Nintendo cleans up Wii U Miiverse after accidental “hacking”

Nintendo says that Miiverse, its new Wii U online gaming and social network, wasn't hacked on Sunday after a user posted images of a debug mode for the network online. The menu was just an inactive prototype, but why was it there at all?

Of the many small troubles reported about Nintendo’s Wii U, not all are the fault of the Japanese video game giant. It isn’t Nintendo’s fault after all that users are unplugging their Wii Us in the middle of a 5GB mandatory system update, accidentally breaking the console in the process. Other technical issues concerning new owners definitely should have been caught by Nintendo in the quality assurance testing phase. For example: Users probably shouldn’t be able to access Miiverse’s debug mode, whether it’s active or not.

NeoGAF member Trike posted images on the forum on Sunday night after seemingly accessing the Miiverse debug menu—a debug menu is an interface built into software to let developers freely manipulate it, typically to fix problems—on accident. By navigating through menus attempting to set up a friend list, he found himself navigating menus for a prototype version of the Miiverse, as well as browsing commands including “Delete Admin” or generating new passwords. There were even references to possible unannounced Wii U games including Metal Gear Solid, Yoshi’s Land Wii U and Soul Hackers, an old Japanese RPG recently ported to the Nintendo 3DS.

The post indicated that Nintendo’s security for Miiverse was so poor that users could stumble into administrative tools, potentially accessing personal information of other users. For a fledgling online gaming network, such a security gaff could spell certain death. According to Nintendo, though, these menus are simply mock ups and don’t actually represent functioning Miiverse admin tools.

“It has come to our attention that some people were able to access a mock up menu on Miiverse following the launch of Wii U in the US,” reads a statement Nintendo issued to GamesIndustry International, “Please note that this was only a mock up menu and has now been removed and is not accessible.”

Mock up menu or not, it’s troubling that Nintendo’s fledgling network was opened to the public before it was properly polished. Between this, reports of glitch-troubled third-party software and the need for a sizable firmware update on the first day, evidence suggests that Nintendo’s Wii U was rushed to retail to make it in time for the holiday season. Nintendo’s Wii was a rock solid product from day one when it released in 2006. Hopefully for Nintendo, this rocky launch week isn’t a sign of trouble to come.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Nintendo Wii U gets a teardown

Nintendo recently launched their next generation game console called the Wii U, which comes with a very unique controller that has a touchscreen that can be used to interact with the game in different ways.

The console has now been acquired and ripped apart by AnandTech to see what’s ticking inside. Let’s take a look.

Unlike mobile devices, larger machines such as consoles are relatively easy to take apart so with only a minimal effort will you be able to get inside the console. One of the first things noted is the optical storage medium used by Nintendo. It uses high density 12cm discs that look like any other CD or DVD but uses Nintendo’s proprietary format to store up to 25GB of data per disc. While it’s significantly better than the now thoroughly outdated DVD format used by Microsoft on the Xbox 360, one wonders why Nintendo simply did not use Sony’s Blu-ray format instead of creating their own as that would have also enabled the playback of Blu-ray movies on the console.

The Wii U has two Wi-Fi antennas inside, one for the 802.11 a/b/g/n connectivity for the console and the other interestingly for communicating with the controller over Miracast.

The Wii U uses 8GB or 32GB flash memory (depending upon the model you purchased) manufactured by Samsung and four 512MB RAM modules manufactured by Hynix. The CPU is based on the PowerPC architecture and is using IBM’s 45nm process. The GPU is an AMD RV7xx model based on a 40nm process although the exact model number is unknown. The Wii U has a memory bandwidth of 12.8GB/s, more than twice of Wii’s 5.6GB/s and on par with that of the iPad with Retina display and the Nexus 10, although the Wii U will be pushing a lot less pixels than either of these tablets.

You can read the full teardown report in the link below.

Source : blog[dot]gsmarena[dot]com

‘Paper Mario: Sticker Star’ Shines Despite Sticky Situations

Image credit: Nintendo

Somewhere around the end of “Super Mario: Sticker Star,” I realized that it was the most beautiful handheld game I’ve ever played. “Sticker Star” has a consistently charming design that keeps the surprises coming even late into the campaign, but unfortunately suffers from one or two key level design flaws that may mar your experience.

In the world of Paper Mario, all characters and surfaces are made from paper, stickers and cardboard, their flat nature making for clever, eye-pleasing, layered foregrounds and backgrounds. The game represents a fantastic use of 3D, and although I tend to play Nintendo 3DS with the third dimension slider turned off, I found myself flipping the 3D switch often to appreciate the shoe-box dioramas that Nintendo had created.

The Paper Mario games are RPGs that have always worked to simplify the turn-based fighting experience, and this Nintendo 3DS offering simplifies RPG gameplay even further.  The world can be navigated quickly and easily, there are not an overwhelming number of side quests to complete and there is a lack of emphasis on HP stats, taking away the complications that may have kept kids from previous incarnations. The game also avoids introducing many new characters, instead using Mario’s classic cast in new ways.

One big note on “Sticker Star”; you are going to need to play this game with Google by your side. While the game plays intuitively for 95 percent of its run, getting stuck on just one puzzle can stop your entire adventure dead in its tracks. There is a help system built into the game, but I found that it would not provide the desired advice in the majority of situations where “Sticker Star” left me stuck. Here are the top 5 sticker stumpers I found as I played…

WARNING:  SPOILERS

World 1-3: How do you get that faucet to stop pumping? I tried cutting the cord with scissors, slamming my hammer down, stomping the hose, striking Bowser with the hammer. The solution? This is the only puzzle that actually requires you to jump up and down.

World 2-4: That’s not a sticker indicator spot, it’s a plug. Didn’t mind this one as much, but it sure went against intuition.

World 4-1: I felt stupid when I spent an hour trying to bypass snowball-throwers. You can hammer their snowballs with precise timing to pass them, but if you’ve tried this a few times and failed, you might think it impossible. Keep at it.

World 4-3: The ghost house room with the floating furniture threw me for a loop. At first it seemed one might be able to jump from table to chair in mid-air. Then it made sense that if the final bookcase could be found, it might bridge to the desired area. Instead, click the candle off on the upper level of the moving furniture room to reveal your way forward.

