New Mario Bros 3D It’s official! New 3DS Mario confirmed for Christmas!
It’s been emotional Nintendo gaming’s most tear-jerking moments
Wii U IN CRISIS?
Kid Icarus: Uprising Final hands-on verdict before release day!
REVIEWED!
MARIO PARTY 9 Why we’ll be RSVPing with a ‘yes’
THE GAMES THE TECH THE PRICE
PLUS!
PANDORA’S TOWER HEROES OF RUIN PAC-MAN PARTY 3D XENOBLADE CHRONICLES SPIRIT CAMERA
THE
TRUTH And why it might not even be called Wii U at all! BRAND NEW INFO!
Darksiders II
Issue 73 March 2012
£4.50
Wii U’s apocalyptic adventure explored
BEYOND THE LABYRINTH
ONE PIECE: UNLIMITED CRUISE SP
NANO ASSAULT
1
01 SKYRIM’S THE LIMIT
Hyrule gets a new look with mod makeover
D
o you know what we had to go through to steal these Wii U Zelda screens from Nintendo? Eiji Aonuma has his Zelda team shacked up in a life-size replica of the Water Temple. It takes Olympic-grade bow skills just to ring the doorbell… Alternatively, we asked one of our PC buddies to mod The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim with Zelda texture packs. Skyrim’s Nordic vistas are a sight to behold to begin with; replace a barbarian hero with Link and mouths gush saliva like yonder waterfall. Nintendo are going to do their own thing with Zelda HD, but Skyrim does make us wonder if it’s time they tried another coherent landmass. Skyward Sword’s bite-size regions were the right choice for Wii’s humble innards; with Wii U’s added horsepower, it’s time for Nintendo to reclaim their crown as the true architects of the living, breathing world. Oh, and really shiny swords wouldn’t go amiss, either. If you’re a Skyrimmer, get the Link/Navi mod from www.bit.ly/NGmodlink, and the Master Sword and Hylian Shield mod from www.bit.ly/NGmodsword.
10 NEW REASONS TO ♥ N I NTEN DO 2
10 N E W R E A S O N S T O ♥ N I N T E N D O
It’s the Hylian Shield! It’s the Master Sword! It’s Epona! All in glorious stun-o-vision. This is a glimpse of the future, surely.
02 DR MARIO’S MALPRACTICE Model-maker’s unsettling look at life in Mario’s surgery
H
ow is it that Dr Mario has yet to be sued for medical malpractice? The guy uses 300 pills to cure the common cold. And thanks to toymaker Donald Kennedy, we can add sexual harassment to the charges. To be fair to our dumpy doc, however, he didn’t begin life as a pervert. “I was originally going to do Dr Mario and the germs, but I couldn’t get the germs right,” says Donald of this particular project. “I then thought that Mario should have a nurse Peach, but I wasn’t sure how I was going to position them. I got the idea from an anime figure to make a sexy nurse.” Donald’s recycling of older figures can make him sound like a toy serial killer. Peach’s torso came from Neon Genesis Evangelion’s Rei Ayanami while the rest of her is “random anime girls’ legs that I had lying around.” Mario’s belly is slightly more familiar
– once upon a time it belonged to Dr Hibbert, The Simpsons’ chortling GP. These models got off easy. Donald’s website shows beloved mascots in various states of zombie decay, from shambling Game Boys to Peach eating Toad’s face. (“I love putting videogame characters into weird or not normal situations,” Donald explains.) Pervy Mario suddenly seems pretty sound. Not that Donald questioned Dr Mario’s morals to begin with. “I would probably do the same thing if I saw nurse Peach doing that.” You can check out all Donald’s creations at www.kodykoala.com.
I LOVE PUTTING VIDEOGAME CHARACTERS INTO WEIRD OR NOT NORMAL SITUATIONS 3
FEATURE
SPECS
SCANDAL Wii U FAILS TO PERFORM?
