The DS version of Viva Piñata looks really great -- for a DS game. A lot of what made the original Xbox 360 game appeal to the Xbox 360 audience was in the amazing high-def graphics, with the weird paper "fur" visible on every character. But the new game is for a different audience -- the DS audience (which probably includes the entire 360 audience anyway). Graphics don't matter as much, and this kind of game actually seems more in line with the Animal Crossing-loving DS crowd.
Do you think VivaPiñata will end up more popular on the DS due to meshing well with the DS audience? Or will it lose the sales that were generated mostly by shader-hungry 360 fanboys? Alternately, will some sort of fanboy vendetta on either side hurt sales?
For those of you who keep track of developers and programmers like children keep track of baseball cards, this bit of news is going to be old hat to you. For the rest of the Nintendo loyal, prepare to light some torches and sharpen some pitchforks, because longtime programmer Colin Reed has bailed on Nintendo and taken up a position at Microsoft.
Reed was with Nintendo for 11 years, working on such titles as Metroid Prime: Hunters and Pikmin. He now joins Microsoft's Turn-10, an internal studio that is responsible for the Forza Motorsport line-up of games.
With the DS and ... that other handheld having sold a combined total of almost 100 million units, you'd have thought that Microsoft would be like a bear on honey when it came to the portable gaming market.
Well, apparently not. See, they're not all about cash, those Redmond billionair -- okay, we can't say that with a straight face. Truth is, they are all about cash. It's just that Nintendo (and, if we must, Sony) has done such a fine job of covering handhelds that it's going to be pretty awkward for Microsoft to join in the fun.
Those aren't our words either, but the verdict of Robbie Bach, president of Microsoft Entertainment and Devices: "... When I look at the handheld space, we haven't seen anything there that says, 'gosh, we wanna go make a big investment there.' It's a fairly tough area, a place where Sony and particularly Nintendo are doing a pretty good job."
We've heard about Microsoft's non-interest in the handheld arena before, yet we're also familiar with Microsoft's fickle nature -- Xbox, anybody?
Someone needs to tell the WallStreet Journal what's up. While we love the DS, we're pretty sure it's not the gift that everyone wants this holiday season. Still, the folks at WSJ saw fit to add Nintendo's little handheld into its online arena of combat, to duke it out with other cool gadgets such as the iPhone and and Microsoft's Zune. Heck, if it were us, we'd want a Flat Panel TV. It costs a lot more money than a DS, that's for sure.
Posted Nov 13th 2007 2:50PM by JC Fletcher
Filed under: News
Microsoft Game Studios UK's Phil Spencer spoke to Develop magazine about the lessons the company is taking from Rare's scaling down of Viva Pinata. While it might seem strange to put one of their flagship titles on a competitor's system, the DS is a great platform on which to learn about casual and shorter games, while also making piles of money.
Speaking about Rare's previous handheld experience, Spencer said the following: "When we acquired the studio that expertise was there and the team was there. As Microsoft we had a discussion – do we want to build that expertise? We decided yes. Not so much because we need to support Nintendo – their platform will do fine without us – but because it is important for us to build that experience as a publisher and game developer and understand what it means to build lightweight, maybe shorter session experiences, and maintain that design innovation."
Where does Microsoft hope to apply the lessons learned from Viva Pinata? Not the DS! As it turns out, Microsoft has their own platform for small-scale games. We don't know exactly how a portable version of a full-size Xbox game translates to Xbox Live Arcade development, but if it drives the company to experiment further, it's a good thing.
It would appear that some aren't exactly believing Matt at IGN's Alpha of Halo DS, both in the comments of that post and the embedded video above. YouTube user SwiftShock thinks he has the answer to the whole debate and is of the mind that the game is nothing more than a modded version of GoldenEye: Rogue Agent.
We don't know what's weirder about the ongoingHalo DS story: that somebody decided to cancel what would have been an obvious cash cow for everyone involved, or that IGN's Matt Casamassina has been sitting on screens and video, and only decided to post them when he found out that people were making fun of him on Wikipedia.
That means that keeping his promise to show us stuff "after E3" wasn't enough of a motivator, but ire from anonymous Wikipedia jerks caused him to spring into action. Whatever the reason, we're now a little sad that Halo DS is both real and dead, because it looked like fun. Seriously, it looks like a real Halo game. Kudos to the developers for almost pulling this off.
The one-level demo (Zanzibar) seemed to be pretty complete, with textures, and music, and sound effects, and everything. Unfortunately, Matt cannot reveal the reason that this game was cancelled, nor can he tell us who was working on this, because he has to not tell us something. Check after the break for another video, and hit the link for more vaporous Halo.
Neil Thompson, Microsot's senior regional director for the UK and Ireland at Microsoft's Entertainment and Devices division, sat down with GamesIndustry.biz to discuss all things Microsoft. While we could care less about that, he does offer some insight as to why Microsoft didn't enter the handheld gaming space and some of the challenges that Sony faced in trying to be competitive with Nintendo.
Thomspon says "The DS has been a great success for, and I think the interesting thing that case writers looking back at Nintendo in the last two or three years will look at, is the simplicity somewhat of the technology. They may argue it's a complex technology, but in a lot of ways it's actually quite a simple technology." While that's a good thought, isn't Thomspon overlooking the fact that a system is only so good as its games?
Mistwalker seems to be pro-DS, which we guess means they like money. Not only are they bringing us ASH, which looks not completely terrible, but now it seems that they will be sending us Blue Dragon, the title that encouraged Japanese gamers to buy an Xbox 360. We smell a special edition DS Lite in the works for this one. After all, they have to try to drive system sales again somehow.
