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Wii

This Week's Virtual Console and WiiWare

by Nick DiMola - March 16, 2009, 6:34 pm EDT
Total comments: 15 Source: Press Release

Summer Games II for the Commodore 64 makes its debut alongside a trippy beat.

This week's Virtual Console and WiiWare features yet another week of only two releases, with one for either service.

Retro visuals and gameplay make a return to WiiWare with the awaited BIT.TRIP BEAT from Aksys Games. Players will use the Wii Remote to bounce 8-bit beats with up-to-four players in this retro throwback title. The game serves as the first in the BIT.TRIP saga. BIT.TRIP BEAT is rated E for Everyone by the ESRB and is available now through the Wii Shop Channel for 600 Wii Points ($6).

Summer Games II, a Commodore 64 title has players competing in eight different events: cycling, equestrian, fencing, high jump, javelin, kayaking, rowing and triple jump, from eighteen different countries for the gold medal. Players can both practice and compete in order in all featured events. Summer Games II is rated E for Everyone by the ESRB and is available now through the Wii Shop Channel for 500 Wii Points ($5).

WII-KLY UPDATE: ONE WIIWARE GAME AND ONE VIRTUAL CONSOLE GAME ADDED TO WII SHOP CHANNEL

March 16, 2009

Old-school action is the main attraction at the Wii™ Shop Channel this week. With a wealth of underground buzz already surrounding it, a brand new WiiWare™ title uses vintage-looking graphics and 8-bit sounds to create a rhythm-based game that's loaded with retro cool. Find out if you have enough skill to create order from chaos in a game that is as mesmerizing as it is challenging. Meanwhile, the latest addition to the Virtual Console™ lineup brings a Commodore 64 classic to the Wii console, proving that fans of international sports events needn't wait until 2012 to get their track-and-field fix. Even if you're too young to remember the original days of 8-bit gaming, these awesome titles provide timeless kicks.

Nintendo adds new and classic games to the Wii Shop Channel at 9 a.m. Pacific time every Monday. Wii owners with a high-speed Internet connection can redeem Wii Points™ to download the games. Wii Points can be purchased in the Wii Shop Channel or at retail outlets. This week's new games are:

WiiWare

BIT.TRIP BEAT (Aksys Games, 1-4 players, Rated E for Everyone, 600 Wii Points): BIT.TRIP BEAT is a rhythm game that brings retro action into the present, letting you use the motion-sensing Wii Remote™ controller to bounce beats. Retro visuals, classic game play, four-player multiplayer and an 8-bit soundtrack will get you in the zone and rock your world. The challenges are mighty, but if you can stay cool as the difficulty increases, you'll discover the beginnings of the BIT.TRIP saga.

Virtual Console

Summer Games II™ (Commodore 64, 1-8 players, Rated E for Everyone, 500 Wii Points): A thousand athletes. A hundred countries. Billions watching around the world as you enter the stadium, marching confidently among your nation's strongest, fastest and boldest young men and women. Your gaze sweeps the crowd as you realize the scope of your achievement. You are about to compete against the world's best athletes in a 3,000-year-old competition. This is the pinnacle of athletic achievement: the Summer Games. Summer Games II challenges your competitive skills with a series of athletic contests for one to eight players. Experience the excitement and realism of eight different events: cycling, equestrian, fencing, high jump, javelin, kayaking, rowing and triple jump. Practice each event to sharpen your skills, then choose from the 18 countries you can represent in the competition.

Remember that Wii features parental controls that let adults manage the content their children can access. For more information about this and other Wii features, visit Wii.com.

Talkback

GoldenPhoenixMarch 16, 2009

What a horrible week, it is a bit ridiculous we are now down to one WIi Ware Title and one Commodore 64 title!

StratosMarch 16, 2009

BitTripBeat is supposedly pretty good.
And at that price I may just go D/L it.

GoldenPhoenixMarch 16, 2009

Quote from: Stratos

BitTripBeat is supposedly pretty good.
And at that price I may just go D/L it.

