news/reviews/previews

Rainbow Six Vegas 2 "possible" on Wii

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Rainbow Six Vegas 2 is already confirmed for the Xbox360, Playstation 3 and PC. Ubisoft developers recently stated that it's possible to bring it to the Nintendo Wii!

In a recent interview by VideoGamer.net, Rainbow Six Vegas 2 developer Philippe Therien, from Ubisoft Montreal, said "I would never say never" for bring the first person tactical shooter Rainbow Six Vegas to the Nintendo Wii.

Philippe Therien said: "I would never say never. It's possible. The controller is certainly there to try and do it. Although it's not planned right now. If there was a plan I would give it a shot. Yeah, sure, why not!"

He also stated that "The Wii Remote really looks like something cool for shooters, so yeah absolutely".

As for my thoughts, I would think that Rainbow Six Vegas 2 should be considered to be brought the Wii. Like how many games are first person shooters on the Wii? Not many. If they added online to it too, then many people would buy it. The only thing that worries me would be the graphics. Rainbow Six Vegas is known for its graphics and everything, and everyone knows that the Wii's graphics aren't that strong.

But overall, I would love Rainbow Six Vegas 2 to come to the Nintendo Wii.

do yo uactuallt write all this or you just cut and paste

copy paste lol

oh ok just wondering

nintendo aussie is the least seen game release chart on ign, wen i look at it its uasually crappy 3rd party games that look like n64 games with slightly better graphix

a response 2 no aussie wifi(copied from ign):

Last week we reported that all online functionality had been stripped from Medal of Honor Heroes 2 on Wii in Australia. Not only did this come as a huge shock to Australian Wii owners looking to get stuck into some 32 player fracas' online, but it also came as something of a surprise, given that the game's manual, and indeed, information about the game on EA's website, still touted online as one of the game's major features.

We told you to stay tuned, and now EA Australia has made an official comment on the situation and is offering refunds for anyone who purchased the game. Here's the official statement released by EA Australia's PR Specialist Cameron Jenkins:


Medal of Honor Heroes 2 for Wii does not support online functionality in Australia. We made an error in the documentation and marketing materials. We are very sorry to have caused confusion for our customers. We will provide a refund to anyone in Australia who wishes to return the game to EA because of the lack of online functionality.

Of course, this issue is about more than money or misleading information – it's about why the online element was stripped out in the first place. Unfortunately, EA Australia "do not wish to comment" on the reasons the game is missing this functionality, but from what we understand the company would need to run local servers to ensure low latency online play, and it has evidently decided not to do so.

new mario kart details:

With Smash Bros. at last out (in Japan, at least), Nintendo appears to have penciled in Mario Kart as its next big title. We're assuming that much, considering the unexpected blowout on the game in the latest issue of Famitsu.

The Wii installment of the cart racer that started it all looks like it's going to have lots of variety. Famitsu reveals a total of 32 courses, with 16 remakes of old courses, and 16 completely new courses. New courses include Mario Circuit, Momo Country, Kinopio Factory, DK Snowboard Cross, Coconuts Mall, Kinoko Canyon, and Luigi Circuit.

Some of these courses will put a new feature of the karts to use: mid-air tricks! Karts and bikes are both capable of performing actions and tricks in the air. Get a trick just right, and your cart will perform a dash upon landing.

In addition to a ton of content, Mario Kart Wii will have some serious multiplayer options. The game will include Wi-Fi based play for up to 12 players. You'll be able to select to play against players from throughout the world, players in your country, and players on your friend list.

As part of the new network mode, Nintendo will be making use of the Wii's Channel interface in yet another unique way. We're not sure of the specifics, but it seems that you'll be able to install a Mario Kart Channel to your Wii hub to view world rankings as well as your own records.

Going along with the Wi-Fi multiplayer play, Nintendo will be giving players a means of customizing the game. You'll be able to make your very own Mii ride a bike or kart, adding that bit of you to online races.

The online mode will also expand the single player fun. The game will offer downloadable ghost data, so you can play against some of the best players.

Not big on the whole internet thing? In addition to the Wi-Fi play, the game will also let players play together the old fashioned way: through split screen for up to four.

With this Famitsu blowout just hitting Japan, we expect the Nintendo marketing machine to start getting into gear and remind everyone why Mario Kart is so great. If, as a part of that initiative, we get a chance to sample the Wii installment in advance, you can be sure we'll let you know.

kool

yup

Today it was announced that Spore, Maxis' highly anticipated evolution simulator, will release this September 7th on PC, Mac, Nintendo DS, and mobile platforms. But what about Wii? We got a chance to ask Spore's Executive Producer Lucy Bradshaw, and here's what she had to say:

IGN: What about the Wii version? When might we hear more about that?

