This is what your local GAME might look like soon enough.

It has been widely reported by the gaming press, including Eurogamer, that the UK’s largest independent video game retailer is in financial difficulties. The firm had a poor 2011, and whilst many had hoped the Christmas season might bring a last minute reprieve it was not to be and sales were down close to 15% compared to the year before. To put this into context, most major high street retailers in the UK experienced a rise in sales compared to twelve months earlier, as Christmas 2010 had been so poor due to excessive snow and ice keeping shoppers away from their town centres.

To be fair GAME have, for a while now, been issuing profit warnings and talking of reducing the number of shops they have over the next one to two years. This of course is taking place at the same time as HMV recently having to reorganise its debts with its lenders. However, HMV have a broader range of products, less stores but larger ones (and hence can sell more and try a greater variety of activities) and have earnestly started moving the business into new areas, albeit some more successfully than others. The firm has invested in live music and venues, and started to transfer space in stores (which was set aside to plastic boxes) to fan related merchandise and technology.

This is not to say that HMV has the answer, but I mention it as a way of demonstrating that specialist music, film and game retailers are having to find new ways and that this is hardly new. Over the last few years we have gone from having, perhaps, 3-5 retailers offering such products per high street to 1-3, with some towns having barely 2. Those two are often HMV and GAME. There is now a serious chance that over the next 2-3 years this will reduce further to one or in some cases none.

The all conquering Amazon. It's taking sales from bookstores, toy stores and of course videogame stores. It's also the perfect platform to migrate from physical product to digital download or stream. Something it is pushing more and more.

Let’s look at the reasons why and what this means for both the games industry as a whole and the consumer. Whilst it would be easy to say it’s down to the increase in downloaded content (legal or illegal), it would not be true for the overall market. For PC, clearly, it has had a huge impact but the average store dedicates very little floor space to PC titles. Meanwhile in console land, whilst you can get a small selection of titles as downloads, most are retail only, or are retail only for a long time before they go onto Xbox Live, for example. Sony has started doing near simultaneous releases for a few titles, but it does not release numbers for the PSN store; though it’s safe to say that if a game is on for significantly more money there than it is priced in shops that it can’t be picking up many sales at present.

So what does the trouble at GAME signify? It could just be that the business expanded too fast and inherited too many shops, with a range of leases and costs which are unsustainable. In other words the business has put itself into the situation it now finds itself and is not systematic of any type of global change. I suspect though that this is not the only reason the firm finds itself in trouble. It expanded rapidly, largely on being the only place which had a good selection of titles and in more recent times in supplying a strong second hand offering.

Both areas are now under attack, from both Supermarkets such as Tesco and due to the online side of the business such as Amazon, Play and many independent ‘warehouse’ only operators using the Amazon/Ebay marketplace. Whilst GAME also has a strong online presence, it’s not actually that easy to use, and doesn’t offer great prices. This is because the focus of the business has remained its stores.

So we have established that most consumers are buying boxed games still, but the market is being redefined by the online retailers and supermarkets. Yet that is not the only factor in play here. We are buying less games. Sure some games are selling in huge numbers, and for more money per purchase, but we are buying less overall.

When discussing market size, services such as PSN, STEAM and others are rarely included in such figures. However, it's clear that if you are a PC gamer, you download, you don't get the box.

The size of the UK market shrunk last year. The UK is not alone. Some people are hoping a new console generation will solve this. I doubt it will in the short term. In the medium to long term it will as people who currently play games continue to, whilst new younger generations join the ranks of hardcore gamers. However at present, there will be no sudden demographic shift where we immediately find new consumers to join our ranks. Such a culture change last took place during the Wii/DS generation and at least 30% of that has since found that smartphones suffice, as they were never hardcore gamers to begin with.

As I’m sure many of you will have noticed the games we buy take longer than ever to complete. Aha, I know what are thinking; Modern Warfare 3. This takes a bus ride to complete. That as we know is the single player experience only. The online is an ongoing all consuming social experience, with more special op operations being added, more multiplayer maps and modes. Even the Elite experience is designed to take up your gaming hours with stat analysis! Yet check out the games sale’s figures. It made more than Black Ops but sold less copies in 2011, as reported by Eurogamer.

So back to the idea of launching new consoles. The Vita is out pretty soon and as it offers an HD experience in your hand it, ironically, will split consumer spending even more. It won’t increase the size of the hardcore market but take purchases away from the PS3, Xbox and WiiU. In case you missed it we are now in the midst of a deep economic slow down, which for some people is starting to look like a depression, or at least a slow and ongoing contraction (which could last up to a decade). Whilst the entertainment sector as a whole is less effected during downturns (as reported by TIME, quoting the ever popular Michael Pachter), as people need escapism and spend less on holidays and other high price ticket items, it’s clear that new consoles and games costing £35 or above are now falling into the luxury area of disposable income for many, bar a few yearly purchases where value is eked out through replay and DLC offered throughout the year.

So less games are being bought, which means less games being traded, which results in less profits on second hand sells for the retailers such as GAME. The more money we spend on AAA titles and then investing in DLC to go with them also means we are more likely to play them to death and not trade them in (compounded by the ‘online pass’ feature meaning second hand copies lack online functionality).

So back to the present. In the short term this has been an awful week for GAME. Whilst they have managed to secure support from publishers and creditors it seems logical that consumers will slowly start to place pre-orders elsewhere in case the inevitable happens soon. Also will you be taking your games there to get reward points? What happens if the company goes down the pan and you haven’t spent those points? The time to redeem could be now, which could actually give the firm a short rebound, but if we don’t take in new games to part-ex against other new titles their business model will dry up. Publishers meanwhile will start to encourage the platform holders to push digital delivery, at decent prices (perhaps) and at the same time as the game launches on the high street. The days where they had to protect their retail distribution is perhaps starting to end.

