_Alkaline_
Member
http://wii.ign.com/articles/845/845204p1.html
SUMMARY
- Matt's new beard was grown because he likes to grow a beard when he puts on weight during christmas to confirm his weight gain. Once he loses the weight, his beard will be lost as well.
Game of the Year
- Winner was Super Mario Galaxy.
- This was the first time that the Nintendo editors did not take part in the discussion - they only submitted their votes as they were away on holiday. However, they did play all of the contenders.
- Craig and Matt voted for Galaxy, but Bozon voted for Call of Duty 4 because he loves multiplayer FPS.
- Call of Duty 4, Bioshock and Mass Effect were all deserving of winning, though Mass Effect less so due to its technical issues.
- Such an incredible year of gaming that the decision was very hard to make compared to previous years - at least 5 games would have automatically been 2006 GOTY.
- Surprised that Bioshock didn't win any of the major awards.
CES
- Matt's one of IGN's tech-nuts.
- Looked around the Apple and Mac areas as well as TV and projectors.
- There would be lots of worthless Wii accessories - there was a Cooking Mama accessory which changed the controller into a fork, a Zelda sword and shield that blocked the IR, and a Trauma Centre scapel add-on.
- Found it pretty boring - gets worse and worse every year, and always bring back old products rather than E3 which bring in new ones.
Bomberman Land
- Did a ton of hands-on this week.
- Ton of mini-games.
- Use IR and motion to play the game - for example, you shoot volcano droplets with a gun and tilt the controller to steer.
- Some aspects are cool and innovative, but how many mini-games do we need on Wii?
- Dissapointingly no online, despite the DS version having it.
Bully: Scholarship Edition
- Will have full impressions next Wednesday.
- Motion kept to a minimum.
- Good-looking, more in-depth version of the PS2 game.
- Some Rockstar representatives may be coming onto the podcast soon to talk about the game - this is something that will be happening more throughout the year.
Nitro-Bike
- Definitely not Excite Bike.
- Looks blurry and has framerate issues that shouldn't be there.
- Floaty are floaty - more like Excite Truck than Excite Bike.
- Mid-air tilt controls are a bit floaty and unresponsive.
- However, the more they played it the more they started liking it - when you first pick it up it's like "what the hell?", but as you keep playing and the world opens up more and you get more used to the controls and trick system, the game improves.
- Very glad to see the game actually has online. Also has some cool mini-games, like Hoop Havoc, which are good fun and keeps things fresh.
My Horse and Me
- Killer app - possibly even better than Ninjabread Man.
- Matt played it for about 3 minutes - it's pretty much what you would think.
- You ride a horse and sometimes jump.
de Blob
- Matt first played this game about half a year ago - it was decent fun but lacked polish, needed more wii remote usage and had boring music that needed to be really spruced up.
- Sat down and played it this week.
- Pretty impressed - the game is really funky and has a distinct style to it.
- Start out with a black and white world and your blob is small, but it gets bigger as you paint the town, which becomes more colourful
- The music is layered - it starts off basically non-existant but as you paint the town more and more the funky music builds.
- A ton of racking up combos through jumping from wall to wall and from skyscrapers.
- The gesture system worked every single time, which is an improvement from the original build.
- The camera is still a little weird, the gesture system needs to be deeper (and should use IR which is a missed boat) and multiplayer hasn't been seen yet (though it is in there), the game has really improved.
- A really weird, funky, original and fun game - expect more coverage.
Super Smash Bros. Brawl
- Coming out in Japan at the end of the month.
- Bozon wants to see a few more characters revealed before the site updates stop.
- Love the fact that Olimar and Pikmin are in the game.
- Anoop, the Japanese IGN guy, will get the game as soon as possible and give impressions, they will also get an import copy to the US for Matt and Bozon to cover.
Wii Fit
- Trying to work with Nintendo to get a US copy to cover.
- Matt and Bozon are going to see how much weight they can lose through Wii Fit.
- Both are also participating in the Nike Challenge.
- Already sold 1 million in Japan despite the price - game is selling great and should do well in USA as well.
Some upcoming notable games in 2008
- No More Heroes (review coming soon)
- Mario Kart Wii
- Animal Crossing
- Wii Love Golf
- King Story
- and more
Red Steel 2
- Rumours that the game experienced a troubled development cycle and has been shifted to a different team.
