tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-149176192024-10-06T22:42:21.831-07:00a blog about Nintendo, Games & CultureDexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.comBlogger95125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-69125575698043671892015-06-16T20:18:00.000-07:002015-06-16T21:57:35.480-07:00

Let's call a dog a dog. This year's E3 presentation from Nintendo was disappointing. I stop short of hyperbole here as they did show games -- most of which will release within six months, almost all within the next year, and several of which I will buy. However, I also won't go along with the historical revisionism and comparisons. One person I heard compared this reveal to the reaction Wind

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-82538874479810996532015-06-01T20:56:00.003-07:002015-06-01T21:05:54.384-07:00

I wasn't planning on writing anything about the Nintendo World Championship 2015 qualifiers this past weekend as none of the events were near where I lived, but spotting Patrick Scott Patterson's epic story at his event led me down the rabbit hole and I sound found several other stories detailing what seemed like a lukewarm event across a couple of other locations.   Several

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-87682671257001438252015-05-31T12:57:00.000-07:002015-05-31T17:37:37.980-07:00

I must apologize for I have been remiss in updating this blog. The last time I made an update was in the glow of last year's highly successful post-E3 glow. A year on, Mario Maker is still on the way so jury is still out (although I'm excited), Zelda has been delayed, and Amiibos as it turned out, was a huge success, selling well over 10 million units in less than seven months on the

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-47710269353136632042014-06-16T19:54:00.000-07:002014-06-16T19:59:53.533-07:00

I've spent the last couple of E3s, especially since the weird Wii U reveal in 2011 trying to be positive but always walked away a little disappointed in Nintendo's approach to their E3 show. Though I was mostly satisfied last year, it was hard to shake the narrative that Nintendo's cancellation of their big E3 press event and putting instead an E3 'Nintendo Direct' was a retreat by the

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-11199930687957845772014-06-07T20:31:00.000-07:002014-06-07T20:31:00.431-07:00

When Miiverse was first revealed in a pre-E3 digital presentation two years ago, I was hopeful that it could be a killer app for the then upcoming Wii U console. Nearly two years after the Wii U's launch, Nintendo's sales have continued to decline and the Wii U, like the GameCube two generations before it, feels like the odd console out.  Ignored by third parties, defended by a core group

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-85472306387207486632014-05-03T11:56:00.000-07:002014-05-17T11:16:41.398-07:00

With recent talk of new hardware at E3 (denied by Nintendo), discussions about Nintendo’s successor to the 3DS have, not surprisingly, come to the fore. Having grown up with the original GameBoy, the concept of portable games machine is quite natural to me. Even though I also own a smartphone, I still prefer to keep a separate games device.  I don’t see that going away, and the handheld

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-44840475197819667032014-01-04T09:39:00.000-08:002014-01-05T20:26:24.594-08:00

Demo Version  Town It's been a long time since I've played a JRPG as tightly polished, beautiful, authentic and fun as the Bravely Default demo that was recently released on the Nintendo eshop.  (see the Demo Trailer) Taking a clear homage from the old-school DS JRPG  4 Warriors of Light, Square-Enix's Bravely Default is its own creature and it is, I can say with

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-79825830080604790972013-08-16T21:51:00.001-07:002013-08-17T08:26:54.008-07:00

I rarely want to revisit or detail at length my thoughts about a movie after a review, even if I have more things to say.  But nearly two weeks  and two more viewings later,  I’m still buzzing about Guillermo Del Toro’s Pacific Rim. I’m as surprised about it myself.   Why does Del Tero’s ode to the kaiju and mecha films of his childhood have such a hold on me? Part

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-41365134304845361712013-08-06T22:43:00.000-07:002013-08-16T21:51:32.280-07:00

Once in a while a movie like Pacific Rim flies under the radar and almost slips away from a first viewing on the big screen. I am very glad I didn’t let it slip away.   I had started out highly anticipating the film given the film’s pedigree (helmed by Guillermo del Toro) and the premise (mechas).  But as release neared, the marketing which tried to evoke a Bill Pullman

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-37873593684568896532013-06-15T16:18:00.000-07:002013-06-15T16:56:07.735-07:00

So E3 2013 is done and over with.  I had commented last week that I hoped to seesurprises and the unexpected but sadly that didn't happen. I think it was obvious given the reduced pomp in this year’s presentation that Nintendo would be focusing on tried and true franchises to kickstart Wii U sales.   That said, it was still a little disappointing that there were no surprise “one

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-87241008959254968192013-06-08T10:51:00.000-07:002013-06-09T08:45:58.257-07:00

It’s been a year since I wrote about the Wii U reveal at E32012.  The Wii U launched to lukewarm public reception and Nintendo’s position heading into E3 2013 is precarious, with Sony’s PS4 and Microsoft’s Xbox One nipping at their heels. In this industry, the narrative can change on a dime.  After tearing through several E3s with record sales and the next Wii titled casual

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-28065958044803226932013-06-01T15:04:00.003-07:002013-08-21T18:01:15.348-07:00

Crimson Shroud for the 3DS eShop Designed by Yasumi  Matsuno of the Ogre Battle series & Final Fantasy Tactics fame and initially released in Level 5's anthology collection Guild 01 before making it to eshop in Europe and North America as a stand-alone download, Crimson Shroud is delightfully fun retro experience.  The game is table-top RPG, with an unseen game-master

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-17370765803417117982013-04-27T13:38:00.001-07:002013-04-28T02:45:51.127-07:00