The loss of GAME or HMV won’t mean the end of retail or a lack of competition for the consumer. We have 3-4 supermarkets in the UK of a decent size. In addition we have a plethora of online retailers all able to sell a product which is not required to be sold on the high street. After all it’s just a box with a disc in it.

The next generation of consoles will offer discs, but ultimately though, game retail will stop being physical and the next generation of consoles will offer all titles as near simultaneous digital copies, at competitive prices, as the publishers will learn a lesson from the (eventual) demise of GAME. Whilst it’s always been in their interests to protect and look after their retail channels, times are a changing and they now must look after themselves and their future distribution partners i.e. the platform holders themselves.

As predicited TVs are now shipping with game streaming software built in. This of course is a threat to everyone in the industry, but is much more of an immediate threat to one trick ponies such as GAME.

Assuming the next generation of consoles also offer a streamed game service in parallel to downloaded content for those with broadband fast enough (it’s safe to assume that a large enough market will exist 5-7 years from now with super fast broadband in many countries), it is clear that there is no hope for businesses such as GAME and HMV. In the UK it could be argued that the decline in the high street retailing of games really started with the demise of Woolworths and Zaavi (which is now online only), but the troubles at GAME have demonstrated that perhaps we have become perilously close to the tipping point which will lead to a fundamental change in the way in which the majority of gamers purchase and access future content.

Nintendo Conference: June 7^th 05:00pm GMT

Everyone wants to see the new console Nintendo is premièring today. I don’t really want to take guesses on what it will be like, but my assumption would be no-3D and only about as good as the current gen. That said, they will hopefully have learned from the poor 3DS sales that really what matters is a powerful launch line-up.