Kind of funny when the Wii Ware game is outmatched in gameplay visual detail by a Commodor 64 game. (Yeah I know that is mean to say!)

I'm interested in BTB, but I don't understand why the download is so large.  It has 8-bit graphics and only three songs.  Groovin' Blocks has nice, modern visuals and about ten songs (some of them pretty long), and the file size is roughly the same.

StratosMarch 17, 2009

Quote from: Jonnyboy117

I'm interested in BTB, but I don't understand why the download is so large.  It has 8-bit graphics and only three songs.  Groovin' Blocks has nice, modern visuals and about ten songs (some of them pretty long), and the file size is roughly the same.

Yeah, 312 blocks is a pretty large number, close to the WiiWare size limit.
My best guess would be that they use a higher quality bitrate for the music. It could also just be poor code because talented programmers can make a very good program with very little actual code. They have competitions to make the best game with the fewest lines of code. I have no idea what the developers skill level or experience may be, but if they are newer to the trade then it may just be less economical coding. I dealt with this issue when I was doing a large amount of BASIC programming back in the day.

KDR_11kMarch 17, 2009

I thought BTB's graphics get better as you play better?

Quote from: Stratos

Yeah, 312 blocks is a pretty large number, close to the WiiWare size limit.
My best guess would be that they use a higher quality bitrate for the music. It could also just be poor code because talented programmers can make a very good program with very little actual code. They have competitions to make the best game with the fewest lines of code. I have no idea what the developers skill level or experience may be, but if they are newer to the trade then it may just be less economical coding. I dealt with this issue when I was doing a large amount of BASIC programming back in the day.

Small code is usually a specific goal and involves many hacks and optimizations. Commercial software development is as much about maintainability and reusability as it is about actually making the software. I doubt it's the code itself, that doesn't grow to 40MB in size even if it's massively inefficient. The entire Spring Engine fits into less than 10 MB and that thing is a monstrosity of ugly, unmaintained and redundant code running a very complex simulation. A game that's a glorified Pong shouldn't need even a fraction of the LOC Spring uses.

I downloaded BTB this morning and played it for a few minutes.  The songs are extremely long, so that may contribute to the file size.  While the graphics do improve as you play better, they were always 8-bit quality in the level I played.  The video on Nintendo Channel seems to show a later level that may have FMV-style backgrounds.

StratosMarch 17, 2009

Quote from: Jonnyboy117

I downloaded BTB this morning and played it for a few minutes.  The songs are extremely long, so that may contribute to the file size.  While the graphics do improve as you play better, they were always 8-bit quality in the level I played.  The video on Nintendo Channel seems to show a later level that may have FMV-style backgrounds.

Well, FMV would kill any hope of a small file size. The size is the only thing keeping me from giving it a D/L. All the games I have on my Wii are moderately used. I'll have to wait until I beat a few more.

KDR_11kMarch 17, 2009

Which reminds me, where's our Onslaught review?

StratosMarch 17, 2009

I thought WiiWare games didn't get full reviews, only mentions in the weekly DLC articles.
Not that I'm opposed to seeing them. More NWR is better IMO.

TJ SpykeMarch 17, 2009

They may not review all of them, but they do review WiiWare games: http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/reviews.cfm?system=Wii&desc=&timespan=recent&

TanookisuitMarch 17, 2009

B.TB is amazing.  It's in the same spirit as the Art Style games.  I personally love it.  I love rhythm games and retro graphics, so it's a perfect fit for me.  And it seems pretty tough.

BTB is like evil Pong.  My eyes are burning.

KDR_11kMarch 18, 2009

It's been said that you have to deflect the balls in arythm, does that just happen naturally by the way your paddle is positioned and they arrive or do you have to work extra for that?

I think if you hit all the balls, you are playing in rhythm.  There's no extra step.  But the rhythm of the music may help you predict the timing of when the next balls will arrive.  That's useful when you have different kinds of balls coming at different speeds.

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