NHL 13

It's too bad that EA Sports doesn't have any competition for the hockey gaming market anymore. While the previous two editions of its long-standing hockey franchise were impressively playable--if not exactly groundbreaking refinements of the superb game that was NHL 11--too little of note has been added this time around. EA Sports is really pushing things this year with a game that incorporates nothing significantly new aside from arcade-style hitting, more fighting, and a lame re-creation of NHL 94.

Playing in Boston is the Pitts!

It has now been two decades since NHL 94 changed hockey gaming forever, so EA is marking this with what's ostensibly a souped-up version of the usual release. But just like in Madden 25, there isn't much here worth blowing out the candles over. Game modes are similar to those offered last year. You still play one-off matches, get into careers running a player or a whole franchise, take on GM duties, mess around with Hockey Ultimate Team card-collecting, relive big games from last season in the expanded NHL Moments Live, and take the whole shebang online for multiplayer games, tournaments, and leagues.

Controls are identical to what was offered last year, save for the addition of a one-button deke move and some finicky dangles that are tough to pull off on a regular basis. And like last year, some moves are still overpowered, most notably poke-checking. You can control the nuances of nearly every stride and shot, or drop down to basic button-pushing as was offered in 1994. The game continues to include most of the international hockey world, from Major Junior in Canada and the elite European leagues to the NHL and its minor-pro AHL affiliate clubs. Team rosters are a little messed up, though, apparently dating back to June, and even the first downloadable update includes some noticeable mistakes and omissions, like the absence of the new division names that were announced in July.

Graphics and sound have been ported over almost intact from last year's game. Visuals remain very good, with impressive animations and TV-accurate depictions of players. The broadcast duo of Gary Thorne and Bill Clement spouts the same lines as before, the sound effects are ultrafamiliar, and the soundtrack includes the standard alt-rock lineup of new and old tunes where the most prominent track is Wolfmother's "Joker and the Thief" from its 2005 debut disc.

Red vs Blue: The rivalry lives on.

Additions are present, though they don't amount to much. The big new feature change is that the Be a Pro franchise mode, where you play an up-and-coming phenom or an existing star, has been converted to a slightly more elaborate role-playing experience called Live the Life. It never rises above being more than a half-baked version of what 2K Sports has been doing with its NBA 2K series, where you gain endorsements, design shoes, and even mess around with the media to make a name for yourself. Live the Life functions similarly, but there's no meat on this bone. Interactions are handled through bland text screens. You choose from several possible answers when teams quiz you before the draft, for instance, or simply say yea or nay when sponsors come calling with deals like putting your toothless mug on billboards in exchange for cash.

The results of how you mouth off to your team or the press directly translate to scores given to four audiences--fans, teammates, management, and family--that govern how things work off the ice. Be too much of a prima donna, and your team and management hate you, and might just trade you out of town. It's all too boring and rigid to feel authentic. Scores go up and down immediately after you finish answering questions, making the whole thing seem like you're painting a good guy like John Tavares or a nut like Steve Downie by the numbers, rather than creating a real hockey player.

The other headline new feature is NHL 94 mode. This is a retro option where you play arcade hockey just like you did in the Clinton era. It's a great idea, although it doesn't include many actual retro touches. The mode acts more like a dumbed-down NHL 14 sped up and locked to an old-school top-down camera. You get the distinctive blue-tinted ice, stars under players, 16-bit sound effects, and the zippy action that made NHL 94 so great back in the day. But the game uses the new graphics engine, mostly modern sound effects, and the current rosters.

Never have so many men loved an inanimate object so much.

Other modern touches that could have been more meaningful, like online multiplayer and league play, aren't supported in this mode. Ultimately, it's as if EA Sports couldn't decide between going full retro with the complete 1994 game or doing a modernized take on a classic, so it compromised and did neither. The result is barely a passing nod to this legendary hockey game, with the most standout detail being the bleepy-bloopy music you might remember well from long-ago marathons on the Sega Genesis.

Gameplay changes are also very slight in NHL 14. This is the second year of EA Sports' newest physics engine, but the action on the ice isn't noticeably smoother this time out. Granted, the skating physics are still very good. Momentum continues to be extremely well handled, especially when it comes to sharp turns and stops. Opposing defensemen get really aggressive in front of the net, and it's routine to see the net knocked off its moorings when forwards drive hard into the crease.

Collision detection has been altered to make matches more hit-happy. Now you can lay out opponents just by skating into them with momentum, and you can set guys up in the trolley tracks by hitting them. This adds more of an arcade feel on the ice, with players getting launched into the boards or sent sprawling during virtually every shift. Hitting has been amped up beyond what happens in the authentic NHL, but not to the point where you can turn a player into a Ping-Pong ball that bounces around hammering all comers. You also still have to line up players before you can hit them. Going for the big hit often leaves you out of position and out of the play.

Replays have come a long way since the old 'video goal judge' system.

One weird aspect of the emphasis on hitting is how hits coexist with penalties. There's feast-or-famine mentality, where you either get nailed a lot or get away with murder. Players on the receiving end of your hits turn into the boards a lot, resulting in instant penalties for boarding or hitting from behind. This applies a significant potential cost to acting like a tough guy and stepping up to make bone-crushing hits, which is fair and lifelike, all in all. But this somewhat tight interpretation of the rules goes right out the window when it comes to how much time you're given to level a puck carrier. You can demolish an opposing player a good few seconds after he's gotten rid of the puck and receive no penalty for the late hit. That's not so fair and lifelike, even while it can be satisfying when you're dishing out the hit, not taking it.

Along the same rough-and-tumble lines, fighting has been changed dramatically. Scraps now take place as part of the action. Fights aren't given the big production that they've been given in recent years, where the camera switches to a dramatic first-person view whenever players drop the gloves. Now, brawls take place as part of the play and are fought while looking through the usual third-person in-game camera. Where fights were rarer and more sideshow-like last year, now they happen on a regular basis.

There are markedly different types of fights, too. Most evolve right out of the action, with players going at it after a big hit, or one tough guy rushing in to settle a score after a teammate just got leveled. But there are also staged fights, where two tough guys square off out of the blue to rev up their teams. Fighting itself remains the same no matter what the type. You employ basic button presses to pull jerseys, grapple, dodge, and punch.

Build up your meter and unleash a metsu hadoken!