World 5-5: Jump the jungle flower. I’m convinced there is no official way to get over the last jungle flower. Luckily, the hive-mind of global trouble shooters has figured out a way to jump on an invisible leaf ledge and make your way up to the final crumpled piece of paper. Then again, the best item in the game is accessible after this jump, so I’m thinking the game’s designers knew just how maddening the puzzle would be. Still, I could have used a lawnmower or a ladder sticker at the end of this level.

Random Tip:

Final Bowser Battle: I didn’t have the patience to keep entering battle with Bowser in order to figure out how to knock his bodyguard Whomp down and cut up its clearly vulnerable back. I tried putting him to sleep with a Baahammer and was weary of using a bed as it put Mario to sleep on an earlier test run. I found it was easier to use an infinite jump sticker, as long as you have the patience to mash buttons for a full minute’s time.

Extra Observations:

• This game finally answers the burning question, why are the forest rivers in Mario’s world filled with poison?
• So now Nintendo’s handhelds are juggling two RPGs at once. The question is, will the Mario and Luigi series continue when Paper Mario is now in the mix??

“Paper Mario: Sticker Star” is now available in the United States for digital download and physical purchase.

Source : abcnews[dot]go[dot]com

Report: Not many Nintendo Wii U units to go around at launch

The Nintendo Wii U will be a hot commodity this holiday season, not just because it's the first new home console from the company in six years, but because there won't be very many of them to go around.

Nintendo’s Wii U will be out in November, but it’s not entirely clear how many of them will actually be sent out into the wild to be snatched up by rabid fans and parents who want the latest and greatest machine under the Christmas tree. Nintendo said during its quarterly earnings report earlier this week that it expects to sell 5.5 million Wii U consoles between November and the end of March. As that release day gets closer, its becoming clear that Nintendo may be basing those estimates on the low number of consoles that will actually be available.

Shortly after Nintendo announced the Wii U’s release date and price in September, a number of retailers including GameStop stopped taking pre-orders for the console. Nintendo of America president Reggis Fils-Aime said at the time that he thought supplies would be adequate. “We’ve learned a lot of lessons from the launch of the DS, the launch of the Wii, and the launch of the 3DS. And our supply chain is solid,” said Fils-Aime, “We want to satisfy all of the demand that’s out there.”

This week Nintendo confirmed that GameStop had sold 250,000 additional “wait list” pre-orders for the Wii U, guarantees for customers looking to get the system whenever they might become available. While that statistic certainly suggests demand for Nintendo’s new device, it also suggests that rumors about Nintendo’s Wii U manufacturing problems hold some truth. In August, word was that Nintendo might even have to detail the console’s European release due to problems manufacturing its signature tablet controller.

Further demonstrating Nintendo’s supply problems is a Thursday report from Computer and Video Games. An anonymous retailer told that outlet that Nintendo would be shipping a paltry 25,000 Wii U consoles in the UK on launch day. Another retailer confirmed that figure. While a third source said it was expecting “between 75,000 and 100,000 units during the launch period,” they also said that Nintendo hadn’t indicated when those systems might be made available.

Nintendo UK failed to quell concerns. “Wii U stock levels will be tight on day one,” said a representative, “However, we will be providing retailers with regular stock deliveries in the run up to Christmas in order to meet demand as quickly as possible.”

Scarcity can be a good thing for technology companies, driving demand to a fever pitch. Since Nintendo is selling its console at a loss, though, it needs to be selling software at a strong clip to make up for lost revenue. If people can’t buy the machine, they won’t be buying the games.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Co-op, Not Competition: Nintendo reveals list of worldwide best-selling games of 2012

Nintendo revealed comprehensive lists of the best-selling video games of 2012 to date, shedding significant light on player tastes around the world. What games will publishers be investing in based on current trends?

Regional sales tracking firms like the NPD Group, Media Creates and others are often the only regular source for getting a picture of what people are paying to play in the video game market. As the balance between digital distribution and traditional brick and mortar retail even out, it’s become more difficult to accurately portray just what people like to play besides Call of Duty. It’s surprising then that Nintendo, one of gaming’s most secretive companies, revealed the top twenty bestselling video games from around the world during its recent earnings report. Nintendo compiled data from those previously listed research firms as well as Gfk International.

With breakdowns for the US, Europe, and Japan, the lists show not just what’s performed well this year, but helps gauge what types of games console publishers will invest in over the next few years as the transition to next-gen consoles begins in earnest.

The tops of the charts aren’t surprising based on how the industry’s past half decade. The top two best-selling video games in the United States between January and September 2012 were Madden NFL 13 for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. Electronic Arts also dominated Europe (Gfk tracks fourteen countries in the region), taking the top three spots with FIFA 13 on PS3 and Xbox 360 in first and second respectively with FIFA 12 on PS3 taking third. Nintendo dominated Japan, with Pokémon Black 2/White 2 taking the top two slots.

It’s deeper in the list that more revealing statistics emerge. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, for example, was only the sixth best-selling game across 2012, beaten out by competitors like Mass Effect 3 and even Borderlands 2 (fifth and third respectively.) This means that while the sales tail on Call of Duty remains strong, it’s diminished from highs in 2010 with Call of Duty: Black Ops and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, which dominated for months after their respective releases. The competitive shooting games was not as favored over the first nine months of the year as co-operative, campaign-centric shooters like Mass Effect and Borderlands. The rest of the list bears this out as well. Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Future Soldier came in at eleventh, where EA’s Battlefield 3 came in at fourteenth. Future Soldier was a May release, and it does sport competitive modes, but even that example supports the POV that multiplayer tastes in the US are shifting.

What of Europe? Modern Warfare 3, Battlefield 3, Uncharted 3, and Mass Effect 3 were on the European list, but that was it for shooters. Nintendo published titles like Super Mario 3D Land, Wii Party and others were far more common in the region, boding well for the Wii U. Gran Turismo 5 also took eighth in Europe, reaffirming the strength of that brand for Sony abroad.

Japan was, again unsurprisingly, dominated by Nintendo and Square-Enix published games for handhelds, with three Capcom titles and two Namco Bandai titles sneaking in as well.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Mass Effect 3 Wii U studio prepares a 2013 Square-Enix game for Wii U

Straight Right, the Australian studio hard at work converting BioWare's Mass Effect 3 for the Nintendo Wii U, is working on another port of a triple-A franchise for Nintendo's new tablet controller console. This time, for Square-Enix.

