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Smash Bros. Gets Story-Driven Single Player Campaign
If you were wondering how they could make the upcoming Smash Bros. Brawl even better than its predecessors, the official Dojo site has some great news for Nintendo fans. Via Game|Life comes the news that Brawl will feature a fully-fleshed out single-player sidescrolling campaign. Called 'The Subspace Emissary', it appears to explore the stories of the individual characters and their interactions with each other. "This time, though, we've managed to create a complete side-scrolling action game. It's storyline isn't overwrought--it's hastened along by a bunch of quick movies ... The Adventure mode also emphasizes character development. You'll see many famous characters persevering under the weight of their personal histories, shouldering their unique burdens... It's really something you won't see anywhere else." While obviously folks like Link and Mario will feature heavily, it's worth pointing out that this will be the first time in more than 15 years that Kid Icarus' Pit will get any sort of 'plot development' in a videogame.
(This post should be blank, because words cannot be expelled with all the drool. However using parenthetical statements allows me to convey omniscient thoughts without giving the idea of words, thus I can tell you that I really can't wait to play some serious smash bros. I kinda thought Melee was disappointing, because it never had the sheer madness that was the original, but the game was very unbalanced, especially in favor of DK [that big ape should not be able to move so fast].)
Yes it's an anecdote! Were you expecting original research in a Slashdot comment?
Doug: In episode 2F09, when Itchy plays Scratchy's skeleton like a xylophone, he strikes the same rib twice in succession, yet he produces two clearly different tones. I mean, what are we to believe, that this is some sort of a [the three nerds chuckle] magic xylophone or something? Boy, I really hope somebody got fired for that blunder.
Aliens.
You need to watch more TV and read more books. Aliens always abduct people and put them in competitions that would be pointless under any circumstance other than a fourth-wall breech of the universe by all-knowing aliens. And if you don't believe me, try reading Walter Farley's Black Stallion series. When he wanted to do a cross-over between Black and the "secret" Island Horse flame, who fixed the continuity problems so they could both race? That's right, aliens did it.
You'd think that a race of beings with technology superior enough to travel between universes would have something better to do than kidnap folks from their homes and force them to participate in some sort of competition. (A competition that the contestants always seem more than willing to compete in?)
See also: A wizard did it!
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
All I can say is Nintendo has the best marketing of the big three. Smash Brothers fans are practically dehydrated from drooling over the blog.
Seriously, what other game in history has successfully maintained news updates every weekday? There hasn't been a weekday since it started where there wasn't something new, however small.
I remember when the site first opened and I read the text "I will be updating this site periodically". I thought "Oh, I can expect some random news every few weeks/months". I was stunned to find that it was literally every weekday.
I don't think there's a single game hyped as well as this one.
Thunderclone: ONE MAN ENTERS! TWO MEN LEAVE! ONE MAN ENTERS! TWO MEN LEAVE!
I've been following the site for a while, and they've cleared up some questions in the last teaser update about the story: It takes place in an alternate universe, the characters aren't the "real" canon characters, they're trophies of those characters. It's always been implied in the opening cinematic that Smash Brothers was just a kid playing with toys (which is why the final boss is a hand--kids have their action figures fight their hand when they finally run out of other toys for it to fight), but it was explicitly stated in the last update that all the characters are simply toys, and not part of the canon. When they die, they turn back into toys. They exist in an alternate universe where trophies exist to fight in tournaments, and this lifestyle has been maintained for the past two games, but now Metaknight has broken the tradition by storming the tournament and dropping some evil-looking goo that turns into evil-looking monsters, and somehow requires the trophies to stop him. Keep in mind, Smash is primarily made by the people who make Kirby, so the villain is probably going to be Dark Matter or something. Metaknight is traditionally a red herring villain that turns into a helpful rival in the end. It's not "a series of fights with motivations for the fights" in between, it's a full on side scrolling game, like the first level of the last game's Adventure Mode. It's probably punctuated with actual fights, but it's mainly side scrolling, fighting enemies (which also appear in the main game as "assist trophy" summons, like, Hammer Brothers are enemies in the side scrolling game, but you can also summon them to aid you in the multiplayer game). It also says the plot wont be bloated, just quick-paced cutscenes between action. I doubt there's going to even be text boxes.