Steve Nix, business director for Id Software, was recently interviewed and has shared his thoughts regarding all of the next-generation consoles and has shed light on Id's plans regarding each of the three.

Nix praised the Wii for the ideas that breathed new life into the graphics race-driven console market. He described the Wii as "fantastic" and "mass friendly," pointing out that though the strength of the system may not come from turbo-charged visuals, the friendliness of the system and the ingenuity of game paradigms were just the right elements to attract a good crowd of gamers.

Nix also pointed out that the Wii may not be as powerful graphically as its competitors Xbox and PS3, but when Id does start developing games for it, they would "make it look special."

The director also hailed the Xbox 360 as a great platform with advanced capabilities, an abundance of development tools and a "programmer-friendly" machine that is a joy to develop games for. He a...

SNK games was recently reported to have joined the Nintendo Virtual Console bandwagon by offering its Neo Geo games for the Wii. The game developer has remained relatively quiet on the matter, but has now spoken up through its US chief Ben Herman.

Herman expressed his delight regarding the new deal with Nintendo and described the partnership as an "exciting" one because of the advantages behind VC. The SNK bossman also said that the games are coming out this year, though he can't say what titles come out when.

Herman explained that decisions regarding which titles to put out are made primarily in Japan, but word should be out in the next few weeks. He also added that making ports will be an easy enough matter because of Nintendo's flexible technical resources.

When asked if this would affect the deal that SNK is also forging with Nintendo rival Sony, Herman said that there are no exclusivity issues in play, and that means less problems.

"I personall...

We all love Nintendo Wii for its fresh take on gaming, using motion sensors, and melting the fat off of millions of fast food-weaned gaming kids. Perhaps you should know who to thank for it.

The Wii's motion sensing feature is all thanks to these shirt-button sized sensors, called accelerometers, supplied by ST Microelectronics, whose MEMS (microelectromechanical systems - the technology of motion detection) division is headed by Benedetto Vigna, the Italian physicist who developed the sensor.

The former University of California at Berkeley co-ed has made motion-detector chips for the mass market, such as motion sensors for car airbags, laptops, and washing machines before he got to know Nintendo and "married" the game maker's vision. Facts: your laptop has a motion sensor, to warn you to put it in a safer place to keep it from falling, and so does your washing machine - to warn you of an unbalanced washload.

Vigna says that in the near future, he plans on ...

Ocarina of Time was recently made available for you to download on the Virtual Console (if you don't mind the killer Wii point costs), and we're sure this event will trigger a bit of nostalgia for the fans who remember its Nintendo 64 (N64) incarnation. Now, for the case of the truly truly loyal (read: hardcore) fans, no classic game is complete without matching figurines.

   
In line with this, First 4 Figures is announcing another of their Legend of Zelda collectibles for later this year. This particular resin figure is for the mysterious Sheik.

Sheik was Princess Zelda's alter-ego in Ocarina of Time, occasionally popping up in Ocarina's plot to help Link along with his quest. Fans may remember gender issues for this character, given that Sheik was criticised for being far too masculine to have been Zelda. But whether this alter-ego was created by (chest-shrinking) magical enchantments or by some other means, it still makes for a cool collectible ...

The Mac sites are humming with rumors of Multitouch Apple Cinema Displays. I can trace the inspiration for these posts from two sources, at least here at Giz. First, the video above. Stunning, ain't it? Secondly, I received this loosy-goosy email the other day:During a dinner with a very old friend, who happens to be an anonymous designer at Apple...when my dad mentioned his plans to get two large flat screen monitors side by side for his macpro, the designer said wait just 2 years, then...proceeded to demonstrate the multi-touch screen of the iPhone. An email isn't enough to spark a rumor, but that's not what this is about. The blogs are excited about the notion. I am, too, but I am also aghast. The thought of doing 12 hours of work on such a monitor reminds me of these terrible things:
a) the inverse relationship of proper ergonomics and proper viewing distance on such a setup b) unnecessary exercise c) being punished in grade school for flying paper airplanes by having ...