Straight Right games, Australia’s premiere (only?) Wii U developer, has offered up a hint as to what their next title for Nintendo’s tablet controller console will be.

Australian studio Straight Right is a real up and comer in the console development world. Headed by Tom Crago, formerly of Tantalus Interactive, Straight Right has yet to release an original IP hit. In fact, outside of the iOS version of Electronic Arts’ Shift 2: Unleashed, Straight Right hasn’t released a single game. The studio is working on multiple projects for Wii U, though, one of which is a launch title of Mass Effect 3.

As we reported in September, Crago said, “We made a number of bets on the Wii U, so we’re certainly hoping that the platform comes strongly out of the gate. We’ve got two other titles in development. One of them is original, our own IP, and another is based on another big franchise that will come out in 2013. It’s a big title and you will have hears of it.”

Given the company’s ties to Electronic Arts, it seemed probable that Straight Right would be working on another Wii U port for that company, likely one of its key 2013 titles like Dead Space 3. Turns out that Straight Right’s next Wii U port will be for none other than Square-Enix.

A NeoGAF forum member spotted a LinkedIn profile for Straight Right’s technical project manager Chris Slater, who joined the studio in June. The current project Slater is working is “porting a triple-A Square-Enix game to the yet-to-be-released Wii U platform.”

Square-Enix is a popular, prolific publisher with a number of triple-A releases under its belt over the past two years. This year alone it’s released, and will release, Final Fantasy XIII-2, Sleeping Dogs, and Hitman: Absolution. The company’s development history, though, does help narrow down what property Straight Right is likely porting.

Square’s Japanese development business is wholly segregated from its western studios that were previously part of the publisher Eidos. Since development of the Final Fantasy series never leaves Square’s internal studios in Japan, and that series is the only remaining console triple-A franchise remaining in the company’s portfolio, upcoming games like Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII are out of the running.

Crago did say that his other Wii U port project is a 2013 game too, meaning that the most likely candidate is Tomb Raider. Developer Crystal Dynamics has often relied on outside developers to complete work on its Tomb Raider games for other platforms. Tomb Raider: Legends, Anniversary, and Underworld all had ports developed by Nixxes Software, not Crystal Dynamics. Since Straight Right already has experience with Wii U, that makes them an ideal choice to port the new Lara Croft adventure.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Our first look under the hood of the Wii U

In a recent interview with Nintendo President Satoru Iwata, four of Nintendo's engineers give us our first official look at the inner workings of the Wii U.

Nintendo has released an internally conducted interview of four engineers working on the Wii U product. Though the company stopped short of getting into the specifics of clock speeds and architectures it does provide some new details about what is in the company’s latest console.

The juiciest information relates to the new processor, which Nintendo calls the multi-chip module (MCM). It is a package that puts both the CPU and the GPU onto a single die. This is similar to what both Intel and AMD do with the integrated graphics components in some products. In this case, however, the package combines hardware from IBM (the multi-core CPU), AMD (the GPU) and Renesis (RAM).

Genyo Takeda, one of the engineers on the project, stated this approach was beneficial because “the package costs less and we could speed up data exchange among two LSIs while lowering power consumption.” The MCM’s reduced latency between components and reduced power consumption has made it possible for Nintendo to extract respectable perform from a small, inexpensive part.

With that said, this decision bolsters complaints that the Wii U might not have mind-blowing performance. Placing the CPU and GPU on one package concentrates power draw and heat generation at a single location. This reduces the maximum performance potential relative to a system with a separate CPU and GPU.

Engineer Yasuhisa Kitano went further into the packaging of the new console. He revealed that Nintendo sees its console as a “stagehand” – something that works unobtrusively behind the scenes – and went on to describe how this influenced its design.

To be unobtrusive the Wii U had to be small, quiet, and reliable. The new MCM helped achieve this goal by reducing the areas responsible for producing significant heat from two to one. However, because of the console’s improved performance, overall heat generation tripled. The engineers dealt with this by substantially increasing the size of the heat sink and the fan. Even the system’s vents were tweaked to ensure maximum airflow. 

Yet, in spite of these efforts, the system’s fan speed still had to be increased to keep the console cool. Kitano said that engineers accounted for this during testing. “If you increase the number of fan revolutions, it makes more noise, so we checked to see how much noise was acceptable while playing games.”

Some details about the console’s exterior emerged, as well. The engineers confirmed that it is designed to be primarily horizontal, but will work in a vertical position with a stand that comes in the Deluxe Set. They also revealed that the Wii U has moved the two USB ports found in the original Wii from the front to rear and made the remote sync button more accessible.

Nintendo’s engineers took time to talk about the extensive testing conducted on the Wii U to make sure defects won’t occur after launch. Using the MCM made this process particularly complicated because components from three different manufacturers were included. All four companies had to work closely during testing to locate and squash bugs.

While a fair amount of information was divulged in this interview there’s some that we’re still waiting to hear. Specifics about the architecture used in the CPU and GPU remain elusive, and the engineers did not reveal any new information about the technical specs regarding the console’s controller. It’s possible that we’ll have to wait until release, or even after, to know more.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Sony opens a whole new PlayStation Store on Oct. 17

Sony delivers a redesign of its PlayStation Store after 6 years. How does it fit into the facelift of its overall gaming business?

Nintendo’s quietly building hype with its Wii U, selling out pre-orders at every retailer around, from its own Nintendo World Store to GameStop. Microsoft is letting the Xbox 360 speak for itself this fall, with a rock solid library, reliable releases like Halo 4 and Xbox Live community staples like Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 to carry the device through what’s likely its last full price season. Then there’s Sony. It’s not entirely clear what Sony is doing with its PlayStation business, other than giving the brand a quiet makeover.

The latest facelift to hit PlayStation: Sony announced the details of a full makeover for the PlayStation Store on PlayStation 3.

Long overdue, Sony finally made public its much-rumored plans to refresh its digital game storefront on Thursday. The redesigned store will go live next Wednesday, and bring with it what Sony hopes will be a markedly smoother shopping experience, opening up what’s become a substantial catalog of retro and modern downloadable games.

