Nintendo Downloads - May 2009 (VC / WiiWare / DSiWare)

[Scrubking]

I have 1000 points. I'm looking for something "arcadey". Which of these 3 is the best? -Megaman 9 -Onslaught -Swords & Soldiers

I don't think any of those are "arcadey".

[Phife Dawg]

I have 1000 points. I'm looking for something "arcadey". Which of these 3 is the best? -Megaman 9 -Onslaught -Swords & Soldiers

What are you looking for exactly? Arcadey could mean different things. The games are all good and worth the money in my opinion.

[RandomVince]

How big an SDHC card does the wii support? 4GB or 8GB? Ive just unpacked my wii after moving interstate and seem to have quite a few games to catch up on.

[nincompoop]

32GB

[RandomVince]

Well thats news to me. It is fully SDHC compliant then? Sweet.

[morningbus]

Yep, fully SDHC compliant. However, it probably won't be necessary to get anything over 16gb or maybe even 8gb. I think Cheesemeister ran the numbers and, unless they start releasing large, disc-based games, you'll probably never fill all that space up. You'd have to spend thousands of dollars and get literally every single game released for the predicted life of the service.

[RandomVince]

Yeah that would make sense. At the moment the biggest games are going to be the N64 ones, which IIRC were advertised in the day as being '256MB' or '512MB' in the case of the bigger games like Resident Evil 2 and Zelda MM. I reckon 8 or 16GB will more than suit my needs.

Thanks to all who helped :)

[PepsimanVsJoe]

Played through Super Mario World again for the zillionth time. I think I finally believe that this is a great game. Took me nearly twenty years to come to this conclusion though.

[morningbus]

Yeah that would make sense. At the moment the biggest games are going to be the N64 ones, which IIRC were advertised in the day as being '256MB' or '512MB' in the case of the bigger games like Resident Evil 2 and Zelda MM. I reckon 8 or 16GB will more than suit my needs. Thanks to all who helped :)

Well, actually, the largest carts were 512 Mbit, which is only 64 MB. Like I said, they'd have to start offering SegaCD/Saturn/Gamecube games to start necessitating the larger SDHC cards.

You could honestly probably get a 4GB card and never fill it up. At the same time, the cost difference between 4GB and 8GB might not be that great, so just get what you can afford. You could always use the cards for something else in the future.

[RandomVince]

Well, actually, the largest carts were 512 Mbit, which is only 64 MB. Like I said, they'd have to start offering SegaCD/Saturn/Gamecube games to start necessitating the larger SDHC cards. You could honestly probably get a 4GB card and never fill it up. At the same time, the cost difference between 4GB and 8GB might not be that great, so just get what you can afford. You could always use the cards for something else in the future.

Exactly what I was thinking. And if worse comes to worse I can always swap the files over and onto a bigger card if needs be as the games are locked to the console and not the card.

The biggest N64 game was surely RE2 though?

[sfog]

The biggest N64 game was surely RE2 though?

It's tied with two others. Conker's Bad Fur Day, Pokemon Stadium 2, and RE2 are all 64 MB carts.

[BikoBiko]

I'm just playing DoReMi Fantasy now, such a charming game and a good platformer! Kinda reminds me of Wario Land with all of the different environments. It's a shame they didn't translate it. No biggie as the story speaks for itself, but you just lose some of the atmosphere there.

[beelzebozo]

Played through Super Mario World again for the zillionth time. I think I finally believe that this is a great game. Took me nearly twenty years to come to this conclusion though.

why the delay man? you just now getting to star road/the special levels? best 2d mario levels ever made, imo, particularly the latter.

[Caesar III]

Played through Super Mario World again for the zillionth time. I think I finally believe that this is a great game. Took me nearly twenty years to come to this conclusion though.

Shame on you. Took you long enough :) Best Mario game EVER!