Even though it's good to see more brawls in NHL 14, especially the reaction ones where someone defends a teammate, the balance is too revved up. Fights are too common on the default settings now, and many are of questionable benefit. Most fights result in both teams earning energy for their lines, regardless of who wins. They often amount to little more than button-mashing for a minute or so, which can make for tedious interludes in the real action. This slows the game down, albeit with the compensation of adding meanness to the game present in real hockey. So you love the new fighting when it adds nastiness to close games between rivals like the Leafs and Sens; you hate it when it drags out blowouts between virtual strangers like the Leafs and Blue Jackets.

Despite the alterations, the general feel is similar to that of NHL 13. The action is insanely fast out of the box. Forwards fly, and pinball passes are common. You need to dial back a lot of the speed settings to get a more realistic game, but it can be done. Artificial intelligence hasn't been improved, and if anything, the game may be stupider. Dumb teammates are a problem when playing games with your pro in Live the Life or when you play games with the controller locked to one position. Your comrades often pause at the blue line, refuse to pass the puck even when you're wide open, and fail to head-man the puck properly. Playing at one position makes this much more of a stop-go game than real hockey, with little of the flow that makes the pro game so great to watch. As a result, you need to stop in full flight a lot of the time to avoid going offside, and hog the puck until a teammate gets into position for a pass.

The flow isn't nearly so bad when playing normally and switching from player to player. More offensive initiative is displayed by your teammates, and you see speedy forwards like Phil Kessel and Alex Ovechkin trying to get well behind the defense and setting themselves up to receive long stretch passes. Enemy defense is still sharp and smothering, giving you a serious challenge when playing on All-Star and above.

Looks like a Blackhawk is about to get his wings clipped.

As in last year's game, opposing players pounce on loose pucks with unnatural speed. They also forecheck relentlessly and with speed that just isn't possible in the real world. Enemy goalies get their usual boosts at higher difficulty levels, as well. You can often pepper the opposition with point-blank shots from prime scoring positions and come away empty as the enemy keeper goes from post to post faster than you can snap the puck into the top shelf. This remains aggravating, particularly because the enemy goalie always tends to pull off these acrobatics just before your own netminder lets one through his five-hole from 60 feet.

NHL 14 is not a bad game; it's just a very familiar one. The core game remains quite good; the tweaked hitting physics and new fighting model can provide some spice, and the sheer number of solo and online options give you plenty to do. But the new features brought to the table don't add enough over what was available in NHL 13, making this a dubious buy for anyone who still has last year's game and can live without the crushing new hits and more widespread fisticuffs.

Dead Or Alive 5

his is the third version of Dead Or Alive 5 to hit this gen, a run of form Capcom would be proud of.

We’ve had the original Dead Or Alive 5 (fun but shallow), the costume-heavy Dead Or Alive 5+ on Vita (fun but shallow) and now there’s Dead Or Alive 5 Ultimate, bringing a series of bells and whistles to the mix while leaving the core gameplay mostly untouched.

So how did this one turn out? It’s fun but shallow. Surprise!

Dead Or Alive 5 Ultimate - How Does It Play?

To those who've not dipped into the series yet, Dead Or Alive 5 is based around stuns, crumples and counters.

Moves that successfully connect have unusually long hitstun while commands for those moves have surprisingly lenient input. The combination of those two mechanics mean you can string elaborate combos together without having to devote an excessive amount time to training mode or even really having in-depth knowledge of what moves you’re doing.

Even if your moves aren’t connected as combos, the long hitstun means Dead Or Alive 5 is far more momentum-based than something like Tekken Tag Tournament 2 or Virtua Fighter 5: Final Showdown.

The main defence against these long combos (as long you haven't been hit off the ground) are counter attempts, which snap your character out of hit stun to attempt to grab the opponent’s limb. You have to guess if it’s a low attack, high attack, mid-punch or mid-kick. Guess wrong and you end up eating more damage via another combo or a throw.

Apologies for the technical moonspeak there but it’s easy to understand once you actually start brawling.

Perhaps more importantly, even if you don’t understand the nuance behind the mechanics, you can still mash buttons and string combos together. It looks so effortless, so slick and it’s so beautifully animated, even this early button-bashing stage has a lot of appeal and is more engaging than it should be.

There isn’t a particularly high ceiling for Dead Or Alive 5’s level of play, which mostly revolves around second-guessing and punishing counter attempts, but then it’s also got the lowest barrier of entry for those who just want to jump in and have fun.

If you can press buttons, you can play Dead Or Alive 5.

Dead Or Alive 5 Ultimate - What's New?

None of this will be new if you’ve put any time into the vanilla or Vita outing of Dead Or Alive 5, and there’s nothing ground-breaking that’s been added into Ultimate.

In terms of mechanics, the most significant new move is the Power Launcher, which sends the opponent spinning into the air in comedy fashion if it connects.

It replaces Power Blow in terms of utility for stages where there isn’t a nearby object to hit your opponent into. Power Launcher doesn’t really add much new in the way of tactics or high-level play but on the plus side, it is pretty damn funny the first time you see it connect.

Outside of that, the ‘what’s new?’ checklist runs surprisingly far even if the majority of it is to do with the aesthetic side of things. For example – deep breath – there are new outfits, new entrances, new victory animations, new hairstyles, new clothing options, new titles, new feature called movies where you can set the cutscene, set the level of sweat on your character and then zoom around them, taking snapshots that can be saved for future use.

The mileage you get out of any of those enhancements obviously varies. Ahem.

New stages is the sort of phrase that’s normally as exciting as 'now with unlockable artwork!' but the five new arenas all offer something distinct and interesting – there are uneven levels such as Desert Wasteland and a giant Buddha who crushes opponents in Sky High Tokyo. Lost World is the pick of the bunch, a series of small island peaks in a misty valley, inviting you to boot your opponent off the edge.

The new characters aren’t as exciting, mostly because they aren’t strictly speaking new. Momiji and Rachel are from Ninja Gaiden, Jacky is from Virtua Fighter while Leon and Ein have ventured all the way from… erm, Dead Or Alive 4.

