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Wii games. Here’s the list of the top ten Wii games on the market. If you’re an existing Wii owner, or thinking of starting up with Nintendo's Wii console, choose one of these top Wii games for hours of fun.
This is only our Top 10 Selling Nintendo Wii Games. Click here to SEE ALL Nintendo Wii GAMES
, 01 Feb 2012
Wii News Item :
February is here, which means new game rewards available for Club Nintendo members. This month, you can get either Mario Party 2 (Wii) or Art Academy: First Semester (3DS) for 150 coins each. Head over to http://club.nintendo.com. Hurry, though, because these offers will end at the end of the month.
, 01 Feb 2012
Wii News Item :
Game – Ace Combat: Assault Horizon Legacy (Rated T for Teen)
Version – Nintendo 3DS
Obtained – Review copy from Namco Bandai
Reviewer – Steve Cullum
The critically acclaimed aerial combat series flies onto the Nintendo 3DS in Ace Combat: Assault Horizon Legacy. While it looks pretty, does it also pack a punch in other aspects? Read on to find out.
Story & Plot
You are a pilot for USEA Allied Forces, a group of nations who have joined forces against two world superpowers. However, the northern and western nations are strongly against a specific treaty between the southern nations and the Osean Federation. A band of conservative extremist have staged a military coup, and the allied forces have initiated their retaliation attack. You have been chosen for this mission as a member of Special Tactical Squadron “Scarface,” a part of Operation: Fighter’s Honor, to take out the rebel forces.
From the menu, you are given ability to jump into the story, pursue specific challenge modes (unlocked as you progress), view your game data, and change options within the game. As you begin the story, you are briefed on each mission, given the ability to choose your airplane, gear, and (sometimes) your wing-man. Then, you are off to the skies to take on whatever mission awaits you. After you complete your mission, you are debriefed and given a ranking based on how you performed. In addition, you can even keep a video copy of your mission by saving it to your SD card. Unfortunately, you cannot share these videos with anyone.
Gameplay & Controls
Each mission is pretty straight forward. Sometimes you will be shooting down rebel pilots. Other times, you could be taking out targets on the ground. Still, other times, you could be shooting down supplies dropped from enemy airplanes. Usually, you will complete the initial mission, and then go back to your base. On occasion, though, harder enemies will surprise you afterward. It is very easy to understand what you are to do each time, and you will rarely get confused.
Ace Combat feels great. It is not a simple flying game, as you will find a slightly higher learning curve than something like Star Fox. However, the controls are fully customizable. This includes changing which buttons fire which weapons to inverting the axis for flight. If you prefer, you can even change the language for the subtitles. With all these options, you are sure to find the control scheme that works for you, which is just another strong point to this game.
Graphics & Sound
Every aspect of Ace Combat looks amazing on the 3DS screen. You do not have to play with the 3D on, but it is highly recommended. It gives a depth that really adds to the gameplay. The only problem is that you may end up moving around while flying, if you are that type of pilot. If so, you may drop out of the 3D “sweet spot,” so just be careful not to move around quite a bit. You are able to change the in-game view from third-person, cockpit, and HUD view. I prefer the third-person view myself. There are few animated cut-scenes in the game, but when they do show up, they are also very good.
The music during the menu is some sort of Japanese slow pop style, but during gameplay, you will get a variety of orchestral music that fits very well to the feeling of flying in the open sky during combat. Sounds are spot-on, and it sounds great coming out of the 3DS speakers. However, if you plug in a set of headphones, you will be even more drawn into the combat.
Concluding Statements
In all honesty, there are very few things to be said against this game. In fact, all I can think of is the lack of multiplayer. Connecting with a friend for a local or online dogfight would have been a great addition. In the end, though, Ace Combat: Assault Horizon Legacy is an excellent game. If you are a fan of flying games, you have to get this today.
FINAL SCORE: 4.5 out of 5
Here is a video I shot off-screen of the opening song and video sequence.
Here is a video I shot off-screen of Mission 02.
, 31 Jan 2012
Wii News Item :
GameIndustry.biz wrote up a fairly extensive opinion piece about the power of the Wii U, have a read of this excerpt:
In theory, we could look at laptops here as an example of getting powerful chips working in smaller areas. The problem here is that high-power mobile GPUs are highly ‘binned’ – they’re the pick of the production crop of processors destined for a broad range of different graphics cards. Mobile parts are typically the very best chips, the cream of the crop, capable of great performance at low voltages. Nintendo would not have this luxury on a mass-production item with a single design, where high efficiency is the key to keeping costs down as much as possible.
Realistically, short of a major architectural shift to components based on smartphone tech – and lots of it – the idea of Wii U possessing next-gen rendering capabilities doesn’t make a lot of sense. We know that there’s no transition to mobile tech because the IBM CPU is an off-shoot of an existing line and the firm doesn’t make mobile CPUs. Similarly, while AMD has produced smartphone GPUs, none of them get close to the performance of the Xbox 360′s Xenos GPU. That being the case, the chances are that it’s a customised variant of an existing PC Radeon part: Japanese sources have previously hinted at a connection to the Radeon HD 4000 series – and a lower-end chip from that range would be a good fit.
With the IBM chip confirmed at a 45nm process – the same as the current Xbox 360 – the question then moves on to how the graphics chip is made. TSMC, the most probable candidate for actually producing the chip, has just moved onto a 28nm process, and will be ramping up production throughout the year. But any new node typically starts with low production yields, so Nintendo would need to either swallow the cost (Microsoft did this at the launch of the 360 with the then state-of-the-art 90nm Xenos GPU) or downclock the chip. It’s far more likely that sticking to the existing, established 40nm process for AMD GPUs would actually be cheaper for them in the short term – and would provide cost-savings in the future when the chip could be shrunk economically.
But let’s assume that Nintendo does push the boat out here. Even a 45nm CPU and a 28nm GPU in a box that small is still likely to cause cooling issues for an actual “next-gen” 360 beater. The more probable 45nm CPU/40nm GPU combo combined with the size of the machine suggests a far more likely scenario: that Wii U has a ballpark performance level with current PS3 and Xbox 360 titles, perhaps actually lower. Across the years, chip designs may have become more refined and efficient but it’s worthwhile to point out that almost all major increases in processing power have mostly come from shrinks in the fabrication process meaning that more transistors can be packed into the same amount of silicon.
The final nail in the coffin about a notional 2x increase in power over the Xbox 360 comes from Nintendo itself. At no point has the platform holder ever suggested that Wii U offers that kind of leap in processing power, an extraordinary omission considering the amount of money Nintendo would need to invest in this architecture. The focus of the platform holder’s message is of course on where the money has been spent: the tablet controller, with its zero latency link to the console – technology that must have been fairly expensive.
But is there anything in the package that could give the Wii U an advantage over the PS3 and Xbox 360, aside from the tablet controller? We should look at the commodities that have collapsed in price over the past few years, and could prove genuinely useful for a games machine. RAM is the obvious choice: a 1GB minimum wouldn’t break the bank and would help developers significantly. The pre-E3 rumour of 8GB of flash RAM also makes sense, especially when we bear in mind that there is no internal hard drive. The Wii U optical drive – almost certainly based on Blu-ray technology – could also be faster than its PS3 equivalent too. This may be useful bearing in mind that the lack of HDD would preclude mandatory installs.
Read More:
[GameIndustry.biz]
