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New Sonic. Sega has decided to explore new ways with his Sonic character, perhaps due to poor sales results from Sonic Heroes. The new game, entitled Shadow The Hedgehog, stars Shadow (basically a dark version of Sonic) whose main characteristic is the ability to use weapons and control vehicles. No one will blame you if the first thing to come to your mind is "Sonic in GTA Land". This spin-off is directed by Takashi Iizuka, lead developer of the past Sonic 3D games, and will release this winter. For more details, just wait till the E3.
Hollywood. Mario would like video games characters to have their star on the Hollywood's walk of fame. You can help him by signing this petition. However, what we would like is Mario to appear in some new great game. You got to deserve that star one more time, Mario.
Euro DS. According to Nintendo Europe, the DS has been selling awfully well in Europe, 77% of its initial stock, half a million units, with several stores reporting to have sold out. Super Mario 64 DS has been the best selling title, 250.000 units. Problem is, every time Nintendo launches a new system anywhere, they always claim it's a big success breaking records, but then they seem to have hard time with the competition, go figure.
Ubilove. This is a piece of news which is getting old, but it's worth mentioning. Ubisoft has an interesting line-up for this year, being one of the very few editors (if not the only one !) still fully supporting the GameCube with several titles. So look out for:
- Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Lockdown
- 187 Ride or Die (urban street racing)
- Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon 3
- Peter Jackson's King Kong
- Prince of Persia 3
- Splinter Cell 4
and perhaps also Far Cry Instincts. In any case: thank you Ubisoft !
Dates. Geist and Nintendo Pennant Chase have been delayed to June, while Dance Dance Revolution with Mario is reported to come out on July 14 in Japan.
Rumours. There is a persistant rumour at the moment concerning the controller of the Revolution, Nintendo next console. The controller would be devoid of buttons and sticks, with just a touch screen. Of course, this is a pretty scary rumour and if it's true, well, Nintendo will surely have something unique there but something too unique for the players' sake. What is worrying though, is that Iwata recently said in an interview that controllers were too complicated, with too many buttons, hinting the Revolution would certainly be a contrast to this. A revolution, all right, but at which price ?
Just for you, tactical freaks, to spend a great weekend, Nintendo Japan has put online a new 1 minute 45 trailer for Fire Emblem: Souen no Kiseki.
» Download the new Fire Emblem movie (Windows Media Video, 8.7MB)
Nintendo also unveils four new features: an improved "base system", it is now possible to purchase and sell items, to collect information and to build relations between your characters when on the map; a new command, direct attack, which seems to allow you to defeat easily weaker enemies; three new unit types: the Beast Fangs, the Bird Wings and the Dragon Scales; and a higher difficulty level for pro gamers, the new "Maniacs Mode".
SK to Sega. Sega issued a press release yesterday enlighting us a bit more on the future of Silicon Knights, ex-Nintendo's benefactor. The company is set to release games on the next generation consoles, and Sega to publish them. No additional information has been revealed as to which platform and what game we're talking about. Yet, people should be happy to hear that SK works with Sega, it is very good news, perhaps the best one given the circumstances. Sega has been one of the most active editors on GameCube and one of the few who is still publishing titles for the system (Chaos Field Expanded and possibly a new Sonic to come), at least SK has still an open door for Nintendo developments. Imagine if SK had signed directly with Microsoft or Sony !
Bugs in Harvest Moon. In the latest Harvest Moon released in Japan, Poem of Happiness, you don't need to plough earth to find bugs... Marvelous Interactive, the publisher announced two serious bugs have been discovered in the game: when wild animals come to play in the house, the game freezes, and when advancing from level 4 to level 5, you won't be able to move the furnitures on the second floor of your home. This is quite problematic and the problem is currently under investigation.
Sonic, Pacman. Sonic Heroes has become a Player's Choice title, since yesterday, players from North America can buy it for $20. Namco, on the other hand, announced Pac-Man World 3 for GameCube and other consoles.
This week, the GameCube puts two new games (Donkey Konga 3 and a new One Piece title) in the top 10; this is so rare that just for this, the ranking is worth seeing.
» See this week ranking
The Movies is one of the most original and ambitious titles to bless our consoles this year, unfortunately the game seems to receive little attention from the gaming community, and even less from GameCube afficionados. Hopefully things will change before the game release and Samurai Nintendo will try to help as much as it can to promote The Movies. If you like movies, if you're interested in film making, The Movies will most definitely be a must-buy for you this year ! For a start here's a fact sheet preview with basic information and 11 pictures.
» Fact sheet for The Movies
Because of the work on the site's new version, there are several reviews late, sometimes for games which have been released for a very long while. Tony Hawk's Underground is one of them and today, we finally have the review.
