Via Eurogamer

Nintendo has finally shredded the wraps around Shigeru Miyamoto's new Mario game. It's called Super Mario Galaxy and it uses the Wii's freestyle controller to allow Mario to run, jump, catch hold of shooting stars using the pointer, and flick objects at enemies on rotating worlds.

As you may already have read, Nintendo's also planning to release Zelda: Twilight Princess in Wii and GameCube versions - the latter shorn of the gesture and pointer control options, and also devoid of widescreen - with both due out on the same day as the console during Q4 2006.

Also on show during Nintendo's pre-E3 conference were Excite-Truck, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, Warioware: Smooth Moves, Fire Emblem, Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles, Sonic Wild Fire (also referred to as Hyper Sonic at one point), and several original titles.

Those included Ubisoft's FPS game Red Steel, one called Necro-Nesia, Nintendo title Project HAMMER, which is what it sounds like, and Wii Sports, the focal point of several demonstrations. Sports includes tennis, baseball and golf games with stylised bobblehead-esque characters, all played using the freestyle controller. During a demo, Miyamoto was racing back and forward across the stage to return forehands and backhands, showing how you can serve, lob and apply top-spin.

Many of the games were shown as CG videos, or in some form of video - and there was also a crowd-pleasing introduction featuring Miyamoto in full conductor's get-up using the wand like a baton to control an orchestra, whose music soared and slowed to reflect the speed and character of his movement.

What's more, Nintendo said there would be 27 games playable on its stand tomorrow, as well as many more on video.

For more on Nintendo's conference, check out our walkthrough of the important points, including depthier looks at how some of the games work, or dive directly into our archive of live-text commentary, delivered line by gasp by line by rubbish joke during the conference this morning. We'll have video on Eurogamer TV as soon as humanly possible. ...

Via Eurogamer

Nintendo DS owners can look forward to a handful of potential blockbuster first party titles over the coming year, with the Japanese company revealing the likes of Diddy Kong Racing, Yoshi's Island 2 and Starfox during the latter stages of its pre-E3 conference this morning, with more on Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, recently shown during GDC.

We caught a quick glimpse of an updated DS version of Diddy Kong Racing, Rare's fondly remembered N64-era Mario Kart clone. Using roughly identical-looking mechanics as Mario Kart DS (and clean, impressive 3D visuals), this looks like being another obvious big-hitter for the legion of karting fans, particularly if it includes the same Wi-Fi functionality.

Also shown off briefly was an updated version of Final Fantasy III, sprucing up the gameplay and graphics of the ageing RPG classics in ways that should give Square-Enix lovers palpitations.

Zelda, meanwhile, will "pick up from where Wind Waker left off," and using the same cute cel-shaded visual style that caused such a stir a few years back. The brief gameplay footage showed touch control battles, with players loosing off cannons on board their ship, and a scaled-down isometric viewpoint for the main dungeon exploration.

But that's not all - also announced (but not given any airtime) were the likes of Mario Vs DK: March of the Minis, Yoshi's Island 2, Starfox DS, DK King of Swing DS, Mario Hoops 3 on 3, Touch Generations, Hotel Dusk: Room 215, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Blue Rescue Team (available as Red Rescue Team on GBA), Elite Beat Agents (the Western take on Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan!), and Chibi Robo: Park Patrol.

In total, 100 new DS games are promised, but Nintendo wasn't giving much away in terms of release dates, except to say that they're all coming "this year" according to the accompanying press release. In all, a pretty busy time in prospect for DS owners, and plenty of big names to look forward to among a clutch of innovative unknowns. ...

Via Eurogamer

Speaking at Nintendo's pre-E3 press conference, Nintendo's Reggie Fils-Aime has confirmed that two versions of long awaited Zelda game Twilight Princess are in development - one for GameCube and one for Wii, which will of course make use of the remote controller.

Fils-Aimes described it as "by far the best Zelda game we've ever made," before handing over the controls for a real-time demonstration of exactly why that is.

The game uses the analogue 'nunchuck' attachment to control Link's movement, with items assigned to the wand's d-pad. Targeting is achieved by holding the Z button, and there's a fairy on the screen to keep constant track of your movements with the wand, making sure you don't end up pointing at the ceiling when something's biting your legs, for example.

Attacking is a matter of pressing the B button or moving the wand in a circular motion to perform the spin attack, and jabbing or flicking the wand makes Link perform a shield strike, knocking enemies off guard and leaving them prone to a more serious kicking.

Putting the sword aside and moving onto the bow, you can point the wand where you want to aim, and a targeting reticule appears. If you move the wand outside of that reticule, the camera circles your target.

