Though there were plenty of teething issues with it—who could forget that tiny file size limit?—the Wii Shop Channel marked a milestone moment for Nintendo, as the company made its first notable foray into digital game distribution. Considering the age of the Wii, and the fact that all other online services for the console have been disabled, it was only a matter of time before Nintendo would announce the end of the Wii Shop Channel, and now that day has finally come.
On January 31st, 2019, the Wii Shop Channel will close its doors for good, though the date for adding points to your account is coming much sooner. Users will be able to add funds to their accounts until March 27th, 2018; after that, you won’t be able to buy games from the shop on either the Wii or the Wii U. It’s a shame to see it come to an end, but this was inevitable. If there were any Virtual Console or WiiWare games you were thinking of getting, now might be a good time to jump on those.
What do you think? What was your favorite WiiWare game? Will this spur you to buy something from the shop? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
The latest notable news in ARMS was the recent addition of Lola Pop—a brand new, clown-themed fighter—alongside an associated stage, new ARMS, and various balancing tweaks. Nintendo sure isn’t slowing down with the updates though, as it’s already prepped and released a new patch that makes a series of notable tweaks to the core game.
The biggest change is that Sparring Ring has now been added as a fully playable stage, and can be accessed in Ranked Matches. Also, there have been a series of bug fixes and tweaks to Ninjara and certain ARMS. Here’s the full list from the patch notes:
· The versus stage Sparring Ring can now be selected.
It’s a square stage without gimmicks, used in the Warm-Up minigame.
Enjoy some serious bouts while enjoying the soundtrack of the ARMS Official Song (Electro-dance Ver.).
Sparring Ring will also appear as a stage in Ranked Match.
· Fixed an issue in Hedlok Scramble where sometimes Guardian and Clapback ARMS would fail to expand.
· Fixed issue where the rewards for 1-on-100 would change if played while searching for a Ranked Match.
· Adjusted some fighters and ARMS as shown below.
Fighters / Arms
Adjustments
Ninjara
After getting some advice from a Ninja College alum, distance traveled when performing a mid-air mist warp has increased. Mid-air mist warp” refers to the ninja technique performed by dashing after jumping.
Increased retraction speed. Adjusted how damage multipliers for Rush attacks function.Total damage when connecting with all hits is unchanged.
Funchuk
Increased the time span from exceeding a target until retraction. Adjusted how damage multipliers for Rush attacks function. Total damage when connecting with all hits is unchanged. Fixed issue during online play when Rush damage would increase under certain conditions. Fixed an issue where at times an opponent’s throw could be deflected with a successfully completing throw attack.
Clapback
Decreased Rush attack damage.
Chilla
Decreased curving.
Phoenix Thunderbird
Decreased homing.
Nade Tribolt Chakram
Decreased speed of charge attacks.
What do you think? Do you like the changes that have been made? How long do you think it’ll be before another new fighter gets added? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
Cuphead is a classic run and gun action game heavily focused on boss battles. Inspired by cartoons of the 1930s, the visuals and audio are painstakingly created with the same techniques of the era, i.e. traditional hand drawn cel animation, watercolor backgrounds, and original jazz recordings.
The Strong Museum of Play announced today that its International Center for the History of Games (ICHEG) has accepted a donation of artifacts documenting work done by Nutting Associates, the first company to sell coin-operated video games.
This is a big deal for game industry history buffs, since in 1971 Nutting put out what’s basically the world’s first commercial arcade game: Computer Space, designed and pitched to Nutting by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney.
Famously, the pair went on to cofound Atari a year later. Nutting continued to make electronic games until it closed in 1977, and now game industry historian Alex Smith has donated photographs, marketing materials, circuit board schematics, and other artifacts documenting Nutting’s work making games.
The donated materials are expected to make appearances in future exhibits at The Strong, which is located in Rochester, New York and already counts a number of Nutting game machines among its collection.
FIFA 18 launches today, but EA has been curiously reluctant to show off very much of the Switch version; aside from off-screen footage recorded at events like this year’s Gamescom, we’ve been unable to pick apart the Nintendo version’s visuals to see just how favourably they compares to the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One editions.
With the game now available, no such barriers remain – and we thought that you’d appreciate 10 minutes of direct feed footage, part of which shows the mighty Leicester City going one-up against some also-ran outfit by the name of Real Madrid.
