Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Kid Icarus Returns? Unknown concept art revealed

Kid Icarus is a game that appeared on the NES and spawned a sequel for the gameboy called Kid Icarus: Of myths of monsters. Since then, The Kid Icarus series has been in the dark for a long time. It wasn't until the Wii, when Nintendo remembered the lost series. The folks even gave Pit, the main star of Kid Icarus a spot in Super Smash Brothers Brawl!

After Brawl, many began to wonder if this will mark the return of the lost series. On May 8th, Wii.Kombo.Com revealed some concept art. They claim that Factor 5 (Creators of games such as Pilot Wings for the Snes, and Star Wars Rouge squadron for the N64) a brand new Kid Icarus series.

I took a good look at them. All I could think was...WHAT THE HECK IS THIS?! >_<
What happened to Kid Icarus?! Why not use the Brawl design?! Granted, some people where not too fond of Pit's anime design, but still, That design used in Brawl screamed out Nintendo! It was perfect! Like I said, some people where not fond of it, but the majority of Kid Icarus fans loved his updated design. Why change it so suddenly?
Also, as if some of the designs weren't bad enough, how about the story?
"At the time of the document's writing, Factor 5 had imagined a plot starring a grown-up, adult Pit, who is "cursed for thousands of years for a crime and becomes a 'fallen angel.'" The pitch adds that "a tattoo on Pit's arm bears the inscription of Pit's crime.""

Pit? Staring as an anti hero?! Whaaat?! Pit just doesn't seem like a character to commit a crime, unless Pit is trying to prove his innocence in the game. but judging from the design I'm afraid that is very unlikely.

After Pit was announced for Brawl, I was very happy to see a long lost character return, and I used to love playing Kid Icarus for the NES. I even had hopes for a sequel, but come on! was this sudden re design necessary?
Well, I shouldn't worry, and you Kid Icarus fans shouldn't either. Remember, Nintendo has NOT announced a Kid Icarus game, so it's very possible that this concept art is fake. Even if it is true, remember, It's concept art. As horrible as it is, it may change. I'm just worried that one of these may end up being a final design.
Here's some more art work, and here are my thoughts on them.




Ugh... too Prince of Persia-like
No way.















This one's Seems to be a cross between Pit's Brawl and Original design. I this is one of the very few I like.











Uhhh... no... I don't really like the outfit, and what's with the hair?














Although I don't like the Idea of Pit being an adult though out the game, I like this design as well. It is also very close to Pit's Brawl design and kinda neat.










This one's okay. I like the cartoony feel of it. It kind of reminds me of Ben 10, a show on Cartoon Network.















This design reminds me of Star Wars: The Clone Wars animated series by Genndy Tartakovsky. This one's not too bad...


















I really, really Despise this design. He looks waaay to much like a DC comics super hero.
Like I said, this may be a Hoax, so you shouldn't take this credibly. However, IGN Journalist Matt Casamassina has said in recent IGN podcast that there is a Kid Icarus game in the works. What do you think? Is this art authentic and part of the said game? Or is this all just fan speculation and a hoax to get peoples hopes up or Irritate people? You never know..
That's all for now...

Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Mario and Sonic at the olympic games: I tried to like it, I really did...

I remember first hearing the announcement about The two long time rivals, finally meeting and competing against each other! I could not believe my eyes, for this was the official Mario Vs. Sonic everyone was waiting for! I anxiously waited for the game to come out, even if it took place in the Olympics.

A few weeks ago, I rented the game with eagerness and high expectations. I started playing when I got home. Was it good? ummmm... I thought it stunk!

It wasn't horrendous but I was extremely disappointed... Although some where enjoyable, I just could not find it spectacular. Usually in Mario games, there are gimmicks that make the game very entertaining and fun, but in Mario and Sonic, you could just replace all the characters in the game with generic Olympic stars and it would not be different (Minus the Dream Events which I'll get to later.)

I would have liked to have seen Boxing (It's in the DS version but I haven't played it) and other various forms of fighting but alas, there's none.

The dream events are the most enjoyable part of the game and how I think the whole game should have been like. My personal favorite was the fencing where if you gained enough energy,
you could knock your opponent out of the ring.

My final verdict for the game? Disappointing. I expected better from a big name game like this. Hopefully Nintendo will make a Sonic and Mario platformer someday, seeing as how Nintendo and Sega are friends.

Sunday, March 16, 2008

Super Smash Brothers Brawl

After waiting practically two years for it to come out, I finally got my hands on Super Smash Bros. Brawl. All I can say is, it was definitely worth the wait. Smash Bros. Brawl it the third in the series of the famous Nintendo crossover fighting game.

When the trailer first came out in 2006, it was a very happy day for Nintendo fans everywhere. The trailer announced Meta Knight, a very popular character among Kirby fans, Pit, a long lost video game hero from Nintendo's classic, Kid Icarus, Zero suit Samus, Samus without her armor, Wario, who was surprisingly absent in Smash brothers melee after being one of the top three in the official character polls, and finally, Nintendo surprised everyone by announcing Snake, who hasn't been on a Nintendo console since 1990!

