E3 2010: Nintendo

I thought the show was pants up until the 3DS. And the 3DS, well, I love it. I need one. The line up is stunning. Screenshots amazing - if they can really pull off that level of graphics in 3D at any kind of decent frame rate, I'll be very impressed. Looks great.

FuryofFrog wrote:

The 3DS thing was a shocker and very bold on Nintendo's part. I would have preferred to have seen actual video of the games but instead they said, "We can't really represent how awesome this is up here so let us bring the console to you."

That's Nintendo's usual M.O. when it comes to new hardware.  They'll make the announcement and reveal during E3, but then save the games and more concrete release details until the Tokyo Game Show in September.

http://www.allgamesbeta.info/
http://www.allgamesbeta.info/2010/06/3d … -game.html
http://www.upload.ee/image/637669/3DS-Features.jpg

look at the lineup of planned games for the 3DS

look at it!

Damn.

I heard 3DS was supposed to surpass Wii, but it looks like being around PSP. Do Nintendo really think this is something that will become the platform for the next 5 years? Glad that it isn't so expensive though.

I haven't seen a price point announced for 3DS yet.  As for the graphics, I agree that is seems to be around the PSP's level, although you have to remember that to do these in 3D the system is probably actually twice as powerful in order to make one image for each eye.

One thing maybe I didn't make a big enough deal about in my original post in Nintendo's lack of discussion about a download store.  The 3DS can have all the fancy tech in the world, but what's to stop Apple from putting out the same thing with the inevitable iPhone 5 next June?  If Nintendo can't make a competitive digital storefront, it will lose marketshare.  Sony is also expected to have a PSP2 somewhere in development for a release next year, so I hope Nintendo has more up its sleeve than we know about.

Last edited by XLord007 (Jun 15, 2010)

Angela wrote:

Cedille wrote:

I heard 3DS was supposed to surpass Wii, but it looks like being around PSP. Do Nintendo really think this is something that will become the platform for the next 5 years? Glad that it isn't so expensive though.

They've announced a price point for the 3DS already?  What is it?

My assumption, but I'd be surprised if it's higher than $200. I worry we will play games with better graphics and much higher resolution on iPhone a few years later, but yeah, I should hold off judgement until I try the 3D thing.

Cedille wrote:

I worry we will play games with better graphics and much higher resolution on iPhone a few years later

why would this worry you

do you worry about the possibility that the sun will rise tomorrow

Go 3DS! Well, I'll be honest, I only care because I want the XL to go down in price.

Nintendo's is the only press conference that impressed me.

Zelda looks good (it's nice to see a mix of Wind Waker's cel shading with Twilight Princess's more mature look) and I'm sure the development team will do lots of cool things with the more accurate weapon controls.  Several of the other new Wii titles look nice as well and it's encouraging to know I'll be getting some use out of the system over the next year or so.

But let's face it, Nintendo's E3 presence this year is all about the 3DS, and with it they've managed to upstage Sony's Move and MS's Kinect when it was supposed to be their time to shine.

The design is what I had hoped for and expected, with added analog and motion controls and a larger top screen (I wish the top screen were even larger - it looks like it would fit in the current casing and I hope the resolution is high enough to allow them to do that in a future model), although a different, sleeker look compared to the current DS might have been nice.

Flaunting the much-requested Kid Icarus sequel as a new 3D adventure makes brilliant sense from a marketing perspective, as does its reported Sin & Punishment-like gameplay from a design one.

The 3rd party lineup is ridiculously massive (even if a lot of those titles won't see the light of day for a long time) with titles like Resident Evil, Street Fighter 4 and Metal Gear Solid showing surprising early support for "core" gaming.

People complaining about the graphics capabilities haven't been paying attention to what Nintendo's been doing over the past several years.  Nintendo obviously are not interested in providing bleeding-edge photorealistic graphics, in fact they are likely quite happy to be against it (and the added development costs it entails... the original DS was reported to have N64-level graphics upon its release, which was nothing special for its time).  They're about providing new experiences in affordable packages - that people are going to buy in droves.

What's interesting is the various channels of revenue this is going to open for Nintendo.  You can see it already with the announcements for Ocarina of Time and Starfox 64 3D - take fan favorite 3D games, give them a fresh coat of paint and a few tweaks, render them twice over for 3D and watch the sales come in.

You might even see the same thing happen for classic *2D* games, as implied by the tech demo for classic games in 3D.  You know that weak parallax effect that happens in poorly converted 3D movies?  Well for classic 2D games (not to mention the already announced new Paper Mario) it could actually be kind of cool, since that parallax effect is meant to be there in the first place.  I can totally see companies repackaging 2D series with the added 3D effect or offering them as individual downloads on 3DSware.

Speaking of which, the big question that remains for me (aside from release date and price, which I expect to be $180 or $200) is what kind of online storefront they'll have in place.  I wouldn't be surprised if they kept the physical media (to make retailers happy) while also making every title available for paid download (as an answer to Apple's App Store).

Anyhoo, obviously there's a lot that remains to be seen but I expect the 3DS to be another huge success.  Given the little time I've spent playing my own DS (the original model, which I bought on release), I'll wait to actually hold the system and see the screen and 3D effect for myself before buying, but unless Sony preempts them with a seriously impressive PSP2 (PSP-3D?) announcement, Kid Icarus, Street Fighter and Star Fox will be looking really nice in 3D on my next trans-Pacific flight.

XLord007 wrote:

Another example of Miyamoto's genius:

Miyamoto discussing Nintendogs + Cats:

Miyamoto wrote:

So you know cats are interesting. They are kind of like girls. If they come and talk to you it's great. But if you try to talk to them it doesn't always go so well.

regardless of gender, my talks with cats tend to be a lot more informative and rewarding than my talks with human beings.

Interesting press conference, for sure. There was a lot I didn't care for or didn't have interest in, but a few things definitely caught my eye and made me rethink selling off my Wii. First off, Metroid: Other M looks goddamn ridiculous. I absolutely need that game in my life. My girlfriend wants to pick up a Wii for the apartment, so I'll hopefully be rockin' the hell out of that game come August 31st while she watches So You Think You Can Dance reruns on the DVR. It looks like Team Ninja found a great balance between Prime-style shooting/perspective and classic Metroid exploration with a 3D twist... and with ample amounts of action and badass-ness WANT. Also, Donkey Kong Country Returns? Yep. Sign me up. The 3DS looks damn cool and I'll be keeping my eye out on that one... hopefully the game library will deliver. If there's good app support, I'll be picking one of those up as well. After a year or two I finally have reason to keep an eye out on new stuff that's coming out!

Totally disagree on both horror games and fighting games. I did agree on horror games until I actually played them on a handheld. Playing through SH1 on the PSP was oddly just as nervewracking as playing it on the big screen. SH Origins, while I felt it was bland, was pretty immersive in places and I got totally sucked in and creeped out by the world of Shattered Memories on PSP. If a horror game doesn't work on a handheld, it's the game, not the system.

If anything 3D may well add a whole other layer of immersion in there, in spite of the small screen.

And, as for fighters, Tekken DR works great on PSP. The Def Jam fighter was also a complete surprise treat for me on the same system. And the Neo Geo Pocket fighters are still fantastic. The games that don't work on handheld systems are just those that were made for systems well beyond the capabilities of the systems (too many buttons or, in the PSP's case, the handicap of the early godawful d-pad) and aren't optimised for the system.