E3 2008: Nintendos Media Conference Live Blog – Recap
Nintendos E3 Media briefing is now gone for another year, and while nothing too big was revealed Nintendo did set out what it achieved at the start of the conference. A Slew of new things was shown off and third parties featured prominently. Inside is our live blog recap, and all the information and screens for all the games announced will coming as soon as possible. Blog Recap inside
Press Release Recap
11:53 – Five Minutes Remains
11:59 – Buckle in Folks!
12:07 – It begins, Montage of Nintendo fun – Live Feed is chopping in and out. We Promise to Keep the World Smiling.
12:08 – Cammie Dunaway enters.
12:09 – In short …. Shaun White Snowboarding being demoed. By Shaun himself – looks pretty good. Showing off how it works with Shaun. Half Pipe being demoed. Weird its not a Nintendo game – By the years end.
12:13 – Iwata joins the stage! Mii too!
12:14 – A true paradigm shift has taken place in the market – 5 years ago Iwata addressed E3 and can recall that every held a pessimistic view about Nintendo. It was not nice to do that.
12:15 – Not even Nintendo employee’s imagining that they would be selling millions of “”bathroom scales”” 5 years ago.
12:16 Whats different about this Paradigm shift? Nintendo did not imagine that games like Nintendogs, NSMB and Mario Kart would keep selling for a long time like 2 years. Previously this did not happen.
12:17 Gamers do not seek games with just better graphics anymore. We at Nintendo continue to challenge ourselves. The Mario and Zelda teams are now hard at work working on evergreen titles.
12:18 Small teams with Small Budgets can get wide audiences with the right ideas.
12:18 Certainly the user base has expanded (look at the pictures, older people, expanding)
12:19 A better interview brings more people. It has even changed hardware sales, and it is now more then a gift for the holidays.
12:20 At Nintendo, Iwata believe that the psychological barrier for new gamers is being broken. He says that new forms of entertainment – this can get boring if more people copy this change (taking a dig ripoff’s no doubt 😉
12:21 – We Must find ways to make players more Engaged, Enriched and Enthused. This is all easier to say then do.
Let me conclude by are always changing ourselves to be the pioneer. We seek fresh suprises. Enjoy the ones we have today.
12:22 – Kaysuya Ehuchi talks about Animal Crossing and how its the way to get people to make their own things.
In 2008 Animal Crossing Comes to Wii
ANIMAL CROSSING CITY FOLK!
Graphics are similar, do what you want, no goals. New GUI – you play as your Mii (with a Mask) – Designs look the same, Pelly are all back… it looks VERY much the same.
Rotating Orb like the DS. Showing
MICROPHONE! Will be supported, showing off 4 people playing together talking and fishing.
Shows off the new city as well as the village – Old keyboard is still there.
A Place where players can connect with Each Other
Reggie Takes the stage!
12:28 – Reggie says Animal Crossing will be heading to Wii in 2008 – with Wii Speak option.
12:29 – Here come the sales figures, stroking ego… Nintendo is still not happy, not everyone is playing games yet – they want them. And Gamers are also hungry for whats next.
Nintendo will fill both!
12:30 – Marketplace Perspective – More Sales, Reggie promises will be short 😉
12:31 – Nintendo thinks 100 million DS’s by next year.
12:32 – 2007 Peak year for DS? Yeah right, 2 out of every 3 handhelds in America are the DS. DS sales are 12% up on last year.
12:33 – Pokemon Franchise is now at 180 Million. USA DS Software up 29%
12:33 – DS will overtake the Wii in June NPD – Evergreen titles still driving Sales (Nintendogs, NSMB, Brain Training)
12:33 – Wii Sales shown off, even better then PS2. And its getting better.
12:34 – Wii Software is selling great too, No system has sold more games in first 19 months then Wii ever. Nintendo approached Wii development on two fronts – The established titles like Mario and Metroid, but also had new games like Wii Fit and Sports.
12:35 – 19 Different Third Party Games have more then 400,000 units sold – 11 Different Publishers.