Lucy Bradshaw: Well that's, right now, I mean I know we made mention of the fact that we're exploring other platforms, and we'll certainly be doing that. We don't have any details for you right now on any of that.

IGN: So no tentative release date or anything on that?

Lucy Bradshaw: No sorry, can't.

IGN: Somebody's holding a gun to your head.

Lucy Bradshaw: A bazooka.

Unfortunately, it appears we'll have to wait. For more on the other incarnations of the game, skip over to our full interview.

The NPD Group, which tracks videogame software sales, released its data report for the month of January and, once again, Nintendo's home console was the best-selling system during the time frame. Despite severe hardware shortages – supply was so limited, in fact, that Nintendo was forced to hand out vouchers to consumers interested in Wii – approximately 274,000 gamers picked up the console in January. Surprisingly, the second best-seller was not the company's DS handheld, but PlayStation 3 with nearly 270,000 units sold. PlayStation 2 took third with about 265,000 units sold. DS was the fourth best-seller with roughly 252,000 units sold, PSP fifth with 230,000 sold and Microsoft's Xbox 360 trailed them all with about 229,000 in sales. Is Xbox 360 doomed? Yeah – probably not. Keep in mind that all of the aforementioned systems sold within 50,000 units of each other.

Wii and DS accounted for five of the 10 top best-selling games in January, according to NPD. The biggest performer for the month was Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare for Xbox 370 with about 328,000 in sales. Wii Play was number 2 with 298,000 in sales. Guitar Hero III for Wii was number three with another 240,000 in sales. Super Mario Galaxy was number four with another 172,000 sold. Xbox 360's Rock Band was number five with 171,000 in sales. Guitar Hero 3 for Xbox 360 (167,000), Burnout Paradise (144,000), Call of Duty 4 for PS3 (139,000), Mario Party DS (138,000) and Mario & Sonic at the Olympics (133,000) rounded out the top 10 best sellers.

Guitar Hero III for Wii has sold nearly 1.5 million copies since it debuted in November despite having a major sound bug. Activision has recently started sending out replacement copies of the game to consumers who asked for them.

We're saddened to report that since their simultaneous release last November, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption has sold 626,000 copies and Carnival Games 655,000 copies. On a brighter note, though, Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles has topped the 300,000 mark in sales domestically. Meanwhile, Wii Play has amassed 4.4 million in sales since its release -- a feat that can be attributed to the included Wii remote.

Speaking of peripherals, approximately 375,000 people picked up Wii's nunchuk attachment in January, making it the best-selling piece of hardware for the month.

mario kart wii box art: link, http://media.wii.ign.com/media/949/949580/imgs_1.html

EA shows off the Wii Nerf Blaster Shell

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For those who lacked a childhood, a Nerf Blaster was a water gun device that you could use to attack your parents with on Christmas Day. I used to own one, and yes I remember rather clearly doing that once. Something that was special about this particular Nerf water gun was that it could be switched so it could shoot foam bullets instead. What I'm trying to say is, EA has done that with the Wii.

Think a smaller, slightly cuter Wii Zapper and you pretty much have this new device in a nutshell. It can be used for point and shoot games just like the Wii Zapper can. This comes shortly after EA announced that a Nerf game is in development that will utilize this controller called Nerf N-Strike.

cool i like this gun better the wii zapper felt liek i was holding a waitless bazooka

felt like a sholdier held thompson automatic rifle, WWII soldier's automatic weapon, or the more powerful B.A.R. or browning automatic rifle 4 squad submachine gunners, i kno a lot about this stuff. anyway, it felt like 1 of those, except weightless

Last summer aspiring rock stars received Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s to tide them over until GHIII was out. Today Activision announced the next evolution in its rock-simulation franchise -- Guitar Hero: Aerosmith. Focusing on the music of the iconic American band, players will pick up the picks of Joe Perry (guitar), Brad Whitford (guitar) and Tom Hamilton (bass). We'll also get a chance to play songs that influenced the band. The game will take heroes through Aerosmith's career, from their first gig to writing cheesy ballads for blockbuster movies (we kid).

