Inazuma Eleven is incredibly original, featuring real-time strategy gameplay on the field, as players draw on the touch screen to direct positions of team members. Hopefully the gameplay is easy enough to understand for keen importers, because the chances of localization are not that great. Well, anything less than 100 percent won't be good enough!
Posts with tag soccer
Inazuma Eleven on TV tells you to buy, buy, buy!
Inazuma Eleven is incredibly original, featuring real-time strategy gameplay on the field, as players draw on the touch screen to direct positions of team members. Hopefully the gameplay is easy enough to understand for keen importers, because the chances of localization are not that great. Well, anything less than 100 percent won't be good enough!
505 Games flicking Subbuteo our way
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Anyway, it reached the height of its popularity in the '70s and '80s, before decent soccer videogames (hi, Sensible Soccer) showed up and caught the chil'n's attention. The original Subbuteo is still played today (there's even an annual world championship), but is far less well-known, which is probably why 505 Games is making a DS game about it. It's out this September (though probably only in Europe), and will feature fully customizable tournaments, traditional leagues, and even a full online multiplayer. Wooo!
Gallery: Subbuteo
[Via press release]
Fresh Inazuma Eleven scans take to the field
The latest issue of CoroCoro Comic has taken a long, hard look at Level-5's forthcoming soccer RPG, Inazuma Eleven. Mostly this involves displaying large quantities of the title's pretty fantastic character art (there's a definite Layton feel to it), but there are a number of screenshots dotted about the pages.
These show off several aspects of the title, from your common or garden dialog screens to shots of the matches that take place (and in which players control the movement of players by drawing on the touchscreen). Combining soccer with a real-time SRPG is fascinating to us, not to mention ridiculously original -- the closest comparison we can think of is International Superstar Soccer 2000 for the Nintendo 64, which included RPG-lite elements in its single-player mode, but nothing quite as in-depth as Inazuma Eleven.
Anyway, we digress: Jeux France was kind enough to pop CoroCoro in the scanner and show us the entire preview, so hit the "Source" link below for the full skinny.
Test your useless knowledge with Super Brain Tease
From the consistently high Brain Training sales in the UK, we have to assume that at least some of you Brits are nuts for the kind of games that give you a mental workout. Lexicon Entertainment is even banking on that assumption, as the company is releasing five different trivia games under the Super Brain Tease license. Each game will have a different subject, giving you a choice from the following:- Football (aka soccer, for those of us in the U.S.)
- History
- Geography
- Music
- Movies
The main allure of such games, we're sure, will be their budget price points, as each edition will be offered for £9.99. If the idea of trivia at such a cost interests you, you can expect to see the Super Brain Tease series hit retail in Q4.
[Via press release]
Inazuma Eleven media explosion
Level 5's Inazuma Eleven looks utterly fantastic. Combining a sports title with RPG themes, that alone was enough to sell us on the game. Of course, it also doesn't hurt that Level-5 is developing it. Looks like Japan will find out how awesome Inazuma Eleven is this August.For those of you who're as intrigued by this title as we are, know there is some new media around the net. First up, Game Watch has some lovely screens for you to check out. After that, get some full-motion excitement from the extended trailer up at GameSpot Japan. After that, we'd suggest changing your pants. We had to.
Read - Inazuma Eleven trailer at GameSpot Japan
Read - Inazuma Eleven screens at Game Watch
Level-5's goal: release Inazuma Eleven in Japan this August
Professor Layton/Dragon Quest VIII developer Level-5 has announced a release date for their next big project, Inazuma Eleven: August 22nd. The developer has been building interest in their soccer RPG for a long time in a lot of unconventional ways: offering demos on DS cards which also feature exclusive Layton content, creating a pop group, going so far as to buy naming rights to a soccer stadium.Will the marketing overkill pay off for Level-5? We were pretty sure Inazuma Eleven was going to be huge even before they started doing this stuff, just because of the massive amounts of cred the company has picked up in Japan since Layton and DQVIII.
Level-5 is rich
They're now competing with Square in the 'ridiculous show of wealth' department. Where Square disgraced Hironobu Sakaguchi into fleeing and almost ruined themselves with a high-budget CG movie, Level-5 is taking a more modest, but still overboard, approach to the whole 'conspicuous consumption' thing. Presumably to promote Inazuma Eleven (for which the company also manufactured a singing group), the company has purchased the naming rights to the Avispa Fukuoka J-League soccer team.
