amazing on my brand new HDTV. This recent jump to Xbox One and PS4... meh. Things looks amazing, don't get me wrong, but I don't think we're even going to experience those types of dramatic jumps where anyone, even someone that's never played a game in their life, can look and say "wow, that looks so much better than before".

That's why I love Nintendo. They don't care. They swing for the fences every damn time, and hope something connects. For the Wii, they had a home run. For the 3DS, it took some time, but they got there. Especially in a world where I can download a great looking game like Infinity Blade 3 to my phone in a couple of seconds, the success of the 3DS is a testament to Nintendo's quality. The Wii U might be flailing a bit now, but if they look at it like the 3DS, consider a price drop, and get some quality software out there, it'll be ok. At least they stick to their guns, and I can't wait to see what they come out with next.

Microsoft, on the other hand, has been just coming off as spineless this entire generation. Last year's E3 was embarrassing. I loved my 360, but have been strongly considering switching to PS4 for this gen simply because MS doesn't seem like they have a clear plan. They say something, get their ass handed to them, then say "yeah, we're going to do what they're doing too. We're still cool, right?" Make a choice and stick with it. Even this announcement is all over the place. I read something basically saying "we're dropping Kinect but we still think it's an integral part of our strategy". If it's integral, leave it in there. If you need to play catchup, drop the price and take a loss for a bit. Don't flop around and make desperate decisions. An art teacher I had in high school would always say "make a decision. Make a choice, even if it's the wrong one, and go with it." and I always try to remember that in life. You're going to make dumb calls. You're going to do things that don't make sense, or that other people don't get right away, or at all. But you made that choice. Follow it through. I think Microsoft could learn from both Nintendo and Sony. Right now, it's trying to have the best of both worlds, and it's not doing the best at either.

The State of Nintendo

Nintendo posted an annual operating loss of $457 million for the past year. They sold only 2.72 million Wii U consoles, missing their expectation of 2.9 million (which itself was lowered from 9). 3DS continued to basically keep the company afloat, selling 12.24 million units. Most people reading this will likely know how much I love my Wii U, but I know Nintendo can do better and I really think they've been their own worst enemy the past few years, making weird decisions and ignoring fans for the most part. They've stated that going forward they have a lot of work to do (duh) and they want to focus on titles that showcase how the Gamepad is different that anything else on the market, and also to make use of things like NFC (near field communications), which is built in to the Gamepad and is the same technology Skylanders use to make the figures communicate with the base stations. I actually ranted last year about how Nintendo is ignoring NFC and came up with a couple of very simple but cool uses I think could show juts how different the system is. If you'd like to read that to catch up, click here http://joystickmonkey.blogspot.ca/2013/11/smash-bros-nfc.html

I think Nintendo is shooting itself in the foot in a couple of other key ways as well, and of course, I'm going to list them here and I'd love to hear what you think as well.

So, aside from the ignoring NFC problem, one of the main things that bugs me about my Wii U is the lack of Virtual Console support. Didn't they solve this with the Wii (sort of)? I could write an entire post about the VC and how I've always wanted to see more titles with steadier releases, dating right back to the Wii, but even ignoring that I still don't understand how nearly 2 years after launching the Wii U, I can't just move my entire existing VC library over to the new console. There have been a few NES and SNES titles released, but where are the N64 and Sega titles? I love playing Mega Man X, Super Mario World, Zelda and the other handful of games on my Gamepad while watching TV. Having to switch in to Wii mode and play the other VC games that way is a pain and a nuisance, and instead of porting over GBA games (which are awesome, don't get me wrong) I think Nintendo should be focusing all of its porting power on getting N64 games running on their current machine. Retro gaming is huge, just look to the success of games like NES Remix and you'll see Nintendo is at least vaguely aware that it's past library is still as popular as ever. Stop porting over crappy NES games, bring your SNES and N64 libraries up, and get Sega in on the mix. I'm not even going to complain about the Wii U upgrade fee, because I don't care, just let me play the games.