• Things are a little delayed to start with, probably with it being so early in the morning.
• Screen showing random Nintendo facts, think the same happened last year. Same with the random multiple choice questions. But here we go. The proper start now.
• Live orchestra starts playing a fantastic Zelda medley to videos of the various Zelda titles over the years. Does that mean they’re back to aiming at their older audience? Not many people younger than me will appreciate this trip down memory lane.
• Towards the end of the video is new footage. Celebrating 25 years of Zelda games. That does make me feel old.
• Shingeru Miyamoto takes to the stage. As cheerful as always. Attempted English GO. Fingers crossed for a better on-stage demo this year if there is one.
• Phew, translator comes on stage.
• Last year was Mario’s 25^th, this year it’s Zelda’s turn. The song at the end of the orchestra was the theme to Skyward Sword. Chats about famous music (chest opening, item gained). He talks about the orchestra again and asks them to preform some famous Zelda riffs.
• “Item GET-o!”
• Miyamoto takes a Titanic poster stance during the fairy music for some reason. He then wants to hear getting an item again, orchestra clearly hasn’t played Zelda and starts the wrong riff at first.
• Each hardware system is getting a Zelda game for the anniversary. Link’s Awakening will be coming to the Virtual Console as a download today worldwide.
• Next weekend Ocarina of Time 3D launches (we already knew that). Improved graphics, frame rate and a new sense of realism. Master Quest mode returns and there is a Boss Challenge mode. Free download of Four Swords.
• Finally, Skyward Sword. Worldwide release this holiday season for Wii. “It’s finally done!”
• It uses Motion+. They are making a special gold Wii remote. Will anyone seriously be desperate to get that?
• He mentions he’s been playing Skyward Sword every day and it’s great exercise, he shows off imaginary muscles. Both games will be on the expo floor.
• A symphony based around the Zelda music will be touring the world as part of the anniversary. That’s nice. Wii 2 please. Nope, plugging music CDs next. At a game expo. Really.
• He invites numerous members of the development team onto the stage. I don’t think this is building to anything, he’s just mooching applause now. Mentions all the fans and thanks them, ending this section of the presentation – implies he’ll be back later on.
• Nintendo President Satoru Iwata takes centre stage to some horrible music. I like what he’s done with his hair. What shade of dye would that be?
• Talks about the boundaries that once separated age group, personality and gender being erased. Talks about horrible casual gamers. The vermin of the gaming world. I mean in a more positive way than I am making out here. Sadly.
• “Deeper and wider”. He’s talking about the new platform…I hope. So, deeper must mean 3D, right? A wider appeal than the Wii to gamers. “Let’s everyone see games in full detail” – no glasses, then? He was being a tease, he isn’t going into details until later.
• Moving onto the 3DS and the franchises that are moving into it. He walks off stage as a large trailer begins, starting with Mariokart. Starfox is next. Super Mario is after that (these are all really short glimpses of what I’m not entirely sure is real gameplay).
• Kid Icarus is after that. Next is…Luigi’s Ghost…mansion thing. What was that called again? Doesn’t matter, wasn’t very good.
• Here comes Reggie. Medium sized microphone. Don’t start a speech with an aggressive “Look…” Reggie. It’s rude. Seems to be acknowledging people’s complaints about 3DS while at the same time implying that they are wrong.
• Five key titles to show for 3DS. Mariokart first and a trailer plays. “It’s a tricked out version you’ve never played before” apparently, looks pretty much standard fare to me. Oh until they show that the karts can to flying type glides over large areas and also go underwater. Revolutionary stuff.
• Mariokart 3D out this holiday season.
• Starfox 3D next. Trailer playing in the background while Reggie talks. You can use controls or you can use the hand-held to tilt and steer – all those people who did that for years despite not needing to will love that! 3DS cameras record during gameplay…in horribly pixelated barely recognisable ways. It is released this September.
• Super Mario 3D now. Again typical Mario game, not bad just not special either. That raccoon suit I’ve forgotten the name of returns. That counts as an innovation at Nintendo by the way, if you’re not familiar with them. Out sometime this year.
• Kid Icarus Uprising. A voiced trailer plays. Probably the most impressive of the games shown so far. Trailer ends with multiplayer battles and then Icarus themed AR cards. MP is 3 on 3. Released later this year.
• Final game, a new one. Oh right they count Luigi as new. Luigi’s Mansion 2. An entirely new game (technically). More than one mansion.
• Third party developers now starting with Resident Evil Mercenaries 3D, then Mario & Sonic. Ace Combat, Tetris, Cave Story, Resident Evil Revelations, Driver Renegade, Pac-man, Tekken 3D. Montage ends on MGS Snake Eater 3D.
• Talks about the e-shop and updated browser for the 3DS now. Tried it earlier – nothing to go on about. Though Reggie then said there’d be exclusive 3D trailers on there later.
• Virtual Console next and the GB, GBA titles on it.
• “The biggest download news for 3DS concerns one of the biggest franchises in history” – he’s talking about Pokemon. Is he really trying to make that tacky 3D Pokedex sound like some amazing innovation? I tried that earlier too, bored of it after a couple minutes.
• “The essential tool for fans” - I’ll stick with the in-game one, thanks.
• Bloody hell they are being as condescending as those old Wii training videos. Talking very slowly about how to update the 3DS.
• Reggie is talking about the Wii. The name makes sense once you hear how it is pronounced, apparently. Is this building up to the justification of whatever stupid name they’ve chosen this time around?
• It’s called….Wii U. Sounds like a poor Asian child. I mean come on. Why not just Wii 2?
• The controller is a hand-held by the looks of it. Looks a lot like the PS Vita hilariously, if it had a baby with the 3DS.
• Video plays showing Wii U in action.
• Display switches from TV to the ‘controller’. Shows that it can be used like a tablet for drawing. It has touch screen. Graphics are as poor as the Wii. Well, maybe not quite. Use it as a scope for sniping with while playing first person games. Picture-in-picture calls.
• Wii U is very underwhelming. It’s no big thing to stream to the hand-held essentially, PS3 could do that with a few select games. It’s a gimmick sure, but has no practical use. Unless the game is self contained in the ‘controller’ as well and thus you can play portable or not anywhere, but I doubt it.
• Out next year if you want one for some reason.
• Wii U has 6.2” screen built in. Backward compatible with Wii games and accessories (in other words it’s still just a Wii).
• “We believe you will love the variety of the new console” – Uh huh.
• “Ramble feature.”
• Touch screen, microphone, speakers, two circle pads, control pad, gyroscope and so on. Every time Iwata says button it sounds like he’s saying bollocks. Fitting really.
• Ah, yes it’s wirelessly transmitted so it’s a hand-held Wii with the features of a 3DS essentially. “Those with an HD TV attach it to play Wii games in HD” – isn’t that like watching a black and white movie on the world’s best colour TV?
• Promotes strong bonds with the family, web-browsing, etc.
• “How can it be incorporated into gameplay” – and why.
• Trailer of a horrible conversation between Iwata and Miyamoto begins. To be honest I’ve lost all interest in this conference so I’m not sure what their translated voice-overs are going on about.
• Smash Bros. is coming to 3DS and Wii U, working together on both platforms. First genuine claps from the audience there.
• Reggie is back to talk about what Wii U games are playable at E3. “Eight different interactive experiences” – yeah, what about some nice new games please?
• Trailer plays. A tech demo I assume, a bird flying along on river to some nice music. I’m not even sure this is a tech demo actually, it’s more like it’s just…a video. What were they thinking with that?
• He moves onto how the new controller changes things. Conceptual “New Super Mario Mii” using your Mii alongside Mario. Drowning in innovation here.
• More concept art and concept descriptions. This is sounding like the Wii U is either just really, really early in development or there’s nothing to do with it.
• Oh, oh! One title in development for Wii U! Lego City Stories! Stay there a second! I need to put in my pre-order now to beat the rush! Get out of my way!
• I’m back. Still talking about lego I see.
• Video with Peter Moore and various other assess of gaming making nothing sound like the next generation. I remember the reaction to 3DS last year, even if it didn’t turn out as good as it sounded at the time, at least it got the crowd hyped. In comparison, this is pure embarrassment.
• Assassin’s Creed and Batman Arkham City will be on it apparently. Ghost Recon too.
• “Nintendo have heard the voices of the hardcore gamer” – are you kidding me? He did not just say that. Rage.
• Darksiders 2 trailer plays next. An Aliens game was also shown and some footage of Metro Last Light, Ghost Recon and Tekken. Tekken has customizable costumes. Ninja Gaiden 3 footage ends the Wii U montage.
• Reggie and Iwata on stage together. Blathering on.
• EA’s John R takes the stage. Don’t put your hands in your pockets during a speech – good (he took them out). John chats a bit about Wii U.
• “Brilliant high definition graphics” – really? They show Battlefield 3 footage (PC version) in some poor attempt to imply a Wii U version would be anything like it.
• John is off. Didn’t really listen to what he said.
• Reggie is back to conclude things. Asks people to think what each platform represents. “They share a common pedigree – inspiration” – kind of true, but how about actually being, you know, decent?
• It’s hilarious how quiet the audience is throughout.
• And it’s over. Thankfully.

