October 14, 2008

 

Wii possibilities

A few weeks ago while my friend Robert was in town I finally snagged a copy of MarioKart for Wii. I've been very impressed so far with Wii's games, most espicially the games created by Nintendo. The game is leaps and bounds ahead of previous Mario Karts. The Nintendo 64 version was the one my friends in college played frequently when we needed to avoid studying. What I believe makes the Wii version better aside from excellent playability and visuals is the ability to play against actual humans from across the world through Nintendo's internet service.

If I have one gripe about the Wii it is the under-captilization of its potential. Specifically the Virtual Console has a huge potential to tap into old schoolers like myself – those who grew up on the classic platform (a.k.a side-scrolling) games of the 80s and 90s. The tiled Wii menu is pratically a museum environment for playing the games we grew up on. Younger gamers just don't have the appreciation for those older side-scrolling games, which is to be expected. Most hard core gamers today seem totally immersed in First-Person-Shooters (FPS), like Halo, or Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games, MMORPGs for short (like Word of War Craft, more commonly abbreviated as WOW). As I recall Goldeneye was the game that really caused an explosion in mainstream popularity of the FPS genre. And Goldeneye is a great example of a game missing in the Virtual Consol. Its certainly a game I would love to play again had I the chance.

There are some excellent games available ... Metal Slug, Contra III, most Super Mario games and Sonic the Hedgehogs. I see that Nintendo has just released one of my favorites on the VC: The Secret of Mana. But there are so many games still not included that has me wondering why. So here's a list of the games I would like to see released on the VC:
  • Contra (NES)
  • Contra 4 (Genesis)
  • Contra Force (NES)
  • Mickey's Castle of Illusion (Genesi)
  • Castlevania: Dracula X (SNES)
  • the Final Fight sequels (SNES)
  • Magic Sword (SNES)
  • Castlevania 3 (NES)
  • The Secret of Mana 2 (SNES - it was never released in the USA)
  • Blaster Master (NES)
  • Duck Tales (NES)
  • Blaster Master 2 (Genesis)
  • Bubsy (SNES and/or Genesis)
  • Goldeneye (N64)
  • Perfect Dark (N64)

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