So what's the less-than-good news? It's a card game. Technically, a role-playing card game, according to the scan from Shonen Jump (available after the break). Mistwalker apparently likes to blend game types; one style just isn't enough for them when it comes to their DS offerings. We'll keep an eye out for more information on this one, because Mistwalker might just surprise us and turn out the best damned card game ever.
Were you wondering how Rare would manage to cram the full Viva Piñata experience onto the DS? They've gone deep into their bag of tricks and pulled out a favorite Rare technique: prerendering. Like Killer Instinct and Donkey Kong Country, VivaPiñata uses 2D sprites made from 3D renders of Piñata characters. If it allows them to put the whole game on DS-- including achievements?-- and then add stuff like an "Episodes" mode that ties in to the TV show, then we say "prerender away."
If you want to read the news item that accompanies this single screenshot on Rare's website, you'll have to navigate to the "News" section. Annoying, right?
As had been hinted at earlier this year by Microsoft VP Shane Kim, Rare officially confirmed at the San Diego Comic-Con that its much overlooked fiesta / garden sim Viva Piñata will be smashing its way onto the DS.
While all we have currently is a blurry photo taken at the convention of what the game will look like, Rare has confirmed on the popular pinataisland.info forums (well, popular if you played the Xbox 360 version) that Viva Piñata DS will use the same gameplay principles as the original garden-sim title, as opposed to the recently announced party game for the 360. That means all the produce-tending, romance dancing, and savage piñata-on-piñata combat your little portable can handle.
Beyond that, all we can tell you at this point is that it's being cultivated by the original Viva Piñata team and according to Rare, "The DS team have done an amazing job at getting most of the features from the original into the DS version." Wi-Fi connectivity and official release date are still unknown, but we wouldn't be surprised to see it sprout up for purchase in time for the holidays.
We're expecting an official announcement from Rare any time, but for now, check out that action shot after the break.
Dimly lit, with a cold, dripping sound in the background. Only a table and a single chair adorn the room. Smoke wafts from a cigarette found in the mouth of a young black detective, expressionless. Off near the door is another detective, even younger. He is twin-screened. He looks slightly nervous.
Is Capcom going the way of Rare? That would be a devastating blow to Nintendo fans, who gobble up Capcom's offerings (and those of their subsidiaries) like so much sweet, sweet chocolate. Rumors of Microsoft snatching up Capcom have been rumbling since November, but now we're hearing it a little too frequently for comfort.
There are a number of Capcom games already headed toward Nintendo platforms -- for the DS, there are too many to count. But if this excruciatingly tragic rumor is true, what happens after that? Will getting Capcom games on Nintendo systems become a struggle ala Rare? We hope not, but buying up the things that make the competition good has long been a staunch Microsoft strategy ....
We figured we'd jump right in to the big subjects here with DS Daily, so we're gonna point out the elephant in the room: friend codes. We love Nintendo like ice cream and all, but even we rabid fans can admit that the whole friend code system may not exactly be the best execution of online play ever.
Complaints we've heard include the chaos inherent in trying to get a big group of friends together at once, host and server issues, and just the general pain of keeping up with the codes in the first place. We had to compare our pristine selves to Microsoft, but as these things go, gamer tags are certainly easier to manage. Nintendo's overly complicated online system has definitely affected our Game Nights at times.
What's your take? Do you see benefits in friend codes, or obstacles? What changes would you like to see made?
Two of Rare's founders have called it quits with the company, and the internet is all abuzz with talk of Rare ... and Nintendo. Microsoft bought Rare back in 2002, and the devs carried one of the most-hyped launch games for the 360, but it's still the association with Nintendo that lingers when people mention the company. So it's not surprising, particuarly with Diddy Kong Racing just around the bend for the DS, that people have begun to speculate about what happens now.
All anyone knows right now is that Chris and Tim Stamper left Rare for "other opportunities." That doesn't begin to answer any of the questions about what this means for Rare and Microsoft, or Rare and Nintendo, or even just the Stampers themselves. What led to the departure? Rare's last few efforts, while at times critically acclaimed, have not exactly brought home the bacon, and the situation surrounding E3 2004, DS dev kits, and Microsoft's denials make it seem as though there might have been a disconnect between the development company and their new bosses. We'll keep an eye on this story as it develops -- if it develops -- and what it might mean for Nintendo.
The DS version of Viva Piñata looks really great -- for a DS game. A lot of what made the original Xbox 360 game appeal to the Xbox 360 audience was in the amazing high-def graphics, with the weird paper "fur" visible on every character. But the new game is for a different audience -- the DS audience (which probably includes the entire 360 audience anyway). Graphics don't matter as much, and this kind of game actually seems more in line with the Animal Crossing-loving DS crowd.
For those of you who keep track of developers and programmers like children keep track of baseball cards, this bit of news is going to be old hat to you. For the rest of the Nintendo loyal, prepare to light some torches and sharpen some pitchforks, because longtime programmer Colin Reed has bailed on Nintendo and taken up a position at Microsoft.
Microsoft Game Studios UK's Phil Spencer spoke to Develop magazine about the lessons the company is taking from Rare's scaling down of 
Were you wondering how Rare would manage to 
We figured we'd jump right in to the big subjects here with 
Two of Rare's founders have called it quits with the company, and the internet is all abuzz with talk of Rare ... and Nintendo. Microsoft bought Rare back in 2002, and the devs carried one of the most-hyped launch games for the 360, but it's still the association with Nintendo that lingers when people mention the company. So it's not surprising, particuarly with Diddy Kong Racing just around the bend for the DS, that people have begun to speculate about what happens now.