But I have to admit I haven't found 2 alternative finishs in the whole game (on the GBA) :( The funny thing is, I found both of them in a previous playtrough

[PepsimanVsJoe]

why the delay man? you just now getting to star road/the special levels? best 2d mario levels ever made, imo, particularly the latter.

Eh? Oh No I've been playing Super Mario World for many years and I've seen practically everything there is to see. For close to a year the only games I owned for the SNES were this and Zelda: LTTP(oh and the Super Scope 6-pack..blech)

My opinion of this Super Nintendo classic has shifted many times over the years. It seems that even with the game approaching twenty years of age I've yet to figure out if I think it's a great game or merely just a good game? I can assure you right now that if for some wild reason you've never picked this game up I implore you to do so now, play through it several times over, then come back and read this piece. I don't usually go around proclaiming that certain games should be "required" but Super Mario World is definitely one of those titles that needs to be played. Going with the assumption that everyone reading this blog has already played the game I see little reason to explain the basics but I'll try to be brief. Super Mario World takes place in Dinosaur Island, where the evil bowser and his seven evil children have captured the princess and seven dino eggs. You're Mario(and Luigi if playing with a friend) and you have to rescue them all through a lot of running, swimming, jumping, and so on. If you've played a Mario game before you know what to expect and if you haven't...well God help you. With that out of the way I'm going to talk about the flaws of this game...or at least the things that I perceived as faults. To start with extra lives are simply too numerous. Unless you're doing particularly bad or dying on purpose you will never see the Game Over screen. I think I saw it once while playing SMW on a Wal-mart demo unit with a broken controller. At this point why even have extra lives at all? Pick up Super Mario Galaxy and its the same thing. Heck the Princess is mailing you extra lives in that one it's so bad. It feels like little more than an old stand-by, like Nintendo knows they shouldn't bother but their fans love those green mushrooms and the little 1up jingle. On my latest playthrough of SMW I was still a good twenty stages away from the last boss when I maxed out my life count. Speaking of old stand-bys what's the point of having a score? This isn't like the early games where you could attempt to get as many points from a stage as possible. By SMW it's rendered moot by the fact that you can repeat most any stage. In fact if you store a fireflower in the reserve box and put on a cap you can simply jump towards the top of the screen and get an easy 1,000 points everytime you mash the select button. Thankfully Nintendo ditched this and created a far better scoring system for Yoshi's Island. The worst aspect of SMW to me however has always been its lack of direction. I'll always say that Super Mario World has more good ideas in a single stage than most platformers have in their entire game. Even though this game and Sonic The Hedgehog 1 were released at near the beginning of the 16-bit generation neither of them have seen their equal let alone been surpassed when it comes to creativity(okay Yoshi's Island provides a strong case, and I'm sure some will argue in favor of Donkey Kong Country 2). But most of the time that's all the levels are...ideas. A lot of them simply don't go anywhere. In the Forest of Illusion there's a stage where enemies are floating along in bubbles touching the bubble or allowing it to hit a block causes it to pop. It's an interesting idea but nothing really happens with it. For the most part you can run through the stage as usual not even caring about this. While the cape is neat it renders a lot of stages pointless as you can simply fly over them with no penalties. At least SMB3 limited your flying ability to prevent you from skipping entire stages. Hence you have a lot of great ideas that don't go anywhere and/or can be completely ignored. At least this was how I thought for quite awhile. After a recent playthrough however my thoughts on the game have changed significantly. The extra lives, the useless score, the so-called lack of direction really don't mean a thing. Super Mario World is in fact your world and it can be anything you make of it. If you fly over everything and ignore much of what the game has to offer it's all right. This doesn't make it a fault of the game or the player. That stage with the bubbles? Who says you really have to ignore them? It's your world and you can try to lead a bubble all the way to the other end of the level if you like(or at least as far as it'll go before hitting a pipe). People always talk about making new challenges in games they're familiar with and SMW is perhaps one of the best at it. See how many stages you can play through while carrying a turtle shell. Try to cross a number of pits using Yoshi or the Spin-jump to bounce off spikey enemies. You've got more than enough lives right? Why not waste a few trying something different? The game isn't rating you on how you get through the stage, whether you get through without getting hit, collecting all of the coins or defeating all of the bad-guys doesn't matter at all. Everything that isn't beating the stage and reaching the exit is left up to you. Even if you're not capable of flying you can still complete every stage in the game. Sure you can't reach particular exits but otherwise you can still reach the end. So why not go small Mario? It's perfectly acceptable as long as you remember to skip the checkpoints since they make him big again A lot of these Super Mario World hacks and free-ware titles like I Wanna Be The Guy completely miss the point of what makes a platformer great. They're so caught up in making everything difficult and having every little step lead to a potential death that there's really no point in actually playing the game. Instead you're trying to find a solution via a particular combination of button inputs so you can solve the levels. That's not good game design. There's no freedom to take chances or try new things. What exactly are you going to do from there? Try to play through the game faster and die less? If that's all that can be done to make a game more challenging and entertaining that's just not good enough. There should always be enough options for the player to limit themselves on their own terms. In conclusion I have gained even more respect for Super Mario World and it has certainly deserved it's place as one of the truly great games. I'm just ashamed that it took me this long to realize exactly what makes it so great(especially since I've been playing the game on and off for most of my life). Few platformers offer this level of freedom and experimentation and with design and mechanics to match it is without a doubt a required game to play for those wishing to explore and understand game design.

