Launch Station: Splatoon

The difference a year can make is astounding.  Just under a year ago at E3 2014, Splatoon made its debut to a lukewarm response.  The announcement of a brand new property for Nintendo was exciting, but showcasing the multiplayer mode of Splatoon made the game feel smaller than it actually was.  Many came out of E3 with the impression that Splatoon was a downloadable experiment instead of full retail experience.  In a similar vein to the hype surrounding Super Mario 3D World, Splatoon's stock has only gone up with every new detail, preview and trailer.  During all this time, Splatoon has slowly become one of the most anticipated Wii U games of 2015.

First and foremost, Splatoon is a team-based online multiplayer shooter.  Instead of racking up the most kills, players are tasked with covering their surroundings in ink.  The team that covers more of the arena in their team's ink wins.  Covering the arena in ink doesn't only satisfy the win-condition of matches, it offers players tactical advantages in battle.  Considering you play as a human-squid hybrid known as an inkling, you are able to use the ink to hide from enemies, climb walls and refill your ink tank.  While Turf War is the only multiplayer mode available to play at launch, Nintendo will be updating Splatoon over the course of the summer with new Ranked multiplayer modes such as Splat Zones and Tower Control.

Although multiplayer is Splatoon's main focus, it is not the only thing it offers.  Splatoon has a large suite of offline modes from the single player Octo Valley to local multiplayer Battle Dojo.

Octo Valley has a similar design to the Mario Galaxy games as your inkling must navigate a series of floating planetoid-like platforms in order to reach the Zapfish at the end of each level.  The levels contained in Octo Valley are split between the platforming levels described, arena fights with swarms of Octarians and boss battles.  The Splatoon series amiibos play a role in this mode as they open up sets of unique missions, which unlock special equipment and bonus NES-inspired mini games.

On the other end of the single player front, Battle Dojo is a one-on-one local multiplayer mode where players compete to pop the most balloons.  In this mode, one person plays on the Wii U Gamepad while the other plays on the television with a Pro Controller.

There are still loads of stuff contained within Splatoon's ink-covered package like customization, weapons, mini games and mechanics, but I don't have the space to cover it all here.  If you want a in-depth look at weapons and controls, check out the latest edition of First Byte where I analyze the Splatoon Global Testfire.

All-in-all, I have a feeling that Splatoon is going to surprise a lot of people with its unique take on the shooter genre.  While I am looking forward to spending some quality time with Splatoon, I hope Wii U owners give this game a chance and show Nintendo that it is time to create some brand new franchises to stand beside our established favourites.

Bit by Bit: August 2014

As the weeks pass, we continue to inch ever so closer to the end of the summer.  For most including yours truly, the end of summer means the beginning of school.  With a new school year, I move from the craziness of managing two jobs, this blog and life to insanity of managing four university courses, a volunteer position at the university newspaper and a co-op job search on top of everything else mentioned above.  Before all that awesomeness becomes reality, there are two more weeks to relax and make the most of the summer.  Among the large list of things to do in these two weeks, I am going to Fan Expo Canada this coming Friday, August 29th.  It has been four long years since I last went to this event and things have really changed especially on the video game side of things.  Expect plenty of impressions on Fan Expo and all the games I get a chance to demo at the event in the weeks to come.  While all that amazing content is going to coming to Silver Bit in the near future, it is that time again to take our monthly trip down memory lane in Bit by Bit.

Game of the Month
License games do not have the best reputation among gamers.  Most of these projects do a poor job in translating the properties they represent to the video game medium that many have soured to license games altogether.  Every once and awhile, there comes a diamond in the rough to show us the great potential of coupling a huge license, be it a movie, comic or television show, with this interactive medium.  The latest diamond comes from the fusion of Broforce, a side-scrolling action game made by Free Lives that honours and parodies 80s action films and unabashed American patriotism, and the Expendables, Sylvester Stallone's action movie franchise that plays with nostalgia for a bygone age of blockbuster action movies and their larger than life stars.  From this match made in heaven came the Expendabros.

