Nintendo World 2011 – Day Two Impressions

On January 9, Nintendo World 2011 continued onto its second day out of three. Falling on a Sunday, when fewer people in Japan are working or in school, the second day turned out to be considerably busier than the first. There were more families in attendance, and the Nintendo 3DS demo kiosk wait times were somewhat longer. The actual playable demos and trailers remained the same, although Nintendo placed cases of the upcoming 3DS launch titles on display, which were not there on the first day.

Aside from another demonstration of AR Games and the 3DS camera, the second day of Nintendo World 2011 gave Capcom, the prominent Japanese third party publisher and developer, time to demonstrate their three 3DS titles to the attendees.Capcom held two stage shows: one focusing on 3DS launch title Super Street Fighter IV 3D Edition and one focusing on the two 3DS Resident Evil titles, Resident Evil Revelations and Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D.

Super Street Fighter IV 3D Edition’s stage show, hosted by the game’s producer Yoshinori Ono, was up first. Ono started with a general history of the Street Fighter series, occasionally asking the audience to answer his simple questions (such as asking what the first Street Fighter game on a Nintendo system was). He even poked fun at the various incarnations of the series and how they relate to each other, such as Street Fighter Zero (known as Street Fighter Alpha in North America) coming after Street Fighter II and Alpha itself spawning two numbered sequels.

Ono demonstrated SSFIV3D’s various features, many of which take advantage of the 3DS’s capabilities. He showed that the game has 35 playable characters, which all have three costumes players can choose from: Normal, Arrange and Special Arrange. The game can be played competitively worldwide against any regional version of Super Street Fighter IV 3D Edition using local Wi-Fi connectivity or online play. There’s even an interesting featured called “Channel Live,” which lets someone view a fight between two other players.

Super Street Fighter IV 3D Edition takes advantage of the 3DS’s 3D capabilities by offering 3D-perspective battles. Street Fighter is typically a 2D series, but this game allows for the camera angles to show a fight from an angle, with the game mechanics remaining the same. Ono even demonstrated the difference side by side with the help of Capcom staff, and players can switch between 2D and 3D anytime during a match. Other modes such as Arcade and Versus round out the game’s offerings, while players can collect figures for completion’s sake. The game launches alongside the 3DS on February 26 for 4,800 yen ($58).

The Resident Evil stage show was also filled with plenty of new information. Hosted by Masachika Kawata, the producer of recent Resident Evil titles and Takayuki Hama, who was in charge of Resident Evil Zero and the GameCube remake of Resident Evil to Wii, they held a brief demonstration of Revelations played by Hama. The very brief demonstration used the same demo as the show, with Jill as the playable character inside a cruise ship. Hama did not want to play the game in a violent manner, so shot the B.O.W. below its torso before dying. Kawata promised that Resident Evil Revelations would contain true horror elements missing in Resident Evil 5.

Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D, was also covered at the event. The premise of the game is lifted from The Mercenaries mini-game in both Resident Evil 4 and Resident Evil 5, which is a time attack score game. Players earn points by killing monsters within short time limits; the more enemies killed within a time slot, then the higher the score. Although Capcom admits that there will be more playable characters in the final product, Claire, Chris, Hunk and Krauser were the ones shown in the trailer, and they all have different weapons, moves and strengths. Only Claire had not been used in Mercenaries before. Capcom confirmed that this game and Revelations run on MT Framework Mobile, a handheld version of their main multiplatform engine. Kawata concluded by showing a new trailer of The Mercenaries 3D showing various environments and stages from Resident Evil 4 and Resident Evil 5. While accommodated for the 3DS’s different capabilities, smaller screens and 3D capability, the visuals remain surprisingly similar to the games that they are based on. Kawata hopes the game launches not too far from the February 26 3DS launch, but pricing and release dates have yet to be announced.

For Capcom fans, day two of Nintendo World 2011 is clearly the strongest day of the three-day event. They were able to see three of the better-looking third party 3DS games in motion and even learn new details about them. The event continues into its third and final day on Monday, January 10, which is actually a holiday in Japan.