THE LEGEND OF ZELDA: THE MINISH CAP

The Minish Cap is easily among the most criminally underrated Zelda games of all time. Owing to the fact that it’s a handheld title and that it was developed by Capcom, not Nintendo, it’s been viewed as something of a sidequel by many, though as those who’ve played it will tell you, that’s an unfair assertion, because this is an incredible game. A remake that brings the game back to the forefront for modern audiences would surely prove that.

The combined sales of the Nintendo 3DS, Nintendo 3DS XL, and the Nintendo 2DS have surpassed 2 million in the UK. It was also noted that the 2 million sold marker was achieved in a shorter period of time than the DS.

According to Nintendo, in the first half of the company’s financial year for 2013, a total of 3.89 million 3DS units were sold, stacked up against the 5.06 million units sold in the same timeframe the previous year. Though it’s a notable decline, sales numbers for the 3DS are still high and promising.

As part of a promotional 3DS effort, Nintendo is giving away free digital downloads of their new title, Super Mario 3D Land to European customers. In order to be eligible to receive the free game, gamers must register their handhelds, along with one of their games, to club Nintendo by January 13, 2014.

Source: MCVUK

Nintendo has announced a list of the games Gamescom attendees will be able to sample at the upcoming expo, which takes place in Cologne from August 21st-25th. A whole host of Wii U and 3DS titles will be available to demo, the most exciting of which being Europe’s first ever playable glimpse at the much anticipated Pokemon X and Y in a short playable demo.

The fully announced list comes out to:

Wii U:

– Pikmin 3, which has already been released in Europe as of July 26th, will be =available on the floor for the Wii U to show off all of its brand new interactive features.

– The Wonderful 101, in which players control up to 100 heroes at a time in order to defend the earth from an invading alien scourge. The Wonderful 101 launches on August 23rd.

– The Legend Of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD, the beloved Gamecube title, has been remastered, revamped, and repackaged for the Wii U, incorporating some of the systems unique interactive features and overall touching up the game’s look for HD.

– Sonic Lost World will be available for fans of the classic franchise. Sonic returns to team up with former nemesis Dr. Eggman to battle the Deadly Six, showcasing a host of new abilities and fun environments.

– Wii party U, the Wii U’s family oriented board game station will be playable, and features board games, mini games, table top games, etc.

– Donkey Country: Tropical Freeze, the much anticipated new Donkey Kong side scroller, which features Donkey, Diddy, and Dixie Kong jumping and rolling their way over and through new enemies and environments

– Super Mario 3D World, which is the first multiplayer 3D Mario game for the Wii u will be playable, and will feature some never before seen abilities from the Mario cast.

– Wii Karaoke U will be available to all Gamescom attendees. Whether this is a good thing or a bad thing is really up to you.

– And Finally, Mario Kart 8, set for a Spring 2014 release will be avaiable to demo in full HD.

3DS:

– Professor Layton and the Azran Legacy, which launches November 8th, will be available for a demo. This final game in the Professor Layton prequel trilogy takes place one year after the events of Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask.

– The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds is a new entry in the Zelda series, set in the same world as the SNES classis, A Link to the Past. The game will expand upon the original top down 2D perspective, incorporating many of the unique graphic elements that the 3DS has to offer.

New 3DS XL owners have an amazing opportunity to grab either Super Mario 3D Land or Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask (both excellent games) or one of other few games for free.

If you’ve recently bought a 3DS XL< all you have to do is register it at Club Nintendo, and you can choose either of the following to get for free: Super Mario 3D Land, Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask, Freakyforms Deluxe: Your Creations, Alive!, New Art Academy: Learn New Painting Techniques and Share your Art and Nintendo Presents: New Style Boutique.

You can download one of these, but the offer will only be valid from 31st January 2013- so you’re gonna have to wait a bit. But you will have to register your 3DS XL before January 15th. Anyone who’s done so before the date can get in on this offer.

Both Layton and Mario are excellent games. You can read their reviews here (Layton) and here (Mario).

[Eurogamer]

Super Mario 3D Land, which has been at the top (or near the top) of all charts- 3DS and all formats- ever since it came out in November, has now sold 5 million units, becoming the first 3DS game to reach the milestone. Mario Kart 7 is close behind, with 4,540,000 copies sold.

