If you enjoy these puzzle-rific games like my co-author does, check out the newest WiiWare release, Plattchen Twist-and-Paint for the Virtual Console.

Nintendo unveiled its MotionPlus device at E3 this year, and there are apparently some companies that aren’t too pleased that they weren’t notified in advance.  Nintendo.com has this to say about their new accessory:

Nintendo’s upcoming Wii MotionPlus accessory for the revolutionary Wii Remote controller again redefines game control, by more quickly and accurately reflecting motions in a 3-D space. The Wii MotionPlus accessory attaches to the end of the Wii Remote and, combined with the accelerometer and the sensor bar, allows for more comprehensive tracking of a player’s arm position and orientation, providing players with an unmatched level of precision and immersion. Every slight movement players make with their wrist or arm is rendered identically in real time on the screen, providing a true 1:1 response in their game play. The Wii MotionPlus accessory reconfirms Nintendo’s commitment to making games intuitive and accessible for everyone. Nintendo will reveal more details about the Wii MotionPlus accessory and other topics Tuesday morning at its E3 media briefing.

Okay - well, yes, that sounds cool.  The company in particluar is THQ, the producers of Wii’s de Blob, which was released on September 23.  MTV Multiplayer had this to report from Nick Hagger, the producer of de Blob:

“I think if we had the MotionPlus to start out with, maybe the control scheme would have worked out a little bit differently,” said Hagger in a phone interview late last week. “I think the temptation with having Wii MotionPlus would have been to push it more in a gestural control scheme. While it’s definitely intellectually stimulating from a development perspective to play with those ideas — and I think it does appeal to a set of gamers out there — I think the majority of people that play on the Wii want something very simple that they can just immediately get their heads around.”

We hear you, Nick.  I wonder how MotionPlus will affect future control.

Ok, I promise this is the last Wii Music post for the week.  It’s just that I am pretty excited about playing it!

This is the E3 2008 trailer for the Wii Music title - I still stand behind the idea of this game will be fun, regardless of the haters.  It’s a game after all, people - it’s meant to be enjoyed!

A video on Wii Music’s Shamisen instrument - this game is looking better all the time!

We expunged only briefly about one of the new WiiWare releases, Mega Man 9, for the virtual console.  If you were an NES Mega Man player (as I was) back in the day, you’re going to need to go ahead and pick this up, Bill Lumberg style.  Capcom’s “blue bomber” is back, he’s mad, and he’s ready to kick some butt in this new release.  IGN has an informative article (as they always do) on the Mega Man 9 release.  From the article:

Capcom Entertainment, a leading worldwide developer and publisher of video games, today announced that Mega Man 9 is now available for download on Nintendo’s WiiWare service, and will be available for the PlayStation Network on September 25, and Xbox Live Arcade on October 1. The original 2D classic Mega Man returns, bringing the series back to its roots with retroaction-platform gameplay and NES-inspired old school graphics. Relive the Mega Man experience with maniacally themed environments, a host of power-ups, and classically-inspired bosses, each with their own unique weapons and weaknesses. Mega Man 9 is rated E for Everyone by the Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB) and is available for,1000 Wii Points, $9.99 PlayStation Network, or 800 Microsoft Points.

You know you need some Wii Points for these great releases - go get a Wii Points Card!

Everyone knows that Wii Music is coming out soon, right?  Pre-order is still going on, with a release date of October 20, 2008.  Gametrailers had a ton of videos on Wii Music, most of them in Japanese, which rocks.  I’m going to post a few of them over the next few days.

Okay - I am not going to say muchy of anything about the link below, except for that you need to click on it, and watch the short video in its entirety.  Don’t take your eyes off of the screen!

Experience Wii Channel on Youtube

As Gametrailers said, “This is turning out to be one hell of a day.”  I cannot wait to play this.  We’re still TBA on the North American release date.  As soon as I know, you’ll know.

Wikipedia’s entry on Disaster:  Day of Crisis is actually pretty good.  Check it out.

I think I might have posted this a few months ago, but we preordered this game to check it out, and we wanted you to know about it again.  The Wii-Fit title Jillian Michaels Fitness Ultimatum 2009 is on pre-order at Amazon right now, with a release date just before Halloween (October 28).

A pre-release trailer from Gametrailers.com:

What do you think?  I just hope that Jillian doesn’t yell at me too much, because I feel ridiculous telling her to shut up through the plasma.  Just kidding, Jillian, don’t kick my butt!

There’s a title that I’ve heard lots of ups and downs about, and I wanted to post about it to get some opinions.  For twenty bucks, you can’t really be losing out too much - but I am interested in your opinions.