The video was captured with the console docked, and as we’re sure you’ll agree, it looks pretty decent. Sure, there are a few dead eyes and some rather stiff-looking animation, but the standard remains high – and for a version of FIFA you can take with you anywhere, we think it looks rather spiffing.
What do you make of this footage? Will you be buying the game today? As ever, let us know your thoughts by posting a comment below.
Nine years after introducing the world to Mario (under the guise of “Jumpman”) in Donkey Kong, Nintendo created a companion for him: Super Mario World’s Yoshi. But where did Yoshi come from?
According to excerpts translated by Kotaku of a new Nintendo [Japanese] interview with devs who worked on Super Mario World and Yoshi’s Island, Yoshi was inspired by an image of Mario riding a horse that Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto drew in the ’80s.
(The interview also included a screenshot [excerpted below] of a prototype Yoshi sprite, dated November of 1989, in which the iconic dinosaur looks more like a sad turtle.)
“When we were making [Super Mario Bros. 3], he drew a picture of Mario riding a horse and had put it up on wall next to where he sits. When I saw that, I thought, ‘I guess he wants Mario to ride something,'” Super Mario World director (and fellow Nintendo vet) Takashi Tezuka reportedly said. “So, when we were making Super Mario World, we had this ‘dinosaur land’ concept, and I had [Shigefumi] Hino draw reptile type art.”
However, it sounds like one of Hino’s first attempts came out looking more like a crocodile than everyone was comfortable with. Tezuka reportedly felt that was maybe a little too reptile-y, and sketched a cuter dinosaur-like creature that became the basis for the Yoshi that appeared in Super Mario World.
And of course, according to a company character guide published in ’93 and publicized by Console Wars author Blake Harris in 2014, Yoshi’s full name isn’t Yoshi: it’s T. Yoshisaur Munchakoopas.
Pre-orders were pretty tough to find for the Super Nintendo Classic Edition in the US over recent months, meaning plenty will be heading online and into stores as soon as 29th September rolls around. The big retailers like Amazon, GameStop, Best Buy etc will be on the agenda, but online retailer Thinkgeek – which typically specialises in left-field merchandise – will also be worth a look.
The retailer has confirmed the following to us regarding its plans for the system’s launch.
ThinkGeek.com WILL have Nintendo SNES Classic units up for sale Friday, 9.29.17
This is NOT a pre-sale and units will ship right way
Units will NOT be bundled with other products and will be sold as standalone units
Strict limit of one per customer will be enforced – multiple orders will be cancelled
That purchase page is the general ‘Nintendo’ area, which has everything from bed sheets to hand puppets. The retailer didn’t confirm a sale time to us, but suggested shoppers keep an eye on its Twitter and Facebook accounts for specific information.
It’s another option, in any case. What are your launch day plans to try and get hold of a system in the US?
This week at Bungie, we’re rallying to our favorite faction.
Anytime your favorite faction is brought up, some friendly smack talk follows. With Faction Rallies, we get to settle those old scores and declare a winner based on which garners the most Guardian support. Right now, millions of Guardians are seeking out and destroying enemy supplies, completing public events, competing in the Crucible, and tackling the endgame. They’re doing their part. Would you like to know more?
Many of you are asking, “Who’s in the lead?” We won’t report on the race while it’s still in progress, but next week, once the winning faction rules the Tower unopposed, we might give you some insight on how things shook out. We will announce the winner on Tuesday, October 3, as soon as the scheduled downtime to deploy Hotfix 1.0.3.1 ends. That will be your chance to purchase the weapon from the winning faction in the Tower. There will be a significant discount if you pledged your loyalty to them during the event. The winning faction’s weapon can be purchased anytime during victory week, which lasts until the next reset.
Faction Rallies is set to become a new ritual that visits the Tower periodically. Once the event is over, tokens can no longer be earned, but you can still redeem any that you’re still holding to receive packages. Any engrams that are waiting to be claimed from a faction vendor will be auto-decrypted and placed in your inventory at the reset. Make sure you turn in all of your tokens before the end of victory week. They will reset before the next Faction Rallies event returns… sometime in the near future.
We are eagerly waiting, along with you, to see who prevails. You have until the weekly reset to make your mark on this event, and earn some loot to help define your identity. Get back out there and fight!
