Final Fantasy XV Director Hajime Tabata, current champion of the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, now has a new spot in his heart for the Nintendo Switch. Speaking with French publication Gameblog, Tabata expressed interest in developing for Nintendo’s recently announced console.
I’m very interested in this machine! As a player, but also as a developer. The Nintendo Switch that you can transform into a controller, that you can put into a dock, that you can move around with, on which you can replace elements.
It’s been a while that I’ve told myself that I would like to make games on a Nintendo machine, so if the Nintendo Switch could be that opportunity, I’ll be delighted!
Tabata does have a history with Nintendo
Of course, I don’t think Final Fantasy XV will be coming to the Nintendo Switch anytime soon. Tabata has always seemed to be a tech kinda guy with a love for the powerful consoles and PCs.
However, he does have a brief history with Nintendo, co-directing the Nintendo 3DS game Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance. This is the only point in his credits that show a history with Nintendo, and most of his other directing projects have been limited to the PSP and home consoles.
Tabata has yet to announce his plans after Final Fantasy XV launches next month. I wonder if it will be a Nintendo Switch game.
Both controllers will be out by Christmas, at least in Germany.
A pair of new third-party controllers have been announced for PS4 that resemble the Xbox One's highly regarded Elite controller. However, they haven't yet been confirmed for North America.
New controllers from Razer and Nacon were each announced today on Germany'sPlayStation Blog(viaNeoGAF). Both are said to be targeted toward professional gamers and the esports scene, though they'll be of use to anyone looking for an alternative to existing controller options.
The Razer Raiju features more than a few similarities with the Elite controller. It has two extra shoulder buttons and two rear triggers, the latter of which can be removed. A hair-trigger option allows you to more quickly pull the triggers to maximum input, and you can flip between two profiles. These let you customize unspecified aspects of the controller, which presumably will include defining what the extra shoulder buttons and triggers do. Finally, the Raiju features a 3.5 mm headset jack with integrated controls (for muting and adjusting v olume) and rubber caps on the analog sticks that can be removed.
The Nacon Revolution Pro offers a different take; most notably, it flips the position of the left analog stick and d-pad to resemble the asymmetric design of an Xbox controller. It also features four shortcut buttons, an eight-way d-pad, and what are described as highly precise analog sticks. It can store up four profiles for remapping buttons, configuring shortcut macros, and dictating the sensitivity of the analog sticks and triggers. It also has a 3.5 mm headset jack and internal compartments for storing weights so you can customize the balance of the controller.
Both controllers are compatible with all PS4s and can be connected to the system using a detachable three meter USB cable.
Prices were not announced for either one, but the blog post--which, again, was intended for those in Germany--says they'll be out by Christmas. Official pages on the Razer and Nacon websites are already live, but they don't offer much more information as of yet. It seems safe to assume the Razer one will come to North America, but with Nacon being a newer, European-focused company, the same may not be true of the Revolution. We'll report back as more details are announced.
NINTENDO’S NEXT CONSOLEis almost here. Nintendo Switch, previously codenamed NX and announced this morning, is on track to release in March 2017. When it’s out, your home and portable play will be combined into one unit: Switch is a tablet with detachable controllers that can dock with your TV, playing its games anywhere.
The hanafuda maker is still playing its hand close to its chest, however, only unveiling a short, three-minute concept video of the Switch, plus a little bit of information in follow-up press releases. Nintendo promises to unveil more information later, including lists of games, system specs, and the all-important price.
For now, here’s everything we know about Nintendo Switch.
It combines home and portable into a single unit.
You can play The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild on your big-screen TV at home, but why stop there? Pull the Switch out of the docking station next to your TV, and you can take that game on the go. This means more than just convenience: It means that Nintendo’s home and portable game libraries will now be combined into one single platform. No more having to support both the home Wii U and the portable 3DS with separate Mario Kart games—Nintendo can just create one game that’s played by everyone. And you don’t have to buy two pieces of Nintendo hardware to enjoy all the company’s games, anymore.