Momiji is the most interesting addition, having a few aerial mix-ups and even a 360 air-throw for those who want a slightly more challenging character to master. Rachel is somewhat plodding and slow, lacking the over-the-top flair you want from a Dead Or Alive character. Jacky continues the Virtua-Fighter-to-Dead-Or-Alive tradition of keeping the same moveset and even command list, and he fits in surprisingly well. Leon and Ein have had their command lists spruched up but remain faithful to their previous appearances - Leon dominating with counter-holds that lead into further grabs, Ein attacking with powerful, striking blows over fast nippy attack strings.

Survival Mode is probably the best new addition in Dead Or Alive 5 Ultimate, pitting you against a series of opponents without any loading times or interruption. The key to high scores and survival is grabbing the point bonuses and health pick-ups that pop opponents hit with knockdown attacks or once they’re beaten.

It's a nice addition that offsets the lack of change in story mode (no longer tied into trophies/achievements) and a comprehensive tutorial that means well but is a little too slow-paced to really engage newcomers or for us to recommend.

Dead Or Alive 5 Ultimate - Fun But Shallow (Again)

Dead Or Alive 5 Ultimate is never going to be the cornerstone of EVO or a game that throbs with fiery competitive play months after its release, certainly not to the level of its genre rivals.

That Dead Or Alive 5 Ultimate is the best edition yet is also scant praise, because it should be the bare minimum of achievements for an Ultimate edition.

What’s far more noteworthy here is Dead Or Alive 5 Ultimate is still surprisingly good fun in Versus mode, whether online or offline, with just about enough of a new sheen that it can recapture your attention.

The core game holds up just about well enough that it's worth revisiting again, even if none of the new bells and whistles stand out as particularly worthy additions.

And if there’s one thing you can say about Dead Or Alive 5 Ultimate that you can’t say about another other fighting game, this is the only game where you can counter a punch, snap someone’s neck and boot them clean off a cliff in one swift move.

Electronic Arts \ EA

Electronic Arts, Inc. (EA) is an American developer, marketer, publisher and distributor of video games. Founded and incorporated on May 28, 1982 by Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer games industry and was notable for promoting the designers and programmers responsible for its games. Electronic Arts is the world's third-largest gaming company by revenue after Nintendo and Activision Blizzard.

Currently, EA develops and publishes games under several labels including EA Sports titles, Madden NFL, FIFA Football/Soccer, NHL, NCAA Football, SSX and NBA Jam. Other EA labels produce established franchises such as Battlefield, Need for Speed, The Sims, Medal of Honor,Command & Conquer, as well as newer franchises such as Dead Space, Mass Effect, Dragon Age, Army of Two and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, produced in partnership with LucasArts. EA also owns and operates major gaming studios, Tiburon in Orlando, EA Canada in Burnaby,BioWare in Edmonton as well as Montreal and DICE in Sweden.

Originally, EA was a home computing game publisher. In the late 1980s, the company began developing games in-house and supported consoles by the early 1990s. EA later grew via acquisition of several successful developers. By the early 2000s, EA had become one of the world's largest third-party publishers. On May 4, 2011, EA reported $3.8 billion in revenues for the fiscal year ending March 2011, and on January 13, 2012, EA announced that it had exceeded $1 billion in digital revenue during the previous calendar year. In a note to employees, EA CEO John Riccitiello called this “an incredibly important milestone” for the company. EA began to move toward direct distribution of digital games and services with the acquisition of the popular online gaming site Pogo.com in 2001. In 2009, EA acquired the London-based social gaming startup Playfish, and in June 2011, EA launched Origin, an online service to sell downloadable games directly to consumers. In July 2011, EA announced that it had acquired PopCap Games, the company behind hits such as Plants vs. Zombies and Bejeweled.

EA continued its shift toward digital goods in 2012, folding its mobile-focused EA Interactive (EAi) division "into other organizations throughout the company, specifically those divisions led by EA Labels president Frank Gibeau, COO Peter Moore, and CTO Rajat Taneja, and EVP of digital Kristian Segerstrale."

EA is currently headquartered in the Redwood Shores neighborhood of Redwood City, California. Following the retirement and departure of Trip Hawkins in 2000, EA decided replace its logo with a new one, and Larry Probst took over the reins.

In 2004, EA made a multimillion dollar donation to fund the development of game production curriculum at the University of Southern California's Interactive Media Division. On February 1, 2006, Electronic Arts announced that it would cut worldwide staff by 5 percent. On June 20, 2006 EA purchased Mythic Entertainment, who are finished making Warhammer Online.

After Sega's ESPN NFL 2K5 successfully grabbed market share away from EA's dominant Madden NFL series during the 2004 holiday season, EA responded by making several large sports licensing deals which include an exclusive agreement with the NFL, and in January 2005, a 15-year deal with ESPN. The ESPN deal gave EA exclusive first rights to all ESPN content for sports simulation games. On April 11, 2005, EA announced a similar, 6-year licensing deal with the Collegiate Licensing Company (CLC) for exclusive rights to college football content.

Much of EA's success, both in terms of sales and with regards to its stock market valuation, is due to its strategy of platform-agnostic development and the creation of strong multi-year franchises. EA was the first publisher to release yearly updates of its sports franchises—Madden, FIFA, NHL, NBA Live, Tiger Woods, etc.—with updated player rosters and small graphical and gameplay tweaks. Recognizing the risk of franchise fatigue among consumers, EA announced in 2006 that it would concentrate more of its effort on creating new original intellectual property.

In September 2006, Nokia and EA announced a partnership in which EA becomes an exclusive major supplier of mobile games to Nokia mobile devices through the Nokia Content Discoverer. In the beginning, Nokia customers were able to download seven EA titles (Tetris, Tetris Mania, The Sims 2, Doom, FIFA 06, Tiger Woods PGA Tour 06 and FIFA Street 2) on the holiday season in 2006. Rick Simonson is the executive vice president and director of Nokia and starting from 2006 is affiliated with John Riccitiello and are partners.

During its period of fastest growth, EA was often criticized for buying smaller development studios primarily for their intellectual property assets, and then producing drastically changed games of their franchises. For example, Origin-produced Ultima VIII: Pagan and Ultima IX: Ascension were developed quickly under EA's ownership, over the protests of Ultima creator Richard Garriott,and these two are widely considered to be subpar compared to the rest of the series.

In early 2008, current CEO John Riccitiello acknowledged that this practice by EA was wrong and that the company now gives acquired studios greater autonomy without "meddling" in their corporate culture.

