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N+ Design: Classic Sonic

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Jayvee wanted to celebrate Sonic's 20th birthday by decorating N+ with a classic Sonic stage: Green Hill Zone! Even though Sonic's birthday was in June, it was late June (the 23rd to be exact) so if we were to round-out wich month we should celebrate... it would be now, in July! So what does everyone think of the new page? It certainly is much brighter than the Lake of Rage we had last month, and also a lot less frightening. We have to switch moods into a bright, sunny, summer feel now, and Sonic is here to get us there fast!

If you want a full-sized wallpaper of this months artwork, or ANY of the previous N+ artwork in our entire history, please visit the N+ Art Gallery, we stash all of our wallpapers, and screenshots of how N+ used to look throughout our evolution in there, it's really a nice place to visit if you are new to N+ and a nice trip down memory lane if you are a long time veteran of the site wink

Operation Rainfall

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This is a tale of three RPG games, Xenoblade, The Last Story, and Pandora's Tower. I've been a huge RPG gamer for a long time. My favorite game of all time is Final Fantasy 6, even. Each of the games listed above aren't little rinky-dinky titles. They're games that are highly rated by Famitsu. Each of the games received a 36, 38, and 31 out of 40 respectively from the Japanese magazine. The Last Story was composed by famed composer Nobuo Uematsu, so these are big production games that deserve to make their way to North America. RPG fans have established a website where people can go to petition called Operation Rainfall. They're utilizing a mail-in strategy, one game at a time. Go there to find out how you can participate to get three brilliant third party games released in North America.

Read more...

US Supreme Court: Video Games protected by 1st Amendment

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USA! USA! This may be a bit late but the news is kicky-sweet no matter when you read it.

Recently the United States Supreme Court (the big one) finally put an important matter to rest, video games get the same first amendment protection as other media like books, movies, and music! The ruling was 7-2 in favor of freedom over restriction.

Download the Supreme Court Decision and read more for the full story pulled from the ESA...

Read more...

Ocarina of Time: Skyward Sword Easter Egg

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Woah! I was playing some The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time 3D this morning, as I usually do, and inside one of the buildings I noticed a The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword art poster hidden from view! I really found this on my own, and didn't search for easter eggs online. I am tempted to do that now, but it's fun finding things completely out of the blue, like all the easter eggs I found in Donkey Kong Country Returns.

This photograph is the best I could take, and I even tried to enhance it a little bit so it was more visible, but in the game it looks really nice! I am wondering if there are even more hidden easter eggs in the game that were added! have you spotted any? let us know! also I want to tell you where to find it, but it's also cool to try and find it yourself right? so I will give you a hint, I found this poster as "future Link" not "young Link". That may not help much, but it gives the treasure hunters some fun right?

Kirby On TV

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Nintendo has a press release to those of you living in Europe:

KIRBY SET TO BE THE LATEST STAR OF THE SMALL SCREEN Classic character cements his place as a gaming legend by starring in his own TV channel available exclusively on Wii Fresh from the recent release of the critically acclaimed Kirby’s Epic Yarn, the cute and adorable Kirby is returning to Wii on 23rd June 2011, as part of his own dedicated TV Channel. The Kirby TV Channel will be available across much of Europe as a completely free download and will feature TV shows staring Kirby, the legendary Star Warrior, as he battles King Dedede in Dream Land.

The channel will allow you to view over 50 Kirby episodes that will be updated twice a week over a six month period. Fans of Kirby will be able to check the programming schedule just like a real TV channel and choose from four streaming episodes at a time.

Every week, two new episodes will become available – one on a Monday and one on a Thursday. The episodes will be available to view for two weeks before being archived to make way for new episodes. Episode 1 is permanently unlocked so Kirby fans can watch how he came to land in Dream Land at their leisure. Keep a close eye on the channel, as watching episodes from the archives may be possible, ensuring you never miss an episode.

The Kirby TV Channel will be available to fans in the UK, Germany, France, Italy, Netherlands, Belgium, Ireland, Greece, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Austria, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Australia and New Zealand.
Whether you have been a fan of Kirby since his debut in 1992 on the Game Boy with Kirby’s Dream Land or have recently discovered the cute hero through Kirby’s Epic Yarn on Wii, the new Kirby TV Channel is the best place to help you to keep up to date with Kirby and his friends’ fun adventures in Dream Land.

-Ends-
N.B. Most episodes will be available in English, German, French and Italian, although please note that there will be a few exceptions.

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A Shakedown in Gaming

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Cross posted from Opera News where the poll results you see were from an Opera News poll that ran during the week around E3. Be sure to check out some great comments in the original post.

It's no surprise that a healthy portion of Opera News readers play PC games, often sitting at a desk, right? So how do you feel about motion-controlled gaming being a part of everything these days but lacking on the PC?

At Opera, we like innovation. From voice input to mouse gestures, usability design to face gestures. The options for controlling Opera have always been industry leading.

Nintendo Wii received a lot of attention at launch and through the years for making motion control standard. The subsequent revolution of motion-controlled gaming that followed with Microsoft Kinect, Playstation Move, Nintendo 3DS, Playstation Vita, and devices running iOS to Android, motion control has become a core feature of all hardware. 

Why then, besides the difficulty in forming a standard across computers, has there been no major motion capture implementation in pc gaming? Could a standard exist?

It sounds silly to even ask, right? Console and PC gamers rarely see eye to eye. I wanted some real answers so I asked attendees at E3 why they thought PC gamers didn't care for motion control. Here's how they responded: 

  • 14 people said they'd rather sit.
  • 8 people said they'd knock their water/coffee/beer cheers over.
  • 6 people said that [number of] hours of [some long action, like zoning out in The Sims or raiding in World of Warcraft] should be fun, not excruciating or tiring. 
  • 5 people said WASD keys and mouse work fine.
  • 1 person said they can't dance in front of a laptop. (Why not? I do all the time...)
  • 1 person said "motion control is a casual gimmick, I'm hardcore."

