Most Recent: Switch

If Link can cook, so can you in the latest Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild mini-trailer

Posted on September 21, 2016 by John Scalzo

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Link is going to have plenty of dinner options when The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is released for the Wii U and Nintendo NX next year. In the game, players will be able to find food and cook it to restore Hearts, but certain foods will contain special ingredients that can temporarily boost Link’s resistance or stamina. Some of these superfoods are on display in the latest mini-trailer for Breath of the Wild:

To give you an idea of how food conveys bonuses in Breath of the Wild, Link received ten minutes of “Cold Resistance” after eating a Spicy Pepper in the trailer. But not all foods are recommended by Hyrule’s equivalent of the Food and Drug Administration. If Link adds a Hylian Shroom to his pot, he’ll scoop out a bowl of “Dubious Food” and receive the message: “Eating it won’t hurt you… probably.”

I don’t think Nintendo would send Link on a bad trip… but you never know. Maybe his buddy Mario can offer him some advice on the proper preparation of mushrooms.

Posted in News, Switch, Wii U | Tagged

Pokemon Company CEO confirms Pokemon game is in development for the Nintendo NX

Posted on September 20, 2016 by John Scalzo

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A Pokemon game is officially coming to the Nintendo NX.

Speaking to The Wall Street Journal, Tsunekazu Ishihara, the CEO of The Pokemon Company, confirmed that the developer is hard at work on a game for Nintendo’s next console. “We will make games for the NX,” he said.

Ishihara’s announcement comes on the heels of a rumor published by MCV in August that said Nintendo and Game Freak plan to launch a Pokemon game for the NX in 2017. The executive didn’t discuss release timing for the first Pokemon game on the NX, but it’s reasonable to assume that Nintendo wants it to be available as close to the console’s launch as possible.

However, the executive dropped a second bombshell by also lending further credence to the persistent rumor that the NX is a console/handheld hybrid, telling the newspaper: “The NX is trying to change the concept of what it means to be a home console device or a handheld device.”

With the NX scheduled to launch in March 2017, Nintendo is widely expected to announce more details about the console sometime soon. But the exact “when” of that announcement will probably remain a mystery for a bit longer.

Posted in News, Switch | Tagged

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild release date possibly leaked by Nintendo France

Posted on September 17, 2016 by John Scalzo

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Leaks, especially when they’re connected to Nintendo, aren’t always a reliable and accurate indicator of reality. However, Nintendo France may have accidentally outed a release date for The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild earlier this week.

Yesterday, the Nintendo France site displayed a March 4, 2017 release date for the three Amiibo figures in the upcoming Zelda: Breath of the Wild series. The consolemaker quickly amended the website, but not before a Reddit user captured a screenshot of the page.

There’s a chance that Nintendo France was using a placeholder date on their website, but it’s equally possible that the company plans to launch the Amiibo figures and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (and, by extension, the NX console) on March 4. Each step in this chain requires its own grain of salt, but Nintendo has previously said that the NX will launch in March, so it’s not that far-fetched. Though we also have to consider the possibility this release date only applies to the Amiibo figures. It’s not uncommon for the company to launch Amiibo figures before the game they’re connected to, and Nintendo could be planning to launch Breath of the Wild at a later date.

Nintendo did not respond to media outlets that asked for a comment on the possible release date leak.

Let’s hope Nintendo makes an official announcement related to the NX/Zelda: Breath of the Wild soon. The suspense is killing me.

Posted in News, Switch, Wii U | Tagged

The Big List of Nintendo NX Games: September 2016 Update

Posted on September 9, 2016 by John Scalzo

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I think we’ve reached the point in the pre-release hype cycle where Nintendo fans believe they can make the consolemaker reveal more information about the NX through sheer force of will. And with PAX West happening literally in Nintendo’s backyard, it seemed like a great time to officially pull back the curtain. But the west coast’s biggest gaming convention came and went without a peep from Nintendo (though they had a lot to say about Nindies on the 3DS and Wii U).

So now those same desperate fans turn their attention towards next week’s Tokyo Game Show. Surely, the company must be planning a blowout presentation for Japan’s premiere gaming convention… right? They have to; there’s only six months to go! But Nintendo’s presence at the Tokyo Game Show, if they attend at all, has always been low-key, and there’s the distinct possibility that most of the NX’s secrets will remain hidden until we have it in our hands this March.

Those secrets were alluded to recently in a new round of rumors that focused on the console’s inner workings and its controller. According to several “inside sources,” the NX Controller will closely resemble a Wii Remote, with motion control features and force feedback. However, the controller might also have a “Split D-Pad” and a Share Button, which should generate comparisons to the DualShock 4.