"We've put a lot of ideas into the game so that fans can have fun interacting with our music, getting inside our body of work and learning about the band's history," says Perry. "On a larger scale, it's cool for us to be pioneers helping to rebuild the music industry through a format like videogames. It's great for rock since the record companies are struggling to make sense of how things are changing. Fans want to get and experience music in new formats -- and there are going to be some of them who will play the game, then pick up the guitar for real and start bands. It's what's happening now, and it's only going to build more momentum in the future. It's a massive change for the music business."



Xbox360 and PlayStation 3 owners of Guitar Hero III will get a taste of what's to come this weekend. The song "Dream On" will be available to download for free February 16-18 over Xbox Live and the PlayStation Network.

"Not only is songwriting a bitch, but then it goes and has puppies," added Steven Tyler.

IGN is awaiting an explanation as to what that is supposed to mean. Guitar Hero: Aerosmith will ship in June.

Hands-on Okami
An epic Zelda-like adventure -- and yes, you play as a wolf. Read all about the Wii version. New impressions, plus an overload of first-ever 480p direct-feed videos.


Many Nintendo fans have closely followed the Clover Studios-developed Okami, a PlayStation 2 adventure game that debuted in late 2006 to rave reviews and ultimately beat out The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess as IGN's Game of the Year. It was a beautiful and altogether engrossing PS2 endeavor, but many players felt deeply that Capcom's ambitious project belonged on Wii -- both because of its beautiful cel-shaded presentation, which seemed perfectly suited to Nintendo's system, and because of a particular gameplay component in which players used the Dual Shock's analog stick to paint on-screen spells; right away, Nintendo loyalists thought of how much improved this integral mechanic might be with the Wii remote. Unfortunately, after Okami's release, Clover Studios collapsed -- clearly, less than stellar sales of the project couldn't have helped the developer -- and hope for a Wii port began to dwindle. That is, until late last year, when Capcom officially revealed that it had given the original Okami code to third-party studio Ready at Dawn (God of War: Chains of Olympus) and that the company was well underway with the long-overdue Wii port.

Now we're just a month away from Okami's release on Nintendo's console and the question remains, does it play and look as good or better than the PS2 original? We recently sunk upward of six hours into the Wii incarnation to find out and we have the answers in the paragraphs that follow. But first, humor us as we present to you a quick Okami overview -- after all, judging by sales of the original effort, there are still quite a few of you out there who have yet to play Capcom's title.


Okami is an adventure game in the same vein as the Legend of Zelda series. In fact, Capcom's title and Twilight Princess share a number of striking (and difficult to ignore) similarities, not least of which is that you becomes wolves in both games. You play as the Japanese sun goddess Amaterasu, represented in the physical world as a gorgeous white wolf able to perform amazing feats. Having defeated the eight-headed demon Orochi 100 years prior, Amaterasu is summoned forth from statue form after the the evil monstrosity is awakened once more and begins to poison the landscape. Only the sun goddess can master the 13 techniques of the Celestial Brush and restore order to the land. In Capcom's adventure, you will explore vast, stylized world filled with environmental puzzles and a cast of enemy characters, do battle with these foes and use the Wii remote to paint with the Celestial Brush in order to solve puzzles and advance.
The game features a unique visual presentation made to look like traditional Japanese woodblock paintings. On PlayStation 2, the in-world game graphics appear to drawn to life on a virtual landscape textured in parchment paper, meant to harken back to ancient Japanese art. You will notice in our screenshots and videos that while the majority of the visual sense is maintained in the Wii build, the parchment paper texture is conspicuously absent. We suspect this is a filter that Ready at Dawn was unable to accurately translate to Wii. In a side-by-side visual comparison with the PS2 incarnation, we also noticed that the original title sports more subtle bloom work. However, to its credit, the Wii update to the game runs in progressive-scan (480p) and a quasi-16:9 widescreen mode -- we call it "quasi" because it's not full resolution; thin black bars remain on each side of the screen. The framerate differences separating the two versions are negligible, meanwhile. The ported build features a noticeably cleaner look, partly because of the missing parchment filter and partly because it's running in 480p. However, it's worth noting that everything also looks brighter and more vibrant on Nintendo's system.


Okami never looked so good.Whatever visual sacrifices have been introduced in the Wii version are outweighed by the control advancements made to the build. You control Amaterasu with the nunchuk's analog stick and the wolf is effortlessly maneuvered through huge 3D environments as she quests to save the world from the evils of Orochi. The wolf barks / bites and digs with the C and Z buttons respectively, the former useful for carrying items and the latter for finding hidden goodies buried throughout the universe, like food and treasure. The A button on the Wii remote is used for jumping; tap it again when Amaterasu is near a wall or cliff and she'll double-jump up it. The 1 and 2 buttons toggle different camera views and bring up an on-screen map and the plus button skips cinematics, which is new to the Wii incarnation of the game; trust us, after 20 minutes of opening cut-scenes, you'll be thankful.

