_{Jamie Balfour's}Personal blog

On Friday, two of my most anticipated games are set to launch - Pokemon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire and Super Smash Bros for Wii U. The excitment is now building up as the moment approaches. I can foresee my entire weekend being spent playing Super Smash Bros and all the time on the bus spent playing Pokemon.

I just wanted to express my love for these games and eternalise them in a blog post.

Recently, the 50 things you should see that are coming to Super Smash Bros Wii U was released. 

I think the best couple of things to come to the game include:

• 6 and 8 player Smash! Play with up to 8 players in one match.
• Parallel stages or dual-plane stages. These are stages with multiple planes in them meaning that two kinds of battle can take place on the stage.
• The stage builder. This looks awesome. Draw using the Wii U tablet to create the stage, giving more flexibility.
• Bigger stages - Palutena's Temple looks awesome! 
• Danger Zones - this damages you or KO you if your damage is higher than 100%.
• The Great Cave Offensive - from Kirby, it looks really good.

The stage builder

Jungle Hijinx is a two plane stage.

Notes about controllers when playing 8-Player Smash:

• Wii U GamePad (Max 1)
• Wii Remote or Wii Remote Plus* (Max 7)
• Wii U Pro Controller (Max 7)
• Nintendo GameCube controller** (Max 8)
• Nintendo 3DS series system*** (Max 8)

* Includes expansion controllers (such as the Nunchuk or Classic Controller Pro).
** Two GameCube Controller Adapters for Wii U accessories are required to connect eight GameCube controllers (each sold separately)
*** In order to use a Nintendo 3DS as a controller, each Nintendo 3DS system must have Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS.

There is so much more, but I wanted to highlight the best things here. You can watch the whole video here.

Nintendo never cease to amaze me (a bit like Apple, in some way) with the release of new games and it's no different with Super Smash Bros for Wii U and Super Smash Bros for 3DS.

I've got the game for the 3DS and I must say it works well and I was very pleasantly surprised by how well it works. It's also highly addictive and very good fun. But I'm still even further intrigued by the Wii U version which is to be released in late November.

Nintendo released a hugely shocking revelation today that caught me buy surprise - the release of a new character, coming to Wii U. To find out who this character is, watch the Nintendo Direct tomorrow (although I'll probably post about it here anyway).

Here's a snapshot of what to expect at the event:

My last post mentioned that Minecraft 1.8 was released just two weeks ago this Wednesday. Now in a slightly saddening way Microsoft announced it had bought the company behind it - Mojang.

Now this is not necessarily a bad thing, just a worrying thing (there is no way to tell which way it will go at the moment). Minecraft has been nice as an indie game, albeit a very successful one, but now it will just join another collection of games Microsoft produces. 

I have written numerous times that Microsoft try too hard to enter every marketplace and product range out there.In my opinion, they ruined some of their best products out there such as integrating Windows Live Messenger with Skype, Nokia by giving them Windows Phone and my personal favourite, Rare or "RareWare" back in the day by transforming them from a small company to one that works for Microsoft.

Analysts have said that Microsoft should break up into smaller companies but unfortunately they are still not going that way and obtaining more and more smaller companies.

I just hope that Mojang and Minecraft are not consumed by Microsoft and become a tiny little project nobody works on.

Click here for Microsoft's take on the aquisition

Although it was some few days ago, on the 2nd September Minecraft 1.8 was released! I just wanted to mention this on my blog!

Today a couple of significant photos were posted about the full character roster in Super Smash Bros for 3DS and Wii U. The photo confirmed characters not featured on the Smash Bros website but apparently a Japanese demo was released with the full character roster.

To me the proof of this is found on the Smash Bros wiki. This seems to have a collection of all the characters confirmed.

