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    Shadow Walker: Boy of Shadow, Girl of Light, Trailer of Game

    October 20, 2009 - 2:30pm

    One week from today, Game Arts' Shadow Walker: Boy of Shadow, Girl of Light will be released on WiiWare in Japan. To mark the occasion, Game Arts released a trailer (after the break), demonstrating its adorable character design and puzzle-based gameplay.Okay, so Hudson's Lost in Shadow, which isn't on WiiWare, is about a boy who is a shadow, using other shadows as platforms and making new shadows to travel on with the help of his fairy companion. This game, which is a download, is about a boy who can only walk in shadows, and whose fairy companion helps him create shadow paths.Despite the extremely similar premise, the gameplay looks quite different. In this game, you control only the fairy, creating paths for the boy to walk through. [Via Andriasang]

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    Beatles: Rock Band bests Guitar Hero 5 in U.S. Sept. sales

    October 20, 2009 - 1:30pm


    The Beatles: Rock Band's initial U.S. tour at retail has proven boast-worthy for its promoters. Following two promising platform appearances in NPD's top 10 software sales chart for September, MTV Games and Harmonix have declared B:RB "the top selling music video game in the U.S. for September." The Beatles-only game (released September 9) outsold Guitar Hero 5 (released September 1) with 595,000 units to 499,000 units in total U.S. sales for the month, according to a statement released by the NPD*. Additionally, charity-driven purchases of the "All You Need Is Love" DLC track exceeded 100,000 downloads on Xbox 360 in September.The makers of B:RB have also rubbed in a few seemingly noteworthy facts; namely, (1) U.S. purchases of GH5 in September were eligible for a free mail-away copy of Guitar Hero: Van Halen, and (2) GH5 is available on one additional platform, PS2. Of course, Van Halen isn't exactly the American equivalent of The Beatles, and the PS2 is no longer the dominant platform to stage one's acts upon. Still, despite the staggering odds stacked against its success, B:RB managed to capture the mindshare of U.S. gamers. (And we all know that Americans like to speak their minds with their monies.)The sales de-feat must feel good for MTV Games and Harmonix -- what with B:RB being burned in the sales competition with GH5 by the kingdom that birthed the band (see: Chart-Track UK September sales rankings posted after the break). What was it? Right: Guitar Hero 5 supposedly outsold The Beatles: Rock Band "2-to-1 in the UK." So, score a victory for B:RB in the battle of the bands fought in U.S. retail last month. But let's not forget there's a bigger, "World War of Rock" being waged, as well. And our wallets are the oft-unreported collateral damage.

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    Miyamoto: Wii successor will likely feature motion controls in 'more compact' form

    October 20, 2009 - 12:40pm

    It sounds like Nintendo's plans for the next console are going to continue largely in the direction they've always been going (you know, the one that has resulted in millions of dollars). Shigeru Miyamoto told Popular Mechanics that, despite not having a solid plan yet for upcoming hardware, motion controls are likely to stick around."With both the Wii remote itself and Wii MotionPlus, what we've been able to do is introduce an interface that is both I think appealing and at the right price for a broad audience," Miyamoto said. "And while we don't have any concrete plans for what we'll be doing with hardware in the future, what I can say is that, my guess is that because we found this interface to be so interesting, I think it would be likely that we would try to make that same functionality perhaps more compact and perhaps even more cost-efficient."This could result in a single unit that combines the base Wiimote functionality with the extra accelerometer of the MotionPlus, which makes sense. Or, more excitingly, Miyamoto could be talking about the system being more "compact" and "cost-efficient." Either way, it's starting to look less and less likely that the Wii 2 will be just like its competitors, but with Mario games on it.In much more important news, Miyamoto said that he'd never heard of The Wizard. Bill Trinen's got a night of translating horrible Fred Savage dialogue ahead of him!Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

    Fans campaigning for President Cat

    October 20, 2009 - 11:35am

    Against all odds, a completely random Japanese Wii game starring a cat blogger has become a hot topic among some fans. Sukeban Shachou Rena Wii, published by Jorudan, stars a cat named Rena, from a popular Japanese blog, as the CEO of Cat Queen Inc. You play as a cat going through the initiation into the company, performing various minigames to earn Rena's respect.The Orange Lounge Radio podcast discovered the game, which they have dubbed President Cat, then began Tweeting the Wii game's official account. Fans started sending messages of encouragement and support to the #presidentcat hashtag, and the Rena account has started responding in both Japanese and English, revealing that the publisher is excited and a little confused about all this sudden attention.It would be hilarious if this grassroots movement resulted in the localization of a weird licensed game. However, it would also be pretty sad if the publisher turned out to lose money on it. It's definitely something we want to play, but we're not exactly representative of the mainstream audience.[Thanks, act_def]Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

    Japanese Nintendo downloads: Fire Emblem Premake and Uno

    October 20, 2009 - 11:00am

    Just like last week, the original version of a game remade on DS has been released on Virtual Console in Japan: last week it was Kirby Super Star, and this week it's Fire Emblem. We're guessing this is a coincidence, otherwise it's a really weird initiative. Also like last week, Namco Bandai releases a pair of arcade games in the same series, this time the more recognizable Dig Dug. And WiiWare returns! ... With Uno.On DS, there's another chunk of The Tower DS, more Japanese city maps, and some English training.