You simply waggle the Wii remote left and right and Amaterasu will dart forward and attack enemies. You can chain together combos very effectively by motioning left and right with Nintendo's controller and you can even combo in mid-air by leaping up and then gesturing with the Wii remote. It's not always as easy as it sounds, however, to keep a combo going. The simple button taps on the PS2 are easier to pull off in succession, in our experience, but using the Wii remote has a tactile feel and once you get the timing down, the combos will come. (You can extend Amaterasu's combo attacks by purchasing upgrades throughout the adventure.)

You can in Capcom's adventure use an all-powerful brush, which temporarily turns the world into a canvas meant to house paint strokes. Using the brush, you can paint on bridges where they didn't exist before, paint a sun in the sky to transform evening to morning, make slicing strokes to cut through objects and enemies or even paint circles with fuses to summon bombs. Really, though, the process of using the Celestial Brush with the Wii remote is like night and day compared to the PS2 controller -- it's just so much more intuitive, faster, and better. To activate the Brush, you just hold the B-Trigger, at which point the world becomes your canvas. You hold down the A button to use the tool and draw with the Wii remote. Easy.


We went back and played the PS2 iteration of the game in preparation for this preview, and using the Celestial Brush with an analog stick just feels clumsy when compared to the accuracy and speed gained with the Wii remote. Indeed, on PS2, the Celestial Brush feels like a slow, methodical gameplay component -- when you use it, time stops and you can make meticulously planned movements because, frankly, you need to with the analog stick. On Wii, you will very regularly bring up the Brush and make quick, decisive strokes, slicing through gates, summoning bombs, blooming trees or cutting through opponents with calculated speed, and then going right back to exploration without skipping a beat.
One control decision we aren't particularly pleased with, however, is Ready at Dawn's decision to map some of Amaterasu's secondary movements to waggle on the nunchuk. (Never a good idea, in our experience, and yet we realize the developer probably didn't have much choice since it was out of button and analog stick options.) Eventually, you will be able to buy an upgrade, Amaterasu's Fleet Foot, which enables the wolf to dodge forward, backward, left or right during battle and these maneuvers are done by shaking the nunchuk in the appropriate direction. The problem is that your input is rarely accurate; you will shake left and Amaterasu will dodge backward; you'll gesture forward and she'll dodge to the right. It's so unreliable that we never use it. Thankfully, these evade maneuvers are far from necessary and, in fact, you don't even need to buy them if you don't want to.


Beautiful style, 16:9 and 480p display.There are no actual content differences between the two builds of Okami so if you already own the game on PS2 and are looking for something altogether new with the Wii version, well, don't. On the other hand, if you've never played Okami before or just want to play it with dramatically improved Celestial Brush controls, you're in for one heck of a great adventure. Not only is this a beautiful game on Wii, but the world in which you explore is filled with fun challenges and puzzles, many of them requiring you to use the Celestial Brush in different ways. You will, for example, come to a cave with an inscription on its inner wall and you must eventually draw a sun into the illustration in order to light up the area and break through a wall. You might have to slice down an object from a tree using the Brush. In some cases, evil trees will throw their fruit at you and you'll need to slice the hurled objects in mid-air to send them backward at the enemies, at which point you can summon a bloom spell to transform the baddies. This is all great fun and it only scratches the surface of the Okami experience. There is a satisfyingly rich storyline powering the adventure and the quest at large is deep and challenging. Without giving any more specifics away, think of it as a stellar companion piece to Twilight Princess.
Okami ships this March for Wii and you definitely should add it to your collection. We've posted more than 15 new 480p screenshots and a whopping eight new movies (at least one of them over six minutes in length) to our media section. See for yourself how the Wii incarnation compares. We think you'll be pleased.

The first original title from Capcom's Clover Studio -- headed up by Viewtiful Joe producer Atsushi Inaba. Okami takes place in a time when people still believed in the existence of God. The world has become a lifeless place, as shown in the game's use of Hokusai-style Japanese woodblock print visuals. Playing as Ama Terasu, a sun god who takes on the form of a wolf, your goal is to bring life back to the world. Bringing life back to the world involves defeating lots of beasts. With each beast you defeat, the world's life force is restored just a bit, with colors and eventually people appearing.