The characters Nintendo has not yet confirmed to be returning to the new Smash Bros game from Brawl are as follows:

• Falco
• Game and Watch
• Ganondorf
• Jigglypuff
• Ness
• Wario

Also returning is the Melee favourite Dr Mario! What a surprise this was too! Also note, the Jigglypuff and Wario both do not appear in Mashable's picture, but others have posted pictures of them. 

New characters that have apparently leaked include:

• Dark Pit (!)
• Duck Hunt Dog

To see an outline of all the characters, the Wiki is best for this.

This photo was taken from a Japanese copy of the demo

To see the whole post have a look at this post on Mashable. 

The next few months and the remainder of 2014 will see some really awesome games being released!

Nintendo

My Flygon plush Pokemon and I are so happy with the list of Nintendo games!

Nintendo are releasing the best games in my opinion.

• Super Smash Bros for 3DS has got to be the biggest portable game release for me ever (other than Pokemon games). On 3rd October 2014, Nintendo will release the long awaited Super Smash Bros 4. The release will be the debut for Smash Bros on a portable console and hopes to gain more of an audience this way (albeit they have always been reasonably popular games on the whole).
• Also on it's way to the portable Nintendo console are my favourite generation of Pokemon games remastered; Ruby and Sapphire. The games will be named Pokemon Omega Ruby and Pokemon Alpha Sapphire. Generation III was by far my favourite generation of Pokemon because of it's fluid story and the fact that Dragon Pokemon finally took off, particularly Flygon. The game is incredibly exciting for me personally, and I'm sure other Generation III fans feel the same. We're going to see that in stores on November 28th 2014.
• Then there is Hyrule Warriors as well. The Zelda game that changes the idea of Zelda a bit and goes for a 'hack and slash' approach looks incredibly good fun. With stunning graphics and excellent visuals, this game looks like it will stand out as one of those excellent Wii U games (I'm so glad I bought a Wii U at the very start). That is to be released on 19th September 2014.
• After all of that, there is still Super Smash Bros for Wii U to be released! It looks even more exciting than the previous bunch of already exciting games. The Wii U version with it's absolutely awesome graphics is set up for one of the best launches for the Wii U. Nintendo surely can't go wrong with this - there are already three generations of this game that have been best sellers on their respective console.

PC

• For the PC, there are two games that took my interest, namely GTA V and Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor. GTA V is also being released on PS4 and Xbox One on the same day, although there is still no confirmed date for either game.

PS4

This is as far as I go with next generation gaming, as I may get a PS4 in the future.

• For the PS4, The Last of Us: Remastered is the remastered version of the PS3 release that already looked awesome enough. But anyway, this is a remake of a game thats not even all that old (now why didn't they wait and release it on PS4 in the first place?)

I've definitely left some games out so feel free to comment.

I adored the GameCube. I have games for that have a total value of around £500+ which is incredible.

Games like The Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess and the Legend of Zelda The Wind Waker, Wario Land, Mario Kart Double Dash, Pikmin and Pikmin 2, Final Fantasy Chrystal Chronicles, Pokemon Coliseum and Pokemon Channel, Billy Hatcher and The Giant Egg, Metroid Prime and Metroid Prime Echoes, Metal Arms Glitch In The System, F-Zero AX/GX, Doshin The Giant, Super Smash Bros Melee and Super Mario Sunshine were among the little purple box's best titles in my opinion. The console had great controllers and had good graphics for it's generation.

It's successor, the Wii, may have been the most successful console of that generation to date, but it certainly was not the greatest console ever made. I'm sure a few of my friends would undoubtedly agree that the GameCube holds that category.

What about the Xbox 360?

Whilst to so many people out there, the Xbox 360 is the console of consoles, to me it most definitely was not that. Throughout the years of the 360's life, I managed to find just four games that I enjoyed, namely Halo 3, Halo Reach, Banjo Kazooie (I have this on my Nintendo 64 as well) and Metal Arms Glitch In The System (my brother also owns this on his PS2). I can hardly say I loved the 360, as my original purpose to buying it was specifically for system links and online play of Halo 3.