When you draw back the bow to fire, the speaker in the wand - yes, there's a speaker - lets you hear the sting pulling taught, and when you fire the arrow, you'll hear it and feel it fly from the wand towards your target on screen. The whole thing played out beautifully and looks like a really impressive use of the new technology.

The remainder of the demo, brief as it was, was filled with more examples of sword and bow battles, and how the wand can also be used for fishing - in exactly the way you'd expect, except with fewer maggots, probably.

Visually, the game looks pretty stunning, but as Nintendo kept repeating after almost every game they showed, Wii is not about what you see, but what you feel. Expect more updates once we've had a feel of some Zelda Wii on the show floor. ...

Via Eurogamer

Speaking at Nintendo's pre-E3 press conference, Nintendo's Reggie Fils-Aime has confirmed that two versions of long awaited Zelda game Twilight Princess are in development - one for GameCube and one for Wii, which will of course make use of the remote controller.

Fils-Aimes described it as "by far the best Zelda game we've ever made," before handing over the controls for a real-time demonstration of exactly why that is.

The game uses the analogue 'nunchuck' attachment to control Link's movement, with items assigned to the wand's d-pad. Targeting is achieved by holding the Z button, and there's a fairy on the screen to keep constant track of your movements with the wand, making sure you don't end up pointing at the ceiling when something's biting your legs, for example.

Attacking is a matter of pressing the B button or moving the wand in a circular motion to perform the spin attack, and jabbing or flicking the wand makes Link perform a shield strike, knocking enemies off guard and leaving them prone to a more serious kicking.

Putting the sword aside and moving onto the bow, you can point the wand where you want to aim, and a targeting reticule appears. If you move the wand outside of that reticule, the camera circles your target.

When you draw back the bow to fire, the speaker in the wand - yes, there's a speaker - lets you hear the sting pulling taught, and when you fire the arrow, you'll hear it and feel it fly from the wand towards your target on screen. The whole thing played out beautifully and looks like a really impressive use of the new technology.

The remainder of the demo, brief as it was, was filled with more examples of sword and bow battles, and how the wand can also be used for fishing - in exactly the way you'd expect, except with fewer maggots, probably.

Visually, the game looks pretty stunning, but as Nintendo kept repeating after almost every game they showed, Wii is not about what you see, but what you feel. Expect more updates once we've had a feel of some Zelda Wii on the show floor. ...

Via Engadget

If there was one highlight of Nintendo's press conference earlier today, it was the Wii Remote. While Sony showed off what games on the PS3 would look like, Nintendo's focus was on what they would feel like. So, it's not surprising that, from the moment a tux-clad Shigeru Miyamoto bounded onstage and conducted a virtual orchestra using the remote, to a climactic tennis game, the unique Wii controller was the centerpiece of the show. So, what did we learn about the Wii Remote today that we didn't already know? For one thing, Nintendo confirmed that the remote does indeed include a speaker, which is used mainly to provide ambient sound connected to actions: fire an arrow, and you'll hear the bowstring being pulled right in your hand. There's also a microphone for voice-controlled gaming. The Wii Remote also includes motion sensors in both the nunchuk and the trigger controller, allowing both left and right hands to act independently and direct onscreen actions. While using the Remote may not be as intuitive and simple as Nintendo's execs want us to believe, one thing's certain: it definitely looks like a fun way to play golf. Or baseball. Or tennis. Or the drums. Or drive a car, truck or plane. Nintendo also had an answer for anyone who isn't quite ready for the Wii Remote: the Wii Classic Controller. We'll stick with the Wiimote for now, but will pick off one of these for when we just have to kick it old skool

Screenshot Via Comments ...

Via Engadget

At Microsoft's E3 presentation today, one of the most eagerly awaited pieces of infomation concerned the company's plans to offer an external HD DVD player for the Xbox 360. And the company delivered -- sort of. Yes, they showed off a slide with a picture of an external player designed to match the 360. And the slide did state that the player will be available "this holiday." And, yes, that slide included images of HD DVD flicks that it will presumably be able to play. But the crucial details, such as a ship date, pricing, and, perhaps most important, info on whether or not the player will support HDCP or HDMI, were nowhere to be found. ...

Via Engadget

We've been hearing about the camera for the Xbox 360 for so long, that we almost forgot it still hasn't been released. Well, Microsoft finally came clean about the cam, and gave it an official name at the company's E3 event today. The Xbox Live Vision camera will be available this fall, and will allow users to use their 360 for video-conferencing, video-emails and gamer picture customization. Microsoft also announced the Racing Wheel controller for driving games, and a wireless headset, which presumably will bring joy to parents everywhere. All accessories are expected to be available this fall. ...

