Your Yearly Reminder: Club Nintendo's 2012 Prize Deadline Approaches

For the fourth year in a row, the Club Nintendo "year" is coming to an end. It's once again time to jump over to Nintendo of America's customer rewards site and register your product codes and fill out surveys, because after this Saturday your status is getting reset again.

For those unfamiliar with what that means, a bit lengthier explanation now. Club Nintendo is Nintendo of America's customer reward service. If you log on to their website at http://club.nintendo.com and create a profile for yourself, then help the company out with some feedback activities like typing in the registration codes contained in game packages and filling out some questionnaires about what you did and didn't like about each game, you'll earn Coins. Save up enough Coins and you can redeem them for Nintendo swag, like carrying cases for your 3DS cartridges or posters featuring Mario and the gang.

Further, if you save up several hundred Coins in a single calendar year, you can achieve "Elite Status" – 300 Coins gets you to the Gold level, and 600 earns you Platinum. If it's possible for you to reach those thresholds, you want to make every effort – because extra bonuses are bestowed on those who do. In 2009, Elite members who got all the way up to Platinum got to choose, for free, between getting a swanky official Mario hat or an exclusive download of Doc Louis's Punch-Out!! on WiiWare – a game you could only get through this program.

The Platinum Prize from 2010. What will this year's be?

In 2010, a snazzy exclusive figurine featuring Mario, Luigi, Bowser and a few other familiar Mushroom Kingdom faces was the sought-after Platinum prize. Then, last year, the Platinum award was the "Mario & Friends Pin Badge Collection," a set of buttons emblazoned with classic 8-bit Mario art.

The Gold-level reward? Usually a Nintendo-themed desk calendar for the year ahead.

So this is just an article reminding you that the deadline is coming up again very soon.  This Club Nintendo year runs from July 1, 2011 to June 30, 2012, so you've got until Saturday to push your Coin total up over either the Gold or Platinum threshold and put yourself into free swag territory.

We don't yet know what this year's Elite rewards will be, but traditionally they've been revealed on the day after the deadline, July 1. That's this Sunday this time around, if they stick to the same timetable. The track record is pretty solid no matter what the prizes end up being, though, so you should definitely get to work quick.

Oh, and some of the Coin values for completing surveys and registering game codes will be changing this Saturday as well. (Many older games' values are decreasing, so if you've got old codes still un-entered into the website, now's the time to use them.)

And that concludes our yearly Club Nintendo public service announcement. Happy surveying!



Source : ign[dot]com

SDCC: Toys "R" Us Reveals Stealth Predator Exclusive

As we get closer to San Diego Comic-Con, announcements of collectible exclusives are starting to roll in -- one of my favorite parts of the show. Today, we're excited to debut the Toys "R" Us NECA exclusive that will be available at the Entertainment Earth Booth (#2343) -- the stealth mode Predator from the original 1987 movie.

The official press release says, "Stalking out of the classic 1987 film, this version of the Classic Masked Predator, cast in translucent plastic, is nearly invisible in his stealth form. Standing at 8-inches tall, collectors can bring this Predator on new hunts with 20 points of articulation, extendable wrist blades and a removable backpack. The Predator can stealthily travel to any location for $20."



Source : ign[dot]com

Theatrhythm Final Fantasy Review

Spanning more than a dozen core titles and a quarter of a century, Final Fantasy’s musical roots are nearly unparalleled. Theatrhythm Final Fantasy, Square Enix’s new Chocobo-fueled release for 3DS, aims to draw upon this rich musical legacy to create something of a celebratory rhythm RPG hybrid. The merging of these two genres is ambitious, to say the least. The result of this fusion is a rich and wholly enjoyable rhythm experience, albeit one that doesn’t utilize its RPG roots to the fullest.

Like most music games on DS systems, Theatrhythm’s gameplay largely amounts to tapping and sliding the stylus on the touch screen. That said, the developers went to great lengths to keep players engaged with a variety of different play options. Theatrhythm is split into three different types of gameplay, each defined by the pacing of the songs. Battle Music Stages feature a faster beat, and task players with defeating as many enemies as possible by correctly responding to the given rhythm “triggers” (the circular prompts that tell you how and when to tap and slide) that scroll across the screen along four separate lines. Field Music Stages are a bit slower, and have the player moving the stylus up and down along a continuously flowing line  - similar to a conductor’s baton controlling the beat of the song. And lastly, Event Music Stages revolve around an important moment in each Final Fantasy game. Rather than the triggers scrolling from the left as they do in the other two stage types, here they consume the entire top screen, forcing you to keep a close watch at all times.