The third best selling game of the 3DS is The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D, selling 2,490,000 since its release last June. Capcom’s Monster Hunter Tri G is the fourth highest selling 3DS game, selling over a million units.

Nintendo also announced that DS titles New Super Mario Bros and Mario Kart DS have also created records, with the former selling 28,740,000  unitsand the latter selling 22,300,000 units.

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, which came out in November last year, has sold 3,420,000 million copies globally. Wii Sports, now the Wii’s best selling game, has sold a whopping 79,160,000 copies, counting the millions of copies it must have sold when it was bundled with all Wiis. Bundled or not, this is an impressive figure indeed.

New Super Mario Bros. Wii, Wii Sports Resort and Mario Kart Wii also impress, having sold 25,470,000, 29,870,000 and 31,910,000 units respectively.

Nintendo recently announced plans to release a New Super Mario Bros. game for the 3DS. It will be out before April next year.

In a nutshell- yeah, it is. In fact, I’d say it’s even better. Not only is it one of the best handheld games I’ve played in a long time, it’s also right up there with Super Mario Galaxy/2 and Super Mario Bros. 3 in my best Mario games list, irrespective of the systems.

When Super Mario 64 first came out back in the day, it successfully ported the series from 2D, side scrolling visuals, but the series lost a huge chunk of its identity. And ever since then, the only few games that have been in vein of the good old Mario are the few remakes and re-releases that we have gotten and the two New Super Mario Bros. games. Super Mario 3D Land, however, ingeniously combines the best of both worlds- old Mario and present day Mario, and gives us one solid package. So while you will still be seeing several time based platforming challenges like in the Galaxy games, you will also be reminded of the old Mario Bros. games a lot.

Super Mario 3D Land starts as Mario’s old nemesis, Bowser, kidnaps Princess Peach (gasp!), and the titular Italian plumber sets off to save her. In typical Mario fashion, we must go through 8 worlds, each world having five main stages, one boss stage and some special stages. The worlds all have a theme, like desert or forest or underwater levels, and you’ll play through some very well designed levels in your time with the game. I cannot stress this enough- the level design of Mario 3D is excellent. Sure, the game is a bit too easy at first, but the difficulty does pick up later on. The levels are well thought out and creative and present you with some memorable sequences- including some platforming based puzzles that might take a minute or so to figure out- and you’ll remembered them long after you’re done with the game. The platforming is also always a ton of fun. Not just because Nintendo has developed the levels so well, but also because of how responsive, tight and intuitive the control scheme feels.

The boss levels are also a ton of fun, basically because the boss battles are so enjoyable. They don’t really present a challenge, it’s not hard to bring them down, and it’s easy to figure out the strategy and pattern the game wants you to, but implementing that strategy is always fun; so much so, that you actually look forward to the boss battles. You’ll face the old school lava castles or airships again, reminiscent of the old Mario games.

But where Super Mario 3D Land truly excels is how well it represents the old school 2D Mario games in a 3D world. You will jump on flagpoles, focus is on speed and platforming rather than exploration, there is no health meter, and you will also use the tanooki suit. The game relies on nostalgia heavily, but I don’t think that’s a bad thing. Not in this case, at least. Because when nostalgia results in gameplay so damn fun, it can only be a good thing.

And yes, the tanooki suit reminds me of power ups. As everyone would expect from a Mario game, the power ups are brilliant and simply genius sometimes. Oldies such as propeller boxes, tanooki suits and fireball abilities return, and new ones such as a boomerang suit, a leaf that lets Mario invincible if you’re dying too much till the time you end a stage and others are not just very well built, but also a ton of fun to use, and add that much more enjoyability to the gameplay. And it’s this very nature of the game- the fact that it’s so damn fun and addictive, not to mention the fact that it has just much items to collect and so many stages to complete- that lends it so much replay value.

One major complaint everyone has had with the 3DS so far is that it has no game that particularly defines what a 3D game should be like. Fortunately for us, Super Mario 3D Land is that game. The visuals by themselves are fantastic as they are- charming, have great art design and are nothing but eye candy. However, with the 3D effect turned up to a full 100%, the game looks even more fantastic, making it one of the most visually pleasing and best looking handheld games you’ll ever play. It looks so good, you won’t even mind the headache you get from the effect.

But don’t make the mistake of thinking that the 3D effects only the visuals- no, it impacts the gameplay greatly too. There’re many platforming sections in the game that require you to judge depth or study the environment using the 3D effect. It may not be a ground-breaking implementation of the visual style, but it’s the best I’ve seen so far, and I’ll take what we’ve got.