Expendabros is a free standalone expansion to Broforce which gives players a taste of Broforce's hectic gameplay with bro-ified versions of the Expendables 3 cast.  To describe Expendabros' gameplay as anything short of insane would not do the game justice.  Destructible environments, bombastic weapons, buckets of pixelated blood and enough explosions to bring a tear to Michael Bay's eyes kept a grin firmly planted on my face throughout my time with the game.  As much fun as I had with with the Expendabros, I did run into a good amount of slowdown especially when there were lots of explosions on screen and while loading new levels or cutscenes that took away from my experience.  While Expendabros has a few problems, the game has put Broforce on my radar of games I need to play and I highly recommend those who own a PC to give this free game a try because it is loads of fun.

Most Anticipated Game of the Month
I try not to have many repeats for Most Anticipated Game of the Month, but Azure Striker Gunvolt is the exception especially considering the game is less than a week away from release.  Comcept and Inti Creates' spiritual successor to Mega Man Zero will be available to download from the Nintendo eShop this coming Friday, August 29th for 15 dollars.  Those who purchase Azure Striker Gunvolt within the first three months of its launch will receive Mighty Gunvolt, an 8-bit side-scrolling crossover between Gunvolt, Mighty No. 9 and Gal Gun, free of charge.  From the brief gameplay trailer, Mighty Gunvolt looks to be modeled after the NES era Mega Man games with some new gameplay twists such as character specific abilities.  Seeing as Capcom will be sitting on Mega Man aside from re-releasing past games on new platforms for the foreseeable future, I am glad that Keiji Inafune, Comcept and Inti Creates are taking it upon themselves to fill the void with quality successors to the Mega Man name.  I cannot wait to get my hands on the fruition of their hard work later this week.

Video of the Month
When was the last time a game legitimately scared you?  For me, it was BioShock.  The dark, unsettling setting of Rapture combined with its disturbing residents caused me to debate whether or not to venture further into the level or shudder over the haunting screams that echoed through those halls many times.

While I personally hate horror movies due to their predictable plots and over reliance on blood and gore, I find survival horror games and games with significant horror elements very engaging because I am directly involved in the horrific events rather than a passive observer.  With the drop in quality among survival horror games (Resident Evil and Alone in the Dark) and the need to give players an overabundance of firepower and strength in action games with horror elements (BioShock Infinite and The Last of Us), games that truly scare are few and far between.

Konami looks to change that situation with its new additions of Silent Hill, which will be developed by Kojima Productions with the help of horror movie aficionado Guillermo del Toro and starring The Walking Dead's Norman Reedus.  With a lot of big names behind these projects, it seems like Konami is finally taking the Silent Hill franchise serious once again, but that is not all Konami did.  To show the new direction for these Silent Hills, Konami released P.T. (Playable Teaser) as a free download on PS4.  The one-two punch of the announcement trailer and playable teaser has generated an incredible amount of excitement for these new installments in the Silent Hill franchise.  I strongly encourage everybody to try out the unique yet incredibly scary P.T. for themselves or watch a walkthrough online if you do not own a PS4.  While P.T. may be more of an interactive experience than a game, it is something that all gamers mature enough should take the time to experience.

On the Download: DuckTales: Remastered

“Life is like a hurricane, here in Duckburg.  Race cars, lasers, aeroplanes, its a duck-blur.  Might solve a mystery or rewrite history!”

When that iconic verse rang through the halls of PAX East, a chill formed down gamers’ spines both young and old in anticipation of the newest adventure with the greedy yet lovable Scrooge McDuck.  From the charming 8-bit graphics to the beautiful chiptune music to the masterful gameplay, Capcom’s DuckTales for the NES has been revered as one of the greatest licensed games of all-time.  To see such an iconic game be remade for a new generation of gamers to experience and older fans to lovingly revisit is simply amazing especially considering the NES original has never been released on any online service.  Being developed by the wonderful team at WayForward Technologies, who are responsible for great titles like Shantae, Contra 4 and the Mighty series on DSi and 3DS, there are high expectations for the return of Scrooge McDuck.

