E3 2009: The "Why We Still Play Nintendo Games After All These Years" edition

[Donomni]

DKP menos para que me traduzca.

[Solid Snake]

I used to want a PS3 just to play MGS4...

But now I really want a PS3 to play The Last Guardian.

Why is it that Team ICO seems the only developers interested in investing time to learn to stock their games with real emotion? Metal Gears and Final Fantasies try to impress with their "oh so deep" hours upon hours of dialogue and their textbook-thick characterization and their convoluted plots, but something about the sheer simplicity of petting a horse or watching a girl dance around a windmill is what really speaks to me.

[Kim]

Being perfectly honest, most Final Fantasy and Metal Gear Solid games have actually very little characterization.

Also: New Castlevania games looks fuggin' sweet. Can't wait to play it.

[01d55]

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

Metal Gears ... try to impress with their "oh so deep" hours upon hours of dialogue and their textbook-thick characterization and their convoluted plots,

Who are you and what have you done with the real SS?

[Kaneda]

I just met Guillermo Del Toro a little while ago, and we talked about E3.

I mean, this isn't all that relevant, I just felt the urge to mention it because it was pretty cool. He's especially looking forward to The Last Guardian.

[Mirai Gen]

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

I used to want a PS3 just to play MGS4...

But now I really want a PS3 to play The Last Guardian.

Same, honestly, something about the way that Team Ico presents their emotion and gravity and such just pulls you in and demands your attention in ways that dialog can't, no matter how well written. It is something that really can only be done visually and I sincerely doubt it could be done as anything other than a video game.

[Regulus Tera]

http://www.nintendo.co.jp/corporate/...09/090604.html
Black Wii -> Aug 1, 2009
Red DSi -> July 11, 2009

Also available:

1. Wiimote Black 3,800yen
2. Nunchuk Black 1,800yen
3. Classic Controller Pro Black 2,000yen
4. Classic Controller Pro White 2,000yen

And from 2ch:

Software

• Wii Sports Resort / June 25 / 4800 Yen

Hardware

• Wii Motion Plus / June 25 / 1500 Yen

Monster Hunter 3 tri Special Pack / Aug 1, 2009 / 33,000 Yen
(Black Wii + game + Classic Controller Pro Black )

EDIT: Wii Sports Resort Homepage
http://www.nintendo.co.jp/wii/rztj/index.html

Info & movie page at Wii.com
http://wii.com/jp/articles/wii-sports-resort/
http://wii.com/jp/movies/wii-sports-resort-movie1/
http://wii.com/jp/movies/e3-movie/

Other special movies
http://wii.com/jp/movies/wii-sports-resort-vs1/
http://wii.com/jp/movies/wii-sports-resort-vs2/
http://wii.com/jp/movies/wii-sports-resort-vs3/

EDIT2: Holy fuck, I just noticed that the day of the red DSi launch is the day of Dragon Quest IX.

[phil_]

Originally Posted by Regulas Tera

Wii Sports Resort Homepage
http://www.nintendo.co.jp/wii/rztj/index.html

There are a lot of games in Resort.

From north to south:
Jet-ski- Time trial and 2-player race
Canoeing- Details to come.
Archery- Up to four players shoot at targets.
Ping-Pong- Details to come.
Biking- Details to come.
Swording- Two-player duel, two-player "cut better than the other guy," one-player... run around hitting stuff like Dragon Quest Swords?
Frisbee Flying Disc- Disc dog and Disc golf.
Bowling- Details to come.
Basketball- Details to come.
Sky Diving- Details to come.
Wake Boarding- Details to come.
Golf- golf.

Plus, that's totally Holiday Island from Pilotwings 64.

[tacticslion]

Originally Posted by 01d55

Fun fact: Pretty much every bank is going to require a minimum deposit before you can open an account, and if you ever let your current balance drop too low they're gonna charge you money to keep the account open until you boost it up again.

Ah, yes. Something that we - as continuing education people, with one steady income are both very familiar with. It's like, "sorry, but you don't have enough money, so that's going to cost you s'more." Mmmmmmmmmmkay. Let's just go with "stupid business practice number eighty" then.

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

I used to want a PS3 just to play MGS4...

But now I really want a PS3 to play The Last Guardian.

Why is it that Team ICO seems the only developers interested in investing time to learn to stock their games with real emotion? Metal Gears and Final Fantasies try to impress with their "oh so deep" hours upon hours of dialogue and their textbook-thick characterization and their convoluted plots, but something about the sheer simplicity of petting a horse or watching a girl dance around a windmill is what really speaks to me.

Originally Posted by NonCon

Being perfectly honest, most Final Fantasy and Metal Gear Solid games have actually very little characterization.

Also: New Castlevania games looks fuggin' sweet. Can't wait to play it.

Originally Posted by Mirai Gen

Same, honestly, something about the way that Team Ico presents their emotion and gravity and such just pulls you in and demands your attention in ways that dialog can't, no matter how well written. It is something that really can only be done visually and I sincerely doubt it could be done as anything other than a video game.

Team Ico... they are magnificent. I think part of what they do is use visual experiences in ways others don't, but they also take great detail to their sound. All of the ICO presence requires the subtle background sounds to work. I grant, even on mute it's some of the most beautifully engaging games in existance, but they attempt (and succeed!) at evoking all of the player's senses by focusing quite a great deal on two of them. The sound of the horse combined with the visual almost puts you there, letting you imagine the feel and smell of it as well. The sight of the girl playing evokes the sunny days (if you can remember what it was like to be little, before video games entered your life, it's that big shiney orb-thing I'm constantly told exists), the warmth, and joy you experienced at that time. So, yeah it's a presentation of emotion more than dialogue and it's fantastic. Even so, when they do have dialogue, it's well-written, tightly scripted and understandable (at least when in a language you can read/understand).

Unlike some MG and FF scripts. Which do have fairly good characterizations (depending on the movie/novel game your watching/reading playing), but they don't often have a large bredth of characters. Many times - even when "unique" - FF characters begin to feel very similar to one another. Cloud=Squall, in every way that matters, for example. Tidus was rather unique, until XII (doesn't mean I like 'im, just that 'e's unique, also I've only seen much of XII played and played very little, so I don't know). Yuna, Aerith, and Rosa all have way too much in common to be coincidence. So yeah, FF takes archetypes and makes characters out of 'em. There are plenty of differences between each of the characters mentioned, but it's not enough of a difference to note (granting someone comparitive super-strength or changing hair color does not a different character make). MG is much more focused on action than on dialogue ("action" does not inherently equate to "constant explosions and gun fire"), although there is a fair bit of the latter involved. It's characterization is not the main focus of that dialogue, but exposition (of story or game controls) is. Anyhoo, it's just different ways of story telling. I like them all. I'm just more of a fanboy of Team Ico's than anything else ever.

Originally Posted by Regulus Tera

EDIT2: Holy fuck, I just noticed that the day of the red DSi launch is the day of Dragon Quest IX.

Oh, so that's how Japan ends. Huh. I always kind of figured that it would be in a war with neighboring China over who has the better post-emporer government. Go figure.

[Mirai Gen]

Team Ico... they are magnificent. I think part of what they do is use visual experiences in ways others don't, but they also take great detail to their sound. All of the ICO presence requires the subtle background sounds to work. I grant, even on mute it's some of the most beautifully engaging games in existance, but they attempt (and succeed!) at evoking all of the player's senses by focusing quite a great deal on two of them.

Sounds about right - lord knows even if I never played or heard of SotC or Ico I'd look at that trailer and go, hey, wow, I wonder what that's all about?