4
B
y far the most contentious gossip surrounding Wii U right now concerns the technical specs. Is it twice as powerful as Xbox 360? Only marginally more advanced than Wii? Here’s what we know so far… The Wii U is almost certainly running on a quad-core 3GHz PowerPC-based 45nm CPU. Early whispers that it’ll have 768MB of DRAM embedded within the CPU and shared with an unknown AMD-based GPU (not ATI, as per the original Japanese developer quotes) have been all but debunked; by comparison the Xbox 360 has just 10MB of embedded DRAM, and a colosso-chip of the size suggested would likely require a console casing as big as your sofa. Nintendo are currently testing two versions of the console for development purposes – one with 768MB of memory (compared with the 360’s 512MB) and another with 1GB, as they attempt to find that sweet spot between power and cost.
• THE NAME • THE PRICE • THE TECHNOLOGY • THE GAMES •
FEATURE
Based on those figures, what we have is a machine that should be roughly 50% more powerful than Microsoft’s current offering. Full HD graphics (ie, the maximum 1080P resolution) would theoretically be less of an issue on Wii U, allowing games that run at lower resolutions to look sharper on Nintendo’s console. That tallies with developers claiming that the Wii U should have the best version of multiformat games. Vigil Games’ technical director, Colin Bonstead, said that Darksiders II would be better on Wii U, confirming that “the hardware is more powerful”. Good news. Then we have Team Ninja’s Fumihiko Yasuda and Yosuke Hayashi who told us that Wii U is “very easy to develop for... we’re finding it very similar to develop for Wii U as for Xbox 360 and PS3.” In other words, this machine is current-gen-plus, not a powerhouse destined to blow away anything currently available. That would tally with both Nintendo’s usual MO and recent comments from Iwata, who suggested that while Nintendo “need to be engaged in the power games” when it comes to “graphic representations” for key franchises like Zelda, they are “aiming to make a system which shall not be forced into competing with the others where the contenders can fight only with massive developer resources and long development times as their weapons.” In other words, like Wii and DS, the focus is going to be on providing unique experiences rather than raw horsepower. When it finally arrives, Wii U will be the most powerful console on the market, but not by a great deal. As Patrick Goss, editor of techy website TechRadar, told us: “Nailing down actual
real-world performance from rumoured specs is nigh-on impossible, but if the Wii U does come with a quad-core processor and modern graphics chip it would be capable of surpassing the kind of high-def graphics and blockbuster sound that rivals like the PS3 and Xbox 360 currently bring. Nintendo’s track record suggests that they are much keener on making money on each unit than trying to raise the bar and cut into their profit margins.”
TWICE THE PRIDE, DOUBLE THE FALL?
Then, just as it seemed we had a handle on exactly what Wii U was capable of, another story came along to muddy the waters. Speaking to Develop magazine, an unnamed developer suggested that the console was twice as powerful as the Xbox 360. That’s a little above expectations, but entirely possible given what we know about the hardware – particularly considering the 1GB devkit, which would, of course, carry precisely twice the memory of Microsoft’s machine. Then came a contradiction: “I’ve heard [a project designer] complain it’s underpowered compared to what Nintendo announced, resulting in people having to de-scale their plans,” claimed the website’s source. Curiouser and curiouser…
NINTENDO ARE PREFERRING TO ALLUDE TO THE CONSOLE’S CAPABILITIES IN THE VAGUEST OF TERMS
Now, Nintendo haven’t officially announced any figures to the wider world, preferring to allude to the console’s capabilities in the vaguest of terms. Yes, it can do what Other Formats can – and a bit more besides. But these comments would suggest that they’ve been telling the development community a very different story. Yet others seem happy with Nintendo. Further to his comments about Wii U’s ease of use, Team Ninja’s Hayashi enthused about the format holder’s new caring, sharing approach: “They’ve asked us what we would want from the hardware, and when we give them feedback we can see that they’re definitely listening to it and making changes.” That final word is the key. Wii U hardware is still evolving, and as such any claims about what it’s capable of have to be taken with a pinch of salt. This obviously more than applies to IGN’s recent story that the next-generation Xbox will be “six times as powerful” as the 360, producing “a 20% greater performance than Wii U.” Now, we’re no maths boffins, but those numbers would suggest that, in fact, Nintendo’s console has five times more grunt than the current-gen hardware; a claim which is, not to put too fine a point on it, a load of old nonsense. The answer to that original rumour, then, is that Wii U will be more powerful than we’re expecting, but less so than developers would dearly love it to be. It’s an in-betweener, in other words; a bridge between the current generation and the next, but with enough unique features to differentiate it from rival consoles, both existing and upcoming.