12:36 – ONLY SHOWING 3 NEW GAMES!?!?!?!? REGGIE MY MAN 🙁
12:36 – First one is Star Wars – The Clone Wars. Looks awesome – shows off lightsaber fights. Supports the TruMotion by the looks of it.
12:37 – Showing of Rayman Raving Rabbid TV – playing on the Floor with Wii Fit Board
12:38 – Call of Duty World at War – Wii version looks pretty good, Supports Zapper.
12:39 – Cammie is back on with more sales, about portable games. Those three games showed you what you play at home – these show you what’s played on the road.
12:40 – Guitar Hero On Tour sold 300,00k on first day. On Tour Decades on the way – new games.
12:41 – Spore DS to be demoed too. On Tour Decades will have “”Song Sharing”” between different Guitar Hero version on the DS. Talk about the Grip and portability. No new footage.
12:42 – Spore being shown now. Shows off Creature Creator and some gameplay. DS version will also have Spore Creature sharing.
12:43 – New Pokemon Ranger coming in November in US.
Where are the Nintendo games… at the Nintendo conference?
12:44 – GTA HITS THE DS – Grand Theft Auto Chinatown Wars, set in Liberty City! No Screens 🙁
12:45 – Cammy talks about how the DS is being integrated into Airports and at Baseball games.
12:46 – Talking about Cooking Guide: Hitting the US in November – HA Suck america we get something before you 🙁
12:47 – Over to Reggie, now talking about Wii MotionPlus. Detailing how it works. An empty promise without software, whats going to be shown?
12:48 New game Wii Sports Resorts – with MotionPlus support. 1 Motion Plus and extended Jacket in every game. Others available separately.
12:49 – Showing off 1:1 with a game called “”Disc Dog”” basically frisbee throwing, no buttons needed just actually throw it and it detects it. Showing of tilting the Frisbee. Bill Trinnen is on the stage and has a Nunchuck, Jet Ski being demoed, Wiimote with MotionFree and nunchuck are being used as the handles.
12:51 – Sword Dualing – you hold the Wiimote with both hands, and its picking up the motion 100% perfect. No canned animations all one to one sword swings. Next up is actual sword fight Reggie V Cammy, Cammy goes down and “”thats why they called me the Reggienator!””
Round 2 – Reggie goes down again!
12:53 – A Small taste of Wii Sports resort, games show promise for other new ideas.
12:54 – How are other developers going to use Wii MotionPlus? Developers have not much of a go with it yet and nothing soon on the horizon but 1:1 should be great for developers says Reggie. Wii Sports resort is out Spring 2009.
12:55 – Something is being shown off… Wii Music, showing off a drum set. The guy is playing a small tune. Using the Balance Board for the Big Drum at the bottom (I don’t know the name :P).
12:56 – Here comes Shigggy with a instrument being play with the Wiimote, titling it up and down using the 1 and 2 buttons makes different sounds. Drummer continues in the back.
12:58 – Shiggy and Bill to demo Wii music, Bill is Translating – Wii Music been in development along with Wii Play, Sports and Fit. Music is a must for all ages and genger.
12:59 – Wii Music is not a music rhythm game, Wii Music is for everyone even if you don’t know how to play at all. No notes or guides to play – just play with movements.
01:00 – 50 different instruments in the game, Piano, Violin, Guitar, Big Ass Drum – Drummer is playing a seperate mode with the Wii Fit Board, the game includes lesson so you can learn. The guy on the drums only learnt to play yesterday.
01:03 – Orchestra is still in – Bill and Shiggy will play a song with the Band – it has up to 6 players. Marinba in it all different instrument. Bill gets the Cow Bell, COOOOWWWW BELLL!
01:05 – Playing the Nintendo theme, rather wonky…. do you just shake or is there some means to it… they look like they messing about.
01:06 – Song over, they take a bow.
01:07 – Reggie and Cammy are back, Microphone shown off, plugs into the USB looks like a standalone Microphone not a headset.
01:08 – They are finishing up…
01:09 – The DS was never a fad, a fad is no longer operable – when the paradigm shifts copy cats are always going to happen, best to stay ahead of the curve.
01:10 – Nintendo has been built to be to be the Next Advantage to keep you smiling.
01:11 – END FIN
