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Nintendo of America VP Cammie Dunaway thinks the Nintendo DS is going to keep on getting bigger in America. (And no, not just literally.) Speaking with VentureBeat, the executive highlighted the tremendous success of the Nintendo handheld. “We had our best year ever, selling 11.2 million units. That has never been done by any game platform ever.”

Yet, in spite of its success, Dunaway believes there’s still a lot more to be done with the US market. Dunaway notes that — in terms of market penetration — “in Japan, one in two consumers has a DS.” But in America? “It is one in four. So we have room to grow.” Essentially, if Japan is the benchmark for America, Nintendo must sell twice as many DS systems as it already has.

If there’s one thing we’ve learned not to doubt this generation, it’s Nintendo’s ability to sell systems and make money. In January, the company was able to sell over 400,000 units in America — and that figure is likely to grow with the introduction of the DSi XL in March. Perhaps we need to add even more money to this already-overused JPG.

[Via Edge]

Nintendo’s Dunaway says DS has ‘room to grow’ in US market originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 04 Mar 2010 21:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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SAN FRANCISCO — Did you know that before they made Star Fox, the folks at Argonaut did a 3-D game on the black-and-white Game Boy called X?

Well, you know that if you read Power-Up, currently not available at bookstores nationwide. But since the little technological marvel (it was honest-to-goodness 3-D code) never made it outside of Japan, you’ve probably never played this prototypical Ur-Star Fox. But a sequel to this game is coming to DSiWare, called X-Scape. And it’s made by Q-Games, led by some of the original X team members.

So that’s the history lesson. What’s it like? It’s still a first-person 3-D shooter, with graphics that are clearly meant to resemble the early-nineties virtual reality aesthetic. It has two different types of 3-D shooting environments — open fields that you explore by flying around, with a radar on the lower screen to orient you, and straightforward corridor shooting segments.

You use the touchscreen to move around. The playfield and cursor are shown on the top screen, and you use the lower screen to aim and move — holding the stylus up, down, left and right turns and pushes your craft forward. The D-pad shoots. That’s the long and short of it: The rest of the segments I tried involved flying into “warp gates” to flee a powerful enemy, zapping some lesser foes down a corridor, then messing around in the free-roaming area that followed, chasing after an enemy and shooting it.

I like the concept. I’m not the biggest fan of using the stylus to navigate when I feel like buttons might work just as easily — but I’m happy to try it further and see if I get used to it.

Metal Torrent.
Images courtesy Nintendo

You might be getting the sense that this is a pretty big game, for DSiWare. It is, apparently: Nintendo says it’ll take 10-12 hours to complete.

And what of Metal Torrent? Developed by the arcade-style game masters at Arika, it’s a bullet-hell shooter with a twist. By using your ship’s special weapons, you can turn the screens full of bullets into cubes, which you can collect to bump up your score.

Scoring big and sharing it with your friends is a key feature of this game — not only are there online leaderboards, but you can record, upload, and share your gameplay videos. So if you want to know how the shooter masters get such ridiculous scores, you’ll be able to watch it back and find out.

I had a lot of fun with this demo, too; it’s got that great classic shooter feel and (importantly) isn’t too difficult at first, meaning that even total shooter losers like myself can enjoy it without dying repeatedly.

Now that Disney owns comic book company Marvel, what will become of the video game output of the two companies? Sounds like more Marvel games heading to the Xbox 360 and PS3, more Disney games to the Wii and DS.

Disney CEO Bob Iger said during a quarterly earnings call that the home of Mickey Mouse will publish fewer games for so-called “high-end” platforms. It may release fewer Disney Interactive Studios titles for Microsoft and Sony’s current-gen platforms, as Disney brand games “seem to perform better on the Wii and DS platforms,” according to a report from Computerworld.

“While we’ll continue to make high-end games,” Iger said during yesterday’s call, “we’ll be very judicious in how many we make and which ones we choose.”

Disney’s current “high-end” console slate includes the racing game Split/Second, Pirates of the Caribbean: Armada of the Damned and games based on the new Tron film. On the Wii side, there’s Epic Mickey and forthcoming Toy Story game adaptations.

Disney weighs bringing Marvel games to ‘high-end’ consoles [Computerworld]

Glory of Heracles, the new RPG released last week for the Nintendo DS, feels incredibly familiar. And that’s just fine.

