The Tendo Project – Daily Nintendo News

The game continues as Nintendo adds more to the games and allows you to catch a pair of rare Pokmon

If you’re still battling away on Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver, or even if you’re not, it’s time to fire it up because there is more to do. This Saturday, Nintendo is allowing you to download a new event over Wi-Fi.

The item you get is the Enigma Stone, take it over it Pewter city Museum and they’ll figure out it’s actually an item called the Soul Dew. This will get the Pokémon, Latias, to appear on SoulSilver and Latios to appear on HeartGold. These two Pokémon made their debut back in Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire. The Soul Dew item is also useful to attach to the two Pokémon.

You have until August 27th to get them!

R4s (or Flash Cards) get the chop in the UK as Nintendo wins in the High Court

The UK now joins the ranks of countries that have deemed the ‘R4’ cards for the Nintendo DS illegal. London’s High Court has ruled that the R4 and all other types of flash cards that enabled piracy on the Nintendo DS are illegal. Now of course, not all flash cards are used for piracy but with the way the cards actually work, there is enough for the court to act upon the cards. The judge dismissed that shape of the card and that Nintendo’s logos where being used on the cards. Other Flash card names and brands such as the M3DS, DSTT, Acekard and the CycloDS were named in the case as well.

Software piracy in the UK for the Nintendo DS is huge and it’s believed that it caused a drop of more than 50% in software sales on the Nintendo DS in the last year, partially caused by these cards.

This ruling means the UK joins Australia, Japan and many other countries in banning the cards. But we suspect that we haven’t seen the end of DS piracy for the time being.

Some insight behind the decision to forgo realistic graphics

Courtesy of the Official Nintendo Magazine, we’ve gained some insight behind The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword’s unique graphic style after title director, Eiji Aonuma commented on the choice to leave the realistic graphics of the series predecessor, Twilight Princess behind.

The key point Aonuma focused on was the need for the exaggerated characteristics. “We thought that because we want to highlight the swordfighting combat, we have to exaggerate the features”, Aonuma explained. The title director also stated that this was important to show how the enemies were carrying their weapons. This could be a hint that enemies carry weapons in very exaggerated or unorthodox ways, in order to allow the player to work out their weaknesses, something that is also hinted at in the E3 trailer fr the game.

Aonuma concluded, “We matched the artwork so that we can highlight the over-exaggeration in the gameplay.” It is also interesting to remember that Nintendo stated that the graphics shown in the E3 trailer were not a representation of the final product, as work continues on this area of the game.

What do you think of the art direction being taken in Skyward Sword? Head over to the forums and join in the discussion.

Source: Official Nintendo Magazine

Re-recording taking place, Alice Cooper hopes to encourage young guitar players

20 new tracks, as well as re-recordings of Alice Cooper and Runaways songs, have been confirmed for the upcoming Guitar Hero entry, Warriors of Rock.

The artists have returned to the studio to re-record some of their most popular songs, reportedly including ‘No More Mr. Nice Guy’ and ‘Cherry Bomb’. Cooper believes that this new version of the song will encourage younger musicians to give the guitar a shot. He insists exposing this generation to ‘classic rock songs’ is a good way to influence them to create their own classic melodies.

The 22 new songs are as follows:

Alice Cooper - "No More Mr. Nice Guy"
Alter Bridge - "Ties That Bind"
Atreyu - "Ravenous"
Bad Brains - "Re-Ignition (Live)"
Blue Öyster Cult - "Burning For You"
Bush - "Machinehead"
Deep Purple - "Burn"
Edgar Winter - "Free Ride"
Five Finger Death Punch - "Hard To See"
George Thorogood and The Destroyers - "Move It On Over (Live)"
Lynyrd Skynyrd - "Call Me The Breeze (Live)"
Pantera - "I’m Broken"
Poison - "Unskinny Bop"
The Ramones - "Theme From Spiderman"
Rise Against - "Savior"
The Runaways - "Cherry Bomb"
Steve Vai - "Speeding"
Strung Out - "Calling"
Styx - "Renegade"
Sum 41 - "Motivation"
Them Crooked Vultures - "Scumbag Blues"
The White Stripes - "Seven Nation Army"

We look forward to the new installment in Activision’s tried-and-true cash cow.

CrossPass gets trademarked by Nintendo, could this be the name for the 3DS Tag Mode?

Nintendo Japan has filed a bunch of new Nintendo 3DS-related trademarks. Some of them appear to be new games, but the most interesting ones are the trademarks for ‘CrossPass, CrossPass Mode, CrossPass Network, and CrossPass Connection’. It seems to be that these names could be related to the 3DS’s improved tag mode functionality. This mode will allow 3DS owners to exchange player data when they walk past each other – even when a game isn’t in the system. This is different from the tag mode in, say, Dragon Quest IX or Nintendogs, which both require the game to be in and powered on.

