Nintendo announces new Wii U games and more

The video game company Nintendo held another Nintendo Direct video series this past Wednesday where Nintendo president Satoru Iwata announced many future games for the Wii U.

One of the big announcements involved the revealing of not one, but two HD Zelda games coming to the Wii U.

The first of the two Zelda games is an HD revamp of the 2003 Nintendo Gamecube game, “The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker.”

 The HD overhaul will boast new features including new lighting to enhance the game’s visuals, being able to play the entire game on the GamePad, Miiverse integration and additional features that have yet to be announced. “Wind Waker HD” will release some time within the next several months to satisfy gamers until the next Zelda game comes out, which was another big announcement.

Though there were no specific details given about the game, the first original HD Zelda’s existence was confirmed during Nintendo Direct and is in its early development stages.

 However, Zelda series producer Eiji Aonuma talked briefly about the game. He said the team behind the next Zelda game is “rethinking the conventions of Zelda.” These conventions include the series’ tradition of going through dungeons in a specific order and playing through the story alone. Whether the latter means cooperative play or multiplayer is unknown.

In addition to two Zelda games, it was also announced that a few other games will be shown and/or playable for the first time at this year’s Electronic Entertainment Expo (or E3) in early June. These games include the next Mario Kart, the first 3D Mario for the Wii U and the next installment of Super Smash Bros., which will be on both the Wii U and Nintendo 3DS.

Although no details were given about Mario Kart Wii U, and the next Super Smash Bros. had already been confirmed at E3 in 2011, the next 3D Mario is being developed by the team behind “Super Mario Galaxy,” “Super Mario Galaxy 2” and “Super Mario 3D Land.”

“Fire Emblem X Shin Megami Tensei” was also unveiled for the Wii U and is being co-developed by Intelligent Systems and Atlus. This is the first time the “Fire Emblem” and “Shin Megami Tensei” series will crossover into one game.

Monolith Studios, creators behind “Xenoblade Chronicles” and the Xeno series, is making a new RPG for the Wii U as well. It was not confirmed what exactly the game is, but it is presumed to be another entry in the Xeno series when the end of a trailer for the game showed a large red “X.” The trailer also contained graphics and combat that strongly resembles “Xenoblade Chronicles.”

Satoru Iwata also announced the Virtual Console for the Wii U is coming in April starting with downloadable NES and Super Nintendo titles that can be played using the GamePad only. If you already purchased a game on the Wii’s Virtual Console but want to play it on Wii U and GamePad, you will need to pay a $1 fee. You do not necessarily have to do it since you can go into Wii mode on the Wii U and play them there. The NES and SNES games will also have Miiverse functionality.

A new Yoshi game will also release on the Wii U, making it the first console game starring the green dinosaur since the Nintendo 64 game “Yoshi’s Story,” which released nearly 15 years ago. The development team behind the new title is the same team who created “Kirby’s Epic Yarn,” which had a cloth and yarn art style similar to what the new Yoshi game looks like. It is even being supervised by Takashi Tezuka, director of “Yoshi’s Story and “Yoshi’s Island.”

A new “Wii Party” game was also shown. Appropriately titled “Wii U Party,” it will be a mini-game compilation akin to its party-game predecessor.

The plethora of announcements made the day of many Nintendo fans across the world and has them quite excited for the Wii U.

rkey@thepinelog.com

Twitter: @Robbie_Key_V