The game takes place in an anime-infused version of ancient Greece. Your amnesiac hero may or may not be Heracles, son of Zeus. But he is, like many of the companions he’ll come to meet along his adventure, immortal. So too, apparently, are the rules of the traditional Japanese role-playing game.

Glory of Heracles is the first game in the series to come to the U.S., but the series began in 1987 in Japan. This latest version feels much like an 80’s RPG: Enemies pop up out of nowhere, thrusting the player into the storied “random battles” of yore. Players pick their characters’ attacks one move at a time, then watch the fight play out with a rousing battle anthem in the background. And the game’s first dungeon is the requisite abandoned mine just outside of town.

And yet this familiarity, somehow, doesn’t breed contempt. It helps that the game throws you tons of combat options right off the bat. Characters start out with nearly a dozen magic and attack options — giving role-playing veterans the immediate ability to start crafting game-breaking battle strategies. Because half the fun of playing role-playing games comes in finding ways to exploit the mechanisms of combat.

Glory of Heracles‘ first nod to this kind of play comes when characters bring down the hammer. Kills that go above and beyond, carving off way more hit points than necessary, grant an “overkill” bonus of extra magic points. A smart tactician can keep characters’ MP brimming by orchestrating each kill so that magic users get the final blow.

What’s striking about Glory of Heracles is the way it seems to cater to two audiences. The game’s by-the-numbers plot, buoyed by strong writing, is ideal for the role-playing newbie. Yet its mechanics feel refined enough to occupy the avid role-player who has already played and replayed Final Fantasy IV and Chrono Trigger.

The game does, of course, introduce a few nods to contemporary gaming. All the menu-oriented busywork can be handled via the stylus and touchscreen. Certain magic attacks can be boosted by completing optional touch screen minigames. Unfortunately, the game utilizes the sort of ugly 3-D scenery that Square Enix insists on shoehorning into most of its Final Fantasy remakes.

Still, the ugly melding of lovely sprites and clunky 3-D models just makes Glory of Heracles feel that much more like the games it’s trying to emulate. It pays fine tribute to its forebears. You’d expect nothing less from the scion of legends.

Images courtesy Nintendo

See Also:

• Japan Sales: Baseball Tops the Charts Again
• Rumor: Final Fantasy IV Sequel Coming to Xbox 360
• Final Fantasy IV Sequel Coming to Wii, Says ESRB
• Hands-On With Final Fantasy IV Cell Phone Sequel
• Square Enix Kills Near Complete Chrono Trigger Fan Project …

Nintendo dominated U.S. videogame sales in December 2009 with record-breaking sales of Nintendo DS and Wii, the NPD Group said Thursday.

Prior to this month, the most units of a single game machine sold in a single month was the DS’ record of 3.04 million in December 2008. Nintendo shattered that record twice this month, moving 3.81 million Wii and 3.31 million DS.

In software sales, Nintendo had four games that sold over one million copies each and one that drew extremely close to a million. Other big sellers during the holiday season were Assassin’s Creed II, Modern Warfare 2 and Left 4 Dead 2.

Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 drew up close to each other, selling roughly 1.3 million units each.

U.S. Videogame Hardware Sales, December 2009

1. Wii 3.81M
2. Nintendo DS 3.31M
3. PlayStation 3 1.36M
4. Xbox 360 1.31M
5. PSP 654.7K
6. PlayStation 2 333.2K

U.S. Top Ten Console Game Sales, December 2009

1. New Super Mario Bros. Wii (Wii, Nintendo) 2.82M
2. Wii Fit Plus (Wii, Nintendo) 2.41M
3. Wii Sports Resort (Wii, Nintendo) 1.79M
4. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (360, Activision) 1.63M
5. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (PS3, Activision) 1.12M
6. Wii Play (Wii, Nintendo) 1.01M
7. Mario Kart Wii (Wii, Nintendo) 936.1K
8. Assassin’s Creed II (360, Ubisoft) 783.1K
9. Left 4 Dead 2 (360, Electronic Arts) 728.5K
10. Mario and Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story (DS, Nintendo) 656.7K

NPD also released a list of the month’s top ten boxed PC games, but did not include the actual number of units sold for each:

1. The Sims 3 (Electronic Arts)
2. World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King Expansion Pack (Blizzard)
3. The Sims 2 Double Deluxe (Electronic Arts)
4. World of Warcraft: Battle Chest (Blizzard)
5. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Activision)
6. World of Warcraft (Blizzard)
7. The Sims 3: World Adventures Expansion Pack (Electronic Arts)
8. Spore (Electronic Arts)
9. Dragon Age: Origins (Electronic Arts)
10. Empire: Total War (Sega)

All in all, it was a healthy month for the industry — in fact, said NPD analyst Anita Frazier in a statement today, it was the industry’s “biggest sales month ever, besting last December by 4%.”