Nintendo wins worst conference of E3 2011 hands down. There wasn’t a single on-stage demo. Even a Kinect heavy Microsoft conference couldn’t compare to that waste of time. Forgive my obvious frustration as I watched, because even if I hate what Nintendo has become I loved them for many years. Those days are long gone.

• Format: XBLA (version reviewed), PSN, WiiWare
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Hudson Soft
• Developer: Pi Studios
• Players: 1-4 (offline), 1-8 (online)
• Site: http://www.hudsonent.com/battlefest/

Even the most devoted of Bomberman fans are going to find Bomberman Live: Battlefest a bit hard to swallow. A sequel of sorts to 2007′s Bomberman Live, Battlefest comes off more like a patch that’s been kept in a dusty basement for a few years. The updates are marginal at best; resulting in a game that’s still fun, but very hard to recommend to anyone who bought the original.

Putting the two games side-by-side, visually they’re almost identical. A handful of new costumes, Xbox avatar support, and several new stages are a plus, but a lot of what’s new comes with a catch. The new stages add a lot of variety, but many of them are too visually busy or use poor colour palettes. With the same dated graphics engine in use, you spend as much time contending with muddy graphics as you do your enemies.

The visuals are made worse by the odd, isometric angle the more recent Bomberman games seem to insist on. This wasn’t as bad in the original Bomberman Live, because you could change the view to a more direct overhead angle, but this feature was strangely omitted from Battlefest. Because of this, you’ll often have a hard time approximating your character’s position, and the extra time you spend thinking about that is a death sentence when the game gets hectic.

Other additions include a handful of new weapons and modes, but they come with some catches that diffuse their novelty. The selection of new weapons is hit and miss with some, like the Laser Bomb, feeling more like a power-down than a power-up. The bomb won’t detonate unless someone crosses in front of it, and if you grab it early in a match, the only person to step in front of it is yourself. The Cluster Bomb, on the other hand, is a great new power weapon that explodes and launches three more bombs outward. Those sick of the over-powered Dangerous Bomb from Bomberman Live may want to opt for this one in their custom matches.

While the weapon selection does feel a bit better than it did in Bomberman Live, it’s too much. Players will want to remove a few weapons in their matches, otherwise it gets too busy and hectic. That’s actually one of the problems with the game in general – players become insanely powerful, and a lot of the strategy of classic Bomberman is lost in all the chaos.

New modes don’t really do it any favours, as they focus too much on objectives and infinite respawns. Battlefest basically shoe-horned classic first-person shooter game modes into a Bomberman setting. Capture the flag, kill the man with the ball, VIP, and even a take on Counter-Strike are all accounted for, and all feel out of place in this style of game.

Bomberman Live: Battlefest isn’t an improvement on Bomberman Live – if anything, it’s slightly worse. In our tests we had better, less laggy matches in the original game now than with Battlefest. Every new feature comes with a new catch, making for a game that’s better in some areas and worse in others.

Three years is a long time to come back to a series with so little to show for it, and it’s hard to think of this as anything but a cash-in because of it. It’s odd too because we’d probably be all too happy to let Hudson have their cash-in if they’d just give us a re-release of Saturn Bomberman.

If I were to suggest that the Wii is the best console for hardcore gamers, I would be laughed off the face of the planet via ‘teh internetz’. As I have no desire to ride a wave of bad spelling, questionable grammar and derogatory comments about my mother into the ether, I shall take a different tack. First of all, I’d like you to ask yourselves a question; that is, those of you who have played the Wii little or not at all and dismiss it out of hand.

What is it about the console that you hate so?

Many would immediately answer ‘the lack of decent games’ or ‘it only does casual games’. To this dear friends I reply pish and, dare I say it, pshaw also. Mind you, I’m not going to stick my fingers in my ears and ‘la la la’ all day when it comes to the sheer volume of ‘casual’ games released for the console. If you laid one copy of every casual Wii title end to end it would stretch… well… a jolly long way. But what would you have achieved by doing so? Really? You’d just end up feeling silly, surely.

Anyhoo, people who concentrate on the tsunami of fluffy mass market titles seem to forget that the PS2 suffered from the exact same problem. No, it didn’t? Yes it bloody well did. How many Spongebob, Barbie and Buzz titles do you need me to slap you with before you admit I’m right? Yes, the PS2 ended up with a much larger number of core titles, but the fact remains that it had more casual games released for it than the Wii ever will. I’ve alluded to the fact that the PS2 enjoyed a huge number of hardcore releases throughout its lifecycle. Why isn’t this happening with Nintendo’s latest console?

I imagine it’s in part due to the hideous costs of making videogames nowadays. Wii games may be cheaper to make, but developing for the Wii will ultimately result in a much lower return. Multiformat titles are the way to go for third parties so far as maximum profit is concerned; is it any wonder that the Wii is usually left out of such releases? The market has now reached the point where pretty much everybody assumes that a core game will sell poorly on the Wii but even putting that to one side for a moment, there are the technological limitations to consider. Use the Wii as the lead format, and you’re forced to ignore the processing power of the other machines; use anything else as the lead format, and you’re then faced with the problem of how to downgrade it for the Little White Wonder and still provide a decent game.