There were also some new games registered called 3D Paddleball, 3D Challenge, and 3D Hopper. Perhaps these are some early 3DSWare games or simply tech demos.

Obvious title is obvious, but we have our hands on Dragon Quest IX which is out next month

Nintendo Australia invited us over to their Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies (aka Dragon Quest IX for short) media event in Sydney, one month ahead of its release date. This title is popular in Japan, already attracting a fan base of more than 4.2 million people.

We were briefed on the history of Dragon Quest and shown a promotional video reel, featuring cutscenes and battles from IX. We were then shown one of the gameplay modes that enhance the experience; wireless multiplayer.

It is possible to link up to four DSs with Dragon Quest IX and cooperate amongst yourselves. You can also run on your own and venture by yourself if you want to, grinding those levels that the others choose not to do.

Another new feature is the ability to customise your party members. This allows customisation from choosing different faces, hair, and even eyes. As you progress in the game, characters are able to be customised from more than 1000 items and pieces of equipment.

Lastly, there is the interactive Tag Mode that allows players to keep the game on even while the DS is in standby mode. If two players come within range of each other, Tag Mode allows them to automatically exchange character information, customised greetings and treasure maps. What is unique about these treasure maps is that the content from these maps is exclusive to Tag Mode, which means that you can’t find them if you’re playing by yourself.

Soon after the briefing was finished, we went hands-on with the game. We played from a loaded save game, which had a couple of hours logged into it. We were placed in the heat of a battle, showing off the cooperative multiplayer. The sync between the DSs was perfect, from the battle transition right through to the end of the battle.

Dragon Quest IX proves that this isn’t your typical DS RPG, with the wireless multiplayer feature that allows you to band up with up to three different party members, and an interactive Tag Mode which provides new, user-generated content, extending longevity and replay value.

Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies comes out in Australia on August 19th. We will have a review up before then!

Madden NFL 11 (Wii)
Demo launches today, full title set for August 10 release.

The Wii version of FIFA 11 will come packed with an arcade-style 5v5 street play mode in addition to the core game

Before you all pack up your vuvuzelas now that the World Cup is over, there’s plenty of good reason to stay in football-madness mode. EA Sports have announced that the 2011-branded FIFA on Wii will come with an added bonus - a ‘Street Football Mode’ that allows players to put their favourite international football stars head-to-head in a rough-and-tumble arcade football mode. There’s gonna be a bunch of unique locales to test out your street soccerball skills, with South American and European back alleys for you to play on.

EA Sports are looking to further capitalise on the unique gameplay opportunities presented by the Wii’s control scheme, by implementing a new ‘attacker vs. defender’ trick system that cracks the game wide open with a range of new ways to score goals.

FIFA 11 is expected to drop in October in Australia.

Thats right kids, Doogie Howser himself will once again be providing voice work for Spider-Man in Activisions upcoming game

NPH, of Doogie Howser and How I Met Your Mother fame, will be providing the witty banter for the ‘Amazing’ version of Spider-Man in Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions. He had originally voiced the character in the 2003 TV cartoon ‘Spider-Man: The New Animated Series’. The upcoming Shattered Dimensions features four different iconic versions of Spider-Man from different universes. In addition to NPH’s appearance in the ‘Amazing’ universe, our web-slinging hero will also appear in his ‘Ultimate’, ‘Noir’ and ‘2099’ iterations. Also lending their voice talents to the game will be Christopher Daniel Barnes, Dan Gilvezan and Josh Keaton - all of whom have done voice acting for Spider-Man in the past.

Shattered Dimensions is a bold move for Marvel and Activision, with its unique split-four-ways gameplay that will feature much less well known versions of the superhero. Spider-Man’s popularity has always been high, but has been bolstered by the Sam Raimi-directed films that have been released this past decade. With Shattered Dimensions, developer Beenix have a tough task ahead of them in making the more obscure realisations of Spider-Man appeal to the gaming masses, but have the potential to implement some great original gameplay around the concept.

Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions for Wii is expected to hit locally around September. A DS game developed by Griptonite is also on the way.

 

Already granted an Australian classification in June, finally seems set for PAL release

European rating system Pan European Game Information (PEGI), has granted classification to the highly anticipated WiiWare title Cave Story, following the Australian classification last month. This suggests that the title may soon receive a release in PAL territories, having been available in North American since March 22nd, 2010.

Cave Story, originally a 2004 freeware PC game created by Daisuke Amaya, is a side scrolling shooter, with elements of a platformer and an emphasis on exploration. It is comparable to both the Castlevania and Metroid series.

We look forward to an Australian release for the title, sometime this year.

Source: Pan European Game Information (PEGI)