It has many different control options.
You’ll notice joysticks and buttons on the sides of the Switch. These will let you play Zelda when used in tandem. But you can also break those controllers off, like so many pieces of a Kit Kat bar, hand one to a friend, and play a round of competitive, portable Mario Kart anywhere you like. This will of course mean that each player’s control option is limited to one joystick and a handful of buttons. But many Nintendo games already control just fine with such a setup. You can also play local multiplayer games using two or more Switch consoles.
You also have the option of controlling a game with one controller in each hand, like playing an old-school Wii game with the remote and nunchuk attachment. These controllers are known as Joy-Cons, and you can put them into an accessory called the Joy-Con Grip to create a single controller that’s sort of shaped like a standard gamepad. And if you truly want a standard gamepad experience for hardcore gamin’, you can just buy the Nintendo Switch Pro Controller.
But the teaser trailer does leave some questions unanswered. Is the screen on the Switch a touch screen? We assume it must be, but we didn’t see anyone touching it. Do the Joy-Cons have motion sensors? I give that about a 50 percent chance, but again, we didn’t see it. Can you use the Joy-Cons to point and click at the TV screen, like a Wii remote? Not sure!
Nintendo Switch will indeed have videogames from Nintendo and other software makers.
Phew! Here’s a list of every single game we can see in the video.
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. The only game we definitely knew was coming to NX prior to this announcement, so not a surprise. If you want to read all about it, we played the Wii U version at E3, which Nintendo says will be identical to the Switch version.
Skyrim. Bethesda’s medieval RPG epic is coming to Switch, if you wished Zelda had more murders.
Mario Kart 8. From what we’re seeing in the video, it seems like the Wii U version of Nintendo’s racing game will be ported to the Switch. Not sure what changes might be made.
An unnamed basketball game that is probably NBA 2K17.1
Super Mario. Switch is getting what Wii U never did: a new single-player Mario game in the style of Super Mario 64. About time.
Splatoon. In this case, it doesn’t look like a straight port of Nintendo’s Wii U paint-splattering shooter game, since the characters have customizable hairstyles, which isn’t possible in the current-gen version. An upgrade, or a true sequel? Still not sure.
Ubisoft, back at this year’s E3, also announced that Just Dance would come to Switch. We didn’t see it in the video. Speculation time: Is it because Nintendo isn’t ready to announce that the Joy-Cons have motion controls? Maybe we’ll see Ubisoft’s dance game at that time.
Nintendo Switch is powered by a version of Nvidia’s Tegra mobile processor.
Nintendo usually doesn’t like talking up what’s inside its hardware (which got it into some trouble with Wii U when many people weren’t even aware that it had announced a new piece of hardware). That changes with Nintendo Switch, as it’s publicly touting the fact that inside the unit is an Nvidia Tegra, the high-performance mobile gaming chip.
“The high-efficiency scalable processor includes an Nvidia GPU based on the same architecture as the world’s top-performing GeForce gaming graphics cards,” Nvidia wrote on its blog. But the company isn’t just providing the chips, it says, noting that it was involved in the creation of the “algorithms, computer architecture, system design, system software, APIs, game engines and peripherals.”
Many different publishers and developers have pledged involvement (but that doesn’t mean much).
As usual with the launch of a new game platform, Nintendo has a massive list of major game developers and publishers that are publicly announcing support for the Switch. Just take all this with a grain of salt, because none of this means they’ll definitely release games on the platform—just that they’re looking into it.
Games will be sold on small SD card-sized memory cards.
While you will surely be able to buy games digitally on Switch, physical game retailers aren’t being left out of the equation. You’ll be able to buy your games on tiny cards about the size of a 3DS game cart, if you’re into that sort of thing. No promise that every game will get such a physical release, of course. And no details on how big those cards are.