What’s changed? Everything. The baby blue theme that has become the trademark of the PSN, key in its little shopping bag logo, has been replaced with a sleeker black and grey theme that recalls Sony’s industrial design (televisions, consoles casings, etc.) The store itself is laid out quite similarly to the current Xbox Live dashboard, with large windows advertising new releases in categories like Movies and Games. The cosmetic shift bellies the more user friendly changes though, as categories for products expand not unlike the Cross Media Bar (XMB) used for navigating the PS3 itself. Selecting PlayStation 3 Games will bring out a slider menu that lets you explore options by price, release date, and other sub-categories that should help people better discover things as well as find things they’re looking for. Even search tools have been overhauled.

“Everyone is trying to solve the same kind of problems, but each [eCommerce] ecosystem is different,” game store development manager Elliott Dumville told Eurogamer, “We have a sense of PlayStation values that we want to be true to, and we need to deliver on that as well as solving interface issues.”

A solid makeover to keep the platform relevant and people spending on the product. It’s the same ethos behind the facelift given to the PlayStation 3 itself, a new model that’s lighter, smaller, and cheaper to make. The only problem is that, while Sony is doing the leg work to make PlayStation more approachable and appealing as a service and as a machine, it’s not offering the full package of new exclusive content and a lower price to go with it. The new store may seem like a small change, but it could be significant for Sony were it brining in a huge number of new users this fall with a cheaper machine. It isn’t though.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Why I’ll be buying a Wii U at launch

Every gamer should buy Nintendo's next console. Here's why.

Nintendo doesn’t have it easy these days. Mobile phones and tablets continue to peck away at its handheld consoles while the Wii, now nearly six years old, struggles to find new buyers among fierce competition from Microsoft and Sony.

As if that weren’t enough, Nintendo is now paying for its negligence towards the gaming industry. The new controller has been met with skepticism, and the claims of better third-party support this time out have been met with shrugs.  We’ve heard this song and dance before.

It’s all seems very doom and gloom. Yet, in spite of this, I’m going to line up to buy a Wii U at launch – and if “gamer” is a label you’re happy to claim, you should too. Here’s why.

Enough Power To Please

The Internet’s popular opinion about the Wii U’s hardware is woefully miss-informed.  I’ve read countless forum posts and website comments that firmly state the Wii U is just a minor upgrade to the Wii and no better than the Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3. That’s nonsense.

We don’t know exactly what is in the Wii U yet, but we do know it’s a relatively new PowerPC processor paired with 2GB of RAM and a custom AMD Radeon GPU, most likely derived from the company’s Evergreen architecture. For comparison, the Xbox 360 uses a graphics chip similar to AMD’s Fudo architecture – which is five years older. Given the separation in architectures it would not be surprising if the raw power of the Wii U is three or four times that of an Xbox 360.

We don’t need to rely on speculation, however. Nintendo has constantly demonstrated games running at 1080p, something current consoles aren’t capable of (they render games at a lower resolution and up-scale to 1080p).

It’s likely that the new consoles from Microsoft and Sony will be quicker, but that’s okay. What’s important is that Nintendo will finally have hardware that can do justice to the beautiful art found in its first-party titles.

An Excellent Launch Lineup

The Wii U hits store shelves on November 18^th with an impressive selection of games — 23 will be available on launch day, and 51 titles in total are planned for the “launch window” that runs through March.  Several of these are brand-new games that are launching exclusively for the Wii U. I’m personally looking forward to New Super Mario Bros. U, ZombiU and even Epic Mickey 2 (which will be released on all systems, but offer Wii U-specific features on the GamePad). These titles alone put the launch line-ups of the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 to shame. I’m also looking forward to Rayman Legends, though it now looks like it may not make the November 18 release.

But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Nintendo is also launching with a generous selection of third-party titles including Assassin’s Creed III, Darksiders II, Call of Duty: Black Ops II and Mass Effect 3. Most of the have been released, or will be released for other platforms, but their inclusion on the Wii U helps to beef up the console’s appeal. And that goes double for me.

I haven’t played several new console games because my Xbox 360 went kaput (for the third time) and was no longer covered under warranty. I couldn’t find any reason why I should waste money replacing it when the Wii U was already announced and capable of playing the same games. My excitement might be less if Microsoft made reliable hardware.

Nintendo Can Take Over My Living Room

Nintendo TVii came out of nowhere. There was little to hint at its existence and then – boom! Nintendo drops the bomb just a few months before release.

TVii put the Wii U over the top for me. Since my Xbox 360 died, I’ve been using a Roku for my streaming needs. It works fine and I’d recommend it to anyone, but it’s terribly simple. Scrolling through Netflix titles can take some time, and there’s not much customization available. It works. And that’s all it does.

The new controller must have given the guys at Logitech a heart-attack. It’s taken them years to squeeze small touchscreens into their line of Harmony remotes. Then here comes Nintendo, tromping in with 6.2 touchscreen display that connects directly with streaming services (via the Wii U, of course), and can even be used to purchase new content.

Television via console is now Nintendo’s game to lose. As long as the processor isn’t too slow, as long as the touchscreen isn’t unresponsive, as long as the software works right – it’ll be great. And inexpensive, too, because there’s no need for an additional subscription to access content you’ve already paid for. That’s a lesson Microsoft should learn.

Backwards Compatibility

Buying a new console is often bitter-sweet. Yay, it’s a new console… but now I have to buy all new peripherals and games. Ah, hell.

The Wii U doesn’t ask so much from buyers. Most Wii accessories are compatible with it, as are most Wii games. Even software and save data downloaded to the Wii will be transferable to the Wii U. In a sense, the new console is more of an upgrade than an entirely new product. It adds new capabilities but also retains the functionality found in the old system.

Nintendo is not abandoning its family-friendly position. And that position is partially based on price. Asking a family to replace an old console with a new one – and three new controllers, plus any peripherals – is always a tall order. I’m happy I’m not going to have to re-purchase controllers when the next Mario Kart game comes out.

Yes, The Price Is Right

Nintendo’s premium Wii U, which is the one you want, retails for $349. There have been the usual complaints, but they’re only valid if you think coin is traded as freely in real life as it was in the last Mario game.

