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Looking for another bit of Swapnote stationary to add to your collection? You'll be happy to know that Takeshi Tezuka is part of the latest stationary sent out, with the focus on "The Year of Luigi". Thanks to VGamer for the heads up!

What are the retailers that clutch, what prices growRead more...

A brand-new Nintendo Direct broadcast—confirming the availability of Earthbound for the Wii U Virtual Console— just went up today. Watch the whole thing right here.Read more...

Readers, here's a promo code. It might come in handy if you, the master of saving, take it with you.Read more...

I know. Look, I know, alright? I should know better. But I'm an optimist. And Sonic Lost World keeps looking sweet.Read more...

My favorite character in Shin Megami Tensei IV didn't make the front cover of the North American release. She's not one of the samurai warriors tasked with keeping the world's demons in check. She's not technically even a real person, much less a she. Her name is Burroughs, and she's the keeper of the menus. Burroughs, a sophisticated artificial intelligence, doesn't have much of a personality, but then neither do the characters that did make it onto the game's cover. The erstwhile companions of the game's protagonist (named Fahey in my run) aren't given much time to shine in the fourth installment of one of Japan's most popular role-playing series. All-too-brief snippets of conversation hint as underlying personalities, but mostly they feel like characters created to fill (sometimes with a vigorous shoehorning) the roles of chaos, order and neutrality, as is common in the franchise's core titles. But what Burroughs lacks in personality, she makes up for in utility. Bonded with the main character after he passes the "Ceremony of the Gauntlet", a test to see if one is worthy to join the samurai ranks of the feudal country of East Mikado, it's she who guides the player character through the learning process. She teaches him to explore the game's drab 3D levels. She scans the playfield, materializing otherwise invisible enemies so the player can engage or avoid at will. She teaches him how to engage in battle against the demonic 2D sprites of the world, walking him through exploiting their elemental weaknesses to gain more chances to attack. She trains him to talk to the enemy, answering questions and offering gifts to enlist members of the game's expansive bestiary to his cause. She teaches him to take on their powers as they level up, adding their strength to his own. She's a gateway to the Cathedral of Shadows, where those demons can be combined into stronger creatures, and she keeps track of his acquisitions so he can concentrate on maintaining a party of creatures flexible enough to take on any threat. And she grows, oh how she grows. As the character levels he gains App Points, used to unlock new applications that run under Burroughs' operating system. From increasing the size of his demonic cache to increasing his rate of experiential growth, she dedicates herself to helping him become a better man. Burroughs is teacher, mother, advisor, tour guide and Pokedex — she's the most important character in Shin Megami Tensei IV. She deserves a massive, review-interrupting image. To be honest, Burroughs doesn't make much sense at first. In the feudal fantasy land in which the game begins, where the upper and lower castes are separated by a line so definitive it might as well be hanging in the air as if drawn by an enormous mystical Sharpie marker, an intelligent A.I. guiding the player character through side-quests certainly seems out of place, but then East Mikado isn't exactly your normal country. Buried deep within a dungeon beneath the country's capital city lies a forbidden portal to the village of "The Unclean Ones." Otherwise known as post-apocalyptic Tokyo. Now's she starting to make more sense. Burroughs, the player character and the tag-along trio venture into this strange world in order to find and capture the Black Samurai, a mysterious figure who's been tempting Mikado's lower class with "Literature" — books capable of transforming the reader into a demon. In classic Shin Megami style, the story escalates steadily, powerful supernatural forces rise, and an important choice must be made. It's a grand tale, surely, though one that might feel a little too familiar to fans of these series — less of an "Oh my gosh!" and more of an "Of course." With a world-shaking conclusion inevitable, it's