Redesigned to take advantage of this unique platform, the Wii version sports enhanced graphics and motion controls. Players uses the Wii Remote as the 'celestial brush' in an effort to seal ancient evils once again.

Published by: Capcom

Developed by: Ready At Dawn Studios / Clover Studio

Genre: Adventure
Release Date:
US: March 25, 2008
Japan: Q2 2008
Europe: March 28, 2008

MSRP: $39.99
Also Available On: PlayStation 2

Developer Ready at Dawn recently finished up work on its first Wii project, a port of Capcom's critically acclaimed adventure game, Okami. The developer recently answered a few questions about the porting process and clarified some details about the Wii incarnation of the project.



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IGN: What has it been like working on a product from an original developer which no longer exists?

Ready at Dawn: 'Interesting' to say the least. There were a lot of times where we would have loved to be able to talk to these guys and find out why they did something this way or that way. It definitely made it tougher on us to even get the original PS2 code back up and running.

How big was the Ready at Dawn team which worked on Okami for Wii?

Ready at Dawn: Team 'Deux,' as the rest of the guys at Ready At Dawn have nicknamed us, was made of eight people at its peak. We even got separate offices from the other guys, mainly because we didn't have the space to fit both projects but also because we wanted to make sure we didn't distract each other with the two different games.

IGN: Tell us about the difficulties in attempting to port the game over to Nintendo's console.

Ready at Dawn: Well, first and foremost you have to learn the specificities of the console itself, learn what makes it tick. Then you have to get the code to even compile on the new platform, different processors and different compilers make this a fairly difficult task. Beyond that it was fairly easy to get the barebones of the game engine running and then just add more and more things to get all the game ported over.

IGN: Are there any actual content or story changes or additions from the PS2 release of the game?

Ready at Dawn: We would have loved to be able to but unfortunately we simply didn't have the time to even look into this. It was a very tight schedule just to port the game itself and so we focused on getting that right and decided not to attempt to modify anything with the content. At least we won't get crucified by the Okami purists for messing the game up.

IGN: How are you using the Wii remote and nunchuk with Okami?

Ready at Dawn: The Wiimote is used to control the Celestial Brush, of course, but we also used it to control Amaterasu's attacks and play some of the minigames like the fishing game. You can also use it for the Charge Glaive attack, you charge the Glaive by swinging the Wiimote up and down for example. The nunchuck is used to move around, using the analog stick, but also to perform Amaterasu's Fleetfoot move to avoid attacks. You swing the nunchuk in the desired direction in that case. It doesn't take long to get used to all the control and it's amazingly intuitive.

IGN: Does the game run in 480p and 16:9 widescreen modes on Wii?

Ready at Dawn: Absolutely. This was two of the things that were at the top of our list when we started the port. The game looks awesome as it runs at a higher resolution than the original PS2 game.


IGN: Has anything been sacrificed in the port to Wii? Audio quality, framerate fluidity, texture quality, etc.?
Ready at Dawn: There were a couple of effects that we simply couldn't reproduce exactly on the Wii because the rendering pipelines of both platforms are completely different. We adapted those to look as closely as possible like their PS2 counterparts but they're not exactly the same per say.

IGN: In your opinion, does the game play better or worse on Wii?

Ready at Dawn: I can't go back to playing with the PS2 pad now that I'm used to the Wiimote/nunchuk combination. It's just so much more fluid and intuitive on the Wii. Being able to skip the cutscenes on the Wii is a big plus for me personally too.

IGN: If gamers so desire, can they choose to play the title with a traditional controller – either the classic or the GameCube?

Ready at Dawn: No, as soon as we had the Wiimote working, we realized that there was no going back to the traditional controls.

IGN: Now that you've worked on Wii, would you like to make another game for the console? Perhaps from the ground up? Perhaps, even, an Okami sequel?

Ready at Dawn: As game players we all love the Wii at Ready At Dawn Studios so it's great to get a taste for what it's capable of with Okami, which we're also huge fans of to begin with. We have no plans for another Wii game at this point but never say never, who knows what the future holds.

IGN: What do you want fans to know about your involvement in bringing Okami to Wii?

Ready at Dawn: Okami was a passion project for us, just like any game that we decide to work on. Capcom have been absolutely incredible to work with because these guys are as passionate as we are and just care about the game. Take my word for it, it's very refreshing to see in this industry. We think that everyone will agree that we've done this game justice by porting it to the Wii and we can't wait to see new people discover it on a new platform.