When it was first revealed at E3 2012, I was excited and gushed about its potential to create a seamless communications network for fans, and users of Nintendo hardware across multiple platforms, a kind of Twitter for gamers, a micro-social network. Six months after Wii U’s launch Miiverse has arrived on phones and for browsers and reality seems to have crept up and dashed some of those

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-20514642128707983892013-04-20T15:54:00.000-07:002013-04-27T13:43:57.579-07:00

After two disappointing DS entries and to me what felt like a lucklustre Wii entry, I felt that maybe it was time to leave Zelda alone.   The ‘major’ entries to the Zelda  franchise have increasingly become bogged down by long laborious story sequences, overlong tutorial ‘sandboxes’ and desolate overworlds.    Yet, in the back of my mind, I’ve always wanted to

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-18039347136628520022012-12-08T23:18:00.000-08:002012-12-08T23:23:21.533-08:00

Maybe it is just me, but there is always a certain emptiness and consumer regret every December.  This is usually the month after I’ve just spent a few hundred bucks buying the year’s hottest releases and it is a time where corporations who sold me those goods slink away into their money vaults to count their sales, where marketing machines of said products wind down, and we don’t

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-31347777461682070562012-11-24T23:42:00.001-08:002012-11-25T00:15:15.462-08:00

As promised, here’s the second part of my Wii U impressions focusing on things for Nintendo to improve.  For the first part, click here.  OS/UI As noted previously, it takes too long to exit games. Since my last blog post, I have also installed a brand new 1TB WD My Book Essential external HDD with 1 downloadable game installed and nothing else so far.  The addition of the Hard

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-60982274340785225222012-11-20T23:45:00.002-08:002012-11-21T13:39:03.530-08:00

I failed to secure a Wii U at launch, but thanks to daily supply replenishment and a very hand store availability tool, I managed to grab a Deluxe set from a freshly replenished store a day later.  As I returned home from my local Best Buy, Wii U Deluxe in tow, the unit’s weight was striking.  It’s a  heavy piece of gear, GamePad, console, cables, altogether. Even my lighter

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-68970374953228478402012-11-16T16:21:00.000-08:002012-11-21T02:15:25.072-08:00

For all the talk of WiiSports selling the public to the Wii, one of the Wii's early killer-apps was the Internet Channel and it's YouTube support making it the earliest current-gen console to allow people to watch YouTube via their consoles on their TV. As the internet has evolved and formats advanced, the Internet Browser struggled to keep pace.   The release of a TV friendly

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-89163016934398127102012-11-09T16:14:00.001-08:002012-11-09T16:16:20.020-08:00

I've had a chance to try out the Wii U (my first time seeing a unit in person) with the demo stations finally arriving at my local Best Buy and FutureShop here in Canada. The Good The controller is very comfortable to hold and surprisingly light The size of the controller seems bigger than I had expected, but in a strange way, it looks less bulky than the forced perspective shot of

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-19222190525575563622012-10-20T20:31:00.000-07:002012-10-20T21:08:06.381-07:00

The Mercenaries  After years designing games Hironobu Sakaguchi had arrived at a crossroads at the start of the production process for The Last Story.   “I just felt like I was at a slightly different point from everyone else. As if I was surfing alongside the others, but had ended up riding a different wave from the one I should have aimed for,” he admitted to Nintendo

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-13445654269851419802012-10-18T18:23:00.002-07:002012-10-18T21:49:33.420-07:00

Where is the hype? That must be one of the most common refrains heard across the interwebs from people in the know scratching their heads about Nintendo's sluggish movement. Expanding on the Google Trends analysis done a few weeks ago, searches for Wii in October 2006 climbed 27% from September when Nintendo officially unveiled pricing and launch details. In contrast Wii U searches from

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-13364814097038029822012-10-09T21:12:00.000-07:002012-10-09T22:21:17.783-07:00

New Super Mario Brothers 2 for the 3DS is a joy to play.  While its DNA is very much rooted in the same New Super Mario Brothers (NSMB) game that debuted on the Nintendo DS six years ago, there are enough differences to warrant the purchase. Interestingly, I had purchased the original NSMB on the DS, got to around world 5 and got bored of it and stopped.  It didn’t 

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-48937499438998466582012-10-05T20:23:00.001-07:002012-10-05T22:53:18.503-07:00

When Satoru Iwata first introduced the idea of playing perfectly emulated old games on the then codenamed Revolution console, I was amazed by the simplicity and brilliance of the idea.   I remember thinking to myself that in one fell swoop, Nintendo could have the entire Mario library accessible to their fans on their next-generation hardware. Virtual Console concept introduced at E3

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-74338152102463859572012-09-28T21:06:00.000-07:002012-09-28T23:17:28.218-07:00

In a recent article on istocktrader.com, Rich Bieglmeier performned a Google Trends analysis and concluded that while Wii U likely will not repeat the success of the Wii, it is likely to do well based on search results, predicting 2 million Wii U sold by the end of 2012 and 3.5 million by March 31 2013 (the end of Nintendo’s fiscal year) ; Nintendo’s own forecasts on estimated a combined 10.5

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14917619.post-52561462233859698912012-09-23T13:46:00.002-07:002012-09-23T14:02:55.798-07:00

Last March I attended The Legend of Zelda: Symphony of the Goddesses concert organized by Nintendo and Jason Michael Paul productions.  Based on the Zelda 25th Anniversary concert last year, the Symphony of Goddesses concert features a revised and expanded set list. As a fan of the Zelda games, I had booked my tickets the first day they went on sale for the Vancouver event. 

Dexterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236654128088384910noreply@blogger.com0