Nvidia will launch its GTX 1050 Ti and GTX 1050 next week, pushing its 14nm Pascal hardware into lower price points and presumably offering some tough competition for AMD’s Polaris family. The GTX 1050 Ti will be a 768-core card, with 4GB of RAM, a 128-bit memory interface, 48 texture units, and 32 ROPS, while the GTX 1050 is a 640-core card with 2GB of RAM, 40 texture units, and 32 ROPS. Boost clock is 1392MHz on the 1050 Ti and 1455MHz on the 1050.
The GTX 1050 Ti and 1050 aren’t built on TSMC’s 16nm technology like the rest of Nvidia’s products, according to Anandtech — these chips are 14nm hardware and apparently built at Samsung. We first reported on rumors that Samsung and Nvidia would work together more than a year ago, and while we weren’t sure which chips the two companies would collaborate on, it appears that Nvidia chose to bring up some of its lower-power designs on Samsung silicon. 16nm availability may be tight at TSMC, given that the firm is building Apple’s A10, or Nvidia may just be taking advantage of having more than one firm with cutting-edge process technology on the market.
The GTX 1050 Ti and 1050 are set to debut at $109 and $139 respectively, which puts them squarely on the RX 460’s turf. This comparison hasn’t been strong for AMD so far this cycle, due to a mixture of high prices and weaker-than-desired positioning. The RX 480 8GB remains stuck well above $239 with only intermittent exceptions (there are a few reference board GPUs available for $249, but many cards are in the $279 to $299 range).
RX 460 prices have come down slightly since last month, but AMD hasn’t done particularly well when put head-to-head against Pascal this cycle. The GTX 1060 6GB is faster than the RX 480 and often available for less, and the RX 460 may have a tough fight on its hands against the GTX 1050 / 1050 Ti. Here, moving first may have helped AMD’s sales cycle, but it also allows Nvidia to tailor their own product to beat Team Red.
Capcom has released two more teaser videos for Resident Evil 7 in what it is calling a series. We’re sure to see more of these in the coming days.
Our character finds a shotgun tucked away in an item box and then immediately jumps into a menu system to load his weapon. That’s the Resident Evil I grew up loving! You gotta love that inventory management.
The other teaser looks more like the previous trailers with the main character picking up a ringing telephone and talking to a strange voice on the other line.
Hey, this looks like the Resident Evil I know!
The surprising change in these teasers is that the game is starting to look more like a genuine Resident Evil than what previous teasers have shown.
Capcom has vastly changed the way we look at Resident Evil with this latest game, turning to indie first-person horror games like Amnesia: Dark Descent and Outlast for inspiration rather than its predecessors.
It’s a smart turn given the downward spiral of the franchise’s critical reception, but long-time fans think Capcom ist straying too far from its roots. The company claims that the final product will more closely resemble a traditional Resident Evil, and this is the first evidence we’ve seen of that.
Resident Evil 7 will launch for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC on Jan. 24.
Super Mario Run is set to debut on iOS devices in December of this year. The game features familiar Mario mechanics developed for play with a single hand.
This release marks the Nintendo’s long sought after dive into mobile gaming. It should be huge.
So huge, in fact, that 20 million iOS users have signed up to be notified when it releases.
Tim Cook dished that stat to BuzzFeed Japan.
Super Mario Run will have an indelible effect on the mobile gaming industry
The mobile gaming space has some incredible software. Make no mistake, developers have been pushing some of the best games we have today out on the mobile space.
When Nintendo steps up with a real game, though? Super Mario Run will leave a mark.
Nintendo’s set to release the game with their free-to-try model in place. You’ll download Super Mario Run for free, but that will only get you access to a handful of levels. If you want more, you’ll need to pay. Once you pay, the game is yours without ads forever.
This could become the standard if Super Mario Run takes off, and I expect it will. If that’s the mark Nintendo leaves on mobile gaming, it’s a good one. Especially if it means fewer timed microtransactions.
