Wii News

Rumor: Mario & Sonic at the other Olympic Games?


For some reason, it never occurred to us that Sega would want to make a sequel to Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games, but of course they would. Wouldn't you, if your game was one of the best-selling games on the best-selling console? Not even Sonic Team would botch that decision.This purported scan from Nintendo Acción magazine teases a new Sonic and Mario title with the following text (as translated by Sega Nerds): "Who are these two and why do they come to see each other? Find out all the details on the mystery game in the next magazine. But before that, here are some clues: Games, Olympics, Cold, It's winter..." Either this is a super obvious hint of a Winter Olympics-based sequel, or a fake magazine page, or intentional misdirection from the magazine.

Crystal Defenders R1 site opens with screens and trailer


Just one day after the WiiWare version of Crystal Defenders (now Crystal Defenders R1) was revealed by (early) Famitsu scans, Square Enix has opened the official Japanese website for the iPhone/mobile remake. Not since Lock's Quest have we been ... even slightly excited about a tower defense game!We saw blurry, small screens of the game in those scans, but the website features pixel-perfect screens, highlighting the colorful, somewhat retro 2D style and cute sprites. Even better, larger screens can be found at Famitsu. The official site also features a http://www.crystaldefenders.jp/jp/wii/trailers.html">trailer and a rather large selection of wallpaper images -- all of which seems delightfully lavish for a WiiWare game! But, then, this is only the second (non-Taito, internally-developed) WiiWare game for SE. They can afford to put a nice website together for each one.[Via Famitsu]

Capcom reassures Australia


Here, Australia and New Zealand, take a few long, hard breaths into this paper bag, because everything's going to be okay. Capcom has moved to quash fears that the collapse of Red Ant, Capcom's distributor down under, would delay Capcom releases in the region.The good folks from Capcom PR just mailed us to say that Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop wouldn't be moved from its original Aussie and Kiwi release date of February 27, and that future Wii titles such as MotoGP and Neopets Puzzle Adventure would still be released "in line" with other PAL territories.

We Ski and Snowboard and Look at New Screens


Click image for new screens
Namco Bandai just sent off a bunch of new screens for Family Ski: World Ski & Snowboard. The screens feature everything from splitscreen gameplay down to penguins on skis. If you were wondering, yes, we do approve of penguins on skis. It defintely gets them around faster than walking and, boy, are they cute. Click on the image above or hit up the gallery below for the new screens.

Aussie soldiers abroad receive surprise visitor, free Wii

Some Australian soldiers in Afghanistan received a very welcome gift recently. Handed over by Governor-General Quentin Bryce, the Wii is, we assume, the talk of the barracks. In supporting her troops abroad, the Governor-General arrived to shake hands, offer well wishes, and get a game or two of Wii Sports: Bowling in with the now less-bored troops. Okay, we lied about that last part, but sue us if we like to daydream about politicians playing Wii.[Via Kotaku]

Onechanbara trailer delivered in 30 minutes or it's free


Did you like the live-action Onechanbara: Bikini Zombie Slayers "Birthday Party" trailer? Maybe you found the silly vignette and its broad acting amusing, or, perhaps, charming? We kind of found its rough edges refreshing as a counterpoint to most superslick advertising. If you found something to enjoy in that previous trailer, then feel free to proceed past the post break for the latest Onechanbara-inspired skit by D3.If you groaned, zombie-style, at that previous trailer, you're probably not going to like this one either. There's a bit of gameplay footage at the end, but there's a lot of silliness before that.

OSX and Balance Board play nice, have fun together

If you're a Mac user, this video is likely to interest you. An aspiring individual hacked the program Wiiji (which is designed to allow Wiimote integration with Macs) to recognize the Balance Board as a joystick, allowing the use of Nintendo's peripheral with games that allow for joystick control. In the video above, you can see it in use through games Neverball and Extreme Tux Racer. Looks fun, if we may say so.
Enjoy this kind of thing? Then you'll definitely get a kick out of our Revolutionary feature, where the extremely talented Mike Sylvester tinkers around with all kinds of things. Aside from making his own homemade Balance Board, he helped us train with the Wii Wheel and also showed us what is really crappy about our favorite console.

Niki - Rock 'n' Ball rolls onto WiiWare next week


Bplus' Niki - Rock 'n' Ball will hit the North American WiiWare service on January 26, according to the press release that just rolled across our desks. Niki, you may recall, is the second game from Austrian outfit Bplus, who released Plättchen -- Twist 'n' Paint back in September.The critical reception for Plättchen wasn't too hot, but the one Niki review we've seen to date is actually pretty positive! (B)Plus, the game is half the price of its predecessor!

Surprise? Brownie Brown considers Wii development

Brownie Brown has a history of releasing handheld games ranging from okay to good: Magical Vacation and its sequel Magical Starsign, Sword and Heroes of Mana; and, of course, their best work, done in collaboration with HAL Laboratory, Mother 3. But until now, they've only released handheld games. So in a way, it's quite a surprise to hear that, having finished up Blue Dragon Plus, they're thinking about trying their hand at a console game. Brownie Brown president Shinichi Kameoka told Siliconera that "We're optimistic about it and looking into it." But the choice of console platform is rather unsurprising. Brownie Brown is a Nintendo-owned studio, so they basically have two platforms from which to choose for any game they're going to make. Should they move into Wii development, it will be interesting to see if they start with a work-for-hire project or an original work like the Magical Vacation series.

UK New Play Control prices probably won't be quite so overinflated

Nintendo has responded to UK retailers' pre-release pricing for the New Play Control editions of Pikmin and Mario Power Tennis, saying that those probably won't be the real prices -- and if they are, it's not Nintendo's doing. "It is up to retailers at what price they sell any item for," a Nintendo representative told Eurogamer. At least retailers will have a lower starting point for their prices: "However, our trade price for these games will be below our usual trade price for Wii games and our present estimate of the likely retail price is in the region of GBP 29.99." This doesn't necessarily mean that retailers really will sell the games at the somewhat reduced price point (which still comes out to $41), but it means that if they don't, they're total jerks. Amazon, at least, currently has Pikmin for £24.99!