The Sands of War
Destiny 2 has a brand new sandbox full of weapons and abilities at your disposal. The community is already discussing what they believe to be the best tools of destruction to dispatch both alien combatants and other Guardians in the Crucible. Our team has been monitoring these conversations, along with the constant flow of data, to continue supporting the live game as we learn more from the millions of players playing it. We asked Senior Designer Jon Weisnewski to give us a brief update on their mission to keep your box full of sand fun.
Jon Weisnewski: Hello, Guardians. Since the launch of Destiny 2, we have been reading your feedback, spectating streams, and watching YouTube videos. Very recently, we received our first real batch of player data from our analytics team. We’ve also been shoulder-to-shoulder with you in the trenches daily, playing the ever-loving crud out of this game. We’re not ready to go into detail about any weapon or ability tuning at this point, but there is an ongoing process in play, so we did want to drop a quick line and say…
We have heard your feedback. Thank you!
Destiny 2 will get updates that tune the sandbox experience.
We are aware of MIDA Multi-Tool’s popularity and are looking at it very closely. It is popular, but according to our data, there are options out there that match or exceed its effectiveness in all activities. Have you found one?
It’s only the first month of a long adventure. Many players are still gathering weapons for their arsenal and we have a handful of guns that haven’t even hit the game yet. We’re excited to see how things evolve. As always, thanks for playing, and keep the feedback rolling in.
Thanks for being part of the process. If you want to make your voice heard, but you’re not sure where to jump in, I’m always keeping a sharp eye trained on our #Feedback forum. Constructive criticism and war stories are shared with the entire development team.
Patch Notes Preview
Next Tuesday, October 3, we are deploying Hotfix 1.0.3.1. It contains some fixes for issues some players are experiencing. Here is a preview of some of the changes you can expect to see when you download the update next week.
Fixed an issue in which players could lose access to the Veteran’s Transmat Effect by deleting characters
Fixed an issue in which clan engrams would grant Trials of the Nine and raid rewards at only 10 Power
Fixed an issue in which progress for the Exotic Quest Step “His Highness’s Seal” was not incrementing properly
Quest progress will still increment by 1, but the Quest Step now only requires 10 Seals to be collected
Fixed an issue in which raid milestones would not show for some players after the weekly reset (This didn’t affect any raid rewards)
Fixed issues in which players could enter a state where they are continuously killed or unable to resurrect if encounter complete and failure events occurred simultaneously
If you’re still experiencing an issue not listed in the fixes above, check the list of known issues we are still investigating. If it’s not included, let us know. There will be more updates in the future. Destiny is always evolving.
Hotter Fixes
Speaking of known issues, our Player Support Team is in charge of monitoring our help forum for any player reports and making sure our team has the info they need to diagnose and treat any ailments in the game.
This is their report.
Destiny 2 Hotfix 1.0.3.1
Destiny 2 Services will be taken offline on Tuesday, October 3, in preparation for Destiny 2 Hotfix 1.0.3.1.
Players will no longer be able to sign in to Destiny 2
Players will be removed from all activities at 9 AM PDT (4 PM UTC)
We advise players complete raid and Nightfall activities well before this time to avoid a Cabal victory
Maintenance expected to complete at 12 PM PDT (7 PM UTC)
Players may encounter the Destiny Server Queue when attempting to sign in after maintenance
For vital information concerning Destiny 2 Server and Update Status, please see this Help Article. Stay tuned to @BungieHelp or monitor our support feed on Help.Bungie.net for status updates throughout the maintenance window.
PlayStation 4 Crashes
We are continuing to work with our platform partners at Sony to address an issue where players encounter PlayStation Error CE-34878-0 when attempting to visit the Tower, or during general gameplay. Stay tuned to @BungieHelp and @AskPlayStation for updates.
Cayde’s Stash, Lost Sector, and Planetary Chest Reward Issues
We are investigating reports of players opening rewards chests and not receiving loot. If you are encountering this issue, please post a report to the #Help forum detailing the following:
Which type of chest did not grant rewards?
Had you interacted with alternate chests or planetary materials prior to this issue occurring?
It is expected that if too many planetary chests are opened within a short amount of time, players may not receive items. Cayde’s Stash and Lost Sector chests should not follow this functionality. We will provide updates on our investigation when available.
Leviathan Raid Keys
Through our investigations with internal teams, we have identified two instances where Leviathan raid keys are erroneously removed from character inventory.