- It's coming and we will hear more about it in the near future (probably in a few more months) - but don't expect a mind-blowing game.
- Indeed, Matt expected to hear more about the game in 2007, but it never happened - this may provide validity to the rumour.
- There are more Ubisoft games coming to Wii.
Games they can't talk about
- Have been making calls - they made a call to a company which is making a notable Wii game. The company didn't know that IGN knew, but Matt let them know they did and that he wanted to cover it or at least post it as a rumour.
- Unfortunately times have changed since a decade ago and you can't reveal news as soon as you know about it.
- Both really want to reveal some of these games.
- Guitar Hero: Aerosmith Expansion, which is apparently really fun. and Guitar Hero 4 are both coming to Wii and the Wii version of GH4 will feature many improvements.
Reader Questions
- Matt expects there to be classic controllers specific for each Virtual Console system.
- Zack and Wiki give-aways will be announced next week - if you win, contact them.
- Of all unrevealed Brawl characters, Matt wants to see Cloud the most, as well as Viewtiful Joe. Bozon would love to see Megaman. Both expect one more big, crazy announcement.
- Expect to hear reports of people falling off their Wii Balance Board.
- People from Nintendo and other companies read IGN and from time to time contact them to find out information on things like polls and feedback.
- No More Heroes is a culty, showpiece-game that's not perfect but great fun.
- Really looking forward to King Story. We Love Golf is also a great game that is worth purchasing.
- Expect to see SSX Blur 2 and possibly another Medal of Honor game announced this year.
- Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 is coming.
- Both hope we'll see a Zack and Wiki sequal announced this year.
- Bozon is working on a Virtual Console game right now - working with Way Forward. This is seperate from Matt and Bozon's own game.
Matt and Bozon's VC game
- "Blackout"
- Totally in limbo right now.
- Was pitched to a major 3rd party who really liked it, but they're incredibly busy right now and it may take a while for the game to come to fruition, if ever.
- Two companies offered Matt jobs to quit IGN and work for them, but he didn't want to.
- The game was supposed to very dark and uninhibited, unlike nearly all games on Wii.
- Graphical style was black and white - this minimalist approach to Wii can result in impressive Wii visuals.
- Premise: You're a child stuck at the top of this skyscraper during a blackout (due to a storm) and told by your mum to hide and something comes in that kills your mum in front of your eyes.
- You have nothing to protect yourself, but you can run and hide in certain areas. You go through the guts of the building in order to get out of it - however, in order to progress, not only do you need to solve many environmental puzzles, but you also need to stealthily navigate the areas in order to avoid the evil.
- There is a lot of use of lighting - indeed, you control a flashlight with the Wii remote.
- One idea that was pitched, in order to give the character more strength, was to hold a teddy bear which, when it had enough power, could storm hallways as a demonic bear and destroy enemies. However, it would not be able to harm the main enemy - your mum, who wakes up from the dead.
- The only colour in the game is red - this bring out the violence, and you'd see a lot of red around the building.
- A really original, interesting idea that hopefully will one day be realised.
Bozon's Way Forward game
- Called "Lit"
- You're in a school that has a power outage, and there's evil in the darkness, and you have to solve motion puzzles around the environment. The premise of light and darkness is a big element.
- The game is simple but has a really unique and interesting premise.
- The art and style is amazing that is quite Tim Burton-ish, though it now looks a bit more like Silent Hill.
- The game was unveiled in Play Magazine.
- The game should receive more coverage in the future and Bozon will provide some material from the game himself.
- There's no publisher for the game yet which allows IGN to talk and reveal lots about the game, especially once more is completed.
- 1up detested the controls for Medal of Honor Heroes 2 and said it needed the classical controller - Matt and Bozon think this is flat-out wrong and that the game provides the best console FPS controls ever.
- To put games on WiiWare - you need money (around $2000 for a dev kit), then you need to prove to Nintendo that you can make games worthy of being on WiiWare (which is the hardest part) and then buy a dev kit from them.
- Rock Band still might be coming to Wii - EA pretty much announced it during a conference call a while ago but nothing has been confirmed yet. They would be kicking themselves right now.
- Wii sales in Japan should mean a good deal of Square Enix Wii support.
- Matt and Bozon play music with their beards.