As the months passed, the game's director, Mashiro Sakurai, decided to open up a blog to explain the game as it was being made. Some were pleased by this while others were slightly disappointed. However, their minds changed as soon as the new stuff started churning in. One day, Sonic was even confirmed as a playable character!

After many delays, Brawl finally came out this month and I was able to work and get enough money to buy it!

What can I say? It's an excellent, well made game. Pretty much everything about it is good, aside from a few characters I have trouble using and a few annoying stages. But hey, you can't please everyone can you? Sakurai put a lot of effort into this game, even after he quit Nintendo.

Characters that I found to be really fun to use where:
Meta Knight: Not only have I been dying to play as him since he was first announced, but he is now becoming my main character to play as.
Kirby: although I haven' been playing as him as much due to having so much fun with the newcomers, I still like to play as him.
King Dedede: The enemy from Kirby enters the roster as the only heavy weight in the kirby gang. He is a very fun and very interesting character. (Fun Fact: Kirby's creator and Smash bros. director, Mashurio Sakurai, provided the voice of the penguin king.)
Sonic: Yes, the long time rival of Mario is my one of my favorite characters to play as, along with Meta Knight.
Pit: I remember loving to play Kid Icarus as a youngster when my dad bought a NES. I like his new design, and I hope this may end up becoming a sign that Kid Icarus is returning.
R.O.B: ROB is an excellent and powerful character. Like Mr. Game-and-Watch in the last game,
he is supposed to be the unexpected joke character. He even plays a big and tragic role in adventure mode.

Speaking of adventure mode, This game actually has a story called, The Subspace Emissary. In the story, Mario and Kirby are in a stadium fighting, when Meta Knights airship, the Halberd, flies in, surrounded by a red cloud. Then it drops cute-yet-vicious Zombie like enemies called the Primids. And thus the adventure begins.
I found Subspace Emissary to be an awesome experience. According to an interview with Mashiro Sakurai, the writer of SSE also wrote the story for many Square Enix games such as Kingdom Hearts and Final Fantasy 7.

All in all Smash brothers brawl is a definite must for all Nintendo fans and for those who own a Wii. I repeat, YOU MUST BUY THIS GAME!!!

Sunday, February 24, 2008

Video game reviews: Rayman Raving Rabbids

Yes, I know it's quite old, but hey, I want to review it.

So, the newest game from Ubisoft studios has been given both praise and haze in the media. This game stars Rayman, our Limbless french hero. So it starts off with Rayman and his friends, Globox babies (Globox is a friend of rayman in the past games.) when the Globoxes suddenly fall into the ground, only to be replaced by some bunnies. Although Rayman offers them some food, that doesn't save him from being carried off by a Giant Muzzled Rabbit. So that's when the game starts here. Rayman is taken to an arena, where he will have to take challenges to progress. When you win, you get a plunger. Yes it sounds crazy, but you soon discover how important it is later.

The minigames mostly involve torturing the rabbids various ways. One way is bashing a bandaged bunnies head as much as you can so that you will make his bump go really high.

My personal favorite mini games are the On-Rail first person shooter games. You see, throughout the game, after you beat three Minigames you will unlock the boss minigames. These boss minigames are either racing or first person shooters. In the first person shooters, you shoot plungers a bunnies who run up to attack you. Sometimes, they'll act really stupid and laugh at you, or they'll just stand there doing nothing for a few seconds. As for the racing games, you race rabbids and strange elephant monsters (Possibly enemies from the original platformer version?) on giant pigs around a course. It's pretty straight forward.

I thought that this game is a blast when you have some time to kill. But if you are a die hard Rayman fan, then this game may not be for you.

Kinda strange that a Rayman game may actually not be that appealing to a Rayman fan, but unfortunately, it's true. Rayman plays a small part in the game. Many Rayman fans were angry about this and refused to buy the sequel.

The bunnies steal the spotlight throughout the entire game, and leave very little spotlight for Rayman. So I repeat, If you absolutely love Rayman, Then don't buy this game! However, If you're a casual gamer or like a good party game, then I highly recommend it.

Final score: **** out of five stars

Monday, January 28, 2008

Super smash brothers

Well, Super Smash Brothers has once again been delayed til March. Lets hope that it doesn't become the Next Twilight princess!

Anyway, although this game's been delayed, that does not mean that the news is going to stop! Keep checking out Super smash bros Dojo's updates! There can be some really great news there!

Also for those of you who like their characters spoiled, here's some accidentally leaked info, courtesy of Nintendo themselves!

Here it is!
Whats more, is that shortly after, The Icons where edited out. That's pretty much proof that Ness isn't dead, and we have more newcomer Pokemon.

It good to see Ness is still there and Jigglypuff is fun to experiment with...
As for Lucario, at first I was angry that he was replaceing Mewtwo, but now I'm over it, and I am going to have fun playing as him.

As for characters I wanted to have in the game, I have would liked to see Geno, from Super Mario RPG appear in it.
You all may be thinking Who? and He's too Obscure! Well, that's true, but he did appear on the final results on the poll.
Unfotunately, Like Wario on the last polls of melee, Geno is not set to appear. However, since he was ranked so high on the polls, I think he could end up in the next game. Who knows?

That's all for now...