In 2008, John D. Carmack of id Software said that EA is no longer the "Evil Empire" and decided to go with EA Partners, despite having a poor opinion of the publisher's past record.

Like other EA Partners, such as Harmonix/MTV Games, Carmack stressed that EA Partners deal "isn't really a publishing arrangement. Instead, they really offer a menu of services—Valve takes one set of things, Crytek takes a different set, and we're probably taking a third set".

EA was criticized for shutting down some of its acquired studios after they released poorly performing games (for instance, Origin). Though, in some of the cases, the shutdown was merely a reformation of teams working at different small studios into a single studio. In the past, Magic Carpet 2 was rushed to completion over the objections of designer Peter Molyneux and it shipped during the holiday season with several major bugs. Studios such as Origin and Bullfrog Productions had previously produced games attracting significant fanbases. Many fans also became annoyed that their favorite developers were closed down, but some developers, for example the EALA studio, have stated that they try to carry on the legacy of the old studio (Westwood Studios). Once EA received criticism from labor groups for its dismissals of large groups of employees during the closure of a studio. However, later, it was confirmed that layoffs were not heavily confined to one team or another, countering early rumors that the teams were specifically targeted—countering the implication that the under performance of certain games might have been the catalyst.

EA was once criticized for the acquisition of 19.9 percent of shares of its competitor Ubisoft, a move that many felt would lead to a hostile takeover but has not yet materialized. However, Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot later indicated that a merger with EA was a possibility. "The first option for us is to manage our own company and grow it. The second option is to work with the movie industry, and the third is to merge". he said. However in July 2010, EA elected to sell its reduced 15 percent share in Ubisoft That share equated to roughly €94 million (US$122 million).

For 2006, the games review aggregation site Metacritic gives the average of EA games as 72.0 (out of 100); 2.5 points behind Nintendo (74.5) but ahead of the other first-party publishers Microsoft(71.6) and Sony (71.2). The closest third-party publisher is Take-Two Interactive (publishing as 2K Games and Rockstar Games) at 70.3. The remaining top 10 publishers (Sega, THQ,Ubisoft, Activision, Square Enix) all rate in the mid 60s. Since 2005, EA has published eight games that received "Universal Acclaim" (Metacritic score 90 or greater): Battlefield 2, Crysis, Rock Band, FIFA 12, FIFA 13, Mass Effect 2, Mass Effect 3 and Dragon Age: Origins.

EA's aggregate review performance had shown a downward trend in quality over recent years and was expected to affect market shares during competitive seasons. Pacific Crest Securities analyst Evan Wilson had said, "Poor reviews and quality are beginning to tarnish the EA brand. According to our ongoing survey of GameRankings.com aggregated review data, Electronic Arts' overall game quality continues to fall... Although market share has not declined dramatically to date, in years such as 2007, which promises to have tremendous competition, it seems likely if quality does not improve."

EA had also received criticism for developing games that lack innovation vis-à-vis the number of gaming titles produced under the EA brand that show a history of yearly updates, particularly in their sporting franchises. These typically retail as new games at full market price and feature only updated team rosters in addition to incremental changes to game mechanics, the user interface, and graphics. One critique compared EA to companies like Ubisoft and concluded that EA's innovation in new and old IPs "Crawls along at a snail's pace," while even the company's own CEO, John Riccitiello, acknowledged the lack of innovation seen in the industry generally, saying, "We're boring people to death and making games that are harder and harder to play. For the most part, the industry has been rinse-and-repeat. There's been lots of product that looked like last year's product, that looked a lot like the year before." EA has announced that it is turning its attention to creating new game IPs in order to stem this trend, with recently acquired and critically acclaimed studios BioWare and Pandemic would be contributing to this process. In 2012, EA’s games were ranked highest of all large publishers in the industry, according to Metacritic.

In June 2013, EA attracted criticism from users for replacing its Scrabble app on Facebook with a new version that did not retain players' histories and statistics. The new version added functionality including support for other languages and board customization.

In April 2012, The Consumerist awarded EA with the title of "Worst Company in America" along with a ceremonial Golden Poo trophy. The record breaking poll drew in more than 250,000 votes and saw EA beating out such regulars as AT&T and Walmart. The final round of voting pitted EA against Bank of America. EA won with 50,575 votes or 64.03%. This result came in the aftermath of the Mass Effect 3 ending controversy which several commentators viewed as a significant contribution to EA's win in the poll. Other explanations include use of day-one DLCand EA's habit of acquiring smaller developers to squash competition. EA spokesman John Reseburg responded to the poll by saying, "We’re sure that British Petroleum, AIG, Philip Morris, and Halliburton are all relieved they weren't nominated this year. We're going to continue making award-winning games and services played by more than 300 million people worldwide."

In April 2013, EA won The Consumerist's poll for "Worst Company in America" a second time, consecutively, becoming the first company to do so. Games mentioned in the announcement included the critically controversial Mass Effect 3 for its ending, Dead Space 3 for its use of micro transactions, and the more recent SimCity reboot due to its poorly handled launch. Additionally, poor customer support, "nickel and diming", and public dismissiveness of criticisms were also given as explanations for the results of the poll. The Consumerist summarized the results by asking, "When we live in an era marked by massive oil spills, faulty foreclosures by bad banks, and rampant consolidation in the airline and telecom industry, what does it say about EA’s business practices that so many people have — for the second year in a row — come out to hand it the title of Worst Company in America?"

When asked about the poll by VentureBeat, Frank Gibeau, President of EA Labels, responded “we take it seriously, and want to see it change. In the last few months, we have started making changes to the business practices that gamers clearly don’t like.” Gibeau attributes the elimination of online passes, the decision to make The Sims 4 a single-player, offline experience, as well as the unveiling of more new games to the shift in thinking. “The point is we are listening, and we are changing,” Gibeau said.

Nintendo

Nintendo Co., Ltd. is a Japanese multinational consumer electronics company headquartered in Kyoto, Japan. Nintendo is the world's largest video game company by revenue. Founded on September 23, 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi, it originally produced handmade hanafuda cards. By 1963, the company had tried several small niche businesses, such as cab services and love hotels.

Abandoning previous ventures, Nintendo developed into a video game company, becoming one of the most influential in the industry and Japan's third most valuable listed company with a market value of over US$85 billion. Nintendo of America is also the majority owner of the Seattle Mariners Major League Baseball team.

The name Nintendo can be roughly translated from Japanese to English as "leave luck to heaven." As of June 30, 2013, Nintendo has sold over 655.9 million hardware units and 4.12 billion software units.

Nintendo was founded as a card company in late 1889, originally named Nintendo Koppai. Based in Kyoto, Japan, the business produced and marketed a playing card game called Hanafuda. The handmade cards soon became popular, and Yamauchi hired assistants to mass-produce cards to satisfy demand. Nintendo continues to manufacture playing cards in Japan and organizes its own contract bridge tournament called the "Nintendo Cup."

In 1956, Hiroshi Yamauchi, grandson of Fusajiro Yamauchi, visited the U.S. to talk with the United States Playing Card Company, the dominant playing card manufacturer there. He found that the world's biggest company in his business was only using a small office. This was a turning point when Yamauchi realized the limitations of the playing card business. He then gained access to Disney's characters and put them on the playing cards to drive sales.

In 1963, Yamauchi renamed Nintendo Playing Card Co. Ltd. to Nintendo Co., Ltd. The company then began to experiment in other areas of business using newly injected capital. During this period of time between 1963 and 1968, Nintendo set up a taxi company, a love hotel chain, a TV network, a food company (selling instant rice, similar to instant noodles) and several other things. All of these ventures eventually failed, and after the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, playing card sales dropped, and Nintendo's stock price plummeted to ¥60.

In 1966, Nintendo moved into the Japanese toy industry with the Ultra Hand, an extendable arm developed by its maintenance engineer Gunpei Yokoi in his free time. Yokoi was moved from maintenance to the new "Nintendo Games" department as a product developer. Nintendo continued to produce popular toys, including the Ultra Machine, Love Tester and the Kousenjuu series of light gun games. Despite some successful products, Nintendo struggled to meet the fast development and manufacturing turnaround required in the toy market, and fell behind the well-established companies such as Bandai and Tomy.

In 1973, its focus shifted to family entertainment venues with the Laser Clay Shooting System, using the same light gun technology used in Nintendo's Kousenjuu series of toys, and set up in abandoned bowling alleys. Following some success, Nintendo developed several more light gun machines (such as the light gun shooter game Wild Gunman) for the emerging arcade scene. While the Laser Clay Shooting System ranges had to be shut down following excessive costs, Nintendo had found a new market.

Nintendo's first venture into the video gaming industry was securing rights to distribute the Magnavox Odyssey video game console in Japan in 1974. Nintendo began to produce its own hardware in 1977, with the Color TV Game home video game consoles. Four versions of these consoles were produced, each including variations of a single game (for example, Color TV Game 6 featured six versions of Light Tennis).

A student product developer named Shigeru Miyamoto was hired by Nintendo at this time. He worked for Yokoi, and one of his first tasks was to design the casing for several of the Color TV Game consoles. Miyamoto went on to create, direct and produce some of Nintendo's most famous video games and become one of the most recognizable figures in the video game industry.

In 1975, Nintendo moved into the video arcade game industry with EVR Race, designed by their first game designer, Genyo Takeda, and several more titles followed. Nintendo had some small success with this venture, but the release of Donkey Kong in 1981, designed by Miyamoto, changed Nintendo's fortunes dramatically. The success of the game and many licensing opportunities (such as ports on the Atari 2600, Intellivision and ColecoVision) gave Nintendo a huge boost in profit and in addition, the game also introduced an early iteration of Mario, known then as Jumpman, the eventual mascot of the company.

In 1980, Nintendo launched Game & Watch—a handheld video game series developed by Yokoi where each game was played on a separate device—to worldwide success.

In 1983, Nintendo launched the Family Computer home video game console in Japan (abbreviated "Famicom" and known outside Japan as the Nintendo Entertainment System or NES) alongside ports of its most popular arcade titles. In 1985, the NES launched in North America, and was accompanied by Super Mario Bros., one of the best-selling video games of all time. The Famicom was followed by the Super Famicom in 1990, released outside Japan in 1991 and 1992 as the Super Nintendo Entertainment System(SNES). This was Nintendo's console of the 16-bit 4th generation, boasting superior graphics, game speed, and sound over the Famicom of the 8-bit 3rd generation, and whose main rival was the Sega Mega Drive (known in North America as Sega Genesis). A console war between Sega and Nintendo ensued during the early 1990s. Although relatively late to market, the SNES considerably outsold the Mega Drive.

Aiming to produce an affordable virtual reality console, Gunpei Yokoi designed the Virtual Boy, a table-mounted semi-portable console featuring stereoscopic graphics. Users view games through a binocular eyepiece and control games using a gamepad. Critics were generally disappointed with the quality of the games and graphics, and complained of gameplay-induced headaches. The system sold poorly and was quietly discontinued.Amid the system's failure, Yokoi retired from Nintendo.

With its market shares slipping to Sega's Mega System and new rival Sony's PlayStation, Nintendo utilized a $185 million marketing campaign, centered around the "Play it Loud" slogan, to revitalize its brand. The company's 5th generation home console, the Nintendo 64, was released in 1996 and features 3D polygon model rendering capabilities and built-in multiplayer for up to four players. The system's controller introduced the analog stick and later introduced the Rumble Pak, an accessory for the controller that produces force feedback with compatible games. Both were the first such features to come to market for home console gaming and eventually became a standard built-in feature for many controllers in the industry. Announced before the console's launch, an expansion device called the Nintendo 64DD ("DD" standing for "Disk Drive") utilizing 64 MB magneto-optical disks was developed and in 1999 eventually released to Japan, but its commercial failure there resulted in only nine games being released and precluded further worldwide release.

The 6th-generation GameCube followed in 2001 and was the first Nintendo console to utilize optical disc storage instead of cartridges. Though only supported by seven games (three of which only support LAN play), the release of the Broadband Adapter and Modem Adapter peripheral made the GameCube Nintendo's first Internet-enabled console. While profitable, sales paled in comparison with new rival Microsoft's Xbox and Sony's latest, the PlayStation 2.