This entirely new console, which is more powerful than any other on the market today and comes with a 6.2” touchscreen controller, costs less at launch than either the Xbox 360 or PS3 did (by a huge margin in the case of the PS3). Even now it’s only $100 more (in premium guise) than the current mid-range Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3 bundle. This seems like a damn good deal. I seriously doubt that Nintendo is making any per-unit profit at this price.

And let’s not forget that the Wii U is compatible with old controllers, which means current Wii owners don’t have to pay anything extra for additional peripherals. The new Pro controller, which is tailored towards third-party games, is the only exception — but hopefully it will be sold at a price similar to the current Classic controller, which is $20.

Conclusion

Will the new console reverse Nintendo’s fortunes? That’s impossible to know. Its competitors have yet to reveal themselves, and long-term success depends on far more than a console’s capabilities at launch.

Then again, speculation about profit margins won’t make the Wii U more or less enjoyable. It is a game console. It should play games well, and it should have good games to play. The Wii U promises better gaming than any other console, and Nintendo has thrown in a tasty bonus with TVii. That’s more than enough to get me in line. What about U?

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Nintendo Wii U launch line up includes 23 games on day one

Nintendo finally confirmed the 23 titles in the Wii U launch line up on Wednesday, with impressive support from EA, Ubisoft, and Activision.

There will be plenty to play on November 18^th. Nintendo has confirmed that the Wii U launch line up will include 23 games.

The Nintendo Wii U’s coming out party in New York City earlier this month was surprisingly light on details about the console’s release. Nintendo was clear about the price—$300 for the system with 8GB of memory and $350 for the system with 32GB of memory and a copy of NintendoLand—but concrete information on everything else from the Miiverse online network to what games would be available was scarce. Bayonetta 2, The Wonderful 101—These are exciting games but will they be available on the November 18^th launch day? That Nintendo said 51 games were coming in a “launch window” that extends to March 2013 only confused matters.

Now things are clearer. As reported by USA Today on Wednesday, there will be 23 games available alongside the Wii U on the day it is released. Only three of those games will be Nintendo first party titles: New Super Mario Bros. U and NintendoLand will be available on the first day as promised, and they’ll be joined by the Nintendo published karaoke game Sing Party.

Ports of major publishers’ 2012 games, including FIFA 13, Darksiders II, Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor’s Edge, Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed, and Tekken Tag Tournament 2 will also be available. There are even some 2011 stragglers sneaking in like Warrior’s Orochi 3.

Especially impressive is Activision’s roll out. The publisher has been, to date, cagey about Nintendo’s new system, but all four games announced at the New York event will be rolled out on launch day. Skylanders Giants, Wipeout 3, Transformers Prime, and Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 will all be available, and while only two of those are potential million sellers, it’s still a strong commitment to put four boxed products out simultaneously.

Ubisoft is also going big, with Your Shape: Fitness Evolved 2013, ESPN Sports Connection, Just Dance 4, Rabbids Land, Assassin’s Creed III, and the promising original ZombiU.

Rounding out the list are Scribblenauts Unlimited, Game Party Champions, and Batman: Arkham City Armored Edition from WBIE, and Epic Mickey 2: The Power of 2 from Disney.

That’s three more retail games than Nintendo had for the Wii launch in 2006, and while Game Party Champions probably isn’t going to rev many engines, it’s an impressive display of quality. That Nintendo will have November’s biggest releases, Assassin’s Creed III and Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 available, right alongside their releases on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 bodes well for the system.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Can a PS Vita and PS3 bundle take on Nintendo’s Wii U?

It's hard not to notice that a PS Vita and PlayStation 3 bundle from Sony would make for an impressive Wii U competitor. And Sony knows it.

Nintendo’s Wii U may not eat Microsoft’s Xbox 360 alive (in sales terms) this holiday season, but it will likely gobble up the PlayStation 3. Even at $250, a 2009 slim PS3 model isn’t going to look quite as sexy when compared to Nintendo’s $300 Wii U with its weird touch screen controller and its Skylanders. It’s just too expensive. Consider this though: If the Wii U is a long term success, and Sony can continue to bring down the manufacturing costs of its current hardware, selling it for less and less in 2013 and beyond, the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Vita are going to look mighty attractive to third-party publishers. They will be cheap machines ready made for Wii U games.

Sony is well aware that Vita and PS3 can feasibly be used in the exact same ways as the Wii U controller. “We tell our PlayStation fans all the time that what the Wii U is offering is something that Vita and PS3 can do quite easily,” Sony’s John Koller told Engadget, “[We] need to make sure the content isn’t force fed. And, to us, making sure that the gamer receives the right type of experience is what’s most important. So we’re going to be pick our spots, but that technology does certainly exist there.”

In fact, the Vita can do more. It can play the same games as its big console brother without relying on the hardware and it’s got multi-touch rather single-touch on its screen. Nintendo’s controller does have NFC tech in it, as well as clickable analog sticks, but they don’t exactly elevate it comparatively. The only question is: Will Sony position the Vita and PS3 together as a Wii U alternative? Why not bundle the two together, since games like PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale and Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time are going to be bundled for both consoles already?

“As we look at the lineup, there are going to be some opportunities to do that. Whether we want to bundle the hardware together remains to be seen,” said Koller, “[Retail] asks for it all the time.”

The groundwork is laid already. “In the meantime, you look at the Vita consumer and a very high percentage—almost all of them—own a PS3. So you see that crossover works.”

For game publishers looking to maximize profits on Wii U game development going forward, that crossover could prove very profitable. Sony just needs to find a way to get more people to buy more PS3s and Vitas.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Wii U Deluxe pre-orders sell out. Will Nintendo’s console see the same launch success as Wii?

Electronics retailers have sold out of pre-orders for the $350 Nintendo Wii U Deluxe Set, but will the console see Wii-like success?

Nintendo’s Wii made such a powerful connection with people when it came out in 2006 that Nintendo wasn’t able to satisfy demand for years. It wasn’t until the end of 2008, a full year before Wii sales peaked, that Nintendo was able to manufacture enough devices to properly meet demand. That’s an intimidating legacy for the Wii U to live up to, especially for a machine that’s so confused the public to date.

There is promise for Nintendo’s Wii U: Pre-orders for the device have sold out at GameStop.