DuckTales: Remastered is not a quick and dirty remake of the NES original.  The team at WayForward has put their heart and soul into reimagining DuckTales for this modern era of video games.  The 8-bit sprites have been replaced by beautifully hand-drawn and animated sprites that look straight out of the cartoon itself.  Even with the limited bleeps and bloops on the NES processor, DuckTales’ soundtrack is held in high regard by most older gamers.  Jake Kaufman, the composer of DuckTales: Remastered, did his best to preserve the original compositions of the soundtrack while taking a more orchestral approach on each track.  The NES did not have enough processing power to convey a story through cutscenes like games do today so most of the storytelling was put in the game manual.  With the extensive power of the game systems of today, WayForward expands on the original story of DuckTales with brand new cutscenes which add more context to Scrooge’s objectives in each level and explains some lingering questions such as how a duck is able to breathe on the moon.  Along with the obvious additions to the presentation and audio, DuckTales: Remastered contains two new levels, new areas to explore in returning levels, the privilege to swim in Scrooge’s money vault, a map screen, an easy pogo jump setting and tons of unlockables such as concept art and music.

As a big fan of the show, DuckTales has been a game that yours truly has wanted to play for the longest time.  I have listened to the music and watched quite a bit of gameplay from DuckTales, but I had never got the chance to play the game itself.  Thanks to DuckTales: Remastered, this writer can finally experience this NES classic now in high definition.  DuckTales: Remastered is available now for 15 dollars on PSN, Steam and the Wii U eShop.  Sadly, Xbox 360 owners will have to wait until September 11th to join Uncle Scrooge on his globe-trotting adventure.  For those who prefer physical copies of their games, a physical copy of DuckTales: Remastered will be available exclusively for PS3 on August 20th, which will cost 20 dollars instead of 15.  No matter if you enjoyed DuckTales on the NES or never played the game before, put down your money and support DuckTales: Remastered in order to convince Disney to revisit more of their classic video game library and hopefully inspire them to start a new age of quality Disney licensed games.

On the Download: Wii U Update Bonanza

After months of patiently waiting, Wii U owners have finally received the massive update needed to solve the load time problems the system has had since launch.  While this update does drastically decrease the load times between running games and applications, it is not the only feature that Nintendo has added to the Wii U through the update.  Wii U owners can now boot right into the Wii Menu by holding the B button during start-up, download and install games and applications in the background and when the system is turned off and transfer data between two USB storage devices.  Along with the update came a few new games to download in the Wii U eShop.  For the first On the Download of 2013, let us get on with the show.

Wii U owners have gotten a little taste of the Wii U Virtual Console through Nintendo's 30 cent trial program on the Wii U eShop.  Now with the release of the spring update comes the official launch of the Wii U Virtual Console.  While Nintendo's 30 cent program on select Virtual Console games will continue until July, Virtual Consoles will be released much more frequently now that the service has officially launched.  For those looking at what to download for the Virtual Console launch, there are eight games to choose from.  These games are Super Mario World, F-Zero, Punch-Out, Balloon Fight, Excitebike, Kirby's Adventure, Ice Climbers and Donkey Kong Jr.  The prices for Virtual Console games range from 5 dollars for NES games and 8 dollars for SNES game, but Kirby's Adventure is on for 30 cents until May 16th.  For Wii U owners who have moved their Wii Virtual Console library to the Wii U, you will be able to download the Wii U Virtual Console versions of these games for either 1 dollar for NES games and 1 dollar and 50 cents for SNES games.

While the delay of Rayman Legends and loss of exclusivity made a lot of Wii U owners very angry, Ubisoft has been trying their best to make it up to these gamers.  First, it was announced that the extra time has allowed the developers up to 30 new levels into Rayman Legends.  Second, Ubisoft planned to release the multiplayer portion of Rayman Legends exclusively for Wii U owners before the launch of the actual game.  There was a vague mention of a spring release for this feature, but nothing was ever set in stone.  It was to many gamers surprise to see the Rayman Legends Challenges App up on the Wii U eShop ready to download this past week.  This free app allows gamers to play through the final versions of the demo levels along with the online challenge mode.  There are daily and weekly challenges for gamers to test their platforming skills against people from all over the world.  Win trophies in these challenges in order to boost your awesomeness level and unlock more extreme challenges.  Personally, I have enjoyed my time with the Rayman Legends Challenges App and will easily spend more time with my Wii U because of it.  The app is free so Wii U owners should have no excuse to download it while we all wait for Rayman Legends' September release.

