An HD remake of Zelda WindWaker was interesting news from yesterday's Nintendo Direct, but there were several other, and in my opinion more important announcements as well.

For starters, Wii U is getting some good RPGs. Monolith Soft, makers of the Xeno series (and the recent, excellent Xenoblade Chronicles) are working on an unnamed title for Wii U. Nintendo is also publishing a crossover game with Atlus that mixes Fire Emblem and Shin Megami Tensei. Color me excited about that one because I already love Atlus.

A new installment in the Wii Party series is planned for Wii U this summer. Not terribly exciting for core gamers like me, but at least it's coming soon and thus will be out of the way.

Intriguingly, the team behind Kirby's Epic Yarn is working on the long-rumored new Yoshi platformer, and they're yarn-ifying the little dino as well. I loved the craft-materials look of Kirby but I'm not sure how I like it on Yoshi; the Yoshi games have always looked like they're made of clay, crayons, markers and other kindergarten-themed art materials, not exactly textiles though. The new screenshots look great though, I just hope Nintendo doesn't apply this art style to all of their kid-focused titles.

The most exciting news is probably that a new Mario game from the Mario Galaxy Team, new Mario Kart and even the new Smash Bros will all show up at E3. Mario and Mario Kart with both be playable, and it's nice to know it won't be another few years before Sakurai-san is ready to show Smash Bros.

Finally, the Virtual Console will be making its long-overdue move to Wii U. This will come with two major system updates in the spring that will also put Miiverse on smartphones and speed up the console's still-sluggish OS. VC games will have enhanced Wii U functionality like being playable on the GamePad, but they'll still cost the same as they did on Wii, which is to say too damn much. If you already bought VC games on Wii you can upgrade them to the new version for a nominal fee: $1 for NES games, $1.50 for SNES and no word on the price for GBA, N64, Genesis or the other consoles they'll be adding later. This fee smacks of the irritating Rock Band licensing fee that annoyed me a few years ago but it seems to be the price of doing business.

So, lots of stuff going on in the world of Nintendo, some of it annoying but most of it good. After getting by on ports and a few decent exclusives, it's nice to know my Wii U will have a lot of good content heading its way, and that Nintendo is still dedicated to working with 3rd parties for more exclusives and crossovers.

[READ MORE]

Eye-Brawl and Thumpback are two of the new figurines that will be joining the roster of characters available for use in the widely-popular Skylanders Giants. With the addition of these characters, the roster of giants now totals seven that players can select from for use in their adventures.

The water element giant Thumpback previously was a crew member of the pirate ship The Phantom Tide to fulfill his passion of fishing. The undead element giant Eye-Brawl is described as one of the most powerful Skylanders because of it's combination of a headless giant and flying eyeball, both of which joined together after a hundred-year battle. The headless giant and flying eyeball realized they would be far more powerful if they set aside their quarrels and join together as one Skylander.

Both figurines are now available for purchase at retailers.

In a repeat of the round of sixteen, Alabama snags first place receiving over 60,000 votes to grace the cover of NCAA Football 14.  Michigan and Texas A&M round out the top three.  

The complete standings look like this: (1) Alabama, (2) Texas A&M, (3) Michigan, (4) Ohio State, (5) Oregon, (6) Notre Dame, (7) Georgia, (8) Florida State.

The next round of voting starts right now on Facebook.  The voting totals have been reset, so you're going to have to vote again if you want your team to have a chance at winning.

Also, in the coming week, the specific athletes that will represent their schools on the cover should their school win will be announced.  Check Facebook daily so you don't miss anything.  Athlete voting begins on February 4 and runs through February 18.

To learn more, follow the jump. [READ MORE]

Nintendo's latest Wii U Direct is now live and you can watch it all from announcements such as the HD remake of Wind Waker to the patches that will be coming to the system to address some of its issues.

One thing I've appreciated about Nintendo is they are at least being a little more transparent with their fans these days. The Nintendo Direct broadcasts are a sort of fireside chat where they go into detail about their new products, and tomorrow's will focus on new and upcoming Wii U games. Nintendo has had a rough couple of years and the profits haven't looked too great for a while, and with the economy still looking puny it doesn't look like the Wii and DS years of plenty will be back anytime soon.

Nintendo can't afford to be either coy or high and mighty anymore, so I'm glad they're being more up-front about their products and services, the way their competitors have been for years now. You can check out the latest Nintendo Direct at this link tomorrow, at 6AM Pacific/9AM Eastern.

On Wednesday of CES, my appointments finally brought me into the Las Vegas Convention Center to begin the meat of my schedule.  As Dan and I have both mentioned before, audio seemed to be the primary focus of this year's show, and sticking with that theme brings us to the Sennheiser booth.  The goal at this booth was to get my hands on the latest PC gaming headsets that Sennheiser had to offer in the form of the U320 and the PC363D.