The Virtual Console is the main focus of my next point as well. I think Nintendo needs to bite the bullet and stop double-dipping. If they sold 12.24 million 3DS units this year, giving them a total of a little over 43 million sold altogether, they're sitting on a HUGE potential audience that can be at least a little more tempted to buy a Wii U if their damn purchases were transferable! I'm not talking about every eShop game being able to port to and from both systems, despite that working for a lot of titles, I'm sure, since there are effectively two screens on both. Just allow people to buy Super Mario Bros 3 ONCE and have it on both systems, and I'm sure there will be at least a few of those 43 million people that say "ok, might as well get a Wii U if it lets me play my retro titles at home". It would be awesome to do save and/or freeze state transfers like I can do between my iPhone and iPad on certain titles, but I really don't think they have to go that far. If I'm paying $5 for a game that's 25 years old, put it on both of my systems, shut up, and take my money. As it stands now, aside from a couple of games that I'll buy pretty much any time they're released (I'm looking at you Super Mario Bros), I am really really picky when I have to decide if I want something on my 3DS or Wii U. I'm not spending the money twice regardless, but if I had it for free on both, I'd tell my friends about it.

The last thing I'll mention are the games. I know, I know, everyone says Nintendo needs more games, and I agree. The problem is Nintendo can only make a few games at a time, and good games take time. I really think Nintendo needs to dip in to its MASSIVE cash stocks and start paying developers to do exclusives. Seriously, Nintendo could have flop systems for the next 20 years and still not run out of money. Use that cash. Start paying developers to make games for your system. Sponsor indies. Do whatever it takes to make your platform attractive. Pimp out your characters, even if it's just as simple as being able to wear something resembling a Link costume in an Assassin's Creed game, having Mushroom coloured gun skins in Call of Duty, WHATEVER. Look back to the Gamecube, which wasn't Nintendo's best selling console, but games like Soul Caliber did fantastically well on that system, in a large part because Link was a playable fighter. Have I bought a SC game since? Hell no, but I was there to grab that game day one, and I would again.

There are many more things I could mention that Nintendo could do, like going back in time and changing the name from Wii U to literally anything else. Seriously at this point I think the Nintendo Game-a-tron would be a better name. However, I'll stop with those three things and ask what, if anything, you think Nintendo can do to make the Wii U more appealing to people.

Smash Bros NFC

It's been a while since I made a post. New job, busy, blah blah, crappy excuses. I've been writing, which is the weird thing, but most of it's gone in the Day 1 journal app I've been testing out, and none of that gets pushed online. Anyway, I'm hoping I can find a better balance between here and there and get some more thoughts out in the universe. Ok, enough on that, this one's been brewing in my head for a while.

As I've said countless times, I love my Wii U. I use it all the time, and after a bit of a bumpy year, there are some truly great games out for the system, and more on the horizon. The Gamepad is awesome for someone like me! I enjoy spending evenings playing video games and chilling with my girlfriend and our puppy. We have a TV upstairs too, but it's nicer to spend some time together. The Gamepad allows me to play off-TV if she doesn't feel like watching what I'm playing, and if she does feel like watching, or is reading or something, the Gamepad has some other cool features that some games take advantage of, and some don't. And that's fine, as long as the game plays well, I really don't car if a developer shoehorns in some new, exciting way to use the gamepad screen. One thing that has been bugging me, however, is the lack of attention that the NFC reader is getting. I think I've come up with a pretty cool solution for that problem.