The Wii was released in 2006 and introduced the Wii Remote—with motion sensing and pointing capabilities—and on-board 802.11b/g Wi-Fi functionality, used for services such as Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection and the Internet Channel. Since its release, the Wii has spawned many peripheral devices, including the Wii Balance Board and Motion Plus, and has had several hardware revisions. With the release of the Wii, Nintendo revised the color of its company logo from red to gray. The successor to Wii, the Wii U, features improved, HD graphical capabilities and a new controller, the Wii U GamePad. The GamePad features a touch screen, 9-axis of motion sensors, a microphone and a camera. The Wii U launched in two versions, "Basic" and "Premium" ("Deluxe" in North America), with 8GB and 32GB of on-board flash memory respectively. The "Basic" version will be discontinued September 20, coinciding with a drop in price for the "Premium" version.

After the success of the Game & Watch series, Yokoi developed the Game Boy handheld console, which was released in 1989. Eventually becoming the best-selling handheld of all time, the Game Boy remained dominant for more than a decade, seeing critically and commercially popular games such as Pokémon Yellow released as late as 1998 in Japan and 2000 in Europe. Incremental updates of the Game Boys Pocket, Light and Color did little to change the original formula, though the latter introduced color graphics to the Game Boy line.

The first major update to its handheld line since 1989, Game Boy Advance features improved technical specifications similar to those of the SNES. The Game Boy Advance SP was the first revision to the GBA line and introduced screen lighting and a clam shell design, while later iteration, the Game Boy Micro, brought a smaller form factor.

Although originally advertised as an alternative to the Game Boy Advance, the Nintendo DS replaced the Game Boy line after its initial release in 2004. It was distinctive for its dual screens and a microphone, as well as a touch-sensitive lower screen. The Nintendo DS Lite brought a smaller form factor while the Nintendo DSi features larger screens and two cameras, and was followed by an even larger model, the DSi XL, with a 90% bigger screen.

Further expanding the Nintendo DS line, the Nintendo 3DS uses the process of autostereoscopy to produce a stereoscopic three-dimensional effect without glasses. Released to major markets during 2011, the 3DS got off to a slow start, initially missing many key features that were promised before the system launched. Partially as a result of slow sales, Nintendo stock declined in value. Subsequent price cuts and game releases helped to boost 3DS and 3DS software sales and to renew investor confidence in the company. The Nintendo 3DS XL was introduced in August 2012 and includes a 90% larger screen, a 4GB SD card and extended battery life. In August 2013, Nintendo announced the Nintendo 2DS, a version of the 3DS without a stereoscopic 3D screen. It has a slate-like design as opposed to the hinged,clamshell design of its DS-line predecessors. The 2DS will release October 12 in North America and Europe.

Nintendo of America has engaged in several high-profile marketing campaigns to define and position its brand. One of its earliest and most enduring slogans was "Now you're playing with power!", used first to promote its Nintendo Entertainment System. It modified the slogan to include "SUPER power" for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, and "PORTABLE power" for the Game Boy. Its 1994 "Play It Loud!" campaign played upon teenage rebellion and fostered an edgy reputation. During the Nintendo 64 era, the slogan was "Get N or get out." During the GameCube era, the "Who Are You?" suggested a link between the games we play and the people we are. The company promoted its Nintendo DS handheld with the tagline "Touching is Good." For the Wii, they used the "Wii would like to play" slogan to promote the console with the people who tried the games including Super Mario Galaxy and Super Paper Mario. Its successor, the Wii U, uses the slogan "How U will play next."

Nintendo Co., Ltd. (NCL) oversees the company's global operations and manages Japanese operations specifically. The company's two major subsidiaries, Nintendo of America and Nintendo of Europe, manage operations in North America and Europe respectively. Nintendo Co., Ltd. was originally based in Kyoto.It then moved to a new office in Higashiyama-ku, Kyoto, which is now its research and development building. Since 2000, the company has been based in Minami-ku, Kyoto.

Nintendo of America, Inc. (NoA), its U.S. division, is based in Redmond, Washington. Originally the NOA headquarters handled sales, marketing, and advertising. However, the office in Redwood City, California now directs those functions. The company maintains distribution centers in Atlanta, Georgia (Nintendo Atlanta) and North Bend, Washington (Nintendo North Bend). The 380,000-square-foot (35,000 m²) Nintendo North Bend facility processes more than 20,000 orders a day to Nintendo customers, which include retail stores that sell Nintendo products and consumers who order their video games and associated components online. Nintendo of America's Canadian branch,^[42] Nintendo of Canada, Ltd. (NOCL), is based in Vancouver, BC, with its distribution center in Toronto, Ontario.

Nintendo of Europe (NoE) was established in June 1990. The company handles operations in Europe and South Africa. The subsidiary is based in Großostheim, close to Frankfurt, Germany. Nintendo of Europe's United Kingdom branch handles operations in that country and in Ireland from its headquarters in Windsor, Berkshire.

Nintendo Australia Pty. Ltd. (NAL) is based in Melbourne, Victoria. It handles the publishing, distribution, sales and marketing of Nintendo products in Australia, New Zealand, and Oceania (Cook Islands, Fiji, New Caledonia, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, and Vanuatu). It also manufactures some Wii games locally. Nintendo Australia is also a third-party distributor of some titles from Rising Star Games, Namco Bandai Games Europe, Atlus, The Tetris Company, Sega, Tecmo Koei Games Europe and Capcom Europe.

iQue, Ltd., a Chinese joint venture between its founder, Wei Yen, and Nintendo, manufactures and distributes official Nintendo consoles and games for the mainland Chinese market, under the iQue brand. The product lineup for the Chinese market is considerably different from that for other markets. For example, Nintendo's only console in China is the iQue Player, a modified version of the Nintendo 64. The company has not released its more modern GameCube or Wii to the market, although a version of the Nintendo 3DS XL was released in 2012.

Nintendo established Nintendo of Korea (NoK) on July 7, 2006.

Nintendo has consistently been ranked last in Greenpeace's "Guide to Greener Electronics" due to Nintendo not revealing information. Similarly, they are ranked last in the Enough Project's "Conflict Minerals Company Rankings" due to Nintendo refusing to respond to multiple requests for information.

Like many other electronics companies, Nintendo does offer a take-back recycling program which allows customers to mail in old products they no longer use; Nintendo of America claimed that it took in 548 tons of returned products in 2011, 98% of which was either reused or recycled.