There’s another factor, I think, which nobody seems to be considering. It’s important to remember that the vast majority of developers are hardcore gamers themselves – and that includes the Creative Directors and CEOs who make the big decisions (usually in conjunction with publishers, of course). A great many hardcore gamers don’t give the Wii a second thought, and I can think of several developers I’ve met who fall into that category. So if the people making the games have no interest in the Wii…

He's still got it.

Nonetheless, there are many great games available for the console which started the whole motion control malarkey. Okay, some of them are last-gen games with motion control tacked on, such as Resident Evil 4 and Okami. Even Twilight Princess saw a simultaneous release on the Gamecube. They’re still fantastic games though, and there are plenty of other titles exclusive to the console well worth getting, often at a bargain price. Mario Kart Wii, for example. Only FIFA and Call of Duty are as addictive and rude word–inducing online.

It should surely go without saying (which, er, is why I’m saying it) that the two Mario Galaxy games are essential purchases. If you’re a fan of lightgun games, I find it impossible to imagine you being disappointed with Ghost Squad; if you don’t have a PC or 360, you can get season one of the new Sam & Max games. WiiWare carries, among many other gems, the two sublime LostWinds games from David Braben’s Frontier Developments; Sonic creator Yuji Naka’s latest game Ivy the Kiwi? is well worth a shot; plus, each and every Gamecube game for your Wii’s region is fully compatible (although you’ll need a Gamecube controller to play, and a Gamecube memory card to save).

This brings me neatly to the thrust of my argument. It was a struggle, but Sony and Microsoft eventually managed to convince many of us that backwards compatibility doesn’t matter. Remember the early years of the current generation of consoles? Sony messed things up globally by ensuring that the 60gb version of the PS3 was fully compatible with PS2 and PS1 games… well, in the US. In the EU backwards compatibility was produced via software emulation, resulting in some games being incompatible and many featuring bugs that ranged from the hardly noticeable to the gamebreaking. Then of course they developed several new models, almost none of which offered backwards compatibility at all.

Microsoft did little better. Their backwards compatibility was also via emulation, but the games chosen to be included in the list seemed at times almost random. There was even an eventually successful campaign to get Psychonauts on said list. The updates stopped after a while, as Microsoft realised they could make money by offering Xbox games on demand via Live.

Every Wii in the world is fully backwards compatible. Cynics may sneer that this is because the Wii is little more than a Gamecube in a different case and, comparing the graphics of the two machines, it’s hard to argue against this. Nonetheless backwards compatibility is an important issue for the hardcore – at least, it certainly used to be – and this is one issue where Nintendo wins hands down..

David Braben supports the Wii. Don't you?

Retro games are also a core concern, with a great many of today’s gamers looking back at the titles of yesterday with rose tinted specs superglued to their wrinkled old faces. Again, Nintendo has pretty much no competition here. The Virtual Console offers hundreds of retro games at (usually) reasonable prices, including a few that never made it to your region originally. Formats featured include not only the NES, SNES and N64, but also Megadrive, PC Engine, and NEOGEO. If this were available on the PS3 or 360, zealots of that format would wave it around in forums in misspelled triumph.

In fact, let’s have a bit of a ‘What If’. What If the 360 and PS3 both featured armies of retro titles to download, full backwards compatibility, only one version each, and an innovative control system from launch. The Wii on the other hand has been plagued by a high failure rate from the beginning, has almost no retro titles available for download, has had six different SKUs released (the main difference being hard drive size), launched at a high price thanks to the blu-ray drive, and was late to the motion control party. What would be the reasons for the hardcore dismissing it out of hand now?

I know what you’re thinking (I’m going all Derren Brown on yo’ ass). What am I trying to say? Is the Wii under some kind of curse? Well although I have evidence to support that theory, I’m not ready to go public yet. What I’ll say instead is that Nintendo have brought this upon themselves. The Wii as a whole was a gamble that could have brought them down to a software–only company a la Sega. They decided to concentrate on the mass market, and it paid off big time – initially. The downside to this was that they alienated a huge chunk of the traditional market, and there are now signs that this may hurt them in the long term (insofar as the Wii is concerned). Whether or not that is the case, only time will tell.

Still, the Wii introduced videogames to a wider audience and made them more acceptable to mass media in a way that hadn’t been achieved since the release of the PSOne. As so many used to dismiss videogames as childish and unworthy of discussion (and some still do), some gamers are dismissing the Wii in exactly the same way. Don’t mimic this attitude. The Wii does have many excellent games, both old and new. Move and Kinect prove that Sony and Microsoft were suffering severe IWITOTS (I Wish I’d Thought Of That Syndrome) when they saw the Wii remote for the first time. The fact that there are still plenty of developers and publishers willing to support the Wii with ‘proper’ games – such as Black Ops – is evidence that the industry itself is far from giving up on the console. So I ask you again: Are you hardcore enough to defend the Wii?

As a thank you to the positive reaction from their fans, Cosmonaut Games, the studio behind WiiWare title Dive: The Medes Island Secret, have released the original soundtrack for download.

The pack contains 11 remastered songs from the game, as well as bonus tracks that have never been heard before.

You can find the link to download the songs in Cosmonaut Games blog post here.

Aquariums are usually incredibly boring things that get shoved underneath the stairs and filled with fish that look to be harbouring suicidal thoughts, offering no way to wirelessly interact with them that isn’t borderline animal abuse. Well Hudson Soft is really making waves within the virtual fish market as My Aquarium 2 gets released on WiiWare today.

Exploring the relatively untapped ‘relaxation’ genre in gaming, My Aquarium 2 lets you build up a fish tank with several features and helps you enjoy virtual fish at your own pace. With eight different tank options and 60 underwater creatures including loveable critters such as the Japanese spider crab and mikado jellyfish, there’s plenty of stuff to fill your pretend fish tank with.