Nintendo loves when people get together in the living room and play games. They're all about being in the same physical space, interacting, and having fun with real human beings. Online is improved with Wii U, but Nintendo is still doing it a little differently. Again, that's fine. I'm digging MiiVerse and any game I've played online so far works really well. Back to the living room thing. With Wii, we could upload a handful of our Mii characters to a Wii Remote and take that to a friends house. I think you might see where I'm going with this. The Gamepad is a little (ok, a lot) too big and fragile to start lugging around to a friends house. Plus you can't sync up more than one. Therefore, I think Nintendo should release what I'll call a Mii Coin. This little coin, preferably shaped like a coin from Mario, but really there could be multiple styles from different franchises (a Rupee from Zelda, a Star Fox inspired military badge, a Metroid inspired lightning bolt coin, a pokeball shaped coin, etc), would store not only you Mii's information, but also profile data from compatible games. I'm inspired by the Wii Fit Meter, which is now always attached to my hip, to think of something small and cheap, that would always be on you and easy to take from one friends house to another, keeping your stats and experience wherever you go.

For an example, I thought of Smash Bros for Wii U. Imagine this. You buy your coin alongside the game. It's $10 - $20 to keep in line other NFC toys (Skylanders/Infinity) and not too expensive to if you lose it you're going to lose sleep over it. You go home, pick your favourite character and start learning moves, customizing your controls to the way you like them, and building your stats. Maybe there's a levelling system in this version, that allows you to unlock new features, characters, or costumes depending on your level. That weekend your friend invites you over for a Smash tournament. You start up the game, click Transfer on the home screen, and tap your Mii Coin on the Gamepad's NFC square, transferring your stats, control preferences, etc over to the the Coin instantly, and you're good to go. When you get to your friends house, fire up the game, hit the transfer button, and the game tells each person to tap their Coins (if they have them). After the tournament, simply reverse the process, collect your stats, and sync back up when you get home. When you transfer your stats, your friend also has the option of saving your Mii character to their system, so they'll see you when they're playing Wii Sports HD, etc.

Obviously this example is just scratching the surface of what this thing could be used for. Custom made characters and stages in games could be brought with you anywhere you go. Profiles in FPS games could be transferred over so two people can play online and you don't have to use "Guest 1's" crappy default load outs. It's a simple idea, but it's something that I think would get people excited about going to a friends house to play games, keep their progress and records, and actually use a pretty cool feature that's literally just sitting there under our thumbs.

What do you think? Can you think of any uses for Mii Coins that maybe I missed completely? Dumb idea, cool idea. I want to know!

Wii U Problems

I'm going to start this off by saying I absolutely love my Wii U. I don't regret the purchase at all, and I've played some great games on the system so far. I think the Game Pad offers some great new ways to interact with games, and at the very least, being able to play games off screen in the TV is being used is amazing. That being said, I understand why Nintendo is having a crap time selling them. Their latest financial report showed they only sold 160,000 units in the last 3 months. That's bad. They actually sold more Wii systems over that same time period. It's understandable though, for a couple of very simple reasons.

The first, price. The Wii U Deluxe bundle is $350, only has a 32 GB hard drive, and compared to the much more powerful PS4 that's coming in at $400 in a couple of months, it's not a great bargain. Nintendo shot themselves in the foot with the high price of the 3DS, and now people are expecting a similar price drop for the Wii U. I know people that are holding out anticipating a price drop, and I think even dropping the price by $50 could do a lot for Nintendo's public image. $50 cheaper than a much more powerful system doesn't entice many people to buy. $100 cheaper could give the Wii U the same kind of advantage with younger audiences whose parents just want a babysitter for their kids and will go with the cheapest option. The PS4, as it stands now, is worth the $50 for a Bluray player alone. $100 cheaper could also mean core gamers won't have a problem picking it up as a secondary system just for the Nintendo exclusives, which leads in to my next point...

GAMES! Bloody hell I've been making the most out of any Wii U game I've picked up. New games are coming, but not much that will entice people to pick up the game until later in the fall. There are some cool games coming out in the next couple of weeks, and I know I'm excited for Pikmin 3 and Wonderful 101, but I don't think they're system selling games. However, a price drop now could make some people, like the many people I know that are waiting for either a price drop or Super Smash Bros (or both) pick up the system now, just to make sure they get one before the holiday rush, and they'll likely pick up a few games as well, helping software sales and showing third parties that developing for the Wii U isn't a losing battle.

