London, U.K. — On August 10, Ubisoft announced that Assassin’s Creed III for PCs will be available in the UK on November 23, 2012.

Set against the backdrop of the American Revolution in the late 18th century, Assassin’s Creed III introduces a new hero, Ratohnhakéton, of Native American and English heritage. Adopting the name Connor, he becomes the new voice for justice in the ancient war between the Assassins and Templars. Players become an Assassin in the war for liberty against ruthless tyranny in the most stylized and fluid combat experiences in the franchise to date.

Assassin’s Creed III is set to release on October 31st for the PlayStation 3 computer entertainment system and Xbox 360 video game and entertainment system from Microsoft and will be available for Wii U from Nintendo when the Wii U launches.

Initially launched in 2007, the first four Assassin’s Creed games have sold more than 38 million units worldwide, and the franchise is now established as one of the best-selling series ever. Recognized for having some of the richest, most engrossing storytelling in the industry, Assassin’s Creed transcends video games, branching out into other entertainment experiences including comic books, Facebook games, novels, short films and more.

Assassin’s Creed III can be pre-ordered at UBIShop by visiting: http://shop.ubi.com/assassinscreed3

For more information on Assassin’s Creed, please visit the Assassin’s Creed Official Website (www.assassinscreed.com)

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During Nintendo’s Press Conference at E3 2012, they introduced many new features the Wii U has to offer as well as some of the new games that will be released for the Wii U and the 3DS. Out of the list of games they announced, Nintendo Land seemed to get a lot of air time during the conference.

Taking up the mantle on discussing Nintendo Land was game designer and Manager at Nintendo Entertainment Analysis and Development (EAD) Katsuya Eguchi (Super Mario Bros 3, Super Mario World, Animal Crossing, Wii Sports). The main thing that Katsuya wanted to get across about Nintendo Land was that like Wii Sports, its main purpose is a fun training tool to help its gamers with how the new Game Pad controller functions. Like Wii Tennis, once the gamer picks up the controller for the first time, they are able to jump right into the game with ease.

Nintendo Land is set up like a theme park, like Universal Studios Theme Park Adventure, in which there is a theme park hub and a series of character-theme based mini games. Nintendo Land is one of the few Nintendo games that creates a shared universe for their characters. With a total of twelve mini games in Nintendo Land, five of them were announced at Nintendo’s E3 Press Conference.

The first game Nintendo announced was Takamaru’s Ninja Castle. This game is a single-player shooting gallery game based on the characters from the Japanese game Nazo no Murasame-jō. The objective of the game is simple. The player uses the Game Pad to shoot shurikens at attacking ninjas. When using the Game Pad to shoot shurikens, if the player tilts or rotates the Pad to adjust the angle of the throw, and the faster the player swipes the shuriken, the further it launches. This is a simple game that shows the user the motion functionality of the Game Pad.

Nintendo then introduced Luigi’s Ghost Mansion. This is a five player survival maze set in the Luigi Mansion universe. The ability to hold up to five players on one console makes this game unique. Four people can play using a Wiimote and one person can use the Game Pad. The objective of the game is to hunt the ghost with flashlights before the time limit runs out or before the ghost takes them out. The four Wiimote players are the humans, and the ghost is controlled by the player using the Game Pad.

The Wiimote users play the game on the T.V. while they hunt for the ghost that they can’t see (the Wiimote vibrates when the player is near the ghost), while the Game Pad user plays the game on the Pad’s screen. This player can see where everyone is and hunt them down one by one. This type of gameplay is what Nintendo advertises as Asymmetric Gameplay, in which the same game is played differently depending on if the players are using the Wiimote or the Game Pad. Luigi’s Ghost Mansion is a very interesting mini game from Nintendo Land because of this Assymetric Gameplay.

Animal Crossing: Sweet Day is a simple collecting game that also involves 5 players. Four Wiimote users run around trying to gather the most candy while the Game Pad user plays as Chasers trying to stop the other players. Other than the Chaser, this game is as simple as it gets, but still entertaining for a basic mini game.

Donkey Kong Crash Course is a single-player cart driving game in which the player tilts the Game Pad to move the cart back and forth as they navigate through a maze resembling levels from Mario vs. Donkey Kong. The objective is fairly basic, collect as many bananas as you can without dying.