[wazoo]

It's tied with two others. Conker's Bad Fur Day, Pokemon Stadium 2, and RE2 are all 64 MB carts.

and then, the next size is 48MB for Ogre Battle and Paper Mario, and then 32MB for most big hits. Most of the N64 library is under 16MB, Golden Eye is 12MB, which is comparison is the top of the line for the GBA (excluding GBA videos carts). Most DS carts are way bigger than N64 games.

[nincompoop]

GBA games actually go up to 32 MB (Kingdom Hearts, Riviera)

[imthemaid]

SMW blog

hear, hear. good show, old man.

[sfog]

ESRB update:

Sexy Poker

Platform: Wii

Rating: Mature

Content descriptors: Nudity, Sexual Themes, Simulated Gambling

Rating summary: This is a Strip Poker game in which players engage in games of Black Jack and Poker against female avatar opponents. The object of the game is to win hands in order to remove articles of clothing from still images of the female characters. Nurses, police women, office workers, and sports figures can eventually be stripped down to show their bare breasts. The female opponents encourage the player with provocative comments such as, "I'll always know what's in your hand" and, "If you impress me, I might give you my special treatment."

[Cheesemeister]

ESRB update: Sexy Poker Platform: Wii Rating: Mature Content descriptors: Nudity, Sexual Themes, Simulated Gambling Rating summary: This is a Strip Poker game in which players engage in games of Black Jack and Poker against female avatar opponents. The object of the game is to win hands in order to remove articles of clothing from still images of the female characters. Nurses, police women, office workers, and sports figures can eventually be stripped down to show their bare breasts. The female opponents encourage the player with provocative comments such as, "I'll always know what's in your hand" and, "If you impress me, I might give you my special treatment."

Holy crap, you're not kidding. The question is, will it turn out any better than the Panesian NES games or BMX XXX?

[sfog]

Who knows?

That was one unexpected listing!

[twinturbo2]

I really hope Cyber Sled has multiplayer and comes out here, along with all of the other Namco arcade games in the pipeline for the Japanese VC.

[comedy bomb]

Can't wait to see blurry boobz and bald snatches on my Wii!

[Flunkie]

DSi Ware is so shitty. I wonder why I was so excited for it now.

[Fuzzy]

Tomorrow is a holiday here, we better get Majora's Mask. :(

[Eteric Rice]

DSi Ware is so shitty. I wonder why I was so excited for it now.