Blazing Angels:  Squadrons of WWII is a title that has an average 3.5 on Amazon, but 1Up.com gives it an F.  What’s up with that?  I find that, not unlike movies, I have to give it my own try and make my own decision.  Some of my favorite games have been like this - like SSX Blur.  You should know that this is a flying shooter, and not a flight simulator.  This is a title about kicking some Nazi tails while flying your 40 unlockable WWII planes on campaigns ranging from protecting bridges, escorting other planes, and downright dogfighting.  Reviews are all over the chart on this one, with lots of them saying the good outweighs the bad.

Some screens:

I’m interested to know your thoughts.  Anyone?  Are there fans and haters out there?  Let us know!

I’ve noticed a trend lately in titles for the Wii - or rather, grumblings about how the titles for the Wii are lacking in their video graphics prowess.  I have to admit, seeing the PS3 and XBox’s graphics can sometimes be pretty intimidating in comparison to some fo the Wii titles that are out.  But Wii is not as graphics-heavy as some of the super-graphics consoles out there - I can’t say that the Wii graphics are constantly bad, but there are titles that don’t make as much of the graphics as they possibly could considering the processing power Wii has.

What do you think about Wii graphics in games you play?  Are you pleased?  Disappointed?  Sad?  Angry? Thrilled?  Do you have no opinion at all?  We’d really like to know - please post in the comments.

Oops!  There’s two more titles that I forgot to post about in my frenzy to let everyone know about Vectorman and Super Dodge Ball -Mega Man 9 and PLÄTTCHEN twist ‘n’ paint.

From the Official Nintendo News Source:

Mega Man™ 9 (CAPCOM, 1 player, Rated E for Everyone-Mild Cartoon Violence, 1,000 Wii Points): Mega Man fans, the wait is over! The classic Blue Bomber that debuted in 1987 is back with the ninth installment in the classic series. It’s a new adventure for Mega Man done in an 8-bit style-graphics, music and gameplay are all like you remember them.

PLÄTTCHEN twist ‘n’ paint (Bplus, 1-8 players, Rated E for Everyone, 1,000 Wii Points): PLÄTTCHEN twist ‘n’ paint is a crazy, challenging puzzle shooter that delivers more than 100 hours of fun, supporting up to eight players simultaneously. Guard the birth of ZeLeLi and free them from the menace of the evil black Shadow Plättchen. Play as one of the countless FantasyMEs and fight as an astronaut, butterfly, car or football against sharks, cowboys, asteroids and skulls in numerous, fabulous fantasy Worlds. Use items and multipliers in combos to fight yourself to the top of the high scores and find the perfect way to solve a level. Go wild in three completely different game modes of PLÄTTCHEN twist ‘n’ paint with more than 300 levels. Twist cooperatively with your friends or compete through many multiplayer modes.

WiiWare Fans and Virtual Console Lovers, attention:  Vectorman has finally made it out of the gate and is available for points purchase on WiiWare.  IGN was reporting that Vectorman got a green light for release some year and a half ago - so why did it take so long to get this great game out in the USA?  Who knows.  Europe and Japan have had this for about a year.

The game, if you had a Sega Genesis 16 bit, is actually quite a spectacle, and the images do it zero justice.  Vectorman is packed with explosions, shooting, destruction, rampage, and all of those other goodies that you can expect from the old title.  From IGN’s excellent article:

The game looks sensational. Its use of color, its fluid animation, its over-the-top explosions that shake the entire screen — it’s undeniable that Vectorman pushed the power of the Genesis to the extreme, and fans in the ’90s took notice. Vectorman’s graphics got gamers to put down the new PlayStation pads and pick up their classic SEGA controllers one more time. And, when they did, they got to blow up a whole lot of stuff.

Go get some Wii points and get your own copy of Vectorman.

So, Lego Batman is out.  It’s shipping, as of today.  Apparently it’s pretty great. Once we obtain Lego Batman, it’s going to go well into a weekend marathon of Lego Indiana Jones, and Lego Star Wars.

I’m curious about what our readers think of the Lego series of games - are these titles games that you enjoy playing in your home, or do you have other opinions of their Lego-ness?  If you have an opinion, please post in the comments, as we are thrilled when people post.

For those of you wanting some teaser action for Lego Batman, here’s a video from the awesome folk at Gametrailers.com - they’re giving Lego Batman an 8.7, which is one tenth of a point lower than Lego Indiana Jones’ 8.8 rating.  I’m guessing it’s a heck of a lot of fun.  There’s also a screenshot gallery at MTV Multiplayer’s post on Lego Batman - check it out!