The last game that was announced at E3 was The Legend of Zelda: Battle Quest. Battle Quest is a three player rail shooter game in which two players using the Wiimotes play as swordsmen while the Game Pad user plays an archer. The game relies heavily on cooperation, the swordsmen take on close range enemies while the archer takes on enemies at a distance, as well as hitting switches that come along the way. The players also share a health bar, so once the five hearts are used up, it’s game over for everyone.

Nintendo Land looks to be a very promising introduction to how the Wii U functions, and with any luck Nintendo Land will come with the Wii U based Wii Sports on the Wii. With seven more games that have yet to be unveiled, Nintendo keeps us waiting for what surprises they have in store for us with Nintendo Land.

Image Courtesey of GDC 

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It’s now six years since the Wii’s arrival in the US market, and Nintendo sees it’s time for change. But their competitors, Sony and Microsoft, already breached the HD field in these past few years and they are now looking into expanding further with their Next Gen systems. Will the Wii U stand the trials ahead, or will Nintendo fall into obscurity?

Before deciding the fate of Nintendo, it’s important to look at what information Nintendo released for their next big push in the home console. At E3 on Tuesday June 5th, Nintendo held their Press Conference, pushing the Wii U as well as some of their title games such as New Super Mario Bros U, Nintendo Land, and Pikmin 3 which will be released along with the system this winter. At the conference, Nintendo also released selected details regarding the Wii U ranging from what fans can expect and to details about the new controller.

One of the first announcements from Nintendo of America’s President and Chief Operating Officer, Reggie Fils-Aime, was the clarification that the Wii U will support two Wii U Game Pads along with four Wii-mote plus, nunchucks, and classic controllers. As for the Game Pad, features included are, a touch screen that can be used with either the player’s fingers or a stylus, four face buttons, dual analog sticks, motion gyroscope, rumble feature, headphone jack, camera, mic, speakers, volume control (used for both the Game Pad and T.V.), and a home button for menu navigation and for the social network.

Other features offered for the Game Pad are access to Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, and Amazon Video. The device is also supposed to be able to function as a universal T.V. remote. The biggest feature that is offered for the Game Pad, is the option to play most of Wii U’s games directly on the Game Pad, which gives the option for gamers to play their Wii U games even if the television is occupied.

As for features on the Wii U, the underlying focus of the system is Social Interaction. Upon turning on the Wii U, gamers are dropped into the main hub of their Wii U Menu, which is currently known as Main Street. In the main menu, the gamer’s Miis are dropped in an open environment with Miis from other players all while roaming around in a social network Nintendo calls the Miiverse.

The Miiverse is the peak of Nintendo’s social interaction where gamers can communicate with each other by means of texting or pictochat. The Miiverse also gives gamers the ability to post status updates, high scores,  add game hints to help others through more challenging situations in a particular game (similar to that found in ATLUS’ Demon’s Souls), as well as the option to jump right into a game that has already started. The Miiverse is also announced to be available on the 3DS as well as other mobile devices at a later date.

But the biggest push Nintendo was offering with the Wii U was the Asymmetric gameplay. Since the Wii U gives gamers the option of using the Game Pad or the Wiimotes, this gives gamers the option to have up to five players on the same system (four on the Wiimotes and one on the Game Pad). This was not described much in detail, but continuously brought up, and it became clear by what Nintendo meant with Asymmetric gameplay. In some games, as players use the Wiimotes, the person playing with the Game Pad generally has a special role. In New Super Mario Bros. U, the player with the Game Pad has the option of placing blocks to assist other players or to create obstacles.

In Just Dance 4, the player that uses the Game Pad is known as the Puppet Master, in which during a song, the Game Pad user can pick and choose any dance move he desires to make the Wiimote players do, and even has the option to force the dancers to strike a pose and have them hold it until the Puppet Master decides to choose a different move. This Asymmetric gameplay leaves open new options to future games and can greatly increase the gameplay value of games to come.

With these new updates on the Wii U, the anticipation for its winter release is great, but it is a matter of how its sales do that will be the deciding factor if Nintendo can survive the home console market. The Wii U shows great promise and many gamers continue to anticipate other details that can be expected.

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Opening day two for E3 2012 was the Nintendo Press Conference but it was a big disappointment, and could be a potential disaster for Nintendo. This lackluster performance is not a way to advertise the next big console for Nintendo, because a poor showing at E3 can only lead them downhill in this heavily competitive market. So without further ado, these were the shortcomings of Nintendo’s press conference.