But it wasn’t enough, she said, to offset the year-on-year decline in 2009, — full-year sales were 8% less than in 2008.

This month also marks the first time that PlayStation 3 has sold over 1 million units in a single month, and drawing up even with Xbox 360 is a big deal for Sony — it’s setting its own personal best record this month, while sales of Microsoft’s console are down versus December 2008.

Call of Duty, says NPD, is now the fourth-best selling game of all time.

Finally, one more data point for you: NPD says that Madden NFL 10 sold 1.5 million units across all platforms.

I may have more analysis later as we continue discussion of this massive month.

Image: Nintendo

See Also:

• November NPD: Modern Warfare Shifts 6 Million Copies
• October NPD: Wii Wins, Uncharted Charts
• NPD September: PS3 on Top, Beatles Beat Cobain
• August NPD: Madden Beats Wii Sports
• NPD July 2009: Wii Sports Resort Tops Slow Month
• NPD December: $18 Billion Year For Game Industry

Nintendo aims to release the new Legend of Zelda game for Wii in 2010, company president Satoru Iwata said Wednesday.

In an interview with the Asahi Shimbun, Iwata said that the recent release of New Super Mario Bros. Wii has reenergized flagging Wii sales in Japan, and that Nintendo would aim to release more games that will keep the momentum going. To that end, Nintendo will announce a game this July that will use the Vitality Sensor controller that Iwata showed at last year’s E3, and release Zelda by the end of the year.

The new Legend of Zelda will use the Wii MotionPlus controller add-on.

Iwata also said that Nintendo is currently developing a successor to the Nintendo DS that will feature higher-resolution graphics and a motion sensor.

(Analysis below.)

At E3, Nintendo said that Super Mario Galaxy 2 and Metroid: Other M would be released in 2010. I highly doubt that Nintendo will release all three of these major games in every territory in one calendar year.

At the very least, we could see a repeat of 2002, in which Super Mario Sunshine was released worldwide, Metroid Prime shipped in the U.S. only and Zelda debuted in Japan only.

That seems to be the best-case scenario, though. If one game was delayed into 2011 for all territories, I wouldn’t be shocked at this point.

Then again, maybe Iwata really is serious about firing all cannons and keeping the momentum going. After all, it’s not as if there are that many big years left in the console lifecycles anyway: 2010 will be Wii’s fifth Christmas.

‘Wii is accelerating again’ [Asahi Shimbun] (Japanese)

Nintendo said Tuesday that it had sold over 3 million Wii consoles in the U.S. in December 2009, which would be a new monthly record for home game consoles.

After a year of month-on-month sales declines, December’s number’s would represent a big jump for Wii, which only sold 2.15 million units in December 2008 due to supply constraints.

The official numbers will be released by the NPD Group on January 14. Tuesday’s announcement was based on Nintendo’s internal estimates.

The current one-month sales record is held by PlayStation 2, which moved 2.7 million units during December 2002.

That record was for all game machines until the portable Nintendo DS beat it in December 2008. Nintendo said that DS also had a fantastic 2009, estimating that it sold more units this year than any console ever.

It’s clear that Nintendo can credit the launch of New Super Mario Bros. for much of this renewed Wii demand, as it said that sales of the four-player action game are now “approaching” 4 million units.

It still seems highly unlikely that, as per Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime’s prediction, Mario will outsell the Xbox 360 version of Modern Warfare 2 over the course of the holiday sales season (through the end of January).

See Also:

• NPD December: $18 Billion Year For Game Industry
• December Sales: Nintendo Moves 3 Million… DS Lites
• November NPD: Modern Warfare Shifts 6 Million Copies
• November NPD: Nintendo Moves 1.5 Million DS Lites

Solid sequels, a surprisingly menacing superhero and remakes done right made 2009 a great year for gamers.