Polygon reported on Saturday that myriad GameStop stores around the US had already sold through their expected allocations for the Wii U’s Nov. 18 release. Reservations for the Wii U Deluxe Set, the $350 model that comes packed in with a copy of NintendoLand as well as free access to Nintendo Network Premium, were half-filled within hours of the console’s price announcement on Thursday. By the end of Friday, all Deluxe sets were sold out including online.

The Wii U Basic Set, the $300 edition of the console that comes with just the machine, controller, and 8GB of flash memory, is still available for pre-order at GameStop’s website as well as in many stores.

Nintendo is discovering what Microsoft proved with the Xbox 360 in 2005: When you offer multiple models of a console, people will ignore the cheaper model unless it offers real value. The Xbox 360 Arcade, a hard drive-less version of the machine sold at launch, was roundly ignored by consumers until it was re-released in 2010 as a $200 package with 4GB of internal flash memory.

The Xbox 360 is the device responsible for GameStop and other retailers’ policy of limiting the number of pre-orders taken for new consoles. In 2005, far more Xbox 360 pre-orders were sold than systems that were actually available on day one. As a result, devices had to be trickled out to customers over the course of months.

As of right now, there are still other outlets taking pre-orders for Wii U Deluxe. Walmart is taking preorders online but require you purchase it as part of a $450 bundle along with New Super Mario Bros. U. Others like Best Buy have sold through this initial round of pre-orders. Other outlets however haven’t started accepting pre-orders at all. Amazon.com’s product pages for Wii U don’t allow you to pre-order yet and Toys R Us simple has a placeholder page that says pre-orders will be accepted soon.

Wii U’s success is far from guaranteed. There’s interest, yes, but nothing resembling the furor of Wii’s 2006 release. At least, not yet.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Miiverse, Nintendo TVii, eShop: 3 mysteries still surrounding Nintendo Wii U

We know the price and release date but there are still big questions to be answered about Nintendo Wii U.

 

The months of anticipation are over! Now we know everything about Nintendo Wii U! It is naked before us, its gleaming touch screen visage bare in front of the world. We know the release date, we know the first party launch software line up, we know the cost, we know how many bundles there will be. Do we really though? Truth is, we know only the most basic facts about what Nintendo will have in store for the world on November 18^th when the Wii U goes on sale. Here are just a few of the remaining mysteries surrounding the console:

* The eShop

The abysmal digital storefront from the Wii will be retired for Wii U, replaced with the familiar eShop branding. What we don’t know, however, is how it will actually work. What will happen to all those Virtual Console and WiiWare games purchased on Wii? A Nintendo representative told me in March that the official line is, “We are planning to make it possible to transfer the purchased contents from the Wii.” Things are no more specific today. Nintendo’s Bill Trinnen told GameLife the same thing but didn’t elaborate. It’s also unclear how Nintendo will finally embrace 20^th century digital shopping standards and offer users a centralized account for easing the shopping process. There will be unified accounts between 3DS and Wii U, but are they tied to Miiverse?

* Miiverse

Speaking of Nintendo’s answer to the PlayStation Network and Xbox Live, the House of Mario still hasn’t clarified exactly what it is. Miiverse is a social network that will allow people to meet up, play games online with one another, and share information like Twitter-style messaging in game like New Super Mario Bros. U. President Satoru Iwata said that Nintendo will police Miiverse using both human moderators and security software to keep people from abusing others or even providing game spoilers. Specifics though—how accounts are actually set up, how friends lists will be maintained, etc.—are totally unknown. When will Nintendo fill in the public? “Soon,” said Nintendo America president Reggie Fils-Aime. With just 65 days to go before launch, Nintendo has little time to educate its audience.

* Nintendo TVii cable partners

Nintendo TVii is arguably the most attractive part of the whole Nintendo package. It offers the same access to services like Hulu Plus, Netflix, Amazon Instant Video that Sony does through PlayStation and Apple offers on all of its devices. Unlike those competitors, Nintendo TVii has what looks like a simple, intuitive user interface through the tablet controller. There are other streaming partners on board as well. ABC streaming was shown, as was CBS Sports. Nintendo also has the faded TiVO brand for its DVR service. Rumors suggest that Microsoft is partnering cable providers like Comcast and Time Warner to make the Xbox 720 the definitive cable set top box. Nintendo isn’t discussing how far it’s looking to penetrate the TV business. Yet.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Detailed Nintendo Wii U specs leak, official pricing for Japan revealed as well

The Nintendo Wii U, the successor of the highly successful Wii, has been officially announced with pricing and a launch date for Japan. Later today there will be a Nintendo event where they’ll reveal the worldwide launch plans. The exact specs of the new game console are still not clear though.

Luckily, someone posted a pretty extensive specs sheet based on the site for Wii U developers.

Here go the highlights of the new Nintendo console:

• Tri-core IBM PowerPC-based processor; 3MB cache
• 1GB of RAM
• AMD Radeon-based GPU7 (DirectX 10.1, OpenGL 3.3 equivalent functionality)
• 8GB storage (Optional 32GB); SDHC card slot; support for external HDDs
• 4 USB 2.0 ports
• Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n
• Up to 1080p output resolution
• HDMI, DVI, component, RGB and S-Video TV-Outs
• 6 channel audio support via HDMI

Sounds pretty good, considering the very limited hardware that the Wii had. The GamePad controller features a 6.2″ LCD screen of FWVGA resolution (158ppi) along with hardware game controls, stereo speakers, a microphone and camera plus NFC support.

The price of the Wii U in Japan is set at 26,260 yen ($340) for the regular version (available in white only) and 31,500 ($405) for the Premium version (with 32GB storage, available in black only). The Premium version comes with a GamePad and three stands – one for the Wii U, one for charging the GamePad and one play stand.

The bad news is that the fancy GamePad controller accounts for half of the price – a new one will set you back 13,440 yen ($170). Wii U Pro controllers (they look like standard console controllers) are priced 5,040 yen ($65).

The Nintendo Wii U doesn’t come with a Wii Remote controller or Sensor Bar, but you can get some separately.

Source : blog[dot]gsmarena[dot]com

Nintendo announces the Wii U price and release date

The wait is finally over, and details of the Wii U have been released.

