After yesterday’s dazzling Microsoft E3 press conference Nintendo really had to work hard to impress on the same level that Microsoft achieved. The announcement of Project Natal may have suddenly threatened Nintendo’s position at the top of the casual motion controlled market, so Nintendo had to have something at least equally as impressive. Unfortunately Nintendo didn’t rise to the occasion and delivered a pretty lack lustre presentation that only had a few worthy announcements.

Cammie Dunaway – whom I personally like to call Mrs. Smiley – was the first speaker to take to the stage. After getting through the business talk Cammie started to talk surprises, upon which she immediately revealed the first surprise of the day – New Super Mario Brothers for the Wii. Nintendo also confused people by saying they were taking Mario into the ‘fourth dimension’. Consequently this just turned out to be a fancy word for the four-player 2D Mario game that was demonstrated live on stage by Cammie and three others.

The game will see players working together to reach the end of each level, but whilst doing so they are also competing with each other for the familiar coins scattered around a level. At the end of each level the players are ranked from 1-4 depending on how well they managed this girl, Cammie predictably coming in fourth. While the view does pull back pretty far players can also get wiped off the screen if they fall too far behind the player in front, and dying will place the victim in a bubble that others can either free them from or leave them behind. It should be with us by Christmas 2009.

Next up was Wii Fit Plus, which seems to be Nintendo applying their tried and tested formula of milking something as much as they can after we’ve all just finished buying the one before. Wii Fit Plus will be arriving in autumn 2009 and includes six strength and yoga activities as well as fifteen new balance board games. Juggling and skateboarding are included in this, as well as a game called ‘Perfect 10’, which Cammie described as “Brain Age for the backside”.

Reggie and his perfect hair were next to take the stage, talking about Wii Motion Plus just like last year. Eventually he got on to showing a demonstration of Wii Sports Resort using Motion Plus, beginning with a sky dive. Moving the Wii Remote around would change the position of the sky diver depending on where you had the remote positioned. The demo also showed off archery; where you held the Wii Remote and Nun chuck like a real bow, and free-throw basketball; with Reggie and another guy competing to see who called throw more balls through the basketball hoop in the allotted time limit. It’s not as impressive as when we saw it a year ago, but it still looks just as fun to play as Wii Sports. Wii Sports Resort will be released on 26th July.

Reggie also announced a few upcoming games that would be compatible with Motion Plus; including Tiger Woods Pro Tour 10, Grand Slam Tennis (the former two will be bundled with Motion Plus), Virtua Tennis 2009 and Red Steel 2. Red Steel 2 was demonstrated live on stage, and the sword he was using in the game seemed to respond accurately to any movements the demonstrator made with his hands. The game will only work with Motion Plus, so I’m expecting it to lose a few sales because of that.

Meanwhile third-party games coming to both the Wii and DS included;

• Final Fantasy: The Crystal Bearers (Wii)
• Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days (DS)
• Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story (released this autumn for DS)
• Golden Sun DS (finally making its return on DS)
• The Women’s Murder Club: Games of Passion (coming 13th October for DS)
• Cop: The Recruit (an open world game similar to GTA for DS)
• Style Savvy (a fashion game for DS)

After this came some games only for the DSi. Flip Note Studio, a sort of movie maker that was originally introduced as Moving Memo, will be coming in the summer. Mario Vs Donkey Kong: Minis March Again features gameplay similar to earlier instalments in the series but also includes a level editor. Nintendo emphasised the sharing aspect of the DSi here, as levels will be able to be shared between friends over a Wi-Fi connection. Also emphasising the creation and sharing aspects was Wario Ware DIY, which allows you to create your own mini-games, and the ability to share the photos you take on your DSi on Facebook. It’s not on par with Microsoft’s Facebook announcement, but at least it’s there.

Satoru Iawata then came on to talk about the direction the games industry is heading in and how Nintendo can expand the gaming demographic. Apparently something called Wii Vitality will aid in this quest, a small device that fits onto your finger and lets you know what’s going on inside your body. Well, at least that’s what Iawata led us to believe. No software was shown making use of this device, so we will just have to take his word for it.

A late surprise was another Mario game, and not just any Mario game but a sequel to the excellent Super Mario Galaxy. Super Mario Galaxy 2 marks first time a fully 3D Mario game has appeared on the same console, and that may go some way to explaining why it doesn’t look like it’s doing anything innovating at the moment.

Talk then proceeded on to games we already knew about (The Conduit, Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles, Dead Space: Extraction) before trying to please the ‘core’ gamer with Metroid: Other M. I’ve never played a Metroid game so it doesn’t really interest me, but for what it’s worth it looked ok.

So, in summary Nintendo failed to wow in any areas. I’m sure they’ll make tonnes of money through targeting the casual market, but for the ‘core’ gamer there are only updates to already established franchises. Nintendo doesn’t seem to want to try anything new on the game front anymore, falling back on well known characters and the shovelware that populates every local game store.