Thank you Nintendo

Wow! Have you seen the Smash Bros. Nintendo Direct from yesterday? If you haven't, don't read this post. Also if you haven't seen the Nintendo World Championship either, don't read this post. Of course, I will have both videos at the bottom of the post if you want to check them out there! Then, you can come back and read my post if you want.
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The Smash Bros Nintendo Direct yesterday was very cool. Yes, we were spoiled a little a day early with some info about the Direct but that didn't ruin the experience for me. Ryu and Lucas looked great in action. And I had no idea about the new stages or the youtube & tourney stuff thats coming later. For me, the Smash Direct was a complete success. It made me want to play Smash again. I downloaded the Kirby stage and I play to download Ryu and Lucas as soon as I can. Nintendo is keeping the Smash Bros hype alive. Its pretty amazing.

Though, not as amazing as the Nintendo World Championship!

You know, I thought I might be bored by some of the Championship. So I figured that I would only watch some of it and check out more of it later. I was so wrong. The event was not boring at all. Nintendo grabbed my attention right away by showing new Yoshi Woolly World footage and THEN revealing that Mother 1 (aka Earthbound 1) was coming to North America that night!!! My reaction: OH MY GOODNESS. WOW. I was so shocked and amazed. Nintendo blew my mind. I thought that the first Earthbound would never come to the U.S. This is a game that has, for a long time, been a Japan exclusive. So its just amazing that Earthbound Beginnings is on the eshop right now. I still can't believe it. And I hope that I'll be able to get it very soon too!!

But these revelations were only the start of the Championship. From there, Nintendo kept surprising me by the games that they had the competitors playing. The most surprising was Blastball but it wasn't the best game of the show by any means. Blast Ball looks neat but I suspect Nintendo is holding back their better games for tomorrow. No, the game that stole the show was SUPER MARIO MAKER. That was just amazing. The people at Nintendo HQ are just brilliant and created some insanely hard levels for the final two guys to play. It was fantastic to watch and it made me want Super Mario Maker even more. I can't wait to find out what levels I can make (and what other people make).

So, yes, we watched the entire Nintendo World Championship. And it was amazing. It was one of the best Nintendo fan moments I've ever had. I can't even imagine what it must have been like for the people who were lucky enough to be there. Wow.

Thank you Nintendo! You're the best!

Here are the two videos like I promised. Enjoy them for the first time or watch them again:

I'll be back tomorrow with my impressions of the Nintendo Digital Event!

You Shot My Hat Off You Dirty Robot

I've talked about Steamworld Heist before (a couple of times actually). But with the recently revealed 3DS screenshots AND the new Zombie Vikings VS Steamworld Heist video, I felt like it was time to talk about this game again. Plus this is one of my most anticipated games for 3DS/Wii U AND it'll be at E3. Seems like a good time to talk about it yes? Thats what I thought!



In the recent Zombie Vikings VS Steamworld Heist video I mentioned (I'll include it at the end of this post), Heist was shown off some more. What was shown blew my mind completely.

Steamworld Heist, in case you didn't read my other blog entries, is a side scrolling turn-based strategy game. You play robots, outerspace robots, who invade other ships to get water. These robots are obsessed with water! As you can see in the above screenshot, you'll face off against other robots and you'll have some pretty big ships to explore and find stuff in.

My favorite part, still, is that you can shoot off the hats of the other robots. You get to collect the hats too. The robots are obsessed with water AND hats. Maybe not in that order.



Another cool thing about Steamworld Heist, shown off in the screenshot above, are Trick Shots in the game. The player is rewarded when they pull off tricky shots (aka bouncing a bullet off a wall and getting it to hit an enemy). You see, while Steamworld Heist's battles are turn-based, its firing mechanic is hands-on. You control your robot's guns and have to carefully aim at the enemy. Its all skill based. There's no luck or rolling the dice in this game. As Yoda would say " You do or you do not; there is no try."



Also: look at those graphics! Steamworld Heist looks amazing on the 3DS. It also looks great in HD.

Check out this Zombie Vikings Vs Steamworld Heist video:

For some more 3DS screenshots, check out this article at Image & Form's blog: http://imageform.se/first-look-at-steamworld-heist-on-3ds-one-liner-winners/. Thats where I got all the pics for this article!

And keep your eyes peeled on Image & Form's website and their twitter (@ImageForm) for more information about Steamworld Heist! Including a release date and more pictures and the Steamworld Heist Ambassador contests! It's all VERY awesome!

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I'll be back on Monday with my recap/opinion of the Smash Direct & the Nintendo World Championship!

E3 week is almost here!!!!! In case you didn't know, I'm extremely excited.

One Week Till E3!

E3 is next week! One week till E3. Tomorrow will be one week till Nintendo's Digital Event. The truth is, as far as E3 is concerned, Nintendo is all I care about. I use to be a Sony fan. I use to be a Microsoft fan too. Right now, I'm just a Nintendo fan. So all my focus is on Nintendo's E3 events.

In fact, I plan to make next week's blog entries all about Nintendo and E3. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday will all see blog entries about Nintendo/E3 from me.

On Monday next week, I'll talk about Smash DLC and Nintendo's World Championship. Both are happening on Sunday.

Tuesday will be my recap/reaction to Nintendo's Digital Event.