 
The battle between good and evil has been fought countless times, by countless representatives, on countless battlefields. This year, the battle's taking place against the prosaic backdrop of China's sacred temples. The combatants? A young warrior stands ready at the side of good, while an evil magician musters his forces to achieve dominion over the world.

OK, enough with the flowery prose. We managed to score an interview with The Game Factory, the team behind Legend of the Dragon, the upcoming fighting game for the Sony PSP and Nintendo Wii. Legend of the Dragon is based on the BKN animated series of the same name and features lightning-fast martial arts action, beautiful graphics, and innovative RPG-style mechanics. Oh, and magic armbands and kung-fu monkeys, too.

Without further ado, here's the interview.

How faithful will the game stay to the animated series? Will BKN (Bohbot Kids Network) have a hand in the game's production?
The game's ...

Filed under: Announcements

Alright, it's Day 2 of our 3rd Birthday Giveaway! You still have time to enter yesterday's contest and win an Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTX (among other prizes), but today we're cranking it up a notch and making it a little more difficult to win.

Here's today's line up of prizes:


Wii + 10,000 Wii points (courtesy of the WMExperts store)
Samsung K5 Xbox 360 for Windows Controller + copy of Lego Star Wars II A pair of Oakley O ROKR sunglasses
Mystery swag bag #1 Here's what you have to do to win:

Create an Engadget screensaver. It can be whatever you want, just as long as it's Engadget-themed in some way. To make things easier we've included downloadable Engadget logo files after the break. Feel free to use those in your screensaver, or to incorporate our RSS feed, podcasts, whatever you think works. (We'll give you some more info about our feeds and tags after the break,...

Filed under: Rumors, Nintendo Wi-Fi


Details on Blazing Angels have been thin, and the game's release date was shaky for a long time as well. Given those factors, it's understandable that rumors can sprout from the tiniest things -- like a WiFi logo on a placeholder box at IGN. We've seen placeholder boxes start a ruckus before, but this time there may be more too it than a simple mistake.

Blazing Angels was, as far as we know, slated to be online all along. It's not unpossible that we'll see online dogfights, but it may be very, very unlikely. However, this game was originally slated for an earlier release, so maybe we can cross off at least one "very" from that statement. We know online devkits went out, and that with the game's delay ... well, we can definitely understand the speculation.

Reggie Fils-Aime said the Wii should be online by Q2. But here's the thing -- that article didn't specify whether we're talking about the sec...

 
The last time we heard from our favorite ogre was last year. As the third movie nears release in May so does the game's release. Today we have new info on the multi platform title - Shrek the Third from Activision.

In this newest Shrek title, players would be able to play as Shrek, Donkey, Puss-in-Boots, Fiona, Arthur (Fiona's rebellious cousin), and Sleeping Beauty. The game will take players on another adventure to Far Far Away, visiting movie locations plus some exclusive game content. In the game, Prince Charming attacks the city with his merry band of fairy tale villains. Challenges include fighting Charming's evil henchmen, gathering collectibles, numerous boss fights, and single player and multiplayer mini games.

Shrek the Third also features 20 movie-based and game exclusive levels like the Academy Grounds, Pirate Ship, and Evil Queen's Castle (exclusive). And what would a Shrek game be without the signature twisted humor? Each character has a speci...

Filed under: News
What does Nintendo Europe do to follow up Ocarina of Time? Throw a few more side-scrolling titles onto the Virtual Console, of course! At this point, we're starting to think that the VC's subtitle should be something like: All the side-scrolling fun you'll ever need!

If all the shooty/fighty games aren't quite your style, there's a little variety, too. Four games -- not a bad week!

Available in Europe on this fine Friday:

Bio-hazard Battle (Sega Mega Drive) - 800 Wii points Chew-Man-Fu (TurboGrafx) - 600 Wii points Streets of Rage (Sega Mega Drive) - 800 Wii points Sword of Vermillion (Sega Mega Drive) - 800 Wii points Read | Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments