14 DAY TRIAL // At E3 2014, most of the Nintendo booth, which was pretty large, was focused on Super Mario Bros., the title that the company expects to launch this year in order to completely turn around the current sales situation of the Wii U, while boosting the 3DS handheld.
The game was playable and the company ran a huge tournament that allowed the best video game players that loved the series to show off their skills and test our the new characters and powers that would be included.
Super Smash Bros. managed to capture the attention of a large number of people during E3 2014 and I saw gamers who found it almost impossible to separate themselves from the controller after playing a few matches, which is a testament to the addictive core mechanics.
The team also talked about the new The Legend of Zelda during its press briefing, a game that’s designed to use an open world structure and to also introduce innovation to both the exploration and the combat aspect of the title.
Unfortunately, the title was not present on the show floor in any way and fans of the franchise will probably have to wait until 2015 to get another look at gameplay or details about the core story.
Mario Maker might be another big hit for the company as long as the development team manages to make it both easy and fast to put together levels, using a variety of styles from the history of the series, and to then share them with other fans.
One of the most interesting reveals at E3 2014 was that of the Amiibo line of NFC-powered figures, which has the potentiality to revolutionize the way a variety of titles are played, but the amount of details offered at the moment is too limited to get a clear picture of the initiative.
Nintendo is still a powerful company, even if it might never be able to reach the same level of success that it enjoyed during the original Wii era.
The Wii U is still selling well below expectations, but the launch of Mario Kart 8 has shown that a solid video game experience can significantly improve its numbers in the short term.
E3 2014 Highlight – Super Smash Bros. – the brawler looks great, one of the first video games that delivers high quality graphics on the Wii U and runs with no noticeable issues, and the variety of characters will clearly make it a must-buy for all those who are long-term fans of Nintendo.