So at the end of the day, Super Mario 3D Land is an outstanding game- yes, it has a few problems. It’s a bit too easy in the beginning, and a few controls like the gyroscope feel tacked on and pointless, but these negatives can be easily overlooked, and they don’t affect the gameplay or how much fun you’ll have with the game even a bit. Mario 3D is an awesome game with excellent level design and replay value that will get you hooked and won’t let go.

This game was reviewed on the 3DS.

3DS has had the best week in Japan with over 510k consoles sold, according to a Famitsu report. The two mighty sellers Super Mario 3D Land and Mario Kart 7 also broke 1 million in sales, doing 300k and 200k respectively.

This should be good news to Nintendo, as the install base is soaring at this point.

Here are the total numbers:

3DS – 4,135,739

Super Mario 3D Land – 1,042,511

Mario Kart 7 – 1,082,391

It’s been a slow year for the 3DS, with The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D being the only notable release for the system in its early months. It got some other remakes, but none of them were actually worth buying. The past few weeks have been great for the handheld, though, what with Super Mario 3D Land and Mario Kart 7 getting released.

The release of these two news games has not only been met with praise by existing 3DS owners, MCV says it’s also resulted in a sales spike for the 3DS itself. UK retailers have reported a sudden surge in the system’s sales in the past few weeks.

“Sources on the High Street” have said that “the Metallic Red edition is all but sold out, with other colours also in short supply”.

“We have high expectations for the final few weeks before Holidays,” GAME’s category manager for Nintendo Iain Johnson said.

Stay tuned for our reviews of Mario Kart 7 and Super Mario 3D Land.

Check out the launch trailer for Super Mario 3D Land. This Mario game for the 3DS has scored very high and will be releasing this month. 3DS needs system sellers and who better to do that than Mario? This launch trailer shows some amazing gameplay and some stages.

You may want to not view the trailer due to spoiler reasons but these are just some of the stages that can be found in the game. Stay tuned for our review of Super Mario 3D Land soon.

Tell us what you think in the comments section below.

Media Create has released the software and hardware sales figures for Japan for the week of October 31 through November 6. Nine titles have debuted on the list this week, with Super Mario 3D Land and Uncharted 3 taking the top two positions in that specific order. The former, however, managed to outsell the latter by 220,ooo units.

And that’s not even all. The 3DS did not just perform well on the software front. It topped the hardware charts too, selling 145,271 units, ahead of the PS3 in the second place, which sold 27,952 units, which while impressive, seems kind of “lame” when compared to the 3DS figures.

Battlefield 3 also sold very well, selling 123,379 on the PS3 and 27,723 on the Xbox 360.

Here’re the full charts:

Software:

1. Super Mario 3D Land (3DS): 343,492 (New)
2. Uncharted 3 (PS3): 124,989 (New)
3. Battlefield 3 (PS3): 123,379 (New)
4. Final Fantasy Type-0 (PSP): 122,286
5. Kirby Wii (Wii): 55,779
6. Winning Eleven 2012 (PSP): 45,437 (New)
7. Slime Mori Mori Dragon Quest 3 (3DS): 38,859 (New)
8. Battlefield 3 (360): 27,723 (New)
9. Just Dance Wii (Wii): 25,665
10. Go Vacation (Wii): 16,995
11. Winning Eleven Play Maker 2012 (Wii): 14,117 (New)
12. Wii Sports Resort Wiiplus Pack (Wii): 12,570
13. Idolmaster 2 (PS3): 10,721
14. Winning Eleven 2012 (PS3): 10,636
15. Winning Eleven 2012 (PS2): 9,786 (New)
16. AKB1/48 If I Loved an Idol in Guam (PSP): 8,883
17. Minna no Rhythm Heaven (Wii): 8,581
18. Macross F Sayonara no Tsubasa Hybrid Pack (PS3): 8,352
19. Naruto Narutimate Impact (PSP): 7,144
20. Model Fashion Audition 2 (3DS): 6,643 (New) 

Hardware:

• 3DS: 145,271
• PSP: 27,952
• PS3: 26,966
• Wii: 11,725
• DSi LL: 2,041
• X360: 1,699
• PS2: 1,457
• DSi: 1,057
• DS Lite: 33

[Adriasang]