When Nintendo first unveiled the Wii U at E3 2011, the industry sat up and took notice. Nintendo showed just enough to get our blood pumping, but withheld some of the most important details. It wasn’t surprising, but it generated what has arguably been the most asked question in gaming over the last 15 months: When will the Wii U be released, and how much will it cost?

Fast forward a year and change. Today Nintendo finally pulled back the curtain and answered those questions.

The Wii U will be released in North America on Sunday, November 18.

Nintendo will offer two versions of the system. The first will be called the “Basic Set,” and will contain the Wii U, Wii U gamepad, an AC adapter, and HDMI, and Wii U Sensor bar. The console in this package will be white, and it will cost $299.

A “Deluxe Set” will also be released, and along with all of the items in the Basic Set, the Deluxe version will include more memory, a gamepad cradle, and the game Nintendoland. The console itself will be black, and Nintendo President and COO, Reggie Fils-Amie, announced that players who purchase the Deluxe package will receive points for each digital download that can be later used to purchase items from the Nintendo e-shop. More details on that will be coming soon. The Deluxe Set will cost $349.

Fils-Amie also confirmed that the Wii U will be able to use the standard Wii remote controls and nunchucks, as well as most of the games and peripherals. Wii U branded devices will be available shortly, but it won’t require additional purchases for Wii users.

Check back with us all day for more news on the Wii U, including news of the apps the Wii U will support, launch titles, and more. But for now circle November 18 on the calendar, and prepare for the next stage of the console battles to begin.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Nintendo Wii U won’t support more than two tablet controllers

Nintendo aimed to let the Wii U support up to four tablet controllers, but had to settle for just two due to processing limitations.

Nintendo’s Wii U is just about two months away from release, and we still don’t know very much about what it can do. Over the past year, some developers working on the tablet-controller console have claimed that it isn’t even as powerful as the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. Nintendo has countered those claims by saying it doesn’t care about horsepower, just quality games. “We just do not care what kind of ‘more beef’ console Microsoft and Sony might produce in 2013,” said Nintendo president Satoru Iwata in July, “Our focus how we can make our new console different than [others].”

The closer we get to the Wii U’s conspicuous debut though, the more developers are starting to speak more candidly about its capabilities. One thing we know for sure: In its current state, the Wii U can only support two tablet controllers. Any more will be impossible.

At first, Nintendo wanted four tablet controllers. It’s had four-controller support for all its home consoles since 1996’s Nintendo 64. The current Wii U simply can’t handle it though.

“The funny thing about Wii U is, as each week went on, we discovered more cool things we could do with it,” Blitz Games’ design director John Nash told Eurogamer in a new interview. Blitz creates mostly licensed games targeted at young kids, like movie tie-in Puss in Boots. “It’s very much a fast-moving space with shifting sands. Because we were fairly early on with this, the specification for the machines wasn’t nailed down. In fact, Nintendo were still chasing the idea of having four of the tablets running concurrently. Now they’ve stepped away from that and said you can have up to two depending on what you’re doing in the game. That’s given us a base level specification which has changed out thinking and some of our design.”

Nintendo announced during E3 2012 that Wii U would support two tablet controllers. To date, no Wii U game shown to the public supports more than a single tablet controller, including Nintendo’s first-party tent pole games for the system like New Super Mario Bros. U and NintendoLand.

Nash details a number of interesting specifications in the Wii U. The Wii U has markedly more RAM than the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, as well as a robust Graphics Processing Unit. Its CPU meanwhile is said to be slower than that of Sony and Microsoft’s current consoles, something that might cripple developers looking to port titles from those other machines.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Nintendo’s 3DS Song and Dance: Friend Collection and Rhythm Hunter announced

Weeks ahead of the Wii U's launch announcement, Nintendo shows the 3DS some love with new games with weird, storied histories.

Nintendo held one of its periodic Nintendo Direct investor meetings early on Wednesday announcing a handful of new first-party titles for the Nintendo 3DS. The event didn’t exactly prime the 3DS engine ahead of the pre-Wii U release hype explosion, but Nintendo’s new games are worth noting. One’s a spiritual successor to one of the DS’ weirdest Japanese hits while the other is a new non-Pokémon game from Game Freak.

Know this: Friend Collection will never, ever make it out in the United States. Described by the company as a “Life Simulation,” the Nintendo 3DS preview of Friend Collection showed president Satoru Iwata’s Mii avatar singing and dancing in front of a giant Game Boy as well as riding on a giant roller coaster. The game’s a bit like a surreal version of The Sims built from the ground up for Japanese citizens. It won’t make it out in the US because frankly Nintendo would just have to make it a new game.

Why is Friend Collection notable? In terms of Nintendo’s fiscal success, it’ll keep 3DS sales swift in Japan. The console recently hit 7 million in sales in Japan, an impressive number for a system that’s only been on shelves for 18 months. Friend Collection will help as it’s the sequel to one of the original DS’ most popular titles, at least in Japan.  The original Tomodachi Collection (literally “Friend Collection”) sold 3.2 million copies in Japan in its first year on shelves.

The other new Nintendo 3DS game announced at Nintendo Direct should get platformer fans psyched. Rhythm Hunter: Harmo Knight is a sidescrolling platformer but rather than stomping terrapins Mario-style, you collect notes and bust down barriers in your path in time to music. It’s got a smooth look and since it’s rhythm-based you never really stop moving. Think of it as a cross between Bit.Trip Runner and Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy.

Rhythm Hunter’s no quirky one-off though. It’s the latest entry in a rich platforming tradition from Game Freak. While the studio mostly just plugs away at making Pokémon games, once a decade it makes a killer platformer. Back in 1994, shortly after opening Game Freak made Pulseman for Sega Genesis, a stylish cross between Sonic the Hedgehog and Mega Man. Then in 2004 it made Drill Dozer for Game Boy Advance, a mad action comedy about a band of thieves piloting drill-equipped mechs. Both are genius. Here’s hoping Rhythm Hunter lives up to the pedigree.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Metroid: Other M 2? Team Ninja wants to make it for Nintendo

Dead or Alive 5 developer Team Ninja wants another crack at Nintendo's Metroid.

Metroid: Other M 2? Team Ninja would certainly like to make it happen. Dead or Alive 5 director Yosuke Hayashi said at Gamescom this week that he’d love to return to the series.