Nintendo has stated before that they sell Wii U at a loss. That's not uncommon for game systems, for anyone that doesn't know, because they eventually bring the costs of technology down and recoup their costs with licensing fees and volume over time. Nintendo isn't used to selling systems at a loss, but they've also said they recoup the cost if they sell one game with the system. Dropping the price a bit will make their loss per system a little worse, but with a lot of great looking games coming out over the next few months, there's little chance they won't be selling 1, 2, or even 3 games per system. They just have to get the system in people's homes. Hell, they could even do a fall promo. Buy and register two games, get $10 eShop credit for free. This kind of thing could not only encourage people to pick up multiple games, but also encourage them to try out the digital games on the eShop or Virtual Console, helping bring indie developers to the systems, or showing off how great older games play on the Game Pad.

I think the Wii U has a lot of potential, and I hate seeing poor sales due to Nintendo being stubborn on a price point that seemed high before the PS4 was announced, and now just seems ridiculous. Learn from the 3DS. It's arguably the best system out there right now, but it had to get past its growing pains, horrid sales, and a massive price drop to get there.

I don't think the Wii U's price needs to drop that much, $50 should work, $100 would be a no-brainer. What do you think? If you haven't picked up a Wii U, what would encourage you to do so, if anything?

Animal Crossing: New Leaf Review (sort of)

It's so hard to review a game like Animal Crossing: New Leaf. No matter how you describe it, I find it never sounds fun. Not even remotely. I remember first hearing about Animal Crossing back in the Gamecube days and wondering what all the fuss was about. I picked the game up and the next several months were a blur. The real world blended with the town my siblings and I created in the game. Dinner conversations were a mix of real world events and discussing who was moving out of town and how many bells (in-game currency) turnips were going for that day. A few iterations later, the game still has the same hold over the people I find playing it. My girlfriend, who didn't get the hype at all leading up to the game's launch a few weeks ago, reluctantly bought it on launch day with me, and has clocked in around as many hours as I have. We're hooked. We love it. It's already topping the most played list on our 3DS systems. I still don't think I can describe the game in a way that will make any Animal Crossing virgins who might be reading this want to play it. I'll try, briefly, because I so desperately want more towns to go visit. 

For those unfamiliar with the series, you start the game on a train, headed to a village where you're planning on settling down. The game randomly generates villages, and you get to pick one that looks good. It also determines what you will look like through a series of questions presented to you by a cat. When you  arrive in town in this game, there's some sort of mix-up and you become the mayor. You pick a spot for your house, and the characters in your village start explaining things. There's really no guide after that though. You can chose to build up your house, do different projects around the town, talk to other villagers, shop in the stores, etc. The more you do, the more options are presented to you. 

The big hook of the game is that it runs on a real-world clock. That means if it's 4 pm in the real world, it's 4 pm in the game. The villagers go on and things happen even if you're not there. If you let the game go too long, you'll notice weeds and garbage around your town when you get back. You may even find some pesky roaches have moved in to your house. It's a good incentive to check in every day. 

The game can get off to a slow start, for people that don't know the benefits of continuing on with the game. At first you have very limited options on what you can do, but as you build up different stores, locations, landmarks, and projects, the game becomes more rewarding, and collecting and unlocking various things becomes an obsession. It's kind of like The Sims I suppose, which I've also never found to be very appealing on paper, but once you get in to it it becomes almost a second life. 

On the 3DS, the game looks and plays great. Even when visiting other players towns online, the game responds very well and keeps a great framerate. The online features are a welcome additions, and visiting other towns and collecting guest houses via Streetpass is one of my favourite things to do in this new version. 

