Hello,

I was just wondering what the logic is behind releasing a system with just one color like the DS Lite in the US. I know a few people who are holding out for a red or blue DS Lite and it doesn't make sense to me why they don't have at least 3 or 4 colors at release for all Nintendo systems. So how many colors do you think the Wii will be released in and what do you think they will be?

Thank You

It's a combination of two things: Initial supply issues and strategic opportunities for future sales. In Japan, Nintendo had a hard enough time getting enough units for launch day in just one color, let alone the three they promised. (The two blue systems had to be pushed back a week to stockpile enough to satisfy the launch demand.) It's much easier and faster (and probably cheaper) to manufacture a single color initially, so more systems are ready to go on day one, avoiding shortages and lost sales. Just having one or few colors at launch means Nintendo can release the same system in a different color later on down the line, relaunching the system at the same price. Also, the combination of a new game and a new system color can lead to better sales for both. The Mario Kart/Red DS bundle really helped to sell the game and the system, more than if the two were only sold separately. By releasing many colors initially, it's not as easy to do that later down the line.

The GameCube launched in two colors, so the Wii will probably have that many, maybe one more. For now, I think black and white are strong candidates for the launch tones. The original photos of the Revolution had that blue-on-black awesomeness, and then the Wii hardware shown at TGS and E3 was the blue-on-white sexiness. One of the two would fit in any home theater setup, and you could walk home with either one and not be too bummed that you didn't get the other. Nintendo did show off all of those colors at the controller unveil at TGS (mmmm, candy red), but don't forget Nintendo pushed the multi-color thing for the GameCube too—here in the States, there are only really three colors to choose from, five years after the fact.

Hi PGC! I've got a couple DS questions for the Bag:

1) Based on the last few handheld releases (GBA, SP 1 and 2, and DS) when do you think the USA will see a black DS?

2) Based on the same handheld releases, when do you think the USA will see a price drop in the DS Lite?

3) Has anyone at PGC seen the black DS that could comment on it? I was wondering if the glossy coat would get scratched easily and how much it would show up, etc. (After seeing all those problems with the iPod nano, you can't be too careful these days.) If the black DS isn't too scratch-prone, I might hold out for one, but I don't want to wait if it's not worth it.

4) What do you consider "must-have" games for the DS?

Thanks a bunch, and keep up the great writing!

-ornryactor

1. Those lucky Europeans get the black system first thing, and I would imagine we'll get it in the States fairly quickly, probably around the holidays. Nintendo staying with just white through to next year wouldn't be smart, and they may be able to get away with not dropping the price with a release of a new color. A black and white DS Lite would complement a black and white Wii launch quite well, don't you think?

2. Depends on how well the DS Lite is selling heading into the holidays. If it's still flying off the shelves, it'll stay the same price. If things slow down a little, a new color and/or a lower price will help to move the hardware even more. A PSP price cut could factor in to things, but I still don't see the Sony handheld going down in price for a while longer.

3. I don't think anyone on staff has come across a black system yet, but one or two have the almost-black navy blue DS Lite. From what I've heard, the outer shell holds up fairly well, provided the unit is well-taken care of. The occasional scuff is going to happen, of course, but it'll probably stay fairly shiny for a while after its first use. I think the you should decide whether or not you can handle getting fingerprints all over the thing and needing to wipe it down constantly.

4. Must-have is subjective, but in my opinion some of the DS games you just need to play are Mario Kart, Meteos, Castlevania, Trauma Center, Tetris and Tony Hawk. Importers should have Band Bros. and Ouendan. Those are the games I've been spending the most time with, and it wouldn't be a bad idea if you did, too.

I am a huge soccer fan and one of my favorite franchises is the World Soccer Winning Eleven Series by Konami. However, I have to play that game on the PS2 because it is not on the Gamecube. I know that at E3, Konami announced the next game in that series would appear on Xbox 360 and PS3. I don't have any of those systems because I plan to get the Wii when it comes out later this year. I know Konami is working on an untitled soccer game for the Wii. Do you guys have any information as to whether this untitled soccer game is going to be a Winning Eleven game or do you guys think it will be some kind of kiddy soccer game? Also, do you think soccer will translate well on the Wii?

No one knows anything about Konami's soccer game for Wii, but here's some speculation on my part. I'm thinking Konami isn't going to put Winning Eleven on the Wii for their first game. (I touched on this subject last week.) Instead, I think they'll release some kind of soccer game designed for the system and controller from the ground up, and call it something else. A new series or an offshoot of WE, but not the main series.

The way I envision a soccer game on the Wii is to use the nunchaku analog stick to move, but all ball control motions would be done by controller movements, giving the player 100% of the ball. It could work like Madden's passing motion, where a stronger flick of the wand means a longer pass, and twisting the remote as it's moved would put some spin on the ball. Moving the controller in different directions would kick the ball in that direction. No one knows what exactly it is Konami is working on, but if they come up with something like the above, and makes it work (and makes it online capable) I would buy it in a heartbeat.

