Archive for 2014


Nintendo E3 2014 Digital Event Summary

Tuesday, June 10th, 2014

NEW ZELDA!!!!  After you’ve watched the above trailer a few times, come back and let me tell you a tale of all of the wonderful things Nintendo shared with us today.  After a run-up of quite a few legitimate leaks: Mario Maker, Miyamoto’s little very unfinished projects for Wii U including a Star Fox demo thing, and Zelda/Midna being playable characters in Hyrule Warriors, Nintendo was still able to surprise and delight at almost every turn.  My highlights from their Digital Event today were naturally the NEW ZELDA, their half-decent Skylanders clone called “amiibo”, seeing that Yoshi’s Wooly World is essentially the Yoshi’s New Island we were really hoping for, the surprisingly intriguing competitive 3rd-person shooter Splatoon, and of course the completely unexpected tongue-in-cheek stop-motion animation vignettes supplied by Robot Chicken.

Check after the page jump for Nintendo’s official PR line on everything they’ve shown so far today including pricing and release dates/windows for a lot of games that previously didn’t have them.  The $99.99 US (hopefully also CDN, but not officially yet) bundle of a GCN controller, the Wii U GCN controller adapter, and Smash Bros. Wii U special edition bundle was definitely my favourite of the bunch.

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Sony E3 2014 Conference Summary

Tuesday, June 10th, 2014

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Sony, with their usual advantage of going second and knowing precisely what Microsoft had to offer, once again blew Microsoft clean out of the water.  At a break-neck pace for about 85% of the presentation’s rather lengthy 2 hours, Sony kept the big announcements and exciting game demonstrations coming.  Among my favourite news was the Destiny alpha happening this weekend exclusively on the PS4 that can be applied for here by entering your PSN ID, the PS Vita TV launching in North America for $99 this fall, Playstation Now entering public beta on July 31st, an exclusive HD remake of Grim Fandango, the ability to play Far Cry 4 multiplayer on PS3/PS4 even with friends who don’t own the game and the preview shown of the upcoming theatrical Ratchet & Clank movie.  Sony definitely brought the thunder this year and is poised to “win” E3 in the eyes of people who are discounting Nintendo’s E3 presence due to their pre-recorded presentation airing at 9:30am today.  Nintendo could still blow everyone out of the water with their guaranteed Zelda Wii U announcement coupled by some much-anticipated final character information for the swiftly approaching Smash Bros. 3DS/Wii U games, but time will tell if that’s enough for them to knock Sony off of their very high perch.  See after the jump for the official Sony PR summary of their many announcements and showcases.

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Perfect Summary of Xbox E3 Conker Tease

Monday, June 9th, 2014

Nothing else needs to be said, except:  “WHHHHYYYYYY?????!??!?”  JonTron always says it best.

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Xbox E3 Conference 2014 Summary

Monday, June 9th, 2014

microsoft-e3-2014

Well, Microsoft had their yearly E3 conference and it was predictably underwhelming.  With no megatons to drop, we were mostly just shown some additional gameplay from various games we already knew about for the system.  While the exclusive focus on games and the almost complete lack of crappy Kinect stuff was greatly appreciated, the conference felt a little uninspiring overall with the lack of any big new game reveals.  Highlights for me included the official announcement of the next Crackdown game and the respectable Halo 1-4 bundle.  You can see the official PR line from Microsoft with a summary of all the games that Microsoft showed today after the jump.

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E3 Press Conference Times and Streams

Sunday, June 8th, 2014

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Gamers’ Christmas kicks off tomorrow with Microsoft and Sony’s press conferences.  While we were unable to attend in person this year, we’ll keep you updated on the coolest happenings as per usual.  Here are the conference times for the CST time zone:

  • Microsoft: 10:30am, June 9th – Stream
  • EA: 1:00pm, June 9th – Stream
  • Ubisoft: 3:30pm, June 9th – Stream
  • Sony: 7:00pm, June 9th – Stream
  • Nintendo: 10:00am, June 10th – Stream

All of the companies have a lot to prove after a fairly rocky start for the current generation of game platforms, so this year had best be big for everyone.

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Smash Bros. Instagram Contest Losing Video

Monday, June 2nd, 2014

We tried our hand at getting a free ride to E3 this year courtesy of Nintendo, but didn’t manage to with the Smash Bros. Invitational contest.  You can check out the video we submitted above and the contest’s actual winner here and decide which one you like better for yourself.  We know which one we like better.

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Mario Kart 8 (Wii U) Review

Thursday, May 29th, 2014

Mario-Kart-8

Developer: Nintendo EAD
Publisher: Nintendo
Genre: Kart Racing
Players: 1-4 locally, 1-2 per system online, up to 12 per lobby online
Console: Wii U
Hours Played: 13 hours and 38 minutes
Progress: Placed first in all 50cc and 100cc cups (unlocking all characters), earned more than 1200 points in online multiplayer

The Wii U is unarguably in need of a killer app to drive sales and really get the ball rolling on the current generation of Nintendo home systems.  Pikmin 3, Wind Waker HD, and even a brand new Super Mario 3D World, while excellent games in their own rights, all failed at accomplishing this task one-by-one in recent months.  Even the two most recent entries in the Mario Kart series were fairly disappointing in many respects, with broken battle modes that skewed greatly toward the unskilled and rather tepid graphics.  So, with the weight of past missteps and a dire need to move systems looming over its head, is Mario Kart 8 the light at the end of the tunnel that will push the Wii U out of its slump and into the hearts and living rooms of the world?  Read on to find out wherefore kart thou Mario.

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