On the Download: July 1-7

It has been one busy Thursday for the video game industry.  I turned on the computer today and was bombarded with at least four big news stories.  Two of these stories relate to my weekly post on the newest downloadable games.  First, Capcom and Marvel are joining forces again to bring both Marvel Super Heroes and the original Marvel vs. Capcom to XBLA and PSN this coming September in the Marvel vs. Capcom Origins.  Next story is Sega's announcement that their iconic flying platformer from the Sega Saturn, Nights into Dreams will be getting a HD remake for XBLA and PSN releasing this Fall.  Two big games you will definitely see me covering here in On the Download come their release.

July 5th marked the start of Nintendo's 8-Bit Summer initiative  on the Nintendo eShop.  Throughout the month of July, there will be two new 3DS Virtual Console games released on the eShop each week. The first two games released for the 8-Bit Summer are The Legend of Zelda and NES Open Tournament Golf.  Both games were released to the 3DS Ambassadors just under a year ago for the NES wave of free games.  For those who already own these games for the 3DS, you are able to update them, which adds the restore points feature found in all other Virtual Console games among a few other upgrades.  If you are not a 3DS Ambassador, you are able to pick up these NES games for 5 dollars each.

Made by two people, Spelunky was originally released free for the PC in 2008.  Spelunky is a 2D platformer where you journey through ever-randomizing levels on your way to the end of the game.  This week an HD version of Spelunky has been released exclusively for XBLA.  While Spelunky HD does have more polished animated graphics than the PC original, it is not a mere port.  Spelunky HD has new graphics, music, weapons, items, monsters, traps, zones and secrets for gamers to experience.  Spelunky HD has also been tailor-made for the 360 controller as the controls are much smoother and easier to get use to than in the original.  Even though the levels are completely randomized, you are able to navigate the levels any way you want.  Also each level is fully-destructible.  You can compete with gamers across the world with online leaderboards or through Spelunky HD's Deathmatch multi-player mode.  Spelunky HD's Deathmatch plays a lot like a platformer version of Bomberman as you use weapons and other items, possibly even bombs, to take out your opponents in small little arenas.  If you want to play Deathmatch alone, you can play against AI bots.  Also you are able to play through the entire game with co-operatively with three other players.  Spelunky HD can be picked up on XBLA for 1200 Microsoft Points for those interested in picking it up.

Hump Day Music: Duck Tales

For anybody who watched it on Disney Afternoons or saw reruns on Family Channel, Duck Tales was one of the best cartoons of the late 1980s early 1990s.  Duck Tales was soo good that it even got a game made by Capcom, which is just as acclaimed.  While I personally have never played Duck Tales for the NES, I have heard many good things about Scrooge McDuck's adventure into games.  If Duck Tales ever released for the Wii or 3DS Virtual Console, I would buy it immediately as I have wanted to play it for a long while.  I along with many other gamers would accept a sequel made by Warren Spector and his team at Junction Point in place of releasing Duck Tales for NES.

One of my personal favourite parts of the Duck Tales cartoon is the theme song.  Instantly iconic and easy to sing along with, the Duck Tales theme song is quite possibly the best cartoon theme song of all-time.  When Duck Tales was turned into a game for the NES, that meant Capcom had to alter the theme song to work on the musically limited NES.  So Capcom stripped away the lyrics and made an 8-bit version of the Duck Tales that is just as recognizable and just as good.  It might not have the lyrics, but you will be definitely be dancing to the infectious beat and possibly singing the lyrics yourself.  No matter if you watched it back on Disney Afternoons, caught reruns during the late 90s or have just been introduced to Duck Tales just now in 2012, it is a cartoon that has stood the test of time.  Just like Duck Tales' theme has stood the test of time in it's many forms.