There is no doubt, I disliked the Xbox 360 as a console.

Ok then, PS3?

Well the PS3 had a bigger impact for me. I genuinely got it as a Blu Ray player with access to games at the same time. I originally got the Metal Gear Solid 4 bundle and when I started to play MGS4, did not like it.

After trying to get into it, I really did fall in love with that game. In fact, it's one of the games on my list of games that I complete once a year. The game was fabulous and that continued on to my next favourite PS3 games, MotorStorm Apocalypse and then inFamous 2. I then downloaded the first three Spyro games, Mickey's Wild Adventure, C&C, C&C Red Alert and could continue to play my old PS1 games (Croc, Croc 2, James Bond Tomorrow Never Dies).

Overall, I liked the PS3 better than the Xbox 360, especially as a system, but still not over the GameCube.

To the point

Now, the point of this post was about the relationship between the GameCube and the Wii U. It's clear to me that the Wii U has a wide range of games, but there are some games focused more at the `serious` gamer (which I certainly had lost since 2003 until Halo 3 came out in 2007, the only serious games I played were PC games). However, there have never been so many brilliant games on the one console since I have become a serious gamer again. So far, after less than a year, I have a total of 8 games for my Wii U, I already own just under two thirds of my Xbox 360 library which had a total of 13 games. I also own 15 Virtual Console games for my Wii U.

Now, with the Wii U bringing back the serious gamers with the Pro Controller and the awesome new GamePad, I can see another GameCube.

To date, we have had some really awesome games such as Nintendo Land, ZombieU, Pikmin 3, New Super Mario Bros U, Game & Wario and Rayman Legends, all of which feel like, well, GameCube titles. There were countless titles for the GameCube with success. Third party games were good, and the GameCube was considered the Resident Evil player's console (just ask Greg Innes, one of my friends from back in school who holds Resident Evil time trial records), we had awesome games like Metal Arms Glitch In The System, James Bond NightFire and Final Fantasy Chrystal Chronicles but the GameCube relied on Nintendo to release the awesome games such as Sunshine and Wind Waker.

Now you may notice, all the third parties such as trashy EA and Bethesda have already announced a lack of support and interest in the Wii U. Also, so far the Wii U has been incredibly unpopular, just as the GameCube was. Could this mean Nintendo end up making the majority of the games to a very high quality standard just as they did with the GameCube to keep up and try and win back it's gamers?

The line up for the Wii U is incredibly Nintendo-published with loads of games like Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze, Super Mario 3D World, Mario Kart 8, Super Smash Bros 4 and the two new Zelda games (one being a remake of one of the greatest games to have ever existed, and one of the first to ever get 97% or above from GamesMaster magazine). We could even see a new Metroid game or F-Zero (both would be nice!).

So will the Wii U replicate the GameCube's brilliance?

Just two searches that I decided to do on both Bing and Google and look at the results!

Google users search more for why "the Xbox One is bad" and Bing users search for why "the Xbox One is amazing".

You can share this on Facebook if you like.

I have to agree with Google here!

Simply as the title says, this is my list of games that I will be getting for the Wii U this year and next year! The ones in bold are the most important.

1. Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze
2. Game and Wario
3. The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD
4. Mario Kart 8
5. Pikmin 3
6. Rayman Legends
7. Scribblenauts Unlimited
8. Super Luigi U
9. Super Mario 3D World
10. Super Smash Bros Wii U (I will probably get the 3DS version as well)
11. Wii Party U
12. Wonderful 101

Edit: here is the list of games now with ones I now own or are preordered (with the strikethrough):

• Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze
• Game and Wario
• The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD
• Mario Kart 8
• Pikmin 3
• Rayman Legends
• Scribblenauts Unlimited
• Super Luigi U
• Super Mario 3D World
• Super Smash Bros Wii U
• Wii Party U
• Wonderful 101