When I was a kid, I played with this Hot Wheels stow and go set and raced the cars down the track for hours and hours. I was obsessed with it and loved pretending like I was the maniac driving down the track at insane speeds.
There’s still something so fun and raw and innocent about playing with Hot Wheels—so what if I’m a grown adult.
That’s why the video above is so much darn fun. If you fancy yourself a stunt driver but don’t actually want to put yourself in danger, just enjoy the footage from5MadMovieMakers, which strapped a GoPro Session onto the frame of a Hot Wheels car and sent it down a ramp. That jump makes my stomach drop.
I always figured the best use case for GoPro’s action cameras was for action sports: scaling mountains, skydiving, dirt biking. But with a little creativity, it makes for a fun tool in your backyard too.
Lenovo appears to be prepping a new gun controller for virtual or augmented reality gaming. The device recently passed through the FCC to have its Bluetooth capabilities checked out, revealing a lot of other information about the new gadget in the process.
The blaster almost looks like a scaled down version of Sony’s PSVR Aim controller. It’s covered with buttons, including three triggers, two joysticks, a directional pad and a classic ABXY layout. It also sports a haptic motor that vibrates when you pull the trigger to shoot, along with a USB port for charging and a battery indicator.
An included manual mentions that Lenovo’s gadget would be able to pair with Android devices over Bluetooth. That suggests it might be designed phone-powered virtual reality headsets, though it might work with augmented reality as well. It may even be designed for Daydream, Google’s new Android-based VR platform set to launch as soon as next.
When we reviewed the Xbox One S, we asked ‘who is this for?’ In the United Kingdom, at least, the answer is ‘lots of people.’
According to data obtained by MCV, the Xbox One had a 71 percent share of the hardware market last week, an increase of 76 percent over last year.
It’s tough to know how this compares to sales in other markets, or whether this will continue. PlayStation 4 sales accounted for 19 percent of market share last week, down 66 compared to last year, but a special set of circumstances is making for a sort of perfect storm here.
Xbox has typically done better in the United Kingdom when compared to other markets, and many consumers are likely hesitating to buy a PlayStation 4 right now with the significantly more powerful PlayStation 4 Pro just six weeks away from release. On top of that, there’s a new FIFA game this week, which is a huge system seller. So we have a game that pushes systems off the shelves in a market that typically likes Xbox during a time when consumers are hesitating to buy their competitor.
Microsoft has to gain a lot of momentum to push back against Sony’s PlayStation 4, so we’d need to see months and months of numbers like this, which doesn’t seem likely. With that said, Sony’s been making some missteps lately.
No Man’s Sky, which Sony pushed hard for,was so far off the mark that the developer is being investigated for false advertising. News recently broke that Fallout 4 won’t be receiving mods on PlayStation 4 due to policies within Sony. The PlayStation 4 slim and PlayStation 4 Pro were poorly received as well after their September 7 unveiling. The new system is underpowered in comparison to the upcoming Xbox Scorpio and lacking in features compared to the Xbox One S, which features a UHD Blu-ray drive, something that currently seems like a huge omission for a system touting 4K as a major feature.
Microsoft is in a good place to start building up if they can hang on.
“It’s great to see how popular both the Xbox One S and the FIFA 17Xbox One S consoles are with fans, not just over the last week but since the Xbox One S was released in August.” said Xbox UK’s head of marketing Harvey Eagle when speaking to MCV. “4K video streaming and 4K UHD Blu-ray have been extremely well received and we believe there is no better value right now for those looking to upgrade their console.”
Harvey called out the return of Gears of War with Gears 4‘s release on October 11 and Skyrim: Special Edition, which will allow mods on Xbox One, on October 28 as making now the best time yet to own an Xbox One.
Normally, talking about which board members a company might vote for in a meeting is coma-inducing, but today it’s a big deal. Ubisoft has a shareholder meeting today, and it could mark a turning point for the company.