The potential it had.

Which was squandered.

[Cheesemeister]

Tomorrow is a holiday here, we better get Majora's Mask. :(

My prediction: no more VC games until Majora's Mask rings in as the 300th on June 1st to coincide with FFIV:TAY and E3.

[Fuzzy]

My prediction: no more VC games until Majora's Mask rings in as the 300th on June 1st to coincide with FFIV:TAY and E3.

I don't like you.

[Neo Samus]

My prediction: no more VC games until Majora's Mask rings in as the 300th on June 1st to coincide with FFIV:TAY and E3.

Cheese, the 300th game is tomorrow. ;)

Edit,: Oh wait, I see what you did there.

[Cheesemeister]

I don't like you.

Care to make it a ban bet?

[Fuzzy]

Care to make it a ban bet?

You're mean. :(

[Cheesemeister]

You're mean. :(

Sounds like I'm also right on the money. Prove me wrong. I'll challenge you to a 2-week ban.

[BooJoh]

The potential it had. Which was squandered.

Come on now, isn't it just a little bit early to write the service off completely? And with good games in the pipeline, too!

[zigg]

And with good games in the pipeline, too!

Problem is that NOA apparently is too cheap to spring for a plumber.

(and to think, they already have one on staff!)

[Captain N]

Now when I look up Nintendo DSi games on the esrb website it shows up as 0 titles. :(

[Balb]

Come on now, isn't it just a little bit early to write the service off completely? And with good games in the pipeline, too!

Can you name a few of these great games? I admit that I haven't been looking into future DSiware titles.

[Captain N]

Can you name a few of these great games? I admit that I haven't been looking into future DSiware titles.

Square-Enix is working on a game with Intelligent Systems.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=362038

Plus wait and see what Nintendo has to offer at E3. If they don't show anything there..it'll be a sad year for DSi owners.

[Capndrake]

NINTENDO DOWNLOAD: ZELDA CLASSIC BECOMES 300TH VIRTUAL CONSOLE GAME


May 18, 2009

Every Monday for two and a half years, Nintendo has introduced new downloadable games and applications for the Wii™ console. Today marks a milestone for the Virtual Console™ section of the Wii Shop Channel, home of some of the greatest titles in video game history. The classic The Legend of Zelda™: Majora's Mask™ becomes the 300th Virtual Console title available for download. It's one of the highest-rated Nintendo 64™ games of all time, and its three-day time cycle and deeper, darker storyline offer players a different experience than a traditional Zelda game. People who played it years ago can relive their gaming roots, while those who never picked it up can discover its fun and charm for the first time.

Not to be overlooked, the second Art Style puzzle game for Nintendo DSiWare™ makes its debut, along with the WiiWare™ games CRYSTAL DEFENDERS R2 from SQUARE ENIX and Silver Star Chess from Agetec, Inc.

Virtual Console
The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask (Nintendo 64, 1 player, Rated E for Everyone - Cartoon Violence, 1,000 Wii Points™): Link™ must save the world! This time, he finds himself trapped in Termina, an alternate version of Hyrule that is doomed to destruction in just three short days. Link must race to recover the Ocarina of Time (which allows him to manipulate time in multiple ways), defeat challenging bosses in dungeons spread across Termina and discover the key to the mystery of Majora's Mask. Along the way, he'll obtain new weapons and items and help other characters (some strangely familiar) in their everyday lives. In addition, Link must use a wide assortment of masks scattered throughout Termina, each with its own specific use or power. Never before have three days offered so much in the way of action, mind-boggling puzzles and depth. The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask is an adventure unlike any other!

