Wii U in 2014

It's now 2014 and the new generation of consoles have officially begun. The PS4, Xbox One, and Wii U are all on the market so 2014 should be interesting. However now that the initial console sale figures have been released can the Wii U survive? Let's take a look at the numbers.

The Wii U sold 3.91 million consoles world wide in its first eleven months. The PS4 sold over 4 million units in its first 6 weeks. The Xbox One sold over 3 million consoles in the same time spand. Obviously this looks bad for the Wii U. The PS4 has already sold more consoles than the Wii U, and it is brand new on the market.

Let's not forget that Nintendo has not released it's November and December sales numbers for 2013. So it is very possible that the Wii U sold very well in those two months(and if it did Nintendo needs to tell people). Let's also keep in mind that both the PS4 and Xbox One sales numbers are for launch and holiday sales, which are always good. Even still both of these sales numbers are extremely impressive.

I do believe that the sales will taper off now that the holidays are over. I doubt they will drop as low as the Wii U's were in 2013, but they should drop significantly. Even if both the PS4 and XBone have slow sales the Wii U must not slow down. It must keep selling at a high rate, or it wont last through 2015. The release schedule for Wii U games in 2014 is almost non existent. Yes it will have some heavy hitters like Donkey Kong and Mario Kart, but it needs more. Nintendo has promised that there will not be a game drought this coming year. However since Mario 3d World dropped in November 2013 nothing has been released(I know its only 2 months). I'm just concerned that Wii U owners will be game less again in 2014.

Donkey Kong does release in February so we will  wait and see what releases after that. Now is the time for it to sink or swim. With both the PS4 and XBone looking mighty impressive Wii U needs to shine now more than ever.

Nintendo Are You There?

Hello, Nintendo...where are you? Seriously this is how I feel right now. We are now in November 2013 and basicallly have not seen much from Nintendo in months. In the past two months the Wii U has had great games release like:
1. Pikmin 3
2. Wonderful 101
3. Rayman Legends
4. Deus Ex Human Revolution Directors Cut
5. The Legend of Zelda, The Wind Waker HD
6. Batman Arkham Origins
7. Assassin's Creed 4 Black Flag
8. Call of Duty Ghosts
9. Sonic The Lost World
10. Lego Marvel SuperHeros

I'm on Wii U, but nobody knows

That's the main games, but there others as well. So where the hell is Nintendo? The only commercials I've seen for any of these games was Sonic Lost World, and I'm sure Sega paid for those. All these third-party games are heavy hitters. I've seen both Sony and Microsoft have commercials for all of them. Yet Nintendo doesn't even make a commercial for its first-party games.

The average person has no idea that any of these games are on the Wii U. That's somewhat an over statement; most people don't even know that the Wii U exists. It's been out almost one year now and it's still practically unknown to the average consumer. It seems like Nintendo doesn't want the Wii U to sell. Iwata and Reggie keep trying to tell people the Wii U will be fine, but it's getting harder to believe.



The Wii U has an amazing line up of games right now. If Nintendo would just tell people about them the Wii U would be flying off the shelfes. I just beat Batman Arkham Origins (very fun game). Now I'm playing Wind Waker HD. Once I finish Wind Waker I'll get either Assassin's Creed 4 or COD Ghosts. This is what most every gamer would love to do, play the best first and third party titles back to back on one system. All Nintendo has to do is tell people that they can do that with the Wii U.

Batman Arkham Origins on Wii U

So hows the new Batman on the Wii U? It's pretty damn good. I wont go into detail about the game, since there are a lot of reviews that will tell you about the story. However I will say that if you enjoyed the previous two games you will also like Origins. Nothing was changed to the game formula, and to me that's a very good thing. The old saying "if it ain't broke don't fix it" comes to mind.

The real question is how does it look and play on the Wii U. Well the game looks awesome on the Wii U. It really is a good looking game. I did notice a few weird shadows, but in an open world game that's not abnormal. Also during some of the cut scenes there is a little slow down. Nothing major, but it is a little jarring. Other than that the game looks great. 

When I first started playing Batman Arkham Origins I used the gamepad. I actually used the gamepad until my battery died, then I switched to the pro controller. While the pro controller felt good and worked fine; I really missed the gamepad. When Using the gamepad you have access to the map at all times. You can not set a way point with the map, but it's still nice to have the map handy. This is especially handy when finding Enigma's stations. 

Also during the crime scene analysis you can use the gamepad to view the crime scene. I personally didn't care to do that, but it's a cool feature. When your in the batcave the gamepad will act as a finger print scanner. It's not important but still it's kinda fun to scan your finger and see it welcome Bruce Wayne. 

The Wii U version does not have the multi player that both the 360 and PS3 have, but from the reviews I've read that's probably a good thing. Plus it's $10 cheaper than those versions. If you like the Batman games then this one is no different. It looks great and it plays great. Don't be afraid to buy this. You will not be disappointed.

UPDATE
I felt like I needed to address some issues I found. On completing the game and going through the city I've experienced a lot of slow down. I also had one hard freeze. Neither of these make the game unplayable, but it does greatly detract from the overall experience.