Nintendo opened up with a skit starring Shigeru Miyamoto, game designer and producer for Nintendo (Mario, Zelda, Star Fox, Donkey Kong, F-Zero, Pikmin). Pikmin scurried around his dressing room with one getting stuck in his jacket pocket as Miyamoto makes his way to the conference floor. Once on the floor Miyamoto jumps right into Pikmin 3 for the Wii U.

Following this, Miyamoto left and Reggie Fils-Aime, President and Chief Operating Officer for Nintendo of America, stepped in and took the role of introducing details of the system and future games and their developers. Just taking a general look at Nintendo’s conference, it is like any other conference that one would see at E3. But usually the selling points of these press conferences are the unveiling of their big project that has been kept under wraps. So what did Nintendo have to offer?

Besides the already announced Pikmin 3, Nintendo offered a handfull of third party games, a rehashing of games that have already been released, a Wii Fit game that can count as a glorified add-on, two of the same type of Mario games, and an apology that they did not have time to discuss many of the anticipated 3DS games coming out.

Yes, there are quite a few amazing games in the lineup for Nintendo’s Wii U like Pinkmin 3, New Super Mario Bros U and New Super Mario Bros 2 for the 3DS, and Nintendo Land, which gives gamers a unique way to grasp of the potential of the Wii U (like Wii Sports to the Wii). But there was nothing that stood out and made the audience’s jaw drop in awe. The conference was like going to a movie that has been over hyped.

Nintendo really did a great job with creating a system for the casual gamer, as well as keeping their diehard gaming fans entertained, but out of all the games they showed off, they were games that we expected. Something that would have blown the conference out of the water would have been an introduction of an HD Star Fox or Metroid game.

By bringing in something that everyone wants, but does not expect, would have really brought the crowed to life. Instead Nintendo just offered us the firework effects from Nintendo Land. Instead of rave applauds, Nintendo received a dumbfounded look of disappointment from their audience. What Nintendo needs to do is learn from their mistakes and even if the project isn’t ready, give the gaming community something that will make them want to buy their system.

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We have already covered various aspects of Nintendo’s peripherals from Nintendo’s Laser Guns to the infamous Power Glove. In part two of Nintendo’s peripherals, we examine devices from the Roll ‘n Rocker to the Wii U’s controller.

The Roll ‘n Rocker

In 1989 the company LJN develops the Roll ‘n Rocker for the NES. The Roll ‘n Rocker is a balance board with a ball on the bottom. The Roll ‘n Rocker works by plugging the NES Controller to the Roll ‘n Rocker. The A, B, and Start buttons are used on the controller while the Roll ‘n Rocker is used as a glorified D-Pad. That is all the Roll ‘n Rocker is good for. With shoddy controls, poor functionality, and only a 100lbs weight limit, the Roll ‘n Rocker is one of the most useless peripherals for the NES.

R.O.B.

Jumping back to 1985, Nintendo introduces the Robotic Operating Buddy (R.O.B.) to Japan and North America. R.O.B is one of Nintendo’s most intriguing inventions even today. R.O.B. is an interactive robo buddy that the user is able to interact with on various games that came out for R.O.B.

The two games that came out for R.O.B. are “Gyromyte” and “Stack-up”. Both games require R.O.B. to do various tasks in order for the user to progress through the game. R.O.B. may be primitive at best, but he functions well. Though there are not too many other games released for R.O.B., he still is a predominant player in the gaming revival back in the videogame saturation of 1983.

Nintendo up to Today

With the many different peripherals on the NES, Nintendo is continuing to focus on new means of gameplay, and a lot of what they have today seem to be variations of their past projects. For the Nintendo 64 (N64) and the Nintendo GameCube, Nintendo tries two different voice recognition gameplay with “Hey You Pikachu” on the N64 and “Odama” on the GameCube.

Though both work better than their Laser Scope counterpart, they both suffer from command issues and are panned greatly for that. As for the Wii Speak, its only function is to communicate with other gamers.

As part of a new focus to get its gamers healthy, Nintendo introduces the Wii Balance board with the Wii Fit. The Wii Balance Board shares a strikingly similar function with the Roll ‘n Rocker, except the Wii Balance Board actually works and offers a lot more features that the Roll n’ Rocker cannot do.