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    Black Wii system going to Europe as part of Wii Sports Resort bundle

    October 20, 2009 - 10:32am

    Nintendo UK will release the black Wii system on November 6, as part of a limited edition bundle including matching Wii Remote, Nunchuk, and MotionPlus peripherals, and both Wii Sports and Wii Sports Resort. This bundle will be available elsewhere in Europe on November 20. Along with the black bundle, Nintendo is releasing the black Classic Controller Pro accessory. No price has been announced for any of these items. Nintendo of America has yet to announce any plans to release any of these items -- in fact, it has announced that there are no plans. But, really, it's waiting until every holdout gets impatient and buys a white system.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

    September NPD: Obviously Destined to Sell Tons

    October 19, 2009 - 9:10pm

    The new, lighter (in both price and weight!) PS3 continues to enjoy renewed sales in its second month beating out every console except for the invincible DS -- and the PS3 got pretty close to that impossible victory. The PS3's sales more than doubled in the last month! In fact, just about everything enjoyed a boost in September, with all the home consoles benefiting from recent price drops, and the PSP launching new hardware (NPD's September sales period ran through October 3). The only "loser" is the DS, which fell in total sales, but still managed to sell more than anything else.In software (see the chart after the break), unsurprisingly strong debuts took place for both games with Halo on the box and games with Mario on the box. In fact, strong is a bit of an understatement for ODST's 1.52 million units sold. It's not quite 3.3 million units, but for a presumably lower-cost spinoff using an existing engine, it'll do. In a weird bit of cross-platform fickleness, The Beatles: Rock Band debuted in the top 10 for Xbox and Wii, but not PS3 -- while Batman: Arkham Asylum's PS3 version made a second appearance in the top 10 to the exclusion of the Xbox.-DS: 524K29K (-5%)-PS3: 492K282K (+134%)-Wii: 463K186K (+67%)-360: 353K138K (+64%)-PSP: 190K50K (+36%)-PS2: 146K40K (+38%)Check out the software sales chart after the break.

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    Yggdra Unison trailer: welcome back to Dept. Heaven

    October 19, 2009 - 7:45pm

    Atlus released a trailer for the latest game in Sting's Dept. Heaven series, Yggdra Unison. The most notable, and weird, aspect of the trailer? The seemingly random number-writing. Rather than relating to the amount of damage your characters dish out, it's an odd holdout from the game's first life on mobile phones. Basically, each of your units is marked with a number, and on the phone version, you'd type that number to trigger that unit's part of the Unison Attack. For the DS version, the keypad is gone, but the numbers are still there. Of course, it has a long way to go before it can out-odd Knights in the Nightmare, a game in which you, as a ghost, take control of your units by possessing them.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

    UK retailer offers Zelda: Spirit Tracks collector's tin

    October 19, 2009 - 6:40pm

    Nintendo UK seems to have gone tin crazy of late -- first announcing a Limited Tin Edition of New Super Mario Bros. Wii, exclusive to GAME, and now offering a similar package for The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks. This is, of course, wonderful news for people just starting their tin game box collections.Retailer Gamestation is taking pre-orders on the Spirit Tracks: Limited Tin Edition for £39.99. However, Nintendo told CVG that the box is actually a pre-order bonus, and will be available from Gamestation's parent company, GAME, with early purchases of the regular £29.99 game. So, basically, don't buy this thing from Gamestation just yet!While the box doesn't seem to be designed to hold coins like the Mario one, it is designed to hold the two figurines that will be included. We're really hoping (and almost certain) this is a mockup, and that it doesn't come with oddly flat figurines and a game box that tells you to "Pre-order your copy today!"[Via CVG, Coplanet]Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

    Activision: Guitar Hero beat Beatles because it's 'fun as hell'

    October 7, 2009 - 8:30pm


    We were just as perplexed as anyone when Guitar Hero 5 trounced The Beatles: Rock Band in the UK -- where we hear the Fab Four is fairly popular still. Thankfully, Activision's Guitar Hero business CEO, Rock 'n' Roll Dan Rosensweig, is there to explain it all. "The number one thing about Guitar Hero is that it's fun as hell -- it's focused on the guitar, and the variety and value proposition -- and the reviews are spectacular. So I guess we're the only ones not surprised." Rosensweig went on to tell GamesIndustry.biz that "internally we always talked about the Fab Five - Guitar Hero 5 - was going to beat the Fab Four." So, we've also discovered Activision's real secret weapon that keeps it ahead of the competition: Hilarious wordplay.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments