Comic Updated  July 16, 2008

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Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Did I say I was excited about the E3 publisher press conferences? Bad call, I'm sorry. They sucked! The Microsoft brings you Miis! Nintendo lets you turn your DS into a PDA that isn't designed to be a PDA, and is thus more-difficult to use! Sony... doesn't really bring you anything.

I can't help feeling that these conferences would have a lot more meat if they allowed heckling during the pressers.

Animal Crossing Wii -- or, Animal Crossing: City Folks -- HAS, in fact, been announced, and shown off to a small degree! And it... well, it looks like a high-res Animal Crossing: Wild World. New additions include voice chat and a tiny city hub where you can visit a few shops, most of them simply being versions of older shops and/or visitors from the previous games. There'll be new details emerging today, so I'll reserve judgement and merely say -- THERE HAD BETTER BE.  This thing's been on the drawing board for at LEAST four years; one would EXPECT they'd have done a lot more with the concept.

Seriously, Nintendo. I don't expect FLASH from an AC game, but I DO expect NEW. Especially considering that AC was what amounted to Nintendo's big offering for the core gamers, this E3 (niether Mario nor Zelda were in attendance), this showing has completely failed to R0XX0R5 my S0XX0R5.

Don't get me wrong, I'm still gonna get it, but, dang, Nintendo. DANG. It may be time for another outfit (without prior branding -- I'm looking at you, MySims) to throw their hat in the goal-less town simulator ring.

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Monday, July 14, 2008

All right, so the show's not what it used to be -- I'm STILL excited about E3. I miss the media circus, the carnival atmosphere, publishers cramming entire transplanted European castles into their booths on the show floor, but that was all window dressing. The REAL E3, for me, happens before E3 officially begins -- the publisher press conferences. Everything that happens afterwards is just gliding on their jetstream.

In particular, I'm looking forward to the first details on Animal Crossing Wii. Yes, I KNOW there are games with shooty blood people coming out, I haven't turned my back on them. You gotta understand, though, Animal Crossing for Gamecube was the game that broke me offa G.T.A.: San Andreas. That took some doing.

What am I hoping for, this sequel? Lots, honestly -- I hope you can do more than six things in your town proper, this go around.  I hope those more than six things are more interesting, individually, than being able to water flowers or fire a slingshot that can only shoot things that are directly above you. I DEFINITELY hope they brought back the real holidays, or I'll be sorely put out.

I'd like for the NES games to be put back in, though that's a longshot, financially, given Nintendo's new grasping, squeezing retro game policies. A guy on IGN had a good idea regarding that -- skip the NES stuff, make old Game Boy games unlockable, instead. It's not like they're making any cash off of 'em, otherwise. And if Nintendo ever gave a poop about targeting its Western audience, it mighta listened.

Wifi, I think needless to say, is going to be a big part of this iteration. And bully for it -- that was definitely the big saving grace for AC: Wild World, after they cut all of the cool stuff out. Still, it needed serious improvement. Friend codes suck, of course, but they're a one-time hassle, and it's not like you can talk sense to Nintendo on 'em, anyway. Still, there needs to be a way to MEET new people in AC, online -- monitored lobby towns, for instance, or even an adults channel (if they could come up with a term less-oozing with suggestiveness than 'adults,' of course. The people looking for a nice, clean game will be put off, the people looking for hot 'n' spicy Animal Crossing roleplay will be sorely disappointed).

Other big thing about wifi they need to fix -- the actions aren't one-to-one when you have a guest over, which really screws up one's ability to set up custom gaming experiences. That is, if I whack you with a net in my town, you may or may not see it happening in yours. That's a MAJOR blow to those people hoping for a decent deathmatch.

Anyways, the conferences start around noon, Eastern time, and there'll be news a-plenty a-flowing then! (there BETTER be, after the disappointing display at LAST year's E3). Enjoy the comic!