Rising Star Games proudly announced today that they will publish the new game from Yuji Naka, former head of Sonic Team. The new game features the slightly bizarre title of ‘Ivy the Kiwi?’ complete with question mark at no extra cost.

Ivy the Kiwi? places players in the role of a lonely baby bird in search of her mother. The game spans over 100 stages across a variety of 2D landscapes filled with various obstacles to overcome and will be available for both Nintendo Wii and DS. There will also be ‘mini’ versions of the game released via DSiWare and WiiWare comprised of 50 stages each.

Martin Defries, managing director of Rising Star Games, commented: “We’re elated to work on a game that’s so closely associated with Yuji Naka. I’m delighted we’ve managed to scoop the European rights. We hope to see Ivy the Kiwi? reach out to fans the way a little blue hedgehog did all those years ago.”

Ivy the Kiwi? will be released throughout Europe this autumn.

• Format: WiiWare (version reviewed), PSN, XBLA, iPhone, iPod Touch, PC, PSP, DS
  
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Hudson
  
• Developer: PlayFirst
• Players: 1 – 2
• Site: http://www.playfirst.com/game/dinerdash

Our regular readers may realise that this is, in fact, the third time we’ve reviewed Diner Dash. This is not because we suffer from severe memory loss; nor is it because we suffer from severe memory loss. Every time the lovely people at Hudson publish it on a new format, they send us code to review. So here we go again…

Each of the many home versions of Diner Dash suffers from one simple yet slightly embarrassing problem; you can play the original online version for free on your PC on a ten day trial. This is a problem because ten days is more than enough to finish the career; and not everybody will want to go back once they’ve done that. Just thought we ought to get that out in the open straight away.

The console versions haven’t strayed from the game’s simple origins, and the Wii version is no different in that respect. The basic premise is that as resteraunter/waitress Flo, you need to deal with the customers that come into your Diner as quickly and effectively as possible. The process for dealing with a customer is as follows: seat them, take their order, deliver their order to the chef, take the food to their table, give them the bill, clear the table. Despite this Operation Flashpoint level of realism, things aren’t quite as straightforward as that.

You have to wait for customers to finish one stage of the process (i.e. eating their meal) before you can move on to the next. While you’re waiting, you’ll find that another set of customers is ready to give their order; or that the queue of customers waiting to be seated has steadily increased; and so on. The pressure comes from the line of hearts above each set of customers, which indicates their satisfaction. Ignore them when they need seeing to for too long, and the hearts decrease. If the hearts disappear altogether the customers leave, incurring a hefty cash penalty.

Sadly, the three elderly gentlemen on the left are not about to start breakdancing.

On top of that, there are different types of customer (incidentally, seating the colourful customers at similarly coloured seats earns bonuses). You’ll soon be dealing with normal customers that wait and tip normally, businesswomen that tip well but are impatient, and ‘senior citizens’ that are patient but don’t tip great. Intentionally or not, this encourages you to think and act like a real waitress – give the most attention to people who clearly have money, see to impatient customers as quickly as you can, and ignore the pensioners unless you have nothing better to do.

Each stage has a cash target to earn and, as you progress, you’ll earn respect for the ‘casual gamers’ who make up the majority of the Diner Dash fanbase. The only way to meet the targets in later stages is to chain actions together so that, for example, you take four orders in a row without interrupting them by clearing a table or delivering a meal. Doing so risks people becoming impatient to the point of leaving, which will cost you money that almost certainly means you won’t finish the stage. Hearts can be replenished by time – consuming tasks such as providing coffee or waiting at a queue’s podium. It’s a fine balance you need to strike.

Your restaurant will look different as you progress, but the gameplay remains the same.

We found it impossible to find anybody who wanted to play online – but there is an offline 2 player mode too. This and the self explanatory ‘endless’ mode potentially offer replay value – so long as you don’t mind juggling tasks and looking for raised hands like an actual waitress.

3/5

• Format: WiiWare (version reviewed), PSN, XBLA
  
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Hudson Soft
• Developer: Backbone Entertainment
• Players: 1-4
• Site: http://www.hudson.co.jp/index_e.html

Our British readers will be delighted to hear that this game allows you to kill Kilroy. Before you rush out to download this promising sounding game however, we must shatter your dreams and tell you that Kilroy is merely the name of an infantry unit, which can also be on your side. Mind you, another is called Ramsey; so we suppose if you squint a bit and use your imagination, you can show these charmless TV celebs what you really think of them.

The Military Madness games are turn – based strategies and the most recent, Nectaris, has finally made the leap from the HD consoles to the Wii. If you’re not familiar with the genre then, well, it’s basically chess with various spins on the rules and more limited movement. Chess with orcs and/or swords and/or magic and/or guns and/or tanks and/or robots, but chess nonetheless. The biggest difference (despite what die – hard strategy fans may tell you) is that one unit (e.g. piece) can rarely defeat another in just one move.

Wipe butter all over your screen and hey presto: a screenshot of the WiiWare version.

If you’re a strategy veteran then you’ll be immediately familiar with the mechanics of Nectaris, and you’ll slide into it with as much ease as James Bond sliding into a woman’s, er, confidence. If you’re a newcomer to the genre however, you’ll find it to be immediately frustrating and unfriendly. There is no tutorial of any kind whatsoever. Progress will be slow as trial and error gradually, painfully, shows you what to do and how to do it. Percentages and numbers are displayed with no explanation, and new units are introduced with no hint as to what they can and can not do. There are over a dozen pages in the ‘detailed instructions’ on the Wii Shopping Channel, but they’re not quite as clear as they should be – and besides, don’t quite cover everything.

