Nintendo closed everything out by sharing an Online Event with the world on Tuesday. This marks the second year in a row that they have decided to forgo a formal press event in favor of a more personal presentation online. This is an interesting decision because we know that their last year’s performance has been sub-par. One would wonder if they would experiment with a full press event to at least see if it makes a difference. We’ll never really know how they make up their minds about these things.
With all that said, the event was a success. They spent approximately 45 minutes showing off upcoming titles. Here are some important things that we learned:
1. Super Smash Brothers WiiU and 3DS had better sell like crazy!
Super Smash Brothers will release for the 3DS on October 3rd and for the WiiU this holiday season. Nintendo showed a lot of titles off during their event, but very few of them will be coming out in 2014. As a result, they are putting all of their eggs in the Smash basket this year.
The good news is that Super Smash Brothers looks brutally good. The cast of characters is huge, the visuals are astonishing, and the fighting looks tight and well done. It is safe to say that it will help Nintendo sell more units, but it is impossible to know how much of a sales boost it will provide.
2. If Smash Brothers doesn’t help the WiiU there is always 2015.
The vast majority of the games announced at their event will be coming in 2015.
- Mario Maker – a game that allows players to create and share their own Mario levels.
- Star Fox (working title)
- Project Giant Robot – a game where players create giant robots and fight with them.
- Project Guard – a tower defense game
- Splatoon – An interesting 4v4 multiplayer shooter where players squirt each other (and the world around them with different colors of paint.
- Yoshi’s Woolly World – a Yoshi themed follow-up to Kirby’s Epic Yarn
- Kirby and the Rainbow Curse – a claymation Kirby game
- Mario Party 10 – A new Mario Party game
- “Zelda U” – The next installment in the Legend of Zelda Franchise
This is an amazing mix of established properties and new products that should give people thinking about buying a WiiU (or who already own one) hope for the future.
3. The next Zelda game will have an open world (and will likely be the best looking Nintendo game ever).
Nintendo formally announced their development of the next installment in the Zelda series. Eiji Ounuma, the game’s producer, revealed during the presentation that he had always aspired to make a Zelda game with a vast open world. He lamented that they never had the hardware power to pull that off and had to produce very linear and closed in adventures. This is all being corrected in the newest version. Players will explore a vast open world full of possibilities for exploration.
They showed a trailer that is reportedly game play as opposed to a premade video. You can take a look at it here. Go ahead. I’ll wait!
Good wasn’t it? I know. We can’t wait for it either.
4. Nintendo will have its own NFC figurines similar to the Skylanders and Disney Infinity lines.
They will be called amiibos and will feature Nintendo characters like Mario, Link, Samus, and Princess Peach. The biggest difference between Nintendo’s figures and other figurines is that amiibos will work as supplemental products across multiple games in the Nintendo lineup like Mario Kart 8, Mario Party 10, and Super Smash Brothers.
We’ll be talking about them more over the next week or so. Keeps your eyes on Engaged Family Gaming for more information!
5. There is more to come.
Nintendo was clearly holding back information about their games. We still don’t know the entire roster for Super Smash Brothers. We don’t know how the amiibo figures will work inside Mario Kart 8. We don’t even know if the character in the Zelda trailer was Link or not. Nintendo even went so far as to announce another major IP two days later at a private press event. I am all but certain we will be having small details sent our way for the rest of the year and beyond.
What about you? What did you think about what you saw? Sound off in the comments!
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