U320 Gaming Headset

The U320 is a multi-platform gaming headset, meaning it isn't just for use with a PC or a Mac.  Sennheiser realized that console gamers need some love as well, so the U320 has been made to be fully compatible with the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3.  The highlight of this headset is the fact that a user can change the audio levels independently to either raise the in-game volume, or to raise and lower the volume of the other players in the match.  The sound quality is stereo sound, so it is not a surround sound headset.  Still, even with it being just a simple two-channel audio headset, the sound quality was excellent.  There was no cracking at higher levels and the comfort of the headset itself is good initially.

The U320 Gaming Headset retails at $169.99



PC363D Gaming Headset

This was the headset I was really wanting to try out.  Sporting a virtual 7.1 Surround Sound system in a powerful package, the PC363D was directly developed with Dolby to ensure a beautiful array of audio while playing any proper title.  The 363D is designed to be used with a computer system only, due to the output of sound that it needs.  Comfort isn't an issue here either, and the microphone is specifically designed to mute when moving it up from the talk position to a side position on the headset, which is a great feature to have.  If it's a great surround feeling that you are looking for in a headset, the PC363D may very well be your best option.

The PC363D Gaming Headset retails at $299.99

I gave up on Mass Effect 3's multiplayer long ago.  It was about the time getting booted from the lobby if some arbitrary stat wasn't high enough became a thing that I said, "I'm out."  I have, however, kept track of the Bounty Weekends, even though I haven't taken part in one in months.  So I feel confident when I say that they're just phoning it in with this weekend's Operation: Geronimo.

Are you ready for this?  The objective is to earn any first-aid medal on any map on any difficulty.  That's it.  Earn a first-aid medal, get a commendation pack.  I don't think it could be simpler.  Maybe that is just the kind of challenge the player-base wants, but it's a far cry from those initial ones with goals that sounded like they were developed by Seal Team Six.

Operation: Geronimo runs from January 18th until January 20th.  You can read more about it here. 

[via: blog.bioware.com]

Capcom has finally placed a firm release date on Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate for the Wii U and 3DS. The game is set to launch both in stores and digitally on March 19, 2013. The game is an update to the Wii-classic Monster Hunter Tri.

The game will feature higher definition graphics and full online multiplayer on the Wii U and local multiplayer on the 3DS. There is even a bit of cross-platform support when it comes to local multiplayer as up t 3 3DS systems can be connected to the Wii U for cooperative play in the same session.

Those who want to get their hands on the game prior to release only have a few more weeks to wait as a demo version will be released about a month early. Interested gamers can download the digital demo on both the 3DS and Wii U beginning February 21.

You can check out the new trailer for the game below:

One of the great things about CES is the proverbial "shows within in the show" that are attended in the first half of the week.  One of these shows is called ShowStoppers, which gives a chance for companies to spotlight specific products in a more intimate setting instead of on the main show floor at the Las Vegas Convention Center.  Dan and I had the chance to meet up with Peter Nygren, the CEO of Mionix, at ShowStoppers to check out a couple of the new products that Mionix is bringing out for PC gamers in the form of the Zibal 60 keyboard and the Naos 8200 mouse.

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS:

Naos 8200

Right handed truly ergonomic design, full palm grip
Netto weight: 320 g



Zibal 60 Gaming Keyboard





Impressions of the Naos 8200

The mouse is incredibly comfortable.  Having larger hands, it can be difficult for me to find a mouse that truly molds to my palm and fingers, but the Naos 8200 is about as good of a fit as I've found.  The design of the mouse is very ergonomic and has a natural grip to it.  The material is soft and offers a nice cushion for long sessions of gaming.  Of course, the impressive part of the mouse is the 8200 dpi laser that it offers.  Gamers that require quicker motions need the extra dpi to make sure that there is a distinct advantage over their opponent.  The Naos 8200 looks to be a good choice, though I want to have longer sessions with it instead of the few minutes we had at ShowStoppers before coming to a final conclusion.



Impressions of the Zibal 60 Gaming Keyboard

This isn't your everyday gaming keyboard.  In a world where there are a ton of gauges, monitors, macros, and so forth, on just about every keyboard, it's nice to see a company provide a product that is built to last and is no frills.  The Zibal 60 stands out simply because it is a beast of a keyboard.  It is heavyweight, durable, and can take a beating from any gamer.  The solid body of the Zibal 60 means that durability isn't an issue, and the keys are quick-firing even though they stand out higher than standard gaming keyboards.  