“Unfortunately Metroid is kind of out of our league as it’s Nintendo’s game,” Hayashi told VG247, “But we’re still in close touch with co-creator Sakamoto-san, so we want to do something with him moving forward definitely. It really depends on what he wants to do with the game first.”

Metroid: Other M looked like everything fans of the science fiction adventure series ever wanted. Exploration, an expansion of Samus Aran’s pirate-infested universe, and a clever mixture of third-person and first-person perspectives, all in a package meant to flesh out the series’ skeletal story. Super Metroid and Metroid Fusion director Yoshio Sakamoto would be at the helm, working with Team Ninja, experts at fast-paced 3D action.

So what if Team Ninja has a history of making some of the most misogynistic games in history? Surely Nintendo won’t allow “breast physics” into its games.

Samus may not have been playing beach volleyball in Other M, but the strong, silent bounty hunter was turned into an indecisive coward beholden to a cast of men in Team Ninja’s Metroid. It wasn’t a bad game though, just a terribly told story.

If Nintendo is going to return to Metroid, it might be better to revisit its two-dimensional roots. 

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Nintendo makes little effort to police use of “conflict minerals” in Nintendo 3DS, Wii U

Advocacy group the Enough Project has given Nintendo a 0 score for making no effort to police the use of "conflict minerals" in its devices.

Shocker: All the parts in your iPhone and your Nintendo 3DS come from somewhere. They are not, no matter what Apple’s shiny commercials tell you, magic. People dig metals, minerals and other goods out of the ground, refine them, and they are used in the production of electronic products. Many of those minerals like tin and tungsten are cultivated in the war ravaged Democratic Republic of Congo and the ceaseless conflicts in that nation are over control of those resources.

The Enough Project, an advocacy group backed by the Center for American Progress, released its 2012 Conflict Minerals Company Rankings this week, giving a score to electronics companies based on how well they work to not use minerals seized through violence. Intel and HP lead the pack, but coming in dead last is Nintendo.

“Nintendo is, I believe, the only company that has basically refused to acknowledge the issue or demonstrate they are making any sort of effort on it,” Enough Project senior policy analyst Sasha Lezhnev told CNN on Thursday, “And this is despite a good two years of trying to get in contact with them.”

Nintendo released a blanket statement to CNN placing the responsibility of sourcing materials on Nintendo’s manufacturing partners, not the company itself. When Digital Trends reached out to Nintendo for comment, we received the same statement. “Nintendo outsources the manufacture and assembly of Nintendo products to our production partners and therefore is not directly involved in the sourcing of raw materials that are ultimately used in our products. We nonetheless take out social responsibilities as a global company very seriously and expect our production partners to do the same.”

Like many companies, Nintendo established a set of guidelines its production partners need to agree to called the Nintendo CSR Procurement Guidelines. Nintendo did not however go into any detail on how it ensures that these guidelines are followed. The “Honor System” isn’t exactly foolproof.

This isn’t the first time in recent years Nintendo’s been accused of socially irresponsible corporate policy. In 2010, Greenpeace named Nintendo the least green electronics manufacturer in the world. Plus, that was an improvement from reports in 2008 and 2009.

For every effort that Nintendo makes to appear as family friendly as possible—from restricting the western release of games like Mother 3 it deems potentially offensive to insisting on byzantine online friend networks through Friend Codes—it’s shocking how willful the company is in its disregard for socially conscious business.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Review: ‘New Super Mario Bros 2′ for Nintendo 3DS

Photo: Nintendo's "New Super Mario Bros. 2" /  Image Credit: Nintendo

The New Super Mario Bros. series is getting old. When the first game in the collection made its debut on the Nintendo DS six years ago, gamers had been waiting more than a decade for a new 2D Mario platforming experience.

After the release was a smashing success, Nintendo appeased those fans again in 2009, offering a console version for the Wii that felt like a perfect amalgamation of every side-scrolling Mario game that had come before it.  Over the last three years, “New Super Mario Bros. Wii” has sold more than 26 million copies, outselling Wii’s “Super Mario Galaxy” and “Super Mario Galaxy 2″ combined.

With such massive popularity, it was inevitable that the series would continue, but in what form? Would we be exploring new worlds or revisiting long lost ones?

Unfortunately, neither, “New Super Mario Bros. 2″ seems content to explore the same scenery, battle the same baddies and retain the same mechanics as its predecessors.

While Mario’s classic game play is always welcome, fresh advances in story and theme are sorely missing, leaving the game with very few surprises and making the New Super Mario Bros. games even more indistinguishable from each other.

Sure, in every Mario game Princess Peach is kidnapped by Bowser, but there used to be a twist — new characters, dinosaur islands, castles filled with paintings, galaxies of planets. You get the idea. But  New Super Mario Bros games are quickly becoming indistinguishable from each other.

The big new thing in this game? The coins. This incarnation of the game challenges you to collect a million (I topped out at 25,000) and that bodes well for parents looking for a kid’s game with replay value, but it won’t help you differentiate this game from the others several years from now. I thought I would get tired of hearing the “da-ling!” sound effect with each coin collected, but it surprisingly didn’t faze me. Technically, I have to hear the effect 975,000 more times, so I may be speaking a little too soon.

Of course, the level design is top notch, the game is addicting and there are some nice touches revolving around depth perception in both backgrounds and boss battles. But when it comes down to it, “New Super Mario Bros. 2″ isn’t weird enough.  There’s no mystery, no sense of wonder, just a new power-up now and then.

The really annoying thing is that the solution to this problem is staring Nintendo in the face. The New Super Mario Brothers series could blast off to space and see what the “Super Mario Galaxy” world looks like in 2D. Or it could bring back Wario. It doesn’t take a genius to see some interesting directions for Nintendo to go in.

Thus far, New Super Mario Brother Wii has been the crowning achievement of this series. Four player co-op plus highly detailed world maps brought plenty of new Mario magic to the table along with the old. This game feels like Wii-light, less multiplayer options, the same bosses, mix-and-match power ups from previous entries in the series and maps that take a step backwards.

Come on, Nintendo, get weird!

New Super Mario Bros. 2 is available on Nintendo 3DS via game cartridge or digital download (a first for a new Mario title) starting Sunday, Aug. 19.

Source : abcnews[dot]go[dot]com