Via Gamespot

Nintendo is showing dozens of Wii games to attendees of the Electronic Entertainment Expo this year, but they're not making it easy on them.

Much like last year, the front end of Nintendo's E3 booth this year is dominated by the redesigned Nintendo DS Lite. The Game Boy Advance and GameCube are nowhere to be found, with a slew of first- and third-party DS games, including the new DS Pokemon, taking up all the kiosk spaces in the openly accessible front portion of the booth.


Red Steel The Wii controls a sword! The Wii controls a gun!
Watch | Download
All of the Wii games are walled off in the back half of the booth, and anyone who wants to see the Wii needs to wait in a line that will be very familiar to anyone who lost half a day of the Expo just to check out Zelda: Twilight Princess last year.

Before the show even opened this morning, the line of people with exhibitor badges waiting to see the Wii was snaking around the perimeter of the booth. There's a sign warning attendees that the wait in line is an hour from that point, but it serves as little deterrence. The Nintendo faithful are lined up to that sign, out of the booth entirely, down the aisle, and then around the back of the publisher's exhibit space.

Helping them to pass the time are a number of monitors along the wall of the booth that show people who talk to and interact with the attendees, waving to them, explaining the uses of the Wii controller and the like.

GameSpot News got a peek behind the Wii wall, where dozens of Wii systems were set up. Visitors were steered toward an elevated platform, where four Nintendo employees were using the Wii. Two were playing tennis against each other, one was playing Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, and another was playing Wii Music Maestro.

After passing by a display case that showed off the hardware, several games were set up in well-equipped alcoves. Further along, the more accessible stations were lined up along the circumference of the inner chamber in Nintendo's booth.

Watching gamers side by side playing with Nintendo's next-gen console is quite unlike it would be on any other system. People are swinging the controller back and forth, holding it sideways, shaking it around, mocking football tosses, and swinging it side to side like a maestro's baton. Because of these active movements, Nintendo is slowly letting people in to avoid crowds that could hinder the free movements.

Want to see just what it was like to enter the Wii portion of Nintendo's booth? Watch GameSpot News' journey into the center of Nintendo's booth to get some hands-on time with the system.

The playable Wii games at E3 are listed below:


Red Steel
Metroid Prime 3: Corruption
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Super Mario Galaxy
WarioWare: Smooth Moves
Wii Sports (including Golf, Tennis, and Baseball)
Project H.A.M.M.E.R.
Madden
Excite Truck
Wii Music Orchestra
Dragon Ball Z: Budokai Tenkaichi 2
Tony Hawk's Downhill Jam
Sonic Wild Fire (working title)
Sonic the Hedgehog (on the Virtual Console)
Elebits
SD Gundam
Necro Nesia
Final Furlong
Bomberman Land
SpongeBob SquarePants: Creature from the Krusty Krab
Super Monkeyball Banana Blitz
Several Wii controller demos ...

Via Gamespot

One of the many Wii features touted by Nintendo has been the Virtual Console that allows Wii owners to download and play games from the company's extensive NES, SNES, and N64 game library using system emulation software. The library isn't limited to legacy Nintendo platform games, either. Nintendo has signed deals to bring Sega and Hudson Soft TurboGrafix 16 games over the Wii Virtual Console as well.

Nintendo's Wii Virtual Console demo station featured five signature games from the system's past: Super Mario Bros. from the NES, Super Mario World from the SNES, Super Mario 64 from the Nintendo 64, Sonic the Hedgehog from the Sega Genesis, and Bonk's Adventure from the TurboGrafix 16. The navigation menu only allowed us to scroll through the five title selection pages, so we didn't get a chance to select and download games to run.

The Wii Virtual Console stations used the gamepad Wii classic controller instead of the motion-sensing Wii-mote used with modern Wii games like Metroid Prime 3: Corruption or Super Mario Galaxy. We spent time playing all five games and didn't notice any differences between the Virtual Console versions and the originals, although we must admit that it's been about decade since we last played these games on their native systems. Games played in a letterbox on the widescreen booth display, but screens still looked sharp and vibrant.

The button settings were fairly intuitive for most games since the layout of the Wii classic controller can safely mimic the controllers of past consoles. Super Mario 64 had the least familiar mapping with player movement bound to the left analog stick, camera angle bound to the right analog stick, and the Z button bound to a tiny button stuck on top of the controller, just to the left of the right shoulder button. Hopefully, Nintendo will allow players to set their own button bindings in shipping Wii systems. The select and pause buttons function as expected, and players can press the home button in the center of the controller to open a quit game prompt to go back to the game-selection menu.

After seeing the Wii handle five flagship console games without a problem, it appears that the Virtual Console emulator is poised for a successful launch. ...