Whether you get there by trial and error or previous experience, there is an undeniable satisfaction in taking full advantage of the strategy element and winning a stage by careful planning and observation. Surround an infantry unit with tanks and pummel it into submission; sneak your own infantry into the enemy base, winning the stage instantly; move two or three different unit types together to make a formidable whole; and so on. The problem however is that this satisfaction is the bare bones of all strategy titles, and this doesn’t add much in the way of playable meat. There’s the obligatory online mode, but we were never able to find anybody to play with. A quick look at the online leaderboard revealed why. The top player had played and won just six games; and there were only twenty nine people on said leaderboard. Perhaps only the top 29 players are shown for some bizarre reason, but still…

Only slightly more exciting than it looks.

Up to four people can play offline if you have nothing better to do – but you will. Why make three of your friends play this bland and unambitious strategy when you could be playing Mario Kart? Or Wii Sports? Or doing the ironing?

This port reeks of laziness. Insultingly poor graphics, no attempt to use the Wii remote’s pointer, a laughable attempt at story, and basically nothing you haven’t seen done elsewhere much better. The final kick in the teeth is the 1000 points price point. You’re better off spending the extra 200 points for Ogre Battle 64.

2/5

TV ‘supernanny’ Jo Frost returned to UK TV screens in February, with her new show ‘Extreme Parental Guidance’ on Channel 4. The first episode is of interest to us all not because of the young girl who refused to eat nothing but sugary snacks, nor because of the genuinely heartbreaking case of a twelve year old girl who refused to leave the house without piling on make up. Besides these cases, a study by Professor Doug Gentile into the possible link between videogames and violence in children was featured. Several clips of the study itself were shown, and give us a revealing insight into how at least some such studies are conducted.

For the clearest picture of the study’s intentions and conclusions, it is necessary to put it in the context of the show. At the beginning of the show, Frost tells us that one third of UK parents think that they’re doing a ‘really bad job’. She goes on to say that she doesn’t believe this to be the case, and that these parents are “not being honest about the mistakes they’re making” which, she claims, everybody makes. What the viewer is supposed to draw from this of course is not that three thirds of UK parents are doing a bad job (which would arguably be the logical conclusion to her claims), but that no blame for badly behaved children can or should be apportioned to the parents. This way of thinking is at the heart of all ‘games/cartoons/rap music/heavy metal/chips (delete as appropriate for the week) are evil’ soapbox rants. For now however, we shall concentrate on Jo Frost’s show.

So what simple mistakes are these innocent parents making? A survey conducted by the show found that 80% of respondents admitted to bribing their children with sweets. More relevant to us however, is the issue of how long their children spend playing videogames. The times quoted were invariably in the hours, and one mother even resignedly complained that her child spends eight hours a day playing.

What?

Eight hours? That’s bad parenting. Some of us at Critical Gamer are parents, and are or will be more than happy to see our own children play videogames – but we are well aware that eight hours a day is not healthy, not even for an adult. The woman did not say how old her child was, but surely unplugging or confiscating the console/computer is not an unrealistic consideration. It brought to mind a similar story told by a mother interviewed by BBC breakfast, who lamented the fact that her son spent hours a night playing his DS instead of going to sleep. We’re not child psychologists and in all likelihood, neither are you; but the answer to that particular problem seems obvious…

Jo Frost

So the scene has been set. The programme is subtly assuring the audience (a large proportion of whom are likely to be troubled or worried parents) that there is no possibility of the parents of misbehaved children being at fault, and that external forces are instead to blame. Enter Professor Doug Gentile’s study.

The study is presented as an entirely scientific and unbiased one, headed by a qualified professional. Though Professor Gentile’s credentials are never explained, there is certainly no reason to doubt them. The aim of this study, we are told, is to test the possibility of violent videogames desensitising children to violence and dulling their ability to feel empathy.

Forty twelve year old boys were sat down at laptops with headphones and, at a signal, told to start playing the game they had been provided with. Twenty of the boys played a twelve rated ‘violent war game’ (the game footage was blurred so as to make it unidentifiable, but it was clearly an FPS), and twenty of the boys played a non – violent soccer (or, if you live somewhere in the world that isn’t America, football) game. Each boy played for exactly twenty minutes and then, at another signal, stopped playing and closed the laptop.

After this, the boys were then shown violent real – life news footage, which their parents had previously watched and approved. The boys’ heart rates were monitored before and during the footage, the theory being that if the violent game desensitises children to violence, the boys who played it would show little to no heart rate increase whilst watching the violent footage. The results seemed to bear this out; the average heart rate amongst those who played the war game was 86bpm before the footage, and 88bpm during. The averages of those who played the non – violent game however were 91bpm before the footage, and 99bpm during, a significant increase of close to 10%.

Those heart rates are averages, however, and the audience was not privy to the individual results. How many in each group experienced significant heart rate increases? What is the explanation for those who had been playing the non – violent game, and yet experienced only a minor increase? Most importantly, how does this definitively prove that videogames desensitise people – at the least, children – to violence?

Professor Doug Gentile

It was enough for Frost, who declared the results to be “quite shocking”. As the narrator ominously declared, ‘just twenty minutes’ of gaming was enough to desensitise these young boys to violence. The unspoken continuation of that thought, of course, is: imagine what extended play will do to your child.