IGN: Any final comment for Wii owners anticipating the project?

Ready at Dawn: You won't be disappointed.

Big Red Button Entertainment has been launched according to its official website. The studio, which was officially incorporated at the beginning of February, was co-founded by two former Naughty Dog employees. Bob Rafai was the former art director at Naughty Dog and had the distinction of being its first employee. He led visual development on Crash Bandicoot and the Jak and Daxter series, as well as co-art directing Uncharted: Drake's Fortune. E. Daniel Arey, Naughty Dog's former senior designer and creative director, has headed up or assisted development on multiple titles, including Gex, Crash Bandicoot, Jak & Daxter and Uncharted: Drake's Fortune. Rafei will assume the role of Chief Visual Officer at the new studio, while Arey will become its Chief Creative Officer.

"Games are now the primary entertainment medium of the 21st century," a statement on the company's website reads. "Our commitment is to make not just fun, engaging and compelling games, but games that everyone can play, and everyone will want to play. We at BRB share this long term vision, intending to grow the gaming market, both in terms of age & gender demographics, as well as in emotional appeal."

According to their site, part of Big Red Button's philosophy is "To make games you want to watch and films you want to play." With a claim that the studio plans "to become the United Artists of Games," Big Red Button announced on their website that they're currently working on six titles in concept development. To help create these games, Big Red Button is actively recruiting for an executive programmer. A senior programmer, designer, technical artists and animators will be added to the team soon.

There's a certain appeal to getting behind the wheel of a big rig. A feeling of power, of command. Of being in charge of the most massive thing to roll out onto the highway. Rig Racer 2 seeks to capture that certain appeal, and does so for the most part – the sense that you're driving a big, bulky bruiser of a machine comes across well. Unfortunately, that's about the only aspect of this game that feels like it's done right. Though it's fun for a few minutes to experience what this budget-priced racer has to offer, you'll soon find yourself wanting to step out of the cab and let the real rig riders take over their trucks again.

Inconsistency is the issue – or at least the first issue. Inconsistency in how your rig responds to its environment. In Rig Racer 2, you take on a set of Gran Turismo style racetracks while riding in one of several different big rigs modeled after those you're familiar with seeing out on the open road. The generic Mack and Peterbilt trucks all have stereotypical trucker names like Bandit or Smoke, and are all adorned with some simple paint job (maybe there's a racing stripe or two).

The inconsistency is that these kinds of trucks belong where you'd expect to find them – out on the open road, not on a set of Gran Turismo style racetracks. The courses that serve as the settings for Rig Racer 2's competitions aren't meant for big rigs at all. They're too small and cramped, and often only wide enough for two rigs to ride side-by-side next to each other at once. It's almost as if the tracks were designed for a different game that had smaller vehicles in mind, but were then recycled for this title (and given the track record of development from Data Design Interactive, that's probably not too far off the truth).



It's kind of like playing with Optimus Prime, except he's stuck in car mode and he's no fun at all.
And further inconsistency comes into play when you inevitably begin to run into things around the race course. Collisions between your truck and your competitors are handled serviceably well – your rig takes visible damage when it wrecks into the opposition, and the same damage afflicts the other drivers too. But it's in collisions with other objects that things start to stop making sense. Trees, for example, bring your truck to a complete stop if you hit them. As do billboards, or fences, or any other obstacle off the side of the road. That's ridiculous – these are huge, hulking big rigs. The trees should be bulldozed and uprooted if I run into one. The billboards should be knocked down, or at least take some sort of damage. But they don't, and you're instead forced to back up in reverse and lose whatever lead you might have had, surely dropping down to 8th place every time it happens.

And it happens fairly often, as the control scheme employed in Rig Racer 2 isn't the most agreeable of designs. You hold the Wii Remote sideways, as in Excite Truck, Mario Kart Wii or Data Design's own other racing games, and you twist it like a steering wheel to turn left and right. It's fine on straightaways and shallow curves, but heading into a hairpin you're going to have to have a lot of luck to make it through cleanly. A brake and handbrake help to correct and get you re-oriented around sharp turns, but then the camera takes a little while to catch up to your new primary vector.