Tomb Raider

It’s fitting that thematically this new Tomb Raider is about adapting, changing and ultimately surviving. It’s as true of Lara Croft’s journey as it is of this game’s attempt to make the series relevant again and fit within modern expectations.

Tomb Raider is a legacy game, one that produced a massive impact at the time, remains an important franchise and made the protagonist an icon. For all its importance, the way that other games handle the core concepts of shooting and climbing has progressed since the series was at it’s most notable. Adventures based on what Tomb Raider began have entirely changed how we think about it’s systems. We use weapons in different ways now, emphasising defense through finding cover as much as attack, we traverse environments completely differently, not needing as complex a set of rules about different methods of jumping.

This game is the result of recognising where design currently resides. This doesn’t feel much at all like the previous entries and that’s entirely a move for the better. This feels much like the sum of other parts. Learning lessons of effectiveness from other sources in recent memory and distilling down what made them successful. 

Lara’s arsenal of weaponry is limited to five things and their alternate attacks. There’s no swan diving. There’s a variety of different upgrade mechanics that grow her abilities as well as the effectiveness of her gear. You can fast travel. You can backtrack and use newly discovered equipment in old areas. There are collectables. There are hidden areas with optional puzzles. There’s a vision mode that shows you the direction you should be heading toward. Some enemies carry riot shields and some are heavily armoured. This is a game that has learned lessons based on paying attention and displays that knowledge effectively. Every step it takes toward modernisation is the correct one.

That’s not to say that it eshews everything that makes Tomb Raider what it was. There’s still environmental puzzles that have to be solved by understanding the objects in your environment, piecing them together, turning things on at the right time and jumping over to somewhere else before everything resets. Some of these puzzles actually provided significant challenge, though that was a fault of not paying enough attention to all of the signposted possibilities.

It’s not just mechanically a more interesting experience. Narratively it offers so much more. The journey of Lara Croft is one that, although eventually becoming somewhat overblown for the purposes of providing a video game, has some necessary realism at the outset. She spends an hour being brutally ill-prepared for life on the island that she’s crash landed on. She’s hurt repeatedly, but from that hurt there’s growth, there’s the gradual unravelling and revealing confidence hidden behind layers of self doubt. She earns the ability to be seen as the character she’s always been.

That overblown nature does eventually feel at odds with the personal story at the heart of the game. She begins as someone distraught over the idea of taking a life, but proceeds to take hundreds more within the course of the game. This is an issue with a game needing to provide violence as an activity, but by no means is this a suggestion that the plot should have been altered to limit the amount of dissonance. The game makes violence fun and provides it, the game also provides a worthwhile story. The two things conflict, but not in a way that can’t mentally be overcome.

The environments are rich in colour and life regardless of which area you’re in. There’s some that display beach-side vistas of waves crashing against ocean wreckage, others that display disgusting viscera of near-stomach churning mounds of assorted human remains. The level of detail is staggering. The PC version allows players to turn on “Tress FX” technology that purports to make Lara’s hair far more realistic and reactive to movement and wind, rendering strands separately. This technology hasn’t quite reached the point where it works as intended yet. The constantly shifting hair can become a distraction and is better switched off. It’s worth seeing for the novelty but doesn’t quite provide the experience as advertised.

As it’s an attempt at a modern video game, Tomb Raider has to include a multiplayer mode in order to increase the sense of value. Those are the rules. Regularly in other games this comes with a sense of disappointment and the feeling the assets or production time could have been used elsewhere. That’s not really the case here. There’s no shortage of content in the singleplayer and the multiplayer is enough of a draw in itself. 

The multiplayer’s strengths are in it’s simplicity. It doesn’t try too hard to break a mould. It carries the same gradual upgrade system over from Call Of Duty 4 that’s become the standard for the industry. The action barely differs from what you do in the single player with all your abilities carrying over, but the equipment varying based on your loadout.

Multiplayer modes have alternative goals for each sides. In one, the team of survivors needs to collect medical supplies while the island tribe just needs to kill enough of the other team. The teams are asymmetrical in their abilities too, each of which filling roles that are better suited to attacking or defending. The “Solari” have access to long range weaponry while the survivors are based on close range damage. The multiplayer is at worst inoffensive and at best actively recommendable, but it’s still not the strongest reason one should pick up the game.

Tomb Raider is an excellent game. It’s an excellent game because it takes cues from other excellent games. There’s nothing you’ll find in here that wasn’t instigated elsewhere and it doesn’t ever surpass these other sources, but it’s well iterated and will provide you with an experience you shouldn’t miss.

Bioshock Infinite

The original Bioshock was a seminal work that set a new benchmark for narrative in games. It was a cut above the usual pulp that the medium leverages just to progress the player from one gameplay location to another. The narrative actually became a selling point and a reason to pay attention to Bioshock in it’s own right. It was a game that could claim to be about something. Not that it just told an interesting tale; it used that story to explore ideas about culture, politics and even on the most meta level, game design itself.

Being a shining example in that respect wasn’t it’s only success. It took place in the unique setting of the underwater city of Rapture, the art design of which leaned on the previously underutilised style of art-deco, and it had an approach to combat that melded careful contemplation while setting-up and fast paced action in the actual brawl. It wasn't flawless - it dragged a little in the middle - but it was unequivacolly a masterpiece.

Bioshock Infinite matches the past game in so many ways and surpasses it entirely in others.

There's no connective tie with the previous game save the steampunk/art-deco style. The sunken dystopia of Rapture is left behind and instead the player is hurled into Columbia, a man-made floating haven in the sky, set in fantastical version of 1912. Columbia is a city that embodies a specific take on American culture, one that’s highly Christian-conservative and treats the nation’s founders almost like deities in their own right. It’s a city that’s built with a clear racial and class divide, not straying away from the reality of the time. In the hands of a worse team, this treatment would be highly controversial, but it’s handled so impeccably and it’s so necessary to the plot’s themes that it absolutely justifies itself.

Your character Booker’s trip to Columbia is in the interest of retrieving a girl, Elizabeth, from captivity. It’s imperative that you find her so that you can clear a pile of debts, but it’s increasingly clear as your time in columbia continues that this isn’t a simple hero's tale. Elizabeth has the power to control “tears in reality" that are popping up all over the city. Their prevalence has shaped the timeframe’s understanding of mechanisation - leading to modern conveniences like vending machines and automated robotic weaponry - as well as the city's culture. You’ll hear timely appropriate renditions of modern songs like a barbershop quartet singing God Only Knows or hearing panpipe fairground cover of Girls Just Wanna Have Fun, leaving you trying to place if that really is the melody you think it is. All of this lends to the sense of unease and feeling that things are just a little out of place.