Overall, I can't say Animal Crossing is a game that's going to be fun to play like a Mario game is. I find it's good in short bursts, which is why I opted for the digital download version. It's always on my system, so when I'm finished playing something else, I can pop open Animal Crossing, check what I want to do for the day, then move on to another thing. I've been very impressed with the sheer amount of things that keep happening in this game, and I'd recommend it to anyone looking for a reason to keep their 3DS handy for the foreseeable future.

- Mark

E3 Post Presentation Thoughts

The big console makers have had their presentations, E3 is officially off and racing, and us gamers are left to gather our thoughts after receiving a mind-blowing amount of information over a 48 hour period. So... THOUGHTS! 

I've already posted on the Facebook page about my initial impressions from some of the events so far. My overall feeling is... underwhelmed. I was a bit shocked by this feeling, so I went back and read about the announcements and watched some videos of things that transpired over the last couple of days to try to figure out why this E3 just isn't getting my motor running like it has in previous years. There were some great looking games shown. Two new systems are hitting the market this fall. Why am I not jumping up and down like a 4 year old in Disney World? I think the answer is... the Internet. 

The online world, bloggers, news sites, social networks, even MiiVerse. They all contributed to my expectations being set a little too high I think. You can't really hide much these days. Nintendo, a company that used to be great at hiding things, have had to show pretty much every card they have leading up to E3, because they need reasons for people to buy a Wii U, and showing off upcoming games could be one of them. We knew of pretty much every game except Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze. We hadn't seen footage up until now of Mario World or Smash Bros, but we knew they were coming. Mario 3D Land was one of the best mobile games I've ever played. I think I need hands on to convince me that a cat suit and shiny graphics are going to live up to, or surpass, the amazing console experience I got from Mario Galaxy. Mega Man in Smash Bros was a huge announcement that I didn't actually expect to see, but with Mega Man games hitting the Virtual Consolea every week, I kind of figured Nintendo and Capcom were up to something, and even had a chat with some people a couple of weeks ago about how likely his inclusion was.

Sony and Microsoft, as I've said many times before, are going to keep butting heads about the future of high powered gaming consoles. For me, it's become a little boring. Sure, the games all look amazing, but most of the games shown I had already heard about, read about, seen, etc. Many were current gen games with a coat of shiny polish. New COD, new Battlefield, new "Insert Sports Title here", usual batch of launch title racing games... Is that enough for me to jump on a new bandwagon right away? Do graphics really add anything new to the amazing experiences we've seen on 360 and PS3? Judging by how many technical issues both companies had in their presentations, maybe not. Especially in the case of Xbox One, if my Internet goes down or gets a little choppy, will my game run as smoothly with the cloud there to help? Will Xbox One gain as much traction this gen as it did in the last? I got an Xbox 360 because that's what my friends got. It was cheaper, and had Halo and Gears of War and Live was a great service. With so many restrictions, will people care, or will they move to Sony?

Clearly Sony has the upper hand now, after taking so many public shots at Microsoft, but Halo is a system-seller, and MS was smart to at least show a tease for that. I'll probably hold off on getting those new systems and see how things pan out. I picked up a second hand 360 last gen, and never got a PS3. We'll see how it works out this time.

All of this, the unsurprising games, the lack of enthusiasm for having to shell out $400-500 for a new system, have made this E3 one of the least impressive ones in recent memory for me. Don't get me wrong, I know I'm going to log somewhere around 8 million hours in the new Smash Bros, but I wish Nintendo had pulled a "one more thing" type deal and even just shown a logo for a new Metroid FPS with online multiplayer. I think I'd be excited about Halo if MS didn't piss me off with so many of their used game restrictions, high price, and useless "TV" features. Give me an Xbox One for $400 that doesn't include dumb features I'll never use, and we'll talk. 

Until then, I'll be impatiently awaiting Smash Bros and losing track of time in Animal Crossing: New Leaf. 

- Mark