Signing in with alternate characters will remove raid keys if the character had not been signed in since the weekly reset.
If a player earns Raid keys and creates a new character, raid keys are removed from inventory.
To prevent this issue, we advise players sign in with all characters or inspect all characters on the Destiny Companion App prior to completing checkpoints within the Leviathan raid after the weekly reset.
Please note: Leviathan raid progress, including key rewards, are reset each week. We are looking to address issues where keys are removed erroneously with a future update. Stay tuned to @BungieHelp for future announcements.
Lens Flair
You may have noticed the new MOTW Gif above. That’s because the new MOTW emblem arrived with Update 1.0.3.0 earlier this week. All MOTW winners since the launch of Destiny 2, including honorable mentions, will be rewarded with the Lens of Fate emblem.
This week, we have three more winners receiving top honors for multimedia storytelling. If you would like your shot at winning it in the future, submit your video to the Creations page.
At Bungie, we’re all having a great time playing Destiny 2 with you. We’re also enjoying reading everyone’s ideas on how to keep making the game better. Keep the chatter coming.
Tomorrow, I’m heading back to Texas for a week, to surround myself with the ol familial fireteam. That means DeeJ will be back in the pilot seat for the next TWAB. I’ve told him you prefer my conversational writing style, and that he should keep the purple prose to a dull roar. Maybe you can talk him into hiding some Bungie dogs in it? I’ll still be online, but you may not hear from me as often. I’m technically supposed to be off work. In reality, I usually can’t help but keep an eye on things.
Nintendo often finds a way to surprise its fans and throw a curveball, and so in the most recent Nintendo Direct it didn’t unveil the Switch Virtual Console, as such, but the ‘Arcade Archives’ series. It started this week with Arcade Archives Mario Bros., and the following are still on the way.
Vs. Super Mario Bros.
Vs. Balloon Fight
Vs. Ice Climber
Vs. Pinball
Vs. Clu Clu Land
Punch-Out!!
The names are familiar, but these are all reproductions of arcade cabinets, as made clear with the ‘Vs.’ moniker, for example. In some cases they’re relatively similar to the games that ended up on NES and multiple Virtual Consoles, in others there’s quite a notable difference in terms of content, while the Punch-Out!! arcade is an example of a game quite far removed from the NES equivalent. We’ve reviewed Mario Bros. and quite enjoyed it, while being impressed with the authenticity of the port and the extra features that are available. That’s no surprise, as HAMSTER has been releasing ‘ACA’ Neo Geo titles with the same principles for months and has simply continued the good work.
The reception has been relatively positive, in some respects, but also quite muted. Mario Bros. isn’t burning up the eShop charts after over 24 hours on the store, sitting in 9th in North America and Japan (at the time of writing) and 14th in the UK. In the UK chart, for example, Golf Story is already up to 5th place and has only been out a matter of hours as we publish this.
In some respects the Arcade Archives range feels like a middle ground – it’s not the ‘Virtual Console’, and we still don’t know when (or if) that’ll be fully realised in its traditional form on the Switch. Is the rumoured GameCube actually on the way, or will the ‘Classic Game Selection’ in next year’s full Nintendo Switch Online service fill the gap? Some people are undeniably underwhelmed and questioning the $7.99USD / €6.99 / £6.29 price tag for Mario Bros, while others argue it’s a more than fair price to pay for an official ROM that’s rather unique. On the one hand it’s a faithful reproduction of an arcade cabinet that’s now expensive to acquire, but on the other it’s the same price as (arguably) far more complex and advanced ACA Neo Geo games on the eShop.
We’re curious about what you think of the Arcade Archives range, and whether you’re planning to add many of them to your collection. Are you in the same camp as those posting rather gloomy “RIP VC” messages, a bit more optimistic that a full VC is still coming and that these are an extra treat, or simply pleased as punch with the release schedule and the fact these downloads are coming?
Let us know what you think in the polls and comments.
To celebrate the successful release of Death Squared – and its current price promotion – on Nintendo Switch we’ve teamed up with SMG Studios to give away some cool themed prizes to our US readers!
1st place: A custom Death Squared Nintendo Switch dock and download code for a digital copy of Death Squared.
2nd place (x2): A physical game case signed by the team, a download code for a digital copy of the game, and a set of stickers.
3rd place (x2): A set of Death Squared plushies and PAX exclusive enamel pins.