Moments where the game slows down and you have a chance to take in this content are where Infinite truly shines. The detail in making this world seem fully realised is staggering. You’ll see people go about their day, holding conversations and interacting in ways that are far exceed what we've come to expect from games. This attention to proper pacing breaks up the long combat-heavy sections and keeps them from dominating the entire experience.

That’s not to suggest that the combat is a low point; it’s a little less interesting than the first game that incentivised thoughtfulness, but that’s made up for in scale and speed. Infinite’s greatest tool is the Skyhook, a deadly melee weapon with automated whirling blade, but it also allows you to use “Sky-Lines”. These are rails that act as a sort of mass transit system. In practice they’re used to allow you to traverse a massive environment in moments and so the combat sections can be opened up and cover a great deal of ground.

There’s not a great deal of outlandishness to the weaponry, all of it conforms to what you’d expect from the time period, but what it lacks in wow factor is made up for in variety with the full range of pistols, rifles, shotguns, grenade launchers and the like covered. The more interesting options are conferred in the game’s “Vigors”: magical powers that emanate from your hand. These let you summon murderous crows, control enemy robotics or cover massive distances in an instant for an immediate melee hit.

A rather more tenuous addition are different types of clothing you can pick up that confer different abilities, such as a spectral gun that attacks your foes whenever you swap it out for a different option, health bump from melee kills or an automatic reload for your weapons when jumping on Sky-Lines. All of this amounts to a game that allows you to find a style you prefer and stick to it.

Once caught up with, it could've been the case that Elizabeth was one long burden, as the game turned into a massive escort quest, but actually she does nothing to get in the way at any point and often actively helps out. She’ll notice that you’re running low on health or ammo and hurl some over to you, while also lending you the ability to create objects from thin air for tactical advantage.

It’s somewhat of a disconnect once you realise that unless it’s a scripted sequence, enemies don’t notice her at all, but it seems like a decision made for gameplay’s sake and the oddity is far less of a problem than the potential frustration that her taking damage could actually cause. Any feeling of frustration toward her would be a failure of design, because the entire rest of the game is about making you care for, understand and grow to empathise with her character. Elizabeth has an incredible emotional arc here that establishes her as an iconic figure.

This review focuses on the game from a largely mechanical standpoint because delving too deep into the themes and story, which are by far Bioshock Infinite’s unmissable features, would be a disservice to anyone. It’s an adult, thoughtful and compelling work that shames many (if not most) other attempts in the medium. Bioshock Infinite is an incredibly good video game. It might be one of the best.

Lost Planet 3

It has never been totally clear what Capcom want to achieve with Lost Planet as a series. It’s like a shapeshifter that undergoes a transition to something different every time a new game is released. The only safe expectation any gamer can have of the series is that the player will shoot giant bugs and pick up whatever orange goo exits from them as a result. 

The inaugural game was a good graphics test but was otherwise a pretty inoffensive third person shooter set on a horrid ice-planet with some body-heat-retention based survival elements and mech combat. The second was co-op multiplayer focused without much narrative content and entirely changed the art direction toward a tropical-mechanical jungle away from the harsh snow of the first.

Lost Planet 3, seemingly, has reeled in a lot of the second game’s changes. This is a prequel, one that takes place slightly before the events of the first game. Set on E.D.N. III while it’s still a planet-wide frozen tundra, you play as Jim Peyton, a man who’s made a living performing whatever unsavoury task is required in order to provide for his family back home on Earth. That’s the motivation behind anything he has to do: it’s all in service of raising money. 

Peyton's latest job - and this is where you come in - is to help the company that’s attempting to terraform the planet for prolonged habitation and investigate it as a source of fuel. It’s unlikely that this will remain the case because this is a video game plot and it involves a massive corporation.

Our recent preview threw us right into the start of the game as Jim lands on the planet and is under-equipped and far away from the main base (quelle surprise!) He trudges through snow to clear a path to day one of his new career, shooting countless violent indigenous monsters in the attempt. This all took place on foot using a pistol so we were unfortunately unable to see much of how the mech-based combat works out. The on-foot action, though, was good fun as over-the-shoulder alien shooting goes. 

There was later some allowance to wander around using Jim’s mech, just without the combat element thrown in. It will get you round quicker than on foot and seemed to get the feel of being a hulking great mechanical frame mostly right. Here's hoping the combat holds up too.

At the base, Jim’s acquainted with a cast of characters also working for the same company. There’s actually been a lot of work in trying to provide real character depth and motivation here, which is a clear necessity when measured up with the previous game that had absolutely no qualms about confusing the player as to who anyone was, where they were or what they were doing. Here, people talk and act like people, conveying part of who they are as they push the narrative forward.

It’s a small touch, and maybe it’s not even something that the developers have put much active thought into, but the amount of T-Energy (Lost Planet’s form of currency) that Jim’s raised in his stint helping make the planet more inhabitable is often visible when out walking around and at all times displayed in the cockpit of his armoured Rig(a bipedal precursor to Lost Planet’s signature VS-Mechs and a tool that Jim uses to perform scouting expeditions that take him far outside the base). It’s a great character nod that he’d be continually wanting to look at what he’s already managed to save up - the proverbial picture of the wife and kids tucked into the dashboard. Intentional of not, that’s great characterisation through mechanics and a clever way to say a lot about someone without being overly explicit. This money doesn’t just act as a points-tally, this is currency that you’ll spend to buy new gear and upgrade what you’ve already gotten.

Though there is a multiplayer mode, it didn't strike us as something to get too excited about. It consists of mode-based team-objective challenges of the sort we've seen countless times before. We firmly predict it’ll only be a matter of months before the multiplayer audience fades away. It’s not offensive or unplayable, it just doesn’t justify itself above more focused options, at least from what we've seen.

The take-away from this glimpse was the knowledge that Capcom has clearly learned from criticisms of the previous games and tried its best to address them. As such, we're verging on optimistic about this latest instalment, and certainly look forward to seeing just exactly how it turns out.