Following this, random samples of each group were taken to be interviewed by Professor Gentile, one at a time. This was to be a test for empathy. The child would sit opposite Gentile and, on the desk between them, was a pot of pens. Gentile would ask the child about their gaming habits and, at an unexpected moment, ‘accidentally’ knock the pen pot off the desk, spilling its contents across the floor. The theory here was that those who had played the non – violent game would feel empathy for Gentile and his situation, and would help pick up the pens. Those who had been playing the violent game on the other hand, would feel no empathy; and therefore show no signs of being willing to lend Gentile a hand.

It was at this point of the study that the author’s prejudices became clear. The first child was taken from the non – violent gaming group. When the pens were knocked to the floor, Gentile stopped talking and, when the boy looked unsure about what to do, started to get up from his chair – which acted as a visual cue for the boy to get off his chair and help. Frost noticed this but, rather than question the impartiality of Gentile and his study, she simply put the boy’s decision to help down to a polite nature.

It is important to note that Gentile did not repeat this action for any other child; at least, not in any of the footage that followed. Though most other children shown decided to help, leave or ignore the pens without Gentile’s interference, there was one significant exception. One of the boys from the violent gaming group looked down at the pens as soon as they fell on the floor, and seemed set to help tidy them up. Seeing this, Professor Gentile immediately distracted him with hurried words and hand gestures, in order to draw attention away from the pens and continue the conversation. In not one instance shown in the TV programme did Gentile try to distract a subject from the non – violent group in such a way. Incidentally, there was a mix of hesitation and immediacy in the reactions from this group.

The study found that while only 40% of the violent gamers helped pick up the pens, 80% of the non – violent gamers helped. The narrator described it as “a simple and revealing test with shocking results”. We agree; but for rather different reasons. At best, it proved to be an unprofessional study; and at worst, a deliberately prejudiced one.

A powerful tool in psychoanalysis?

It should also be asked, is a pot of pens falling off a desk really the best way to test a child’s sense of empathy? Especially if the interviewer shows little to no signs of concern himself. A better event, which would not have been much more difficult to set up convincingly, would have been to have the interviewer fall off his chair and show hesitation and difficulty in getting back up. Perhaps Gentile feared that such an event would result in the overwhelming majority of both groups going to help?

Furthermore it should not have been Gentile, the author of the study with access to all the facts and expectations, who interviewed the test subjects. The interviews should have been conducted in a double blind manner; that is, not only should the children not have known what was going to happen and what reaction was expected of them, but the interviewer should have been somebody with no knowledge of the associated study (and strict instructions not to encourage or discourage the child’s help). It would be foolish to presume that all similar studies with negative conclusions make the same mistakes, whether intentionally or unintentionally. It would be equally foolish, however, to presume that none of these studies are prejudiced in this way.

When the study is over, Gentile dispels any lingering doubts about his views on the link between videogames and violence by laying his cards on the table. He mentions “other studies” which have apparently shown that those who play violent videogames are “more likely to hurt than help another kid”. He fails to mention what these studies were, how many of them there were, who conducted them, when, and how and why children were able to ‘hurt’ one another. The audience of Extreme Parental Guidance are unlikely to question such matters; after all it isn’t Doug Gentile telling them this, but Professor Doug Gentile (who also goes on to say that there is never just one cause of a child’s bad behaviour and attitude, but videogames are one and “not a small one”).

Frost herself gave some Jerry Springer style thought for the day – esque advice at the end of the section. Parents must set time limits for their children’s gaming, and pay attention to the age rating on the box. Well, um… isn’t that just common sense? Besides which, the industry has been saying exactly that to governments and the media for decades. Still, a certain type of person is more likely to listen to Jo Frost than develop some common sense, and perhaps that programme helped some children.

Channel 4 failed to respond to our request to get in contact with Frost and/or Gentile.

Just a few weeks later, the BBC’s Newsround (a regular news programme made especially for children) published the results of a survey it had commissioned. The survey regarding sleeping patterns had been sent out to various schools, and covered one thousand children aged 9 – 11. Most respondents said that they went to bed at 21:30, with approximately 25% saying that their bedtime was 22:00 or later. 50% of those questioned said that they weren’t getting enough sleep, and wanted more.

Various reasons were listed for the late bedtimes, including TV and mobile phones… but with a sad inevitability, the BBC reporting put the emphasis on videogames. Nowhere, oddly, was lax parenting mentioned as a possible reason for children not going to bed early enough. As a brief aside, we’d like to question the reliability of 50% of the children saying they wanted more sleep. Indeed, if they’re going to bed so late, it’s highly likely that at least half of them would want more sleep. Bear in mind, however, that the children received the survey at (or via) their school. Were some of them perhaps hoping that if they said they wanted more sleep, the school day would start later?

The world suffers under a culture of ‘it’s not my fault’, and the flak videogames often get from media and governments is just one symptom of it. How many times have you heard a story of an American toddler accidentally killing themselves or a sibling with their parent’s gun, or a disaffected teenager going on a killing spree with his parent’s gun… or one he bought over the counter? How and why do these things happen? It has absolutely nothing to do with the cheap, legal, and widespread availability of firearms in America – or so entirely neutral bodies such as the NRA would have you believe. I have my gun, I want my gun, I like having my gun. It’s not my fault if some bozo can’t keep his gun locked up. It’s not my fault if some kid plays too many games and listens to too much Marilyn Manson, and shoots up his school or holds up a liquor store. It’s not my fault, it’s somebody else’s.

It’s not my fault.