For Theatrhythm’s visual presentation, Square faced the interesting challenge of trying to effectively bind 25 years of wildly varying graphical styles into one cohesive package. The result is the “chibi-fication” of the franchise’s most notable characters. Small, stylized versions of Squall, Cloud, Lightning and Cecil - along with chibi Chocobos, Moogles, Summons, enemies, and the like - all populate the colorful world of Theatrhythm. Depending on the mode, the background will feature a bright, scrolling world (the chibi take on the FF universe), actual in-game cutscenes, or bits of gameplay. While it’s a shame the Field segments all use the same background, the whole production offers an amazing, unique tribute to the franchise, an experience that should prove quite nostalgic for longtime fans of the series. The only downside here is that the footage is often repeated over the course of a song, which takes away from the otherwise great presentation.

As a music game, Theatrhythm is top notch, with varied play options, great backgrounds and just about the best song selection you could ask for. The developers also incorporate some RPG elements, which FF fans should be rather familiar with. After choosing a party of four, your chibi team of notable FF characters marches into battle. If you miss a trigger or execute one poorly, the team’s shared HP bar goes down. If that hits zero, it’s game over, meaning you’ll have to start that segment over from the beginning. You can equip your team with an item, like a potion or Phoenix Down, which will automatically be used once certain conditions are met. Each character also has customizable abilities, such as Weapon Break (which reduces enemy attack power) or HP Up (which increases your HP).

Admit it, chibi Terra is beyond adorable.

The incorporation of RPG elements could have set Theatrhythm apart from other music games in a meaningful way, but unfortunately these aspects aren’t as integral to the experience as you'd think. While leveling up in a rhythm game is a fun notion, in truth, playing with a level 1 character feels no different than playing with a level 65 one. Having a higher level simply allows you to get more and rarer items by defeating more enemies, but the items themselves don’t do much either. Items and abilities may come in handy when you’re trying to survive a particularly grueling song on the highest difficulty, allowing you to make it to the end and get a higher score, but most of the time their presence makes no tangible difference in how you actually play the game. In fact, they’re completely optional (you even get a point bonus for not using items or abilities), further adding to the feeling that their presence was a bit forced. Theatrhythm is still an incredibly fun music game even considering the somewhat bizarre RPG integration, but it’s a shame more wasn’t done with this fusion concept.

One of the best parts of Theatrhythm is how it offers something for everyone. Music game novices can stick to the Basic Score of each song and simply enjoy the music and the backgrounds, while those looking for more of a challenge have the Expert Score and the blisteringly hard Ultimate Score to flex their skills. Each song also features a practice mode so you can work on getting to the end without worrying about your HP.

The fun isn’t just limited to the main game either. In addition to having three difficulty settings for each of the three songs for 13 Final Fantasy games to master, there's also a Chaos Shrine where you can collect Dark Note rhythm challenges. These are additional songs of varying difficulty that you can complete alone or play with up to three friends locally. Extra touches like additional characters (unlocked by collecting special shards from bosses), the ability to swap stats via StreetPass, and the Museum (where you can unlock cards, music tracks and movies) give Theatrhythm plenty of bang for its buck. Overall, the game is a more than fitting celebration for the franchise's 25th anniversary.



Source : ign[dot]com

The Fingerprint of Thumbstar

At the tail-end of last year, when Martin Edmondson completed his long-term consultancy role on Driver: San Francisco - the latest instalment in a series that he created - a lot of people were watching to see where the industry veteran would go next.

Now, he and his brother Gareth, who headed-up Ubisoft Reflections throughout the studio’s work on Driver: San Francisco, hold fulltime management positions at mobile developer, publisher and distributor, Thumbstar.

Co-founded by Martin in 2008, Thumbstar boasts Gareth as CEO and Martin as CCO (chief creative officer), and when two industry veterans with a combined development career spanning some 43 years make a whole-hearted move into mobile gaming, it warrants attention. But why now, and what makes the mobile scene of 2012 so appealing?

"We’ve not really been able to do this before now because we were so busy with Driver," Martin explains.

“ The fact that I sit in front the television, or on a plane or on a train and reach for my mobile; it was that point where I stopped switching on my PlayStation quite so often.

"We could see the numbers: increasing distribution channels, increasing revenue. But the actual point where you say ‘this is going to be massive’ was probably not related to the business side but actually related to my own habits. It’s the fact that I sit in front the television or on a plane or on a train and reach for my mobile; it was that point where I stopped switching on my PlayStation quite so often."

In truth, Driver San Francisco’s protracted development has likely helped the Edmondsons hit the mobile market at a prime time. Thumbstar has grown to support 140 worldwide distribution channels, establishing profitable and useful connections as far away as South America and Asia and helping combat the well-documented problem of discoverability.

"Just being good isn’t enough," stresses Gareth, before going on to demonstrate the benefits of pushing distribution beyond the avenues open to small, independent developers. "The numbers are fairly simple: if you do just a thousand [units sold] in each of those 140 channels, that’s still decent numbers for a mobile product and offers much better odds than pinning all your hopes on just two channels [Apple’s App Store and Google Play]."