For months now, French media conglomerate Vivendi has been slowly buying up shares of otherwise independent game publisher. Earlier this year, Vivendi pushed and successfully took control of Gameloft, a mobile-focused company that is, like Ubisoft, owned by the Guillemot family.
Like a significant other slowly moving stuff into Ubisoft’s apartment, Vivendi continues to insist that it’s not looking to move in – with the difference being that when Vivendi moves in, it gets to keep all the stuff while the brothers Guillemot move out. Vivendi insists that it is not looking to take control of Ubisoft, but rather sees a greater level of synergy between the two companies’ music, movie, television, and video game divisions. Vivendi owned a large stake in Activision Blizzard until 2013, when it sold its shares back to the publisher due, apparently, to a lack of synergy.
What’s happening this morning is a stockholder meeting including a vote for two new proposed members of the Ubisoft board of directors. Adding two Ubisoft-allied directors would help Ubisoft push back against Vivendi’s unwanted advances. Vivendi, meanwhile, has the ability as a shareholder to raise a vote at the meeting without warning to bring its own shareholders into the fold.
Vivendi holds about 23 percent of Ubisoft’s stock right now. As Polygon notes, the company can’t buy much more before French law obligates it to make a public offer on Ubisoft.
Ubisoft, meanwhile, has publicly and vocally opposed the takeover. CEO Yves Guillemot has used opportunities like the Ubisoft conference at E3 2016 to give impassioned speeches about Ubisoft’s long history as a creative studio. Guillemot told the Wall street Journal that Ubisoft won’t be able to rest comfortably until Vivendi sells shares.
Ubisoft has remained independent through its existence and, for its part, been the source of a number of unique games. We complain about the annualization of games like Assassin’s Creed, but a history of games like Prince of Persia and Beyond Good & Evil and more recent stuff like Child of Light and Grow Home show the company is willing to experiment. The company has also shied away from pumping out tons of remakes, finally relenting with an Assassin’s Creed collection focused on Ezio Auditore, the fan-favorite protagonist of Assassin’s Creed II, Brotherhood, and Revelations.
Even stuff like Far Cry: Blood Dragon, Far Cry Primal and The Crew have ended up being interesting experiments even if they don’t venture too far outside of the company’s usual fare.
The concern floating around among not only gamers but investors, analysts, and even Ubisoft’s executives is that a takeover from Vivendi has the potential to not only hamper more creative projects but to cause a mass exodus of talent to other studios. Much of Ubisoft’s development is located in Montreal, and there’s no shortage of other studios around there to pull in the studio’s experienced developers.
By the time the meeting ends, we may have a better idea of what Vivendi’s plans are, whether it’s a hostile takeover by stock buyout or a creeping acquisition by way of board members.
Niantic has updated Pokemon Go on iOS and Android, though fans shouldn't expect any big changes.
As detailed on the Pokemon Go website, iOS update 1.9.0 and Android update 0.39.0 make changes to things like capture location display and Pokemon Go Plus functionality with incense. There are also "minor" bug fixes in the update, though these were not specified. The patch notes are below.
Interestingly, Niantic also teased that there are some "exciting features and changes coming soon," though no further details were shared. One of the biggest new features for Pokemon Go was its buddy system, which launched last week, alongside the Pokemon Go Plus accessory.
Pokemon Go Update Notes:
Capture location: The location where a Pokemon was caught will now be displayed on their information screen.
Pokemon Go Plus and Incense: Trainers can attempt to capture Pokemon they encounter from using Incense with the Pokemon Go Plus accessory.
Minor bug fixes
Earlier this week, the CEO of The Pokemon Company teased a multiplayer battle mode for Pokemon Go, though it's not clear if that's one of the "exciting features" referenced above.
Pokemon Go launched in July and took the world by storm--it's reached a staggering 500 million downloads. Even The Pokemon Company was not expecting it to be such a hit, as CEO Tsunekazu Ishihara said the reaction was "10 times or even 100 times bigger than we expected." The game has also led to significant increases in Pokemon game and trading card sales.