A Revolution Comes Full Circle

Something is strange here: isn't a mouse capturing your hand motion and turning it into input? Doesn't that count as motion control? Hand motion, selection of objects, direct control, grab, body movement, momentum, etc. - all of this has to count. left right Right? Isn't a mouse standard?

So what are your thoughts? Is Nintendo going to appeal to the hardcore with the premium Wii U controller? Is Minecraft really possible with Kinect? Does mouse input constitute 'motion control' and is it the reason 'joysticks' are extinct? Or, is Augmented Reality the future? I like AR so I'm sharing a gratuitous photo of iJustine (who really seems to like Operao ) and I with an oversized Nintendo 3DS AR card. Now sound off in the comments, let's hear what you have to say!

Hey! I also want to know who's still gaming on some good older systems and rolling dice - I'm with you on that! yes

Register Zelda OoT: Get an Album!

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And you better do it today because the offer is over at midnight, Pacific Time on Monday June 20, 2011! Read more for official rules and details...

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Happy 'Bizarro' Fathers Day from N+

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Reading the morning paper at work I found that the 'Bizarro' comic strip got into the Fathers Day spirit! Who can guess what game the father is playing?

Multiple Wii U Controllers limited by price?

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Iwata addresses why, at least for now, the Wii U will only support one Wii U controller at a time, and he really makes a point to reject technical limitations and get to the monies...

"Regardless of the technical question as to whether or not we could do that (use two of the new controllers), for the time being, we will focus on what we can do with a single new controller with the system.

"In the future, we may look at what other opportunities there are for gameplay and, how having two of those controllers might create fun or interesting new styles of play, but of course in doing that, it would require a consumer to purchase an additional controller. Therefore, we would need to carefully consider how we could create such an experience and, potentially, how we could ensure that there would be enough value within that experience for the consumer to accept that cost and make that purchase."

Also keep in mind that E3, Miyamoto was quoted as saying that they are...

"doing research about if someone brings their controller to their friend's house and they want to play together on Wii U to whether or not something like that would be possible."

sources: 1, 2

Shining Opportunites

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Hey everyone, I need some help. Recently I decided to finally go through with my long time thought of having a pokemon team full of ghosts! I know some of you will say that there are better choices than what I chose because of secondary types and stuff, and while I know that's true, I still wanted to go with my favorite Ghosts. I know that Frillish for instance would be great because I could surf... but Jellicent looks dumb, and nothing like a ghost. Drifloom would allow me to fly... but he's not that cool either, I mean he's ok, but nothing special to me.

So what you see here is my current team of ghosties, two of them are shiny (Duskull and Banette)! and I would like the rest to be as well. so I need your help replacing a few of them with shiny versions, most specifically Sableye. I have some shiny guys I would be willing to trade, as well as a couple event pokemon, in-case you missed out on any. Or if you are looking for any other kind of Pokemon I could look through to see if I have that too, like one with a special move or nature, or even an Item to hold.

Read more for a list of all the Shiny or Event pokemon I would be willing to trade, as well as an alternate version of my Trainer card with who I would like on my team. Oh and one more thing, I want legit guys, no Action Replay or Gameshark or otherwise hacked guys, chaining to get them is fine however, and I don't care about gender or nature as long as you can nickname it before trading it to me smile I'm naming my guys after the 5 boroughs of New York (and the proposed at one time 6th) I will update this post if I obtain more to offer, as well as if anyone gets me one or more of these requests...

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That Time Reggie Almost Saved Mii

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While at E3, I bumped into a guy you may have heard of who tried to help me out of a tight squeeze... (WARNING: DO NOT READ MORE IF YOU HAVE NOT MADE IT TO THE END OF THE SAVE MII GAME IN STREETPASS MII PLAZA)

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Blue 3Dot Special: Update 2.1.0-3U

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For those of you who have not yet been made aware, Nintendo has released another system update for the Nintendo 3DS. This update claims to "improve system stability", and also includes a fix for Ridge Racer 3D. Press "Read More" for a transcript of the update notice.

Please note that the transcript also includes a partial transcript of the previous update notice from Nintendo regarding users who have not yet applied the June 6 update.

Read more...

NMH3: Suda Brainstorming?

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Weird, really weird. Twittering on Twitter today I noticed that Grasshopper Manufactures official account let out a strange Tweet:

Everyone is super excited bout #NMH3, but it's just an idea rattling
around his crazy head for now. Tweeting @suda_51 might shake it
out.

Looks like Grasshopper is trying to get Suda bugged enough to make a NMH3 for Wii U! So everyone who has a twitter account let one out about how much you want it to be real with "@suda_51" attatched to it! It looks like they are saying it's already something he is thinking about.

Also, there is an online petition which I have already signed, and you should too:
http://www.petitiononline.com/NMH3WiiU/petition.html

Pokedex 3D Freebies: All Unova Pokemon!

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I know I have been holding out on everyone, I wanted to release only one a day because if you scan all the codes you are stuck waiting for them to appear random again. The ones I was giving you can be added just by scanning them, but the rest of the dex will recognize your AR codes and save them. If you scan only a couple of them, the next day you have very high chances of those registered codes to become full entries! So pick your favorite and DON'T scan all of them in one day like I did.

Shown here are ALL of the ones that will register just by scanning, and if you click this link you will get the FULL pokedex of AR codes to scan, but be careful to only scan a few of your favorites each day, I would not do more than three.

WiiU: Extended Developer Testimonials

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A longer video showcasing what 3rd party developers think of WiiU...