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Mr. Miyamoto has done it again. Another
unique, creative, and original game. What does Shigeru Miyamoto, the
genius behind Nintendo software, do in is free time? If you guessed play
video games, you are incorrect. The answer is…Gardening. The
mastermind behind games like Zelda and Mario, and what does he do with
his free time, Garden. Hey if it works for him, I say all game
developers take up gardening. So where did he get the idea for his
latest game, Pikmin? The garden, of course. Pickmin was Nintendo’s one
surprise game of E3. No one knew it existed before Nintendo’s Pre-E3
show on May 16th.
Nintendo is stepping into a new genre with Pikmin. But remember this is
Nintendo we’re talking about. Every time Nintendo tries a new genre,
they ace it. Pikmin is a Real-Time Strategy. With the help of the
simplicity of the Gamecube’s controller, Pikmin is also much more
simplified than most Real-Time Strategies. That is not to say it isn’t
fun. Simple does not mean easy, it means the game has a short learning
curve, which should be considered a good thing.
Pikmin is described as an "inventive life simulation and action
strategy title". The game requires you to think on your feet and to
realize the importance of taking care of the ant-like Pikmin. If you
don’t keep a mutually beneficial relationship with the creatures,
completion of the game will be difficult.
You are a space man. Your ship crashed into a comet, and you landed on a
foreign planet. After colliding with the comet, your ship broke into
tons and tons of pieces. It is your goal to collect all the pieces and
to get back into space. Also the atmosphere is filled with a poisonous
gas, preventing you to take off your space suit. After looking around
the planet you discover, small creature that sprout from the ground like
flowers. If you pull on the leaf or flower on the top of the Pikmin
creatures, and they will be willing to help you on your quest to find
the pieces of your ship. You cannot accomplish your tasks with out these
creatures. You need them to fight monsters, breakdown walls, and other
dirty work, which you could otherwise not accomplish.
There are three different types of Pikmin, Buds, Leafs, and Flowers. The
type of Pikmin is decided by what they have their head. The different
types of Pikmin, have different characteristics and can be used for
different tasks. You can raise different types of Pikmin, which will
alter your success.
Mr. Miyamoto states, “The backgrounds are really beautiful and the
general idea of the game is based off a group of ants. Actually, for all
the resources for the backgrounds in the game, we walked around my
neighborhood and took pictures and put them in the game. You can
actually see the light of the sun go around as the day goes by. So
actually in this game these ant-like Pikmin, you take them out and find
food for them and take it back to the nest and you get more Pikmin. As
you get more Pikmin they can go out and build bridges and tear down
walls, build fortresses and that is really the general idea behind the
game. And actually these Pikmin are like little animals but they are
also like little plants. You plant them in the ground and let them stay
there and they grow. They will grow a leaf and first and then a bud and
that will turn into a flower. And actually when you pull them out of the
ground either as a leaf or as a bud or as a flower they are going to
have different abilities depending upon what stage they are in. Really I
want this game to be a game where when you play it and then you go and
walk around outside and you look down at your feet and say 'are there
really Pikmin down there somewhere?'"
The control is supposedly quite easy. One
you have your Pikmin following you, you guide them with a round target.
You can throw the pikmin one by one by using the B-button. IGN states
that, “to defeat an enemy you must maneuver yourself around the
backside of the creature and inundate him by throwing a bunch of Pikmin
on his back. If you throw Pikmin directly at him, he'll simply gobble
them up.” Calling the Pikmin back is simple, one tap of the A-button
and they all come back. You can also control all of the pikmin at once
by using the C-stick this is useful for tasks like breaking down walls. |
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Topic ONE here
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Pickmin
was Nintendo’s one surprise game of E3.
Nintendo
is stepping into a new genre with Pikmin. But remember this is Nintendo
we’re talking about. Every time Nintendo tries a new genre, they ace
it.
he game
requires you to think on your feet... |