• ONLINE CAPABILITIES • SECRET WEAPON • MIYAMOTO •
5
PREVIEW 3DS
Spirit Camera: The Cursed Memoir
Who you gonna call? Fujifilm!
Ex-N64/NGC editor Tim Weaver is haunted by a handy desk-sized spook. D E TA I L S
Format 3DS Pub Nintendo Dev Tecmo Koei Out Now (JPN), April (UK)
Training the reticule on ghost boy’s face charges the camera. Do you wait for massive damage or suppress him with fast snaps?
INS
T
Gho A - FA s C exis ts don’t T t. 58% And y e t o in a f peop 2 le surv 008 e beli y said they eve d in them .
The old Xbox is haunted by a lank-haired horror... and its lifetime sales. Burn!
Our telephone is really haunted. Makes calling the Ghostbusters tricky.
T
urns out our office is built on an ancient Indian burial ground. It’s the only explanation for the volume of ghosts unearthed by Tecmo’s augmented reality spook snapper. Taking photos in ‘ghost camera’ mode reveals spirits lurking beyond the eye: a lank-haired Ringu escapee plagues the coffee machine (which explains a lot, particularly ‘#28 no sugar’), Satan’s face appears on the Babysitting Mama baby and a ghostly boy skulks near Matthew’s desk. Perhaps it’s the unquiet spirit of the work experience lad we accidentally killed really badly last summer. 1 Another mode takes its cue from Face Raiders and plasters a friend’s mug onto the body of an angry spirit. In true Fatal Frame fashion, ghosts are vanquished with photography – in this case, by physically moving the 3DS to line up shots. As in Face Raiders, the appeal lies in importing celebrity
faces – one quick Google image search and George Clooney’s ghost is legging it around our kitchen. It’s an absolute hoot until you accidentally knock over your flatmate’s plant pot and try to explain how “the ghost of Al Pacino 2 made me do it.”
HOLLYWOOOO
Fighting Al PacinoooOOOooh prepares us for Story mode’s spiteful spooks. The yarn unfolds by scanning concealed augmented reality markers in the 20-page notebook that comes packaged with the game. Pointing the 3DS at the page sees ghostly writing splotch
GEORGE CLOONEY’S GHOST IS LEGGING IT ROUND YOUR KITCHEN…
FOOTNOTES 1 Crushed under a mountain of Fanta cans. 2 Star of The Ghoulfather, Scareface, Frighteous Kill, Insomniargh, Dog Slay Afternoon, Ick Tracy, Glenscary Glen Ross and Carlito’s WooooOOOOOooooo. 3 Come on, when did you last play ‘Fishing’?
6
the paper, wormholes tear in the surface and – the game’s smartest trick – photos burst into life as short video clips. Complete short AR puzzles, such as page-flipping hide-andseek, and a spook emerges into the real world for 360-degree battle. Needless to say, this isn’t one for the bus. Messing around with the booklet is the meat of the game. Well, we say ‘meat’. Having completed half the game in just one hour, this is more of a bacon sliver than a hearty steak. No bones about it (they are ghosts after all), Spirit Camera can’t compete with a fullyfledged Fatal Frame. It’s a throwaway bauble; a worthy replacement for 3DS’s in-built AR distractions, 3 but not a proper game in its own right. If it weren’t for the augmented reality booklet, it’d be easy to see this hitting eShop instead. Thankfully, Nintendo of Japan got it, and released Spirit Camera for roughly £20. Question is, will Nintendo of Europe do the right thing? A price tag of more than £20 and it doesn’t stand a ghost of a chance.