Much more surprising is the (second) round of rumors that state the NX will use cartridges instead of optical discs. This would be a major break from the last two decades of console manufacturing tradition, but it does lend credence to the console/handheld hybrid rumors. Or maybe it’s all a part of Nintendo’s plot to make the NX appeal to “people who like games” and “moms.”

So while we still don’t know anything new about the NX itself, at least we recently learned more about its upcoming lineup of games. (more…)

Posted in Features, Switch, Top Story |

Bplus announces Tank It! for Nintendo’s NX and the PC

Posted on September 5, 2016 by John Scalzo

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Even though we are roughly six months away from the launch of the NX, Nintendo has confirmed exactly two pieces of information about their next console… 1) It exists, and 2) The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild will be released sometime next year.

Thankfully, third partiy publishers are going ahead and announcing their NX projects anyway. Case in point, Austrian developer Bplus recently announced that they’ll bring their next game, Tank It!, to the NX in 2017. Described as a “war simulation game” with an “anti-war” message, Bplus also plans to release Tank It! for the PC in 2016:

Tank it! is a realistic and bloody war simulation game designed to show how brutal and dangerous war really is… that it is no good… that countless civilians are killed as collateral damage.

In Tank it! you command a drone to remotely control a heavy tank. You receive the mission to travel to remote villages, find and destroy the target military camps and eliminate all terrorists. But as in real life, there are many civilians in the villages, as well. The terrorists and civilians alike are at the player’s mercy. It is up to the player alone to decide how to handle this mission.

Bplus has previously developed a number of games for Nintendo’s eShop service including Bit Boy!! (2009) and Bit Boy!! Arcade (2014).

Posted in News, PC, Switch |

Rumor: Another insider is saying the NX will use cartridges instead of optical discs

Posted on September 2, 2016 by John Scalzo

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Citing “people familiar with the matter,” The Wall Street Journal is claiming that games for Nintendo’s NX console will come on cartridges.

This isn’t the first time we’ve heard that the NX will use cartridges instead of the currently-much-more-common optical discs (Eurogamer made a similar claim in July), but if the console is also meant to function as a handheld, it makes a certain amount of sense.

The Wall Street Journal argues that the near-indestructibility of cartridges is something the family-friendly Nintendo is very interested in:

Industry watchers said cartridges were a reasonable choice for Nintendo’s next-generation system, code-named NX, because the company targets a wider range of consumers than Sony or Microsoft. Nintendo’s core fans include small children, who might scratch discs but find cartridges tougher to damage. Cartridges also allow games to load faster, are harder to copy and can be mass-produced faster than discs, they said.

The Wii U currently uses a Nintendo-specific flavor of Blu-ray, so if the NX were to use cartridges instead of discs, it’s unlikely that the NX would have any kind of backwards compatibility features, which have become a standard part of Nintendo’s consoles over the years.

Nintendo is widely expected to officially unveil the NX sometime this month. But bear in mind that even that is just a rumor at this point.

Posted in News, Switch |

New Zelda Amiibo coming December 2: 8-Bit Link, OoT Link, Wind Waker Link/Zelda 2-Pack

Posted on September 1, 2016 by John Scalzo

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While the crazed fervor for Amiibo figures has died down considerably since their 2014 debut, the collectible toys are still quite popular with fans, and Nintendo doesn’t look to be slowing down production on new figures anytime soon.

Earlier this morning, Nintendo announced plans to celebrate The Legend of Zelda‘s 30th anniversary with four new Amiibo figures, all of which will be available on December 2. An NES-inspired “8-Bit Link” figure will certainly get fans talking, and it’ll be joined on store shelves by another Link based on his Ocarina of Time appearance, and a two-pack that includes both Toon Link and Zelda from The Wind Waker.

These Amiibo figures will feature the same functionality as the other Link, Toon Link, and Zelda figures from the Super Smash Bros. series, but they’ll also provide special functionality in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild when it launches next year.

The exact specifics of this special functionality will be announced at a later date.

Posted in 3DS, News, Switch, Wii U | Tagged , ,

Bombs away! Link paraglides in the latest Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild mini-trailer

Posted on September 1, 2016 by John Scalzo

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I think Nintendo might have outdone themselves with the latest mini-trailer for The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.

Link takes up paragliding in the new video clip, which was posted to Nintendo’s Twitter account yesterday. But rather than leisurely leap off a mountain and glide to safety, Link delivers death from above by dropping Bombs on a mob of enemies and using an exploding Arrow to get a bit of an updraft:

That’s just beautiful… and I also love the superhero-esque three-point landing right on top of the remaining mooks. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild will be released for the Wii U and NX sometime in 2017. Probably after Nintendo releases a few dozen more mini-trailers.

Posted in News, Switch, Wii U | Tagged