Nintendo DSiWare
Art Style™: PiCTOBiTS™ (Nintendo, 1 player, Rated E for Everyone, 500 Nintendo DSi Points™): Your goal in Art Style: PiCTOBiTS is simple: clear large blocks that fall from above ("megabits") by combining them with "bits" (square blocks) of the same color. Add in the ability to pick up bits and place them anywhere on the touch screen, and you'll quickly find that strategy is critical to your success. By clearing the bits, you gradually reveal each stage's hidden game character - look for favorites from classic NES™ titles - and earn coins that can be spent to unlock DARK stages or to listen to the game's soundtrack in MUSIC mode. This grand mix of familiar elements and new game play leads to the uniquely enjoyable experience that is PiCTOBiTS.

WiiWare
CRYSTAL DEFENDERS R2 (SQUARE ENIX, 1 player, Rated E for Everyone - Mild Fantasy Violence, 800 Wii Points): In CRYSTAL DEFENDERS R2, you must deploy various units, such as Fencers and Black Mages, to stop waves of encroaching monsters from escaping the area with your party's crystals. There are many types of units to choose from: Some specialize in powerful short-range attacks, some wield far-reaching magicks and still others are equipped with bows, enabling them to bring down aerial foes. Deploy units in strategic locations to take full advantage of their traits. Each time an enemy breaches your defenses and reaches a map's exit, your party will lose crystals. When all your crystals are gone, the game is over. CRYSTAL DEFENDERS R2 offers several new, challenging maps containing multiple entrances and exits. It also introduces three varieties of Power Crystals, allowing you to enhance the abilities of your units, while new jobs, including Flintlock and Tinker, set the stage for even more complex strategies. Can you defend all the maps without losing a single crystal?

Silver Star Chess (Agetec, Inc., 1-2 players, Rated E for Everyone - Mild Suggestive Themes, 500 Wii Points): Silver Star Chess has two modes: 1-Player and 2-Player. 1-Player mode allows you to play a chess match against the computer opponent. 2-Player mode allows you to play against another person. In 1-Player mode, you can select one of five different computer opponents, as well as turn the background music off, adjust sound effects and access in-game help features. Also, during the match, you can redo your last move, save the game at any point or resign from the game. After the match has ended, you can review each move made during the match. While reviewing the match in this way, you can resume that match at any point.

Nintendo adds new titles to the Nintendo DSi Shop™ and the Wii™ Shop Channel at 9 a.m. Pacific time on Mondays. Users with broadband Internet access can redeem Wii Points or Nintendo DSi Points to download the games. Wii Points can be purchased in the Wii Shop Channel. Nintendo DSi Points can be purchased in the Nintendo DSi Shop. A Nintendo Points Card™ can be purchased at retail locations. All points from one Nintendo Points Card must be redeemed in either the Nintendo DSi Shop or the Wii Shop Channel. They are not transferable and cannot be divided between the two systems.

Remember that both Wii and Nintendo DSi feature parental controls that let adults manage the content their children can access. For more information about this and other features, visit Wii.com or NintendoDSi.com.

[DavidDayton]

Oh Capn... I am amazed you posted that before me.

Being sick and up at 5 am makes for odd NeoGAF readings.

[Hobbun]

Finally.

[TEJ]

HOLY SHIT

finally, majoras mask bitches.

[Plinko]

FINALLY--I get to play Majora's Mask after all these years.

May also pick up PictoBits as well if it's any good.

[Captain N]

Nice update

[DavidDayton]

The week I have to send my Wii in for repair is the week we get Majora's Mask... AND Punch-Out!!

...

Amusing, isn't it?

[Wilsongt]

There you go. It only took 6 weeks after the Japanese/Euro release.

[crowphoenix]

Well, looks like Gaf was right. Majora's Mask was being saved for 300. Well, it's finally here.

[Yes Boss!]

Wow!

[Baconbitz]

Art Style™: PiCTOBiTS the only game I'm getting this week.

[Mockingbird]

Wow. A pretty good update. Looks that much better after weeks of crap.

[Captain N]

How many of the people here that complained about now getting Majora's Mask will actually buy it?