The biggest development to come from Nintendo is the Wiimote (Wii Remote). From what seems like a combination of the NES Zapper and the Power Glove, the Wiimote masters functionality as well as gives gamers a completely unique gaming experience that no other developer is able to offer.

This leads to the possibility that the Power Glove was probably to advanced for its time and also shows that Nintendo had the technology back then, but needed time to perfect it before it could be a viable function as a gaming device.

Currently known as the Wii U Controller, the WiiPad a combination of an iPad with a basic gaming controller. Its style is very similar to the DS’ base and functions just like it. It will be interesting to see how Nintendo’s WiiPad will function once the Wii U officially comes out to the public Winter of 2012. Nintendo has certainly come a long way through the years and still continues to push gaming to the limit in how people play games.

To classics like the Nintendo Zapper, which to this day the only thing the Zapper is not able to shoot is the dog from Duck Hunt, and the abysmal failures of the Roll ‘n Rocker, which only accomplished making games unplayable, Nintendo stood up to their mistakes and flaunted their triumphs. It will be interesting to see what others successes and possible failures Nintendo will come up with in their future of video game peripherals.

Image Courtesy of   Barone Firenze / Shutterstock.com

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The Nintendo Company is known for experimenting with different means of gameplay and coming up with the next big thing in interactive gameplay. With so many different types of games to choose from, Nintendo wants to introduce to gamers many different ways to play these games. What better way to examine Nintendo’s methods of gameplay than to look into its evolution from the experimental phase of the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) to the more professionally established peripherals of Nintendo’s later systems.

Nintendo Laser Guns

One of the Nintendo’s first peripherals, and probably most famous one, was the NES Zapper. The NES Zapper came out in 1985 with “Duck Hunt”, but could also work on various games that used the shooting gallery type function. The way the Zapper works is when the user pulls the trigger on the Zapper, it causes the entire screen to go black for a split second, except for the target area, which flashes white. By doing this, the sensor in the gun reads the white area and if a shootable object is caught in the white block, it would register as a hit.

Back in the day it was seen as a marvelous technical advancement, and even today the game Duck Hunt is still seen as a must-play classic with the NES Zapper, though the Zapper’s function can only work on CRT display TVs and cannot work on LCD or Plasma TVs.

In 1992 Nintendo came out with the Super Scope for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES). The Super Scope is about twice as large as the NES Zapper and functions a little differently by shooting out an ’0′ signal as it reads the various 1’s and 0’s that shoot through the TV signals. With this, the game retrieves the data to acknowledge the target position of the Super Scope and is then able to register a hit or a miss. But like the Zapper, the Super Scope can only work on CRT display TVs.

The Laser Scope, developed by Konami for the NES, is a device that the player wears like a headset. The Laser Scope is one of the first peripherals that introduces voice activated commands for gameplay. The Laser Scope includes a laser guided crosshair, which sits just above the user’s right eye, and a microphone attached to the left earphone.

The laser crosshair works just like the NES Zapper, but instead of pulling a trigger, the user merely has to say “Fire.” The issue with the Laser Scope is that it picks up any sound and causes the device to misfire. The device is big, clunky, and does not function the way it is intended to work. The Laser Scope came out in 1990 with the game Laser Invasion.

The Power Glove

In pop culture the Power Glove is seen at the butt of many jokes as well as a popular internet meme. As most of its critics discuss the Power Glove, they always refer back to the 1989 movie “The Wizard” and deliberately misquote the line “It’s so bad” when referring to the Power Glove, mainly because the Power Glove is in fact “so bad.”

Licensed by Nintendo, but developed by Abrams Gentile Entertainment, the Power Glove is intended to be one of the first interactive motion sensor games, in which the user’s hand was the controller. The Power Gloves works by having the user enter an input code found on the forearm of the controller.

This code is used to set the control system to designated games. Once the controller is “linked” to the game, the user’s hand movements are registered for gameplay. One of the games designed specifically for the Power Glove is “Super Glove Ball,” in which the user throws balls to destroy walls.

The Power Glove itself became an utter failure. The controls are unresponsive and it is almost impossible to get the device to function properly. Power Glove, now, is merely used as a glorified NES controller, since the controller buttons are also built on the forearm.

Part two will continue on Nintendo’s development from the Roll ‘n Rocker to the Wii U’s controller system.

Image Courtesy of   Barone Firenze / Shutterstock.com

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