Busted on OUYA

Busted by PIM Entertainment  is an endless arcade runner, except with a car. So instead of running like in Temple Run or Sonic Dash you are driving. I was pretty skeptical when I first loaded up Busted. I personally love to play Sonic Dash.I think it's the best endless runner on the App Store. My endless runner bar is set pretty high, so I didn't think I'd like Busted. However it's a pretty fun game and a good time killer.

Let's talk about how Busted looks. Is it an ugly game? No, it's not an ugly game. It is however a very plain looking game. When your car flips over (and it will flip over) you will see absolutely no details on the undercarriage. This isn't really a problem given the price of the game, but I would have liked to see a muffler or something under my car. Still the graphics in Busted are effective and they look pretty smooth overall.

The presentation of Busted is also good. I have played it for at least ten minutes everyday for the past week and not once have I experienced any slow down. Even when the nitro kicks in and your car is flying down the road it holds its frame rate. This is extremely important in a racer (or runner...racer runner?), and it performs great. I wont lie the audio track gets old extremely fast. There's nothing really wrong with it, but you will be tired of hearing it.

Also you can play with a few different vehicles and change the color of your car. They are not fully customizable but it's nice to have the option. You can also buy power ups to help you increase your score. So make sure you grab as much cash off the street as you can...because you will need it. 

Busted controls pretty well. The left analog stick controls your movement. While the O face button works your brake. You really won't use the brake to often but it can save you if  it's used sparingly. There is one thing I'm not fond of in Busted. It's those damn ramps(like in the picture above)! They're awesome if you hit it just right.and your car goes flying through the air. However if you aren't lined up exactly right it's game over. Or if you fly off the ramp and land on a car it's game over. It's not a deal breaker, just a little annoying. 

Since all games on the OUYA are free to try, give this a download and see what you think. If you decide to purchase the full game it will set you back $2.99. If you enjoy endless runners then you will like Busted. It's another good game to play on OUYA.

CLARK for the OUYA Review

CLARK has released on the OUYA...and it is amazing! The OUYA really needs a lot more games like this. Here's the official description of the game.

CLARK is an action loaded puzzle adventure. It combines complex spatial puzzles with arcade style action elements and an epic storyline. As the story unfolds, the nerdy forklift robot Clark will encounter partying robots, attractive nuclear missiles, intoxicated supercomputers, save the facility from an intruding spaceship and kill M.O.T.H.E.R. CLARK features 25 levels with 100 puzzles and more than 12 hours of gaming. Our grid-based game play and tight controls will give you the retro feel of your first console.

CLARK is a beautiful game. It uses cell shaded graphics so it looks like a living cartoon. The initial menu worried me, because it looked rather cheap. However once you start playing the game you will be blown away. It is one of the better looking games that we've seen for the OUYA (so far). CLARK looks adorable and everything looks bright and crisp on my LED screen.

The game also controls very nicely. The left stick controls CLARK, and the right stick controls your camera. At first I wasn't a fan of the camera, but after playing for a few minutes it felt natural. You also will need you use the face buttons to move objects and etc. You can tell that this game was designed with a controller in mind. So it really does work very well.

Seriously go and buy this game. CLARK only costs $7.99 and that's a great deal for what your getting. It'd be hard to find a better game right now on the OUYA. If you like fun puzzle games with great graphics then this game is for you. If you don't like fun puzzle games with great graphics then it still may be for you. Give the demo a try, you will not be disappointed.

GameStick is Coming Soon

It seems like Android consoles are pretty popular right now. By "popular" I mean multiple companies are making them and shipping them out soon. Whether or not any of these will be successful is yet to be seen, but GameStick looks like it could be a contender.

 

 GameStick is being developed by PlayJam. It was funded by Kickstarter and it made $650,000, which surpassed it initial goal. It was originally going to release in April 2013, but after being so successful they had to delay it's release. Amazon.com has it listed for an August 26, 2013 release date.

 

 

 

Here are the Specs for the GameStick as listed by Amazon

• Includes: 1 GameStick HDMI Console + Bluetooth Controller
• Easy to navigate user interface with access to Android games at 1080p
• Under the hood: ARM Cortex A9 CPU / MALI 400 GPU
• Storage: 8GB internal flash storage (expandable to 32GB via SDMicro)
• Connectivity: 802.11b/g/n WiFi / Bluetooth 4.0

You get all of this for only $79.99 ($20 cheaper than an Ouya).

What really stands out about the GameStick is it's portability. All you do is plug in the HDMI dongle to your HDTV and you are ready to play.

GameStick is based on Android architecture, however it has it's own UI built specially for it. It looks nice and easy to use, but I'll have to play around with one to know how well it actually works.

One downside to the GameStick is that it wont use the GooglePlay App store. This means you will need to repurchase games you own. Also game selection could be limited since they must be approved by PlayJam. PlayJam has said that it has over a hundred developers who say they want to make games for it. So hopefully they will make good on their promise and keep the games coming.

We will have to wait and see if the GameStick is successful. It looks promising and hopefully it will deliver.

Lego City Undercover on 3DS

I finally bought Lego City Undercover : The Chase Begins. I know I said months ago that this was going to be a day one purchase...but I got busy and never bought it...until NOW! I'm not to far in the game yet, but I can tell you that it's pretty impressive so far. Only thing I wish was different so far is the lack of voice acting. There is voice acting in the cut scenes, but other than that it's all text. Not a deal breaker just a little disappointing. I will give a full review once I complete the game.

It's Chase McCain!