Via Slashdot

In a surprise news conference this evening, Nintendo unexpectedly revealed Super Smash Bros. Brawl for the Nintendo Wii, and released a promo video of the title. Smash Bros. Brawl will feature online play; a Nintendog item that blocks your view of the playfield by jumping up on the screen and demanding to be petted; bizarre Dragonball Z style superattacks; your choice of traditional Gamecube or motion-sensing Revmote control; and new characters in the form of Samus (without the suit), Meta Knight, Kid Icarus (!), and... Konami's Solid Snake, complete with a cardboard box he hides in. The only bad news is despite earlier reports it would be a launch title, Smash Bros. Brawl will not be out until 2007." ...

Via Slashdot

Gamasutra reports that, though they're not willing to say they have one in the works right now, LucasArts is interested in a Wii lightsaber game. From the article: "At the end of the demonstration, Gamasutra inquired as to whether the company planned on creating a lightsaber game for the Wii, after many commented on the suitability of the system to the concept - especially after an internal speaker was revealed in the controller being used to demo the concept. This question produced a number of knowing smiles around the room from LucasArts employees, followed by the comments: 'We know' and 'We are looking into it', as possible concepts for the game were discussed. However, the firm has not yet made any official announcements regarding planned Wii titles."

Id love to play a lightsaber Game ...

Via Eurogamer

Rare has officially confirmed its involvement in the development of Diddy Kong Racing on Nintendo DS, marking the first - but not necessarily the last - collaboration with its former partner since the studio was bought by Microsoft.

Arguably producing some of their best work with Nintendo, there was serious and justifiable doubt as to whether or not the two companies would work together again after Microsoft coughed up $375 million for Rare - but it's all turned out all right.

In a post on the company website, Rare revealed: "Yes, Diddy Kong Racing is our first official DS project."

Apparently it's "based on the N64 classic but improved and expanded in ways that only the DS allows," and will feature remodelled and retextured tracks. You can also expect a new mode called TT's Wish Races which that lets you design and race around your own custom-built course.

There's also a bunch of new characters to play with, customisable vehicles, new weapons and gameplay modes, plus eight-player single and multi-card Wi-Fi play. Oh, and touch-screen and microphone functionality - and Rare says that's only the half of it.

No release date for the title has been set yet, but check back for more details soon. ...

Via Engadget

Somehow, we suspect Sony's brass are not very happy right now. Instead of spending their time at E3 fielding softball questions about the Playstation 3's graphics, they're playing defense, as they continue to face queries about the new console's pricing and the missing features on the lower-priced version. In an interview with CNN, Sony's Kaz Hirai said the pricing -- $499 for the 20GB PS3 and $599 for the 60GB version -- was justified by the inclusion of technologies like the Cell processor and Blu-ray, and added that the "totality" of the product is a "good value for consumers." Hirai also defended the lack of HDMI on the 20GB PS3, commenting that "there's not a discernible difference between what you get between HDMI and other forms of high definition." While that might be the case with current Blu-ray flicks, all movie studios (including Sony Pictures) have reserved the right to implement the Image Constraint Token in future discs, which could force anyone using analog outputs -- including owners of the 20GB PS3 -- to watch downgraded video. We assume Hirai's familiar with the issue, so we have to wonder whether his claim that the PS3 is "future-proofed" is just a little bit disingenuous. All it would take is one Blu-ray disc with ICT for owners of 20GB PS3s to realize they've been locked out of the future. ...

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Via CVG

The new Dual Shock 3 pad has been met with a mixed reception at E3. Eschewing the boomerang look unveiled at E3 2005, the Dual Shock 3 now has added 'tilt functionality' which developers are divided about. The new 'PlayStation' button on the pad, which takes gamers online, isn't present on current Dual Shock 3 pads on the show floor - suggesting that both functions were added at the eleventh hour.

A senior EA source working across playable versions of PS3 sports titles admitted that they were only told about the new pad functions on Monday 8th May. "the Sony conference came as a shock, we didn't expect that" said the source. Current games in development such as Madden and Tiger Woods will now face increased development time due to the need to incorporate the motion sensitive tilt functions.

Metal Gear Solid creator Hideo Kojima intends to do add tilt functions to Metal Gear Solid 4 but said he would rather work on Nintendo Wii."As a game designer, it really is the game hardware that I want to work most on" Kojima said. ...

Via CVG

The Metal Gear mastermind has new plans for Nintendo and Microsoft consoles.

Hideo Kojima today announced that he considered the Metal Gear Solid series to be 'made for for PlayStation platform'.

Kojima Productions will be working on Wii and Xbox 360 titles but, crucially, they won't be featuring Solid Snake. "If I was going to do a game on Wii or Xbox 360, I would do a completely different game - not Metal Gear Solid" said Kojima.

Kojima also went on to say that MGS 4 will have important online elements and will use the motion sensing properties of the Dual Shock 3 pad. Taking a swipe at pre rendered PS3 demos currently doing the rounds at E3, Kojima confirmed that the new MGS4 trailer is completely real time "one thing I want you to know is that these cinematics are done in real time on the demo kit". ...