E3: Maxx’s Take on Nintendo’s Press Conference

“It’s good to be the king” That’s what Nintendo’s message seemed to be at this year’s E3. With the indomitable Wii and DS systems continuing to still sell out, Nintendo seems to be content with taking things easy, dictating from their high throne just how much cake we poor gamers get to eat. If the press conference is anything to go by, we won’t have much to enjoy this year, at least not in the form of “core” games.

There were three main first party ones shown at the conference. Wii Sports Resort, Animal Crossing: City Folk, and Wii Music. As far as “innovative hardware” goes, they had a speakerphone attachment for the Wii, and the MotionPlus add-on for the Wii remote. The speakerphone gizmo could easily be forgotten in time, along with the Wii Zapper, MarioKart steering wheel, and several other Wii add-ons that Nintendo hasn’t think-tanked into existence yet. MotionPlus though, that could wind up being significant…

MotionPlus promises to bring true, 1 to 1 motion controls to the Wii. The first title announced that will make use of it is the Wii Sports sequel. How good Wii Sports Resort winds up being will likely determine MotionPlus’s fate. They only showed off three games in Wii Sports Resort: fencing, water skiing, and frisbee toss. Staying true to the original Wii Sports, all three mini-games were simplistic, seemingly playable by anyone who is able to swing their arm around. I wouldn’t be surprised at all if the Balance Board gets some kind of use in other events.

If MotionPlus winds up being a hit, it’ll be interesting to see how new games will make use of it. Will it enjoy success like the N64 rumble pack, becoming an essential part of gaming… or will it be used in a couple of games and then fade away, like the SNES light gun, or the NES R.O.B.? I hope that it will succeed. Unlike the forgettable plastic concoctions that are the Wii Wheel and Zapper holster, MotionPlus actually does something. It’s too bad it wasn’t built in to the remotes to begin with.

I wanted to like Wii Music. The appallingly boring, yet totally accurately named game will have a surprising number of virtual instruments to play: drums, guitar, violin, xylophone, cow bell… Wii Music kinda makes the new Rock Band and Guitar Hero games seem quaint with their two instruments. The actual implementation falls well short of my expectations, though. Robbie Drums (his real name?) played a virtual drum solo with a Wii remote, nunchuck, and Balance Board (for the kick pedals). The Wii kinda seemed to know which pad/cymbal the drummer was trying to hit, but the actual solo sounded disjointed at best. Miyamoto appeared on stage next, playing a virtual saxophone with a single Wii remote. It sounded even worse than the drums. Although he was pushing buttons on the remote to play the notes, it appeared that the button presses were just making the Mii cycle through preset notes in a song. Miyamoto wasn’t actually controlling the notes, in other words, he appeared to just be controlling the tempo.

That could ultimately be the worst thing about Wii Music. If all the player is doing is controlling the speed of the music, and isn’t actually playing any notes, which was a bonus mini-game in WarioWare: Smooth Moves, then the novelty of the game will quickly wear off. The saving grace will be the actual song selection. If there’s plenty of nostalgic and remixed Nintendo game tunes, it’ll be a must-buy on my list.

There were other games mentioned during the show. They had a live demonstration of the new Shaun White snowboarding game that used the Balance Board. They briefly mentioned an all-new GTA game for the DS, set in modern day Liberty City. The new Raving Rabbids was shown. And… that’s mostly it. The presentation was so short, I wondered if I had fallen asleep and missed something.

Nintendo clearly is not worried about the year that lay ahead until the next E3. Maybe when the Wii and DS sales finally start to stagnate, Nintendo will bring out the big guns and show off some really big games. Mario Galaxy 2, a new Zelda made specifically for the Wii, Pikmin 3, old franchises brought back to life (Kid Icarus, Punch Out… I’d kill for a new Mach Rider even). For now, Nintendo will keep doing what they want indefinitely. This E3 wasn’t a bad one for the company, it just wasn’t quite what it should have been.