REVIEW 3DS D E TA I L S
Format 3DS I Pub Sega I Dev Sega I Players 1-4 I Price £40 I Out Now
Robotnik and Wario team up after thinking they’ve not been invited to compete
Oh come on, we’ve all wanted to do this to Tails. Haven’t we?
Has anyone ever questioned why they’re swimming fully clothed?
MARIO & SONIC AT THE LONDON 2012 OLYMPICS Going for gold… but coming up silver
W
ere the real London Olympics to be enshrouded in a coloured fog as the translucent faces of our friends challenged us to the 110m hurdles, we’d be screaming ‘terrorist attack!’ and running. Not so in videogame land – it’s just Robotnik and Bowser up to their usual tricks. Everyone’s happy just to stand there. But then that’s just the sort of behaviour we’d expect in this utopian London. The grass is green, the skies are blue and competitors willingly dive under water without fear of getting snagged on a rusty shopping trolley. What’s more, the characters are beautifully animated in every event, 1 the countdown music is classic Sega arcade stuff and, while the events are based in reality, there are videogamey tweaks (such as characterspecific flourishes) that keep it interesting. It’s very slick.
The story about the fog, however, is pap and outstays its welcome for about four hours. Ironically for a game tagged Mario & Sonic, the supporting cast’s bonus story is what the main one should have been. The script is more knowing, laughs are more plentiful and the challenge is greater.
particularly impressive with download play, sending data while everyone’s reading the instructions. By the time everyone’s ready, it’s loaded and good to go – perfect. But there’s too much compensation for bad players in Party Play, with the catch-up ‘opportunities’ so pronounced the clear best player actually came last when we played. That’s not good. When you’re used to playing full-fat versions of the sports in question, such as football or ice hockey, the simplified events here feel unfulfilling. And that’s the biggest reason this doesn’t get a higher score. A marathon really should be more than just ‘push A to pick up the water bottle’. Justin Towell
ATH-ELITE
Perhaps we’re being too harsh on what’s clearly a child-friendly game. If anything, the way events are stripped down to a single aspect – such as timing a trigger-pull or jumping during the steeplechase – makes this a hardcore challenge, especially as you only get one attempt. 2 There are more than 50 events, some of which can be tackled in co-op, and the 3DS gets a full stylus/gyro/mic-blowing workout. If that sounds wholly un-fun, rest assured it’s perfect for multiplayer. The game is
VERDICT Slick, pretty and a laugh in multiplayer, this is a welcome sequel. However, most events are just too simplified to make this truly essential, which is a pity.
70
NINTENDATA HOW LONG IS IT?
THE BEST BIT
10
HRS
STAT ATTACK
PRO TIP
FOOTNOTES
Always falling off the water jumps in the steeplechase? Press A again to clear the barrier. You’re welcome.
It seems wrong that you get to see Princess Peach in tiny shorts and her swimsuit, yet Robotnik does everything in his regular coat and tails. Probably for the best, come to think of it... 2 It also means your 3DS buttons are spared a thrashing, which is fine by us.
57 Download is a triumph, allowing super-slick multiplayer with just one cartridge between up to four 3DSes.
Number of actual Olympic events from which to choose.
PRICE WATCH
1
£34.99 At play.com
7
THE ULTIMATE NINTENDO MAGAZINE NEW, RETRO AND FUTURE GAMES
EAT ME!
NINTENDO GAMING HAS GOT EVEN
BIGGER
More pages. More games. More value.
■ Passionate coverage of every Nintendo console from NES to Wii U ■ Written by experts for fans ■ The ultimate guide to the world of Nintendo
8
ON SALE NOW
This month... the truth about Wii U • Mario Party 9 reviewed • Final Fantasy creator interviewed