Rig Racer 2 is additionally home to a variety of other frustrations and glitches, like the ability to turn around and drive through a race course in reverse and still have your laps register as completed on occasion – it's an interesting strategy and lets you experience the best crashes the game has to offer as you plow head-on into the seven other rigs coming around the track in the right direction. But turning around can also be troublesome, as if you're the recipient of a particularly powerful impact when you're trying to race through a course legitimately and find yourself facing the wrong direction, you're almost assuredly going to finish in last place. It takes so long to turn your truck around and get it going the right way again (a combination of camera and control issues and the fact that you're driving a big rig) that by the time you right yourself your competition is likely already lapping you where you sit.

And if all that weren't enough, Rig Racer additionally restricts you from enjoying hardly any of the game when you first power it up, only offering two different trucks to drive while making all six of the rest into unlockables. You have to earn money to open up access to them, and earning money is primarily achieved by picking up hovering dollar sign collectibles scattered throughout each racetrack. But the dollar signs are always positioned way off the main road, so if you try to steer over and collect one of them you're pretty much guaranteeing yourself another 8th place finish. Amazing design choice there. (Sarcasm. That's sarcasm.)

Closing Comments
We brought you a review of Myth Makers: Super Kart GP for the Wii just yesterday – it's another racer recently developed by the same team at Data Design Interactive. And the two games have a lot in common, thanks to the developer's tendency to recycle elements and engines between products. The menu is the same, the controls are the same. The issues with the camera and having trouble turning around after collisions on the track are the same. But Rig Racer 2 is ultimately even less worth your while than Myth Makers – that game at least has some fairly likeable characters and a four-player mode. Rig Racer has lifeless, generic trucks and a maximum multiplayer potential of 2. It can be entertaining for a few minutes to command these rigs and watch them run into one another head-on, but Rig Racer 2 is certainly nowhere near worth your money for a full purchase. Give it a rental at best, and then go back to the other, far better racers available on Wii.

IGN Ratings for Rig Racer 2 (Wii)
Rating Description
out of 10 click here for ratings guide
3.0 Presentation
Basic, uninspired menus, no preamble or fanfare before or after races, and several loading screens. The same presentation as other Data Design games.
3.5 Graphics
Very little detail is used overall, but the fact that your truck takes visible damage and can catch on fire is a little bit redeeming.
2.0 Sound
Rig Racer 2 might take the prize for the most annoying sound effect element on Wii – you can hold down your rig's airhorn and constantly blast out the speakers.
3.0 Gameplay
A recycled racing engine that we've seen before, with similar collision and control issues as earlier titles. A big rig should be able to knock over a tree. Come on.
3.5 Lasting Appeal
A fair amount of unlockable tracks, but too much stuff is locked down to begin with. You only get two trucks to choose from in the beginning.
3.0
Bad OVERALL
(out of 10 / not an average)

Published by: Bold Games (Destineer)

Developed by: Data Design Interactive

Genre: Racing
Release Date:
US: January 2, 2008
Europe: February 29, 2008

MSRP: $19.99
ESRB Content Descriptors: Mild Violence

Also Available On: PlayStation 2, PC

Eidos Interactive Ltd., one of the world's leading publishers and developers of entertainment software, has confirmed that Death Jr.: Root of Evil, a spine-tingling, humorous platform shooter from developer Backbone Entertainment, will be released on Nintendo Wii in summer 2008.

Take on the role of the Grim Reaper's teenage son, Death Jr., as he and his friend Pandora, whilst arguing over a cocoon they've collected for a school biology project, accidently release an evil and powerful spirit called Furi. In order to stop Furi and her hordes of nasty minions, Death Jr. and Pandora must team up with their wacky group of friends and fight their way across a series of crazy, fun-filled locations.

"Death Jr.: Root of Evil is a compelling and action-packed game experience coupled with lots of humour as gamers play as the Grim Reaper's misfortunate teenage son," said Ray Livingston, Brand Manager at Eidos. "Played solo or together with a friend, Death Jr.: Root of Evil is a great addition to your Wii collection if you enjoy fun-filled, challenging platform games."

Play as Death Jr. or Pandora or choose to play cooperatively with a friend using both characters. Battle your way through 19 levels, fighting over 60 unique enemies and bosses in a seamless blend of 3D platforming and intense shoot 'em up action. Use Death Jr's famed scythe and Pandora's whip, as well lots of cool upgradeable weapons including everything from twin pistols to C4 Hamsters! Unlock new exciting moves and combos and learn to perform them to great effect using the Wii Remote.

Death Jr.: Root of Evil is set for release in summer 2008 on Nintendo Wii.