I would hope that any original NES players had the Super Dodge Ball game, and played it frequently - you’ll also be happy to know that WiiWare has released said Super Dodge Ball game for the Virtual Console!  For 500 Wii Points it’s yours - and IGN is giving it a rating of “great” with an 8.5 of 10 score.  Totally worth it.  Get a 2000 Wii Points Card and buy this game.  Seriously.  This was hours of fun when NES was the rockin’est console out there.

It’s the eternal question: who would win in a fight, pirates or ninjas? This winter, you’ll be able to answer the question yourself with Pirates vs. Ninjas Dodgeball:

Pirates vs. Ninjas Dodgeball will have scurvy thieves squaring off against crafty martial artists in large, detailed arenas. The game allows for up to eight players and offers a total of seven teams, including pirates, ninjas, robots and zombies plus three unannounced ball slingers. Each team utilizes its own unique techniques and strategies to try and ultimately defeat the enemies. Unique to Wii version, the game will offer all-new story and challenge modes, along with several customized control schemes.

The Consumerist published an article on Tuesday about the comment/ratings revolution that happened at Amazon with Spore.  At the time of WeKnowWii’s writing of this article, there were 1,876 one-star reviews of the game, mostly citing the Securom DRM Anti-Privacy measures.  Here’s a review we found interesting enough to post, fromErich Maria Remarque:

See those older 5-star reviews from 2006 (two years before the game was released)? Well, they had a reason to be excited. Spore was supposed to be a revolutionary experience, combining multiple genres while concentrating on evolution and genetics.

Fast forward two years and here we have the finished product, ready to be installed on our hard drives.

First of all, the game incorporates a draconian DRM system that requires you to activate over the internet, and limits you to a grand total of 3 activations. If you reach that limit, then you’ll have to call EA in order to add one extra activation. That’s not as simple as it sounds, since when you reach that point EA will assume that you, the paying customer, are a filthy pirating thief. You will need to provide proof of purchase, reasons why the limit was reached, etc, etc (it has all happened before with another recent EA product, Mass Effect). EA, of course, is not obligated to grant you that extra activation or even provide that service. In a couple of years they might very well even shut down the general activation servers, because “it’s not financially feasible” to keep them running. What you will be left with is a nice, colorful $50 coaster. And you will be required to pay for another copy/license if you want to continue playing.

This basically means that you are actually RENTING the game, instead of owning it. The game WILL stop to function in the future. That’s inevitable, because even if EA keeps the activation servers going, there IS going to be a time when EA will simply cease to exist because of financial issues or federal laws (like most businesses eventually do).

Second, the game was dumbed down to oblivion. Evolution doesn’t even matter anymore. For example, you can add as many legs to a creature as you want, but the multi-legged creature won’t be any faster than a single-legged one with higher leg stats. This gameplay element makes “creating” your creatures entirely pointless (cosmetic only, because everything is based on stats), and brings you about the same amount of excitement as dressing up a plastic doll.

Consumer action is power.  Let’s hope this Spore crap changes.
Also, did you know that there’s an anti-creationist website for the game?  Well hot-damn.

When PS2 was my big gaming system, Grand Theft Auto III was second only to the SSX series of snowboarding games.  With SSX Blur now out for Wii, all I need is some GTA action for Wii, and it’s all gravy.  Apparently there is something in the works right now, with Take Two dropping some news bytes about a Wii GTA game title.  From the article at Chattahbox:

This was backed up by Take-Two CEO Ben Feder who recently stated “We continue to build that relationship. GTA Chinatown Wars is not even the first step but certainly an important step in continuing to develop that relationship.”

Let’s keep the fingers crossed!  A Wii GTA would rock my world.

Off topic, SSX Blur for Wii is twenty eight bucks.  It was fifty.

Namco Bandai Games is giving away a copy of their Active Life: Outdoor Challenge game and controller mat. Fill out the form on the sweepstakes site to enter. Sweepstakes ends October 7.

Peripheral company Ninty is reportedly working on a storage solution for Wii consoles.  American consumers and Wii fanatics (like yours truly) are buying lots and lots of WiiWare titles, and we need somewhere to stick them once console memory is eaten up.

“We are working on a storage solution and it is especially important in America because our consumers are using Wii Points for the Virtual Console and WiiWare,” Fils-Aime offers.

“I want the people to have the right expectations; we have never said that it will be a hard drive nor have we mentioned how we will fix this issue, but we are going to deliver a better way to store the games.”

Hmm.  Not an external storage drive, and not a zebra.  What could it be?

According to the article, game designer Shigeru Miyamotosays that Ninty isn’t planning many more peripherals with Nintendo.  I wonder what’s up with that?