Mr. Windyman,

What ever happened to Megaman Anniversary Collection for GBA? It was originally supposed to come out well over a year ago. I heard it was delayed due to either (A) porting problems or (B) adding new content. I haven't heard anything about it in quite some time. Was it canceled? Moved to DS? Or is it still in the works?

Thanks,

vudu

I forgot about this game. It was announced way back in 2004, and hasn't been heard about since. Capcom isn't the type to announce a compilation and then not say anything else about it. Most of their business is making money off of remakes and re-releases, so why didn't they get it out after its announcements? There's no official word on its fate, but I would think the game in the format that we know it is dead. Still, it's another compilation that Capcom should release in one form or another, so it should show up again eventually. Moving it to the DS would probably be a better choice seeing as how GBA development is starting to slow down across the board.

Good evening Bag,

I have a question about Twilight Princess on Wii; to shoot arrows, the game requires you to aim with the Wii-mote, then pull back the nunchuck, right? If so, do you then release the B trigger? Or snap the nunchuck forward? And another thing...just how long is the Wii-mote to Nunchuck cord? Because if the game requires me to pull the Nunchuck back, and the cord is shorter than around 5ft, I won't be able to pull it back in a satisfactory manner.

Thanks in advance,

Dr. Pickles

Arrows, the clawshot and the boomerang were all aimed in the “point and shoot" manner that we've seen in all the first-person shooters on Wii. To fire the weapons, players needed to press whatever D-Pad direction that the item was assigned to. Setting the bow to D-Pad Down would mean that you'd need to reach up on the controller to press the down button while aiming at the target. This was tricky due to the D-Pad being set a little high on the controller, and reaching up to press it could rustle the remote around somewhat and throw off the aim. That aspect of the control system needs some refinement, but there was no flicking of the nunchaku needed in Twilight Princess.

If I remember correctly, the cord connecting the remote and analog stick halves of the controller together was around two or three feet long. The cord doesn't need to be any longer because the movements required to achieve flings and pullbacks don't need to be large and exaggerated. Wrist movements are all that are needed to flick the analog stick unit forward and backward, and the cord was certainly long enough for medium-sized swipes with the remote (like in Red Steel) to not get in the way. If a game needed a big-time swing with the remote (like WiiSports), it would probably not need the analog stick attachment. Even if it did, bringing the nunchaku along for the ride would work as if you were casting a fishing rod, with both hands doing the movement. It wasn't an issue at E3, and I suspect it won't be one when the masses lay their hands on the Wii controller.

Hi planetgamecube,

Can the DS connect to the internet through the Wii, if the Wii is connected through the ethernet adapter?

I don't think it'll happen. The Wii and DS can communicate with each other, in that the Wii can send demos to the DS. However, for the Wii to allow the DS to go online would require the console to be a wireless router, something it's currently not. If you want to get both systems online, the USB Wi-fi adapter that was released by Nintendo for the DS will also work with the Wii.

PlanetGamecube,

I'd like to know if you think a base for the Wii-mote would be a good idea for flying games? Essentially, you would plop the Wii-mote onto a base vertically and use some sort of tilt-sensing functionality to steer pilot-based games. This base would be similar to an iPod dock in that you just put the Wii-mote onto the base and you would have the ability to pivot.

I think it would be a great idea because it could bring a lot of realism for games such as the Star Wars Rogue Leader series, Star Fox or even Pilot Wings.

What do you guys think?

Thanks a lot!

Ray

That's a neato idea. The B-trigger and D-Pad would be in an ideal place for shooting and option selecting. They could even put force feedback in the base. For a Star Wars game, the transition from flight to lightsaber battles would be as simple as pulling the controller from the dock. I hope there are devs out there that are thinking about ideas similar to this one, they would be pretty cool if executed properly.

Hi, my question is a quick and simple one. There are a number of sites out there that offer imports from Japan. (Like Lik-sang.com that is showcased in ads on your site). I notice that this site allows you to import games and consoles from Japan. I was wonder if there is a site that will allow you to import games and consoles from Europe? I have found a few sites that will import games, but none that will import consoles. If you can help me I would greatly apperciate it.

Thanks, John

Unfortunately, there are none that I know of. Importing Euro stuff is difficult because they use the PAL video format over there, while we use NTSC in the States. Japan also uses NTSC, so it's as easy as plug and play for Japanese systems. Getting a PAL system to work in America requires some hoop-jumping unless you have a TV that supports PAL. That's why a lot of importers only really support Japanese hardware imports.

If anyone knows of a company that does European hardware imports, let us know. I'm actually kind of curious myself, seeing as there are going to be lots of people here that are interested in getting the Europe-only black DS Lite.