One of the overriding themes at the 2013 International CES was lots and lots of audio products, including headphones of all shapes and sizes.  One of the companies that is now producing headphones is Onkyo, who is usually known for their high-quality A/V components.  Sean and I went to visit with them in the Gibson tent, which is an awesome place to check out products as musicians are strumming away on a variety of guitars.  Heck, while we were in there, Felicia Day gave away a guitar to one luck guy in the audience.

What we went to see was the Onkyo ES and IE lineup of headphones.  I posted about them early last week, but after we actually had a chance to try out the ES-HF300 over-the-ear headphones, both Sean and I were quite impressed.  After listening to a variety of music, the one word that we came up with to describe them was “precise.”  Meaning that whatever song we listened to, the music came out beautifully, as we would expect and without any sloppy audio sounds or muddiness.  The ES-HF300 on display were in white, black and purple and were quite comfy and with an MSRP of $179, on the lower end of what you would normally pay for that type of quality headphones.

There was one other Onkyo product that really caught my eye (other that the massive TX-NR5010 9.2 Networked A/V receiver), and that was the RBX-500 3D music system/dock that was being shown.  The RBX-500 had an incredibly compact design, comes with a remote and connects with Bluetooth or digital dock.  Internally, it has a 6.1 array of speakers (six 2” drivers) including a ported 4” sub.  The best feature may be the Sonic Emotion Absolute 3D Sound Technology that drives the RBX-500.  As with all wireless speaker systems, the possibilities are endless for gaming, video or music playback.

I stopped by the Ion Audio booth again this year to see what they had in store for iOS and Android users.  While they weren’t showing off any updates to their popular iCade lineup, they did have quite a few cool accessories for gaming on hand.  As with most things at this CES, there was a heavy emphasis on audio, as Ion was showing off DJ gear, speakers and party rockers.

I first looked at the All-Star Dance, which is a wireless dance mat for the iPad.  The mat comes with a free dancing app that teaches the basic moves while playing the game, it connects via Bluetooth and lights up (with embedded LED light) as you dance on it.  It was quite responsive and works seamlessly with the iPad and application it ships with.  One other item of note, there is a stand for your iPad included that will elevate it to the height you need to watch while dancing.  The All-Star Dance will ship in May at an MSRP of $49.99

The next item I looked at was the Party Rocker cubes.  These are a combination speaker, amp and karaoke machine all in one solid wood box.  It will ship with a microphone and has an internal 50-watt amp with color choices of white or black and also connects via Bluetooth to your iOS or Android device.  The coolest feature (especially if you are hosting a slumber or New Year’s Eve Party) is the light show that moves to the music.  The Party Rocker will have an MSRP of $149.99, and a slightly smaller version called the House Party will come in at $99.99.


Probably the smallest gadget Ion brought to the show was the Clipster.  This is a very portable wireless speaker that can clip to just about any object.  It includes a built-in rechargeable battery, connects via Bluetooth and will be available in April for $29.99 in Red, Green, Blue, Black and Pink.  This would be great to use for music, games or video when you are working outside where headphones would get in the way or just chilling out sitting on the couch.

The last item that I saw in Ion Audio’s booth was their DJ accessories.  The iDJ 2 Go Plus (shipping in June for $99.99) and Scratch 2 Go ($19.99) give aspiring DJs a way to convert their iOS devices into instant music machines.  The DJ 2 Go has a physical board and works with several DJ apps (including Ion’s iDJ 2 Go app) and connects via the lightning connector, making it compatible with iPhone 5 and iPad retina or newer devices.  The Scratch 2 Go comes with physical controls that sit on any iPad, so as long as there is a compatible DJ app, this will hook up and work.  I am not big into DJ games or apps, but both options seemed to work well during the demo and should appeal to those that enjoy the creativity of being a DJ.  You can probably hook it to the Party Rocker to create some interesting effects.



I would like to thank Wendy, Ion Audio’s Product Manager, for showing me around the booth.

If you've every seen really elaborate cosplay, you might have asked yourself, "What kind of person does that stuff?"  This video might have some answers and offers some insight into the world of serious or even professional cosplayers (I didn't know that was a thing).

The video is from Project Cosplay and was tweeted by @masseffect.  It features Crystal Graziano, professional cosplayer, and Steve Wang, Hollywood effects master as they talk about what went into fabricating a full suit of female N7 armor based on the default female Shepard.  

It's pretty interesting, and not something you see everyday.  

There was one last news bit in addition to John's impressions and our multiplayer video that came out of our time spent with the folks from Square Enix and Microsoft regarding Tomb Raider.  When the game comes out on March 5th, you can expect to find a limited edition Tomb Raider Xbox 360 controller also available for purchase.

The controller will retail for $59.99 and feature custom Tomb Raider artwork, a transforming D-Pad and an exclusive downloadable character.  You can check out the overview at the official Xbox 360 page for it or try to win the one of the five that Major Nelson is giving away if you enter before January 18th.