I dabble in the sport of golf, and I can see a Mario Golf game with the Balance board helping my golf game. Forcing me to stand up straight and keep my body aligned when I swing. Wow, that would be great.

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Protothea
- From Ubisoft (2005 remake), another shooter
- Launch title - 1000 points
- WiiWare could end up with a lot of shooters
- Needs to be faster, more enemies

Castle of Shikigami III

- Great according to Daemon
- Vertical shooter

Boom Blox

- Fun, also good for kids
- A bit overpriced
- Good party game
- Currently embargoed, review tomorrow

- Upcoming events at Sega, Ubisoft, Konami - news out of those events probable
- IGN will have 1 exclusive, Friday - Craig: “Pretty big,” unannounced - Wii & DS game, based off distinct property - video, screenshots

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We posted the review scores from the issue (just look a little below) here is the rest of it.

News:

Sonic Unleashed Wii (holidays)
Time Hollow DS (August)
MySims sequel
Sam & Max
Mario Super Sluggers
Crash: Mind Over Mutant (Wii & DS)
Zubo (Wii..or maybe DS? Doesnt specify)
From the Abyss (DS)
The Legend of Spyro: Dawn of the Dragon (Wii + DS)

Wii Channel Information:

Lost Winds (Interview)
Pop
Star Soldier
StrongBad
Potpourri
Gravitronix

Previews :

Gauntlet (DS)
Alone in the Dark (Wii)
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (Wii & DS)
Mega Man Star Force 2 (DS)
We Love Golf (Wii)
Harvest Moon: Tree of Tranquility (Wii)
Harvest Moon DS: Island of Happiness
FF Fables: Chocobos Dungeon (Wii)
Cake Mania 2 (DS)
Drawn to Life: Spongebob Edition (DS)
Spectrobes: Beyond the Portals (DS)
Bangai-O Spirits (DS)
Order Up! (Wii)
Arkanoid DS
Wonder World Amusement Park (Wii)
Line Rider 2: Unbound (Wii & DS)
Space Invaders Extreme (DS)

Features:

Guitar Hero: On Tour
Guitar Hero: Aerosmith
Rock Band Wii
Samba De Amigo
Final Fantasy Tactics A2
Wii Fit
Trama Center : Under the Knife 2
FaceBreaker
Huge three page spread on Etrian Odyssey 2 which looks awesome

Power Profile: Takahashi Brothers

Next Month: Big updates on Ghostbusters, Sonic Chronicles and Time Hollow

Link

The Conduit:
-Washington D.C. is under attack by aliens
-The All Seeing Eye, reveals hidden locations, monsters, items
-High Voltage was going to show the trailer which ign thought looked cool, but High Voltage wants to delay the public release of the trailer to make the trailer better and fix up its issues.

Gyrostar :
-Looks like Tempest
-$7, Wii-Ware Launch title
-Visuals look better on a larger screen

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GBA (all versions): 81.06m
NA: 41.64m
Japan: 16.88m
Other: 22.53m

Gamecube: 21.74m
NA: 12.94m
Japan: 4.04m
Other: 4.77m

Current hardware LTD:
NDS: 70.60m
NA: 22.39m
Japan: 22.38m
Other: 25.82m

Wii: 24.45m
NA: 10.61m
Japan: 5.90m
Other: 7.94m

Wii Forecast for the next FY: 25m
DS Forecast for the next FY: 28m

Wii Software forecast for the next FY: 177m
DS software forecast for the next FY: 187m

Pokemon Diamond/Pearl: 14.77 million
Brain Age 1 and 2 (combined): 23.81 million

DS has 57 million-selling games (LTD). As of last year, there were 30.

Smash Bros Brawl: 4.85 million as of March 31

There are 26 million-sellers on the Wii.

Link

In September of 2006 Nintendo released two Pokémon Mystery Dungeon titles, one for each of its portable gaming devices, GBA and DS. Developed by ChunSoft, a team with more than enough experience with the genre, Nintendo seemingly started a revival of dungeon crawlers. Not only that, but these Pokémon spin-offs introduced an interesting idea; no longer do you play with Pokémon, now you are one of them, and it’s up to you to figure out why. This premise, the relatively obscure genre, and obviously the brand name made the games a success. Unfortunately, reviewers in general weren’t too keen on the titles, not able to look past the repetitiveness of gameplay and level design. These factors didn’t matter to gamers, though; the franchise quickly found a dedicated ‘cult’ of sorts, populating forums and exchanging rescue codes. A pair of sequels was released in Japan last year, and North American DS players just received the latest updates of the series, Explorers of Time and Explorers of Darkness. Unfortunately, most of the flaws present on the first titles remain.

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Media Summit
- Most focus was placed on Wii Fit.

Wii Fit
- Was able to go through a variety of gameplay modes and put the game to the test. Does it work? It certainly does.
- Actually woke up feeling pretty sore the next morning after doing strength contests against Chobot, felt like he had actually done hard strength training.
- Chobot fell flat on her face during the push-ups.
- Wii Balance Board senses and calculates a lot of data. Very accurate.
- As a workout tool, the game is fantastic. The mini-games like the Ski Jump are great fun. The Ski Jump requires careful balance when sliding the slope, making an upwards motion onto your tippy toes for extra height, and still maintaining balance in the air. It’s challenging but really fun.
- Matt’s really feeling it and believes it deserves all the (massive) sales it has already gotten and will continue to get when it launches in Europe and USA.

Mario Kart
- Absolutely flawless online. Blew them away.
- The offline multiplayer drops the ball because it instantly drops to 30fps when splitscreen, and still manages to chug despite not being a very pretty engine. There’s also a lack of free-for-all battle mode.
- Also, the single player mode still hasn’t progressed in any real way. It’s still dull and there’s still flaws like rubber-banding.
- However, the online multiplayer is phenomenal. You go on and are paired up with as many people as possible (12 being the max).
- Had initial issues where he couldn’t connect to the Treehouse development people in Japan, but worked perfectly after that. Absolutely silky-smooth and a lot of fun to play. Lots of stats tracking. Makes the Mario Kart Wii experience.
- Wii’s premier online game.
- New media should hopefully be coming up soon.

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UK, April 11, 2008 - Okay, so we’re all on the same page, let’s get this out of the way: Mario Kart SNES > Mario Kart DS > Mario Kart GBA > Mario Kart Double Dash > Mario Kart 64. Although we might be inclined to swap the first two around depending on our current whims. As awe-inspiringly entertaining as the first Mario Kart game was, its DS off-spring single-handedly fixed an awful lot of what had progressively dragged the series down into the quagmire of convolution, reminding us what was so great about the franchise in the first place.

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