StrmnNrmn posted this update in our PSP News Forum

Ok, brief update time! I've been working on rewriting the dynamic recompiler from scratch for the PSP. A few months ago I started writing a PSP port of the original dynarec, but I quickly realised that I'd need to take a whole new approach if I wanted it to fit in memory on the PSP. If you've not heard of dynarec before it's basically a way of speeding up the emulator by recompiling the rom's code for the target platform (i.e. the PSP) rather than interpreting instructions one by one.

I'm basically using the same approach that HP used on their Dynamo dynamic optimiser (I talk about it a bit more here: http://strmnnrmn.blogspot.com/). The cool thing about this approach compared to my original attempt is that it uses far less memory - I think I will be able to get it running in less than 1MB ram, compared to around 10MB that the PC version used.

I've still got a lot of work to do before the dynarec is actually usable, but I'm hoping to release another build sometime over the weekend with a bunch of additional graphics fixes. In the mean time I'll try to post a few more progress updates on the site above.

...

Via Gamesindustry

Nintendo's pre-E3 press conference has revealed new details of what we can expect from the Wii and its remote controller - but there's still no word on a price point or release date.

"If all you want is next-generation, you're in the wrong place."

So spoke Nintendo's Reggie Fils-Aime in his opening presentation at today's pre-E3 press conference. "It's not just next, it's what's absolutely new," he continued. "Playing is no longer just about looks, it's about the feel."

And, as far as Nintendo's concerned, it's about the feel of the Wii's unique new remote controller. As shown in a series of video clips and on-stage demos, the controller can be used as a drum stick, a fishing rod, a golf club and a conductor's baton. Or, to give just a few more examples, to play tennis, fire guns, or control Mario.

Yes, Nintendo's mascot will most definitely be making an appearance on Wii, along with fellow classic character Zelda. According to Fils-Aime, two versions of the long awaited Twilight Princess will be released - one for GameCube and one for Wii.

It was at this point that yet another unique feature of the Wii controller was revealed - it has a speaker. This means that when the player is using it to fire an arrow in Twilight Princess, for example, he or she will hear the bow string go taut, and the sound will travel from the controller to the screen before impact occurs.

Other big name games glimpsed during the conference included Final Fantasy Chrystal Chronicles, next-gen Sonic the Hedgehog and Rayman, plus Tony Hawk's Downhill Jam. A pair of Ubisoft representatives were on hand to show off Red Steel, a first person shooter that makes use of the Wii's 'nunchuk' controller as well as the remote.

In total, Fils-Aime said, there will be 27 Nintendo Wii games playable on the show floor when E3 begins tomorrow. But he declined to reveal how many games will be available at console launch - or details of when precisely it will go on sale and how much it will cost. He did confirm that the Wii will launch during the fourth quarter of this year, but as far as further details go, he simply stated: "We believe it's in our interest to keep the details private."

Fils-Aime went on to defend the name Nintendo has chosen for its next-gen console, beginning: "First, we want to thank everyone who wrote good things about it the day you heard it. Both of you."

"At first every distinctive name sounds strange," Fils-Aime continued, illustrating his point with examples such as Lexus, Ikea and Google. Wii, he said, means "just what it sounds like... It's the sound of the future."

Nintendo president Satoru Iwata was also on hand to discuss the Wii, although instead of responding to criticisms of the name he took the opportunity to reaffirm the company's commitment to inclusive gaming.

"When I became president, we decided on a new goal for our company: expanding the total number of people who play games... The solution is to reinvent the relationship between player and game, the game controller interface," Iwata said, in a speech which heavily echoed the one he made at the Tokyo Games Show last September. But despite the emphasis on bringing new players to gaming, Iwata was also careful to observe that "core gamers always represent our most important audience."

And if core gamers are frustrated by problems such as long load times, Iwata went on to argue, "How can we expect mass market to put up with it?" So, the Wii's Opera browser and Virtual Console games saved to ROM will take just a few seconds to load.

Iwata then showed off another hardware feature, which means the console is constantly connected even when it's switched off. So, for example, a player might wake up to find a new in-game Animal Crossing item has been delivered during the night. The Wii, Iwata, said, is "the system that never sleeps... What we are aiming for is a system that is new every day."

Following a lengthy presentation on the past and future of the Nintendo DS - of which more news to follow - Fils-Aime returned to conclude the event, and express his thoughts on how Nintendo's latest offerings will fare at this year's show.

"The bottom line of every E3 is simple - what's hot and what's not. It's hot if it's disruptive, it's not if it's predictable," he said.

"Wii and the DS represent the same thing: risk. Risk allows progress. We don't run from risk, we run to it. Change is good."

To finish, Fils-Aime encouraged all attendees to play the games on the show floor, stating: "Seeing is just an impression. Playing is believing." ...