For the next three years (at $287,185 a year), Hakata no Mori Football Stadium in their native Fukuoka will be known as Level-5 Stadium, and teams across Japan will be encouraged to defeat the bosses of Levels 1 through 4 before attempting a game here. Well, maybe not. But the name thing -- that's true.
Inazuma Eleven adds three for Twe'lv
Aiming for the hearts of companionless gamers out there, Level 5 seems to have formed an idol group to both promote and appear in its Soccer RPG, Inazuma Eleven. The three girls -- left to right, Haruna Otonashi (16 years old), Natsumi Kaminarimon (18 years old), and Aki Kino (13 years old) -- make up Twe'lv, the group's name playing off the phrase "12th man," a common sports term referring to a team's fans.In the game, each of the three girls provides a different support function for your team. Haruna covers matches and events for the school paper, following players to collect data on them. Natsumi, the top student of her class and daughter of a politician/philanthropist, is initially unimpressed with your crew, but she eventually becomes one of the team's biggest fans and benefactors. Aki, the youngest of the group, manages the team. We guess she likes to wear green skirts, too.
Twe'lv plans to perform Inazuma Eleven's ending theme, a song composed by Yasunori Mitsuda (Chrono Trigger), at the World Hobby Fair in Osaka this weekend. Peek past the post break for in-game art and more promotional photos of the young trio.
Goal x Goal, Demo x Video
Fanboy alum James Konik is fancy enough (and located in Japan enough) to have access to the Everybody's Nintendo channel on the Wii. Using the service, he downloaded a demo of Winning Eleven Goal x Goal to his DS, and recorded a play session of the demo for the edificiation of the poor plebes without access to the currently-Japan-only Wii channel.
The game is a much more traditional interpretation of soccer gameplay than Inazuma Eleven, realistically depicting soccer action instead of high-flying anime-ness. According to the detailed impressions provided along with the video, Goal x Goal is an admirable handheld translation of the vaunted Winning Eleven series, with the added ability to change tactics with the touchscreen.
Inazuma Eleven site scores a GOOOOOAL
Fresh Famitsu scans for Inazuma Eleven
For the full scans, head past the break.
EA bringing FIFA Street 3 to DS
FIFA Street 3, EA's arcadey interpretation of soccer designed for people who like their sports games to come with a more (*cringe*) "urban" feel, is coming to the DS.Previously slated for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, EA announced the DS version this morning, promising touch screen controls, the usual array of flicks, bicycle kicks, and tricks, and DS exclusive stages and mini-games.
Also making the transition to the handheld version are the unique character models that appear in the home console editions, which we totally love, by the way. Hopefully, the DS's screens will be big enough to sufficiently show these off.
First shots below!
Gallery: FIFA Street 3
[Via press release]
Six minutes of sort-of uninterrupted Inazuma Eleven
This video provides the first real look at how the game operates. Unfortunately, the shots of gameplay are constantly intercut with footage of the players mugging as they enjoy the game. It's not quite enough misdirection to keep us from seeing how to play the game: passing and movement down the field is done in real-time, with players directed by stylus-drawn lines. Actions, including shooting and the over-the-top anime-style special moves are accessed via an RPG-style menu that opens up and pauses the game. It doesn't seem to hurt these two guys' painful enthusiasm.
[Via NeoGAF]
New at Japanese DS stations: Yosumin, Winning Eleven
Japanese DS owners (i.e. everybody) will have some new demos to try at DS download stations this month, in the form of Square Enix's puzzle game Yosumin and Konami's adorably named World Soccer Winning Eleven DS Goal x Goal! We're hoping that the availability of both of these games will lead to more information, especially about Yosumin. We've already learned from the screens that Winning Eleven features a slot machine that dispenses attribute points.Yosumin is the rectangle-clearing puzzle game first seen here as a demo, which, being a puzzle game, is somewhat of a departure for SE. We're watching this one with interest, because if it's successful, Square Enix's DS offerings may begin to diversify further. Also it's cute.
First Pro Evolution Soccer 2008 shots
Pro Evolution Soccer games may not always get pulses racing in the US, but the series does enjoy hit status here in Europe. Given the limitations of the DS, last year's PES 6 provided a surprisingly serviceable soccer game, despite being stripped of much of the detail and gameplay intricacies that appeared in the home console versions.Indeed, it sold well enough for Konami to give things another shot on the handheld, and CVG now has some of the first screens of Pro Evolution Soccer 2008 DS. Like last year, the whole thing is blocky as hell, but hey, at least it looks a little more intuitive than the holy mess that is the Wii version.
Feint past the break for another couple of screens, or head to CVG for the full set.