» Review of Tony Hawk's Underground
We take a look at the latest trailer of Zelda with scrutinizing eyes, write down detailed descriptions (you might like this if your computer/Net connection sucks) and impressions, and uncover a few new elements. A game like this is well worth an analyze, isn't it ?
» Zelda video trailer commented
It's been one of those good days for Nintendo, one of those days where big N drops a few decisive hints for the future, the kind of hints that make players smile and rub their hands (or their DS), and comes with a new Zelda trailer who blows everyone away.
About the Revolution, Nintendo's codename for their next home console, we learnt today that it will be backward compatible with the GameCube (your GC games will work on the new system) and will use Wi-Fi technology, meaning that it can connect to the Internet wirelessly to allow players all over the world to play with each other online. The Nintendo DS though, will be the first one to go Wi-Fi in the coming months with a brand new title of Animal Crossing (the first time actually, the original game has appeared in three different versions !). We also have a full overview of the latest Zelda trailer with handy links where to download it.
Finally, there's a last piece of news which had been first reported by CNN but was not reported by others strangely. Was it a mistake or not like the next Game Boy scoop ? It was at least omitted from the official round-up of Iwata's keynote speech. Anyway, what was said in this report is that the Revolution would not come before mid 2006 in the USA, that Nintendo would not follow Microsoft because they think it is a mistake to release the console so early. Fact or fiction ? At the moment we have no idea for sure, but this information was definitely published.
Today, is the grand day, today, Samurai Nintendo is born again. It has been a long and windy road, a very long road indeed, more than a year from the preliminary tests to the final version you are looking at, and in between, quite many changes. One of the most important for the months to come will be the change of hosting. Samurai Nintendo's past version literally died when the old hosting (whose downtimes had become anyway more frequent than uptimes) closed down and since then, Samurai Nintendo has been offline. I could have put the back up of the old site very quickly actually, but I thought better to start directly with the new version, to gain time mostly, I'm sorry if some people were wondering why the site suddenly vanished. Now I'm both anxious and hopeful to see if things will work out with our new host.
I've been unable to secure a redirection from my old host, so it's going to make it harder to get back quickly to our past "fame". Not that we were so popular, but like I had to struggle so hard two years ago to set our new address correctly in search engines, I will have to struggle hard once again to make our new name seen on the web. Don't hesitate to promote our site whenever you can ! And remember, no more nintendo.neopages.net, our new address is: samurainintendo.com
As you're going to see, there's more to the new Samurai Nintendo than just a brand new domain name. But, even though the site has changed, it's still the same Samurai Nintendo that it used to be; it is a massive improvement over the old version, yet, it still retains what makes it very different from any other gaming sites, and even went further in that direction. Some might think it's just unprofessional (what !? 90% of the site in plain html !), but, as we often praise Nintendo games for being unique and different (or at least, we used to...), I think if you're looking for these two characteristics in websites, you might find them in Samurai Nintendo too. Now let's have a glance at the new key features:
• A completely new interface and layout, entirely re-designed and re-written from scratch
• Detailed game files for 128 GameCube titles with more than 1500 high-quality screenshots; rich hardware section with multiple information
• The up-to-date and never interrupted Samurai Nintendo's unmatched Japanese ranking with weekly sales results since 2003 !
• A new forum hosted within our site, not shared anymore
• The Hype Meter and Hype Ranking, some exclusive Samurai Nintendo features which allow Nintendo enthusiasts to build up hype for their favorite games
• Player's Portraits, another original feature of Samurai Nintendo with the interviews of international GameCube players
• New Game Boy Advance section strictly integrated to the GameCube context
• A new poll system
Although I tried hard to be as much ready as possible for the opening of the site (and this is one of the reasons why it's been delayed so many times, from a timid October 2003 release to that notably failed deadline of January 2004 and finally this day of March), although I tried, there are still a few things which are not ready, mostly because it would have been too long to prepare. Here is the list of things to finish in the coming weeks and months, and hopefully not years:
· Several reviews have yet to be pusblished
· Convert the 2003 Japanese ranking to the new site format
· Complete the forum's skin
· Add the chat
· Make the help page
· Finish a certain secret page
· Solve a few design/presentation issues
· Work on the Revolution section, perhaps to replace our GameCube theme in the long term
That's what we offer to you, Nintendo player. It's probably not so much compared to many gaming sites out there, but keep in mind our focus is GameCube exclusive titles and we care more about attitude than achieving ambitious goals. This is a site for all people who support Nintendo, the only company left in the world whose primary activity is game console and software making, fighting against mega-corporations and their mighty billion dollars assets in their attempt to turn an art form into a technological pit of violence and cheap thrills for the brainless mass. A flavor of Good vs Evil ? Perhaps, but above all the question of survival of purity.
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Japanese Ranking and Planning Updated
Latest Nintendo news
Preview of The Movies
Revolution Revelations
The New Samurai