Moreover, Thumbstar supports distribution on as many mobile platforms as possible. While Apple and Google dominate in localised areas, a worldwide distribution network allows the brothers to appreciate the bigger picture, as Gareth explains:

“ Our reach is massive and we need to be able to adapt quickly. When you stop looking at just the US and UK and look at the rest of the world there’s huge diversity.

"Our reach is massive and we need to be able to adapt quickly. For example, BlackBerry in Latin America is huge, almost 50 percent of the smartphone market is BlackBerry. In Indonesia, there are 200 million mobile subscribers, almost all of the smartphones are BlackBerry. When you stop looking at just the US and UK and look at the rest of the world there’s huge diversity."

And then there’s China, which has traditionally been something of a black hole market due to the lack of both IP regulation and copyright enforcement. However, Thumbstar recently completed a deal to partner with licensing outfit Viva Red Limited and the government-run China Telecom, a mobile phone operator with 130 million subscribers that grows at a rate of around 3 million per month.

The deal opens up a huge potential market for Thumbstar’s own newly established internal development teams as well as for the third-party developers that it partners with. Most crucially, the deal has the backing of the Chinese government, which has pledged to protect intellectual property and enforce copyright protection across its mobile network.

Of course, numbers and deals are worthless without content and, happily, Thumbstar’s business is primarily about games. The Liverpool-based company has recently committed to roll out two games per week across multiple platforms, the first of which come from publishing deals with developers Mylodon and Ant Hive Games to deliver multi-format titles, Clumsy Pirates and Porkchop and Mouse.

“ The Vita certainly has potential, but the question is: do leave the house with your iPhone and your Vita? Sure, some people do, the hardcore players, perhaps, but the vast majority wouldn’t.

The former is a timed vertical puzzler with cartoon visuals, while the latter is a charming interactive story book created by children’s author Fiona Roberton. These will be followed by i3, a cube-based mind-bender created by Found in the Future, and the humorous, power-up-laden match-three puzzler, Grumble and Piccolo’s Fishing Trip from Fairplay Media. All of these games share a high level of polish, a commitment to multi-format availability and small, independent developers hooked up to Thumbstar’s far reaching distribution networks. Hands-on impressions suggest all are worth checking out.

Looking further into the future, Martin Edmondson believes mobile gaming provides an opportunity that traditional games consoles, even dedicated handhelds, cannot.

"The Vita certainly has potential," he concedes. "But the question with the Vita is: do leave the house with your iPhone and your Vita? Sure, some people do, the hardcore players, perhaps, but the vast majority wouldn’t.

"That’s where this opportunity arises, as a market grows like this, the price of handsets comes down and there’s this wide range of players, old and young, male and female. Then there’s the 10-minute scenario where you’re sat in the train – I mean, you never fire up your PlayStation for just 10 minutes, do you?"

It’s foolish to think that the mobile gaming scene will cannibalise the more traditional console market, as some seem to fear. Instead, its moving towards a state where it will be capable of delivering high quality gaming to whatever device you choose to carry with you, wherever you may be. Thumbstar demonstrates that the mobile scene’s combination of a plethora of bright, new talent and experienced industry veterans offer the very best of both worlds. As a gamer, I can't help but feel it should be both welcomed and enjoyed.



Source : ign[dot]com

Noisia and Combichrist to Score Devil May Cry

Capcom has revealed that the soundtrack for its upcoming reboot of hack and slash franchise Devil May Cry will be composed by Noisia and Combichrist.

Both of them have composed brand new tracks that will play during cinematics and gameplay, while Combichrist have also given permission for their back-catalogue to be used.

“ I had a lot of fun digging myself into Dante’s psyche in order to create music to match the battle scenes and am equally as excited to license existing Combichrist music.

Speaking about the experience, Noisia said, "We had great freedom but were also bound by certain criteria typical in the game world. These are challenging boundaries (for example; consistency in sonics over 180 minutes of music) but also lots of space in terms of dynamics and progression and instrumentation being able to create soundscapes without having to worry about holding the attention of a dancefloor."

Formed in 2002, Noisia are a Dutch electronic music trio specialising in dubstep and drum and bass who have regularly remixed for some of the biggest names in music, from Katy Perry to Skrillex.  Combichrist is a Norwegian industrial rock band, who recently spent a year supporting Rammstein on their North American tour.

Lead singer Andy LePlegua revealed, "As an avid gamer myself I was honored to be asked to work on this project. I had a lot of fun digging myself into Dante’s psyche in order to create music to match the battle scenes and am equally as excited to license existing Combichrist music."

Due out in January 2013, DmC: Devil May Cry reimagines the origin story of Dante, the protagonist from the previous titles in the franchise, in a contemporary world.  If you can't wait, check out one of Noisia's offerings over on Soundcloud now.

Source : ign[dot]com