While the depressed economy caused some videogame makers to drop or delay major titles, others blew our minds with titles nobody expected to be worth a damn. When Wired.com strung together its “Top 11 Most Anticipated Games of 2009” list, who knew Batman: Arkham Asylum would be anything more than a dull slog? That Assassin’s Creed II would feel nothing like the original? That Left 4 Dead 2 was even a possibility?

Ranking this year’s top 10 games sparked a good amount of debate among GameLife’s writers as we sifted through a better-than-average crop of games. Probably the most surprising thing turned out to be our pick for Game of the Year — which, shockingly, was unanimous.

Read our picks for best games of 2009 and sound off in the comments below.

10. Flower (PlayStation 3)

This beautiful, dreamlike game sets itself apart from the darkness and violence of most games. And it actually uses the PlayStation 3’s motion controls (remember those?). Tilt the controller to gather flower petals and bring color back to a dreary landscape and a sinister-looking city. Flower is great fun — and relaxing, too, thanks to the lack of any possibility of failure. Even the closing credits are pretty. – Daniel Feit

Flower probably (OK, definitely) got too much hype prior to its release, but the final product is worth playing. The dynamic music that accompanied your petals’ journey through the wind, plinking out another note each time you revitalized another flower, is one of the game’s unsung features: Lots of games have pretty graphics and music, but few this sort of intertwined Fantasia-style visual symphony. – Chris Kohler

Here’s a look at the four-player battle mode in the upcoming Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks for Nintendo DS.

I got to try out this multiplayer mode at Nintendo’s office last week. Here’s how it breaks down: Each player controls a differently-colored Link. You have no special weapons, not even a sword. Your mission is to collect as many of the the golden triangular Force Gems before time runs out.

These will drop down from the heavens, and you’ll be able to find them by looking at the level map. But really, what you’re trying to do is attack your friends and steal their gems. You can throw Bomb Plants at them, trigger traps and hope they fall into them, or just wait for them to be attacked by the massive Phantoms that roam each level.

Spirit Tracks will be available on December 7. A brief Q&A conducted by email with Zelda producer Eiji Aonuma is below.

Wired.com: We rarely see these kinds of direct Zelda game sequels with such quick turnaround time. What are you doing with Spirit Tracks to keep fans from feeling Zelda-fatigue?

Aonuma: That’s actually a different perspective than we had. We felt that fans would want a follow up to Phantom Hourglass as quickly as possible, so we set out to deliver it without much of a delay. This game has a lot of new content that will keep the experience fresh, especially the story which is different than what we have done in the past with the addition of Zelda to the quest. We’ve also updated the game engine to keep the play experience as smooth and fun as possible.

Wired.com: Why trains?

Aonuma: In Phantom Hourglass, the game featured a boat since most of the world was water-based. We wanted to keep a similar system in place for Spirit Tracks, but since this is a land-based world, we needed a new form of transportation. We felt that a train offered the best possibilities for exploration as players open up new routes and find new areas. My children and I still feel a sense of adventure when we ride trains in Japan, and I think we’ve effectively conveyed these feelings in the game.

Wired.com: Phantom Hourglass was revolutionary for its touch-screen controls. How have these changed in Spirit Tracks? Do you feel there were areas for improvement?

Aonuma: One of the elements of the control scheme we feel has improved is how the player executed the roll maneuver. We heard that in Phantom Hourglass this was too difficult to consistently perform, so we changed the input to a double tap on the touch screen. Beyond touch controls, we’ve added more use of the microphone, such as the Whirlwind and Spirit Flute items. We feel these microphone-based inputs are the best additions to the game’s control scheme.

Wired.com: Zelda doesn’t sell as well in Japan as it does overseas. Why? How can you fix this?

Aonuma: Good question, I wish I knew myself! In Japan, the series is mostly perceived as being challenging and geared toward more experienced players. This perception is hard to change. We felt that Phantom Hourglass offered an opportunity to introduce the series to new types of players, and we did notice this to some extent with more women playing the game.  I think that the touch screen controls and camera perspective, in which you view the game from the top-down, does offer a different experience than the console games that may appeal to a broader audience.

Image: Nintendo

See Also:

• Wii Zelda Uses MotionPlus for Swordplay, Targeting
• Q&A: Nintendo’s Shigeru Miyamoto on Mario, Zelda, Project Natal
  
• Resurrecting Co-op Zelda
• Review: Zelda Phantom Hourglass Reinvents The Wheel, And Hammer
  
• Why You Need to Play Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars