Nintendo Okie

Summer has traditionally been a good time for gaming.  You’re out of school and you’ve got all day to do what you want.  That makes this week’s light list pretty sad.  Some of my most favorite gaming memories involved spending all day hanging out with my brother or my friend from around the corner playing games.  He had a Genesis and I had a Nintendo.  We never really thought of it as a rivalry, just the chance to play a whole lotta games.  So tell us your favorite summer gaming memory in the comments today.

We start the week out with a bang.  In the early part of 2001 Retro Studios was working on a game called Raven Blade.  It was an action adventure game, but few details were known about the title.  On July 19^th, 2001 they announced they would be halting production on that game to change their focus.  In addition to Raven Blade other titles were cancelled as well; a driving game called Car Combat, NFL Retro Football and an unnamed project.   These games were cancelled because they began working on a new project for Nintendo, a little game called Metroid Prime.  The game would come out a year later and begin a hugely successful trilogy of games for the company.

July 19^th, 2005 was the date that Nanostray would hit retail stores in North America.  This game, a vertical shooter, had players defeating wave after wave of enemy coming from above the screen, much like classic arcade games like Galaga.  There were four different types of weapons to choose from and four different gameplay modes.  Adventure mode gave players three stages to choose from that they could play in any order.  Once those were complete you were given three more choices until you finally reached the final level of the game.  Arcade mode gave you the chance to rack up as many points as you can.  Challenge Mode presented players with up to 22 different challenges.  These ranged from obtaining a certain score to defeating levels with only one life or having to use a certain weapon.  There was also a multiplayer mode that had two players competing to reach certain objectives first.  The game was fairly well received with many praising the high quality visuals.

July 20^th, 2009 was Download Day in North America.  There were three games released on WiiWare that day; 5 Spots Party and Battle Poker were two of those titles.  The other was Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a Darklord.  This was a tower defense game that had you, as a young Darklord, defending the tower that housed your father’s soul from hordes of heroes.  The game took place in the Crystal Chronicles universe and is considered a sequel to the WiiWare launch title Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King.  The game even featured cameos from famous Final Fantasy characters like Kain Highwind and Rydia, though they were available as downloadable content.

July 21^st, 2008 was Download Day in North America.  On that date Gley Lancer and Super Fantasy Zone, both originally for the Sega Genesis were released on the Virtual Console.  Pirates: the Key of Dreams was released on WiiWare. 

July 23^rd, 2007 was Virtual Console Day in North America.  That date saw the release of Kirby’s Dream Course for the NES, Shining Force for the Sega Genesis, and Devil’s Crush for the Turbo Grafix-16.

Alien Syndrome for Wii was released on July 24^th, 2007 and was an update to a game with the same name originally released in 1987.  This updated game takes place, appropriately, two decades after the events of the first game.  Gameplay is essentially a top down shooter.  Movement was controlled via the Wii Nunchuk with the pointer on the Wii Remote handling aiming.  The game’s story comprised of forty different levels.  There were 80 different weapons to choose from and more than a hundred different pieces of armor.  You could even bring along three friends to take part in co-op multiplayer.  The game was received mostly negatively with some places praising the aiming controls, but looking negatively on the lack of enemy types and visuals.

That’s all we have for North America this week.  If you know of anything we forgot or you know of that is coming up and you’d like to see it included in this article let us know and we’ll take care of it.  Before we go we have to take a look at the releases that make up Nintendo’s history in other parts of the world. 

July 19^th

1991 – Final Fantasy IV (SFAM, Japan)
2002 – Super Mario Sunshine (GCN, Japan)
2007 – Mario Party 8 (Wii, Australia)

July 20^th

1998 – Bionic Commando (Fam, Japan)
2006 – Cooking Navi (DS, Japan)
2007 – Big Brain Academy: Wii Degree (Wii, Europe)

July 21^st

1986 – Volleyball (Fam, Japan)
1995 – Virtual Boy (Japan)
2000 – Mario Tennis (N64, Japan)
2005 – Mario Superstar Baseball (GCN, Japan)

July 22^nd

2004 – Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door (GCN, Japan)

July 23^rd

2009 – Punch-Out!! (Wii, Japan)

July 24^th

2000 – Cruisin’ Exotica (N64, Europe)
2006 – DS Web Browser (Japan)
2008 – Wario Land Shake It! (Wii, Japan)
2009 – Wii Sports Resort (Wii, Europe)