Hey guys,

Graphical improvements aside, I was wondering if there would be any performance improvements when GCN games are played on Wii? I'm not very knowledgable about the technical side of games - I don't know how many slowdown problems are a result of programming or hardware, nor do I know how the difference between software and hardware-based emulation affects framerate hitches, but I was wondering if games like True Crime: NYC would be sans the suicide-inducing amounts of slowdown on Wii?

Here's my bonus question: What do you guys think about Nintendo's patent for a messaging service? (the story can be found here: http://wii.ign.com/articles/711/711865p1.html) This sadly brings me back to my unfairly-high exectations of the Wii-Fi Connection's due to XBox Live, but in knowing that Nintendo is sticking with the basic DS-esque online setup, I was happy to see that something like this was in the works - or at least thought about. Your thoughts?

Thanks!

Jason M.

I would gather that GameCube games played on the Wii would perform the same as if they were played on GameCube hardware. Any improvements that GC games would see, if any, should be minor. The backwards compatibility in the new system looks like it'll be done completely through the hardware—the Wii is just a souped-up GameCube, after all. Games are programmed to work with a certain amount of memory and deal with specific processor clock speeds. Even with the Wii's more powerful hardware, GC games are only going to use GameCube amounts of power, so they should work as well (or not as well) as they did on the 'Cube. Nintendo could make the new hardware improve older games somewhat, but don't expect any miracles.

Get bonus: I read about that messaging patent. It's interesting stuff, and could offer functionality similar to Xbox Live in the future. Nintendo has been improving the Wi-fi Connection service with every batch of online-enabled games they've released, and it's only going to get better than that from here. Perhaps we'll see some more improvements come the launch of Wii? They're going to need to eventually do some things different with online on the console side, because things like exchanging friend codes aren't as easy when you can't whip out your handheld and punch it in right away. I'm sure whatever it is Nintendo has in store will make WFC the best free online gaming service ever.

Hey PGC you guys are the greatest! I know the Wii is all the rage now and everyone has questions about it (don't think I'm not excited), but my question is geared towards a GameCube game. I'm trying to figure out whatever happened to Donkey Konga 3 and if it's ever going to come to the USA. It came out in Japan well over a year ago and Donkey Konga 2 has also been out here stateside for over a year as well. I haven't heard any news regarding when Donkey Konga 3 would be coming to the United States, and with the GameCube on it's last legs, I'm starting to worry that Nintendo won't even bother bringing the game over. Did I miss something regarding Donkey Konga 3? Did Donkey Konga 2 sell horribly in America? Is Nintendo having legal issues bringing new songs and artists to the game for the American release? If you have any clue on what happened to the game, or your thoughts on whether or not it'll come out and when, I'd really appreciate it.

- Jeff ~ Jome20

It's strange if you think about it. The GameCube is dying, and Nintendo announces some new games at E3, attempting to send the system out with something more than a whimper. DK Bongo Blast, the racer that uses the bongo controller, was one of those games. Nintendo is clearly still supporting the bongos, so why not Donkey Konga 3 to go with it? People like the games, myself included...why doesn't Nintendo give us every opportunity to use the drums if they still want people to use them?

As it stands right now, it may not be worth if for Nintendo round up a completely new song list and release a third game in the series. Localizing Japanese music games for play in America is a monumental task, as it requires all the new songs to be recorded, edited, fixed up and made to work with the bongo beats and claps (in the case of Konga). It's not a quick and easy port, and that could be the reason why we won't see Konga 3 come out over here. I hope I'm wrong about that, though.

That'll almost wrap up another week of the Planet GameCube Mailbag. There's one more issue to address this week, and I'll talk about it a little right here in my space.

The sensor bar.

A lot of people wrote in during the past week, attempting to set the record straight about how the bar and remote worked together. Many of the people who wrote in seemed to have been misinformed or didn't understand the whole concept of the thing. Well, I'm going to try to get this sorted out once and for all...by linking you to sites that know better than any of us do.

Articles at XGaming and Anandtech do a really good job of explaining the guts of the controller and the function of the sensor bar. In a nutshell, the remote uses a combination of infrared and Bluetooth. For games that require aiming movement, a combination of IR and Bluetooth is used for position tracking. For games that require tilt sensitivity only, only Bluetooth is used. Infrared devices can be blocked if something is between the transmitter and receiver, and bluetooth can be interfered with by other devices (although Nintendo is looking to avoid that). Hopefully, the information in those articles will answer the majority of the questions sent in and also clear up most of the confusion over this whole thing.

And with that, this week's bag is over and done with. There were a lot of questions this week, and I apologize I couldn't get to them all this time around. Keep sending those questions in, and the best ones will get answered here every week. See you next week.