About Eidos Interactive Ltd
Eidos Interactive Ltd is part of SCi Entertainment Group Plc (SEG) one of the world's leading publishers and developers of entertainment software. Eidos consists of publishing operations across Europe and the US and several development studios including Crystal Dynamics, IO Interactive, Beautiful Game Studios, Eidos Studios Hungary, Eidos Sweden and Pivotal Games. The Group has a valuable combined portfolio of intellectual property including: Tomb Raider, Hitman, Deus Ex, Championship Manager, Carmageddon, Battlestations: Midway, the Conflict series and Just Cause.

Some of the titles currently in development include Tomb Raider: Underworld, Highlander and Just Cause 2.


Published by: Eidos Interactive

Developed by: Backbone Entertainment

Genre: Platformer
Number of Players: 1-2
Release Date:
US: Q2 2008

Also Available On: PlayStation Portab

There's no stopping Nintendo's brawler over in Japan. Smash Bros. X, as Smash Bros. Brawl is known in its home country, topped the charts in its second week, pulling 251,789 unit sales, double that of second place. As reported earlier this week, Brawl has topped the million sold mark faster than any Wii game before it.

The Media Create charts covering 2/4 to 2/10 have newcomer Gundam: Giren's Ambition for the PSP in second with 122,522 units, beating out a bunch of older titles: Wii Fit (Nintendo, Wii, 65,163), Devil May Cry 4 (Capcom, PS3, 32,045), Mario & Sonic at Peking Olympics (Nintendo, DS, 25,899), and Wii Sports (Nintendo, Wii, 20,978).

One more newbie made it into the top 10 as Konami's L the proLogue to Death Note for the DS took 7th place with 20,493 units sold. It beat Family Ski (Bandai Namco Games, Wii, 18,108), Tales of Destiny Director's Cut (Bandai Namco Games, PS2), and Mario Party DS (Nintendo, DS, 16,488).

The hardware order this week remains unchanged from last week, although the numbers are way down for a few systems. Wii took the top spot again, beating the PSP's 75,912 and the DS Lite's 60,464. PS3 took a major hit down to 23,985. Below it were PS2 at 11,038 units and Xbox 360 at 3,615 units.

wow super smash bros brawl must rock for all those copies to be sold

Sure, we all love Guitar Hero, but there's no denying that certain classic songs -- and several notable bands -- are conspicuous by their absence on the various versions of the game to date. Be it Zeppelin or The Beatles or something far more esoteric like "Dueling Banjos" (yes, that "Dueling Banjos"!), we all have a pretty good idea of what we'd like to see included in the next installment of the ever-popular title. And that's how IGN's Guitar Hero IV Wish List was born, a rundown in no particular order of some of the tracks that we think are sorely missing from GH. Have a look at our picks below, and then be sure to comment at the bottom of the page on what you would like to see/hear/play on the next version of the game!




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Song: "Back in Black"
Band: AC/DC
Album: Back in Black (1980)
Rock Out: These pioneers of hard rock do not license their music out to just anyone, much to the eternal dismay of Guitar Hero players everywhere. The indelible opening guitar riff of "Back in Black" could sell a Guitar Hero IV all by itself, once again reminding us that the eccentric juxtaposition of Angus Young's schoolboy uniform and his instantly catchy and hard-driving playing is eternal. Plus, Brian Johnson's borderline shrill lyrics still give us goosebumps (in a metal kind of way, of course).



Song: "Comfortably Numb"
Band: Pink Floyd
Album: The Wall (1979)
Rock Out: This track has been on our minds again thanks to its inclusion not just in Martin Scorsese's The Departed (taken from Roger Waters' performance of it with Van Morrison and The Band at the 1990 The Wall concert in Berlin) but also in a couple of The Sopranos' key final episodes, including the segment when Christopher goes numb for the last time. Written by Waters and David Gilmour, who share singing duties too, "Comfortably Numb"'s anesthetized feel is punctuated by Gilmour's nigh-on magical guitar solos. Not the most rocking track in the traditional sense, but one of the true greats nonetheless.



Song: "The Unforgiven"
Band: Metallica
Album: Metallica (1991)
Rock Out: Like some kind of heavy-metal Western theme -- think "Gunfight at the Headbangers' Corral" -- "The Unforgiven" has Guitar Hero written all over it with its slow but steady ballad. James Hetfield's rhythm guitar combines with Kirk Hammett's lead for a track, like the album's "Enter Sandman" and "Sad But True," that is quite memorable and catchy. Plus, the song's sequel, "The Unforgiven II," could then show up on Guitar Hero V!