Wednesday will be my Treehouse Live reactions.

Thursday's blog entry will probably be a bit late because I'm going to see Jurassic World that day too. But that blog entry will be about other peoples reaction to the Digital Event and Treehouse. If you have a comment about Nintendo's E3 next week, please send it to me on next Wednesday's blog entry or tweet me @df2506!

And Friday will be my final reaction to Nintendo's E3 this year. Did Nintendo do a great job? What was my favorite game? Etc.

Because of this, there will be no Comic book reviews next week on my other blog. But don't worry, I'll make up for that the week after that. June 22 to the 26 will be about my comic blog and this blog will take a break!

I'll be back on Friday to preview an indie game! And then next week is all about Nintendo & E3.
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The E3 picture above was found on Google.

Nintendo Direct Micro Thoughts

Earlier this week, we had a Nintendo Direct. It was a very small Nintendo Direct. In fact, Nintendo called it a Nintendo Micro. The Direct came out of nowhere. Sure, Nintendo of Japan had a regular Direct the previous day but it didn't seem like North America would hear from Nintendo again till E3. Well, that was wrong! And it was amazing the amount of stuff that Nintendo packed into the Direct.

First of all, we gotta talk about Chibi Robo. Not only did Nintendo announce that Chibi was going to get an all-new platforming adventure of the 3DS but they'd be releasing the game with an amiibo too. Take a look at this package:


Doesn't that look cool? And the actual game itself was awesome. I like how Chibi Robo uses his plug as a whip and a grappling hook. The game looks very unique and fun. It may be a game I'll want to buy sooner or later.



Wait a second. Let me just stop for a second and talk about the brilliance of Bill Trinen. I like Reggie and Iwata but I think Bill should just host all of the Directs. Bill is a really funny guy and always makes the directs super entertaining. I remember when he hosted the Tomodachi Direct. Thats still my favorite Nintendo Direct. It was so funny and entertaining. It sold me on Tomodachi Life. I think this Nintendo Direct Micro is my second favorite Direct ever. Bill was brilliant as Micro Bill. And it definitely fit with the theme of not only Chibi Robo, but the Micro robot game introduced in the Direct and the smaller Pokemon game. Trinen is just a fantastic host!



Also introduced in this Direct was a new Dr. Mario! Dr. Mario Miracle Cure has Dr. Mario, Dr. Luigi, and a new Miracle Cure mode. It looks like an excellent downloadable 3DS eshop game. It even has online multiplayer and download play! Wow.



Project Treasure was mentioned during the Direct but it was shown in a separate video. Treasure looks like a really interesting Wii U game. Its something very different for the system. Hopefully we'll see more about it at E3.



I'm so excited for the Nintendo World Championship and E3. Bill furthered that hype in the video! The tournament should be really exciting. And we're going to see more 3DS and Wii U games revealed at E3.

I didn't talk about everything in the video. For such a small video, man, Nintendo packed it with a lot of games. If you haven't watched it already or you want to watch it again, check it out now:

Not much longer till E3! I'll be covering E3 here with my opinions/summaries of the Championship and Nintendo's revelations! And you should check out Shigeru Reviews for all your E3 news!

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All of the above pictures were taken from Google and are copyright Nintendo!

OlliOlli (Wii U/3DS) Review

I've never really been a skateboarding fan. I played Tony Hawk back in the PS1 era, but didn't get into it much. When I won a copy of OlliOlli on twitter recently, I thought that was cool but wasn't expecting much. Did my opinion change? How is OlliOlli for the Wii U and 3DS?

When you buy OlliOlli for the 3DS or the Wii U, you get a copy for the version of the game you didn't buy. I love that Nintendo is bringing crossbuy to their systems. Unfortunately, you can't give someone else your 3DS or Wii U code because you just get a free discount on the other eshop for the game. Still, this is really nice of the developer and Nintendo. There is no crossplay between the two versions, though, and thats a shame. Its too bad you can't start playing the game on one system and carry your save over to the other game. Oh well.

OlliOlli plays great on the Wii U. The analog stick is very precise and works well for skating and tricks. The 3DS version is a little less precise but works well enough. On both systems, this game is hard. Unless you're a master at games like this, you'll be falling to the ground a lot. That said, OlliOlli is pretty fun. I enjoyed when I did the levels right and I had a good laugh when the character fell to the ground. The character animation when falling looks realistic and comical at the same time. The game is a bit skimpy on modes though. There are several levels play to in but it would have been cool if there had been a survival mode or some kind of two-player mode. There are online challenges to get a better score in and that is neat.

This game's graphics are pretty simple. OlliOlli is a very retro game, but I like that. And, as I said previously, the character animations look really good.

I didn't care for OlliOlli's music, but thats just a personal taste. Sound effect wise, the game is pretty good.

OlliOlli doesn't reinvent the skateboarding genre, but its a fun game. The skateboarding can be tricky, but there's fun to be had in falling too. I do wish the game had more modes. Still, if you like skateboarding or just games that don't take themselves too seriously, OlliOlli is worth checking out. Plus, you get two versions of the game for a great price. Can't beat that deal.

My Score: 7/10

Thanks to @rdelvillano on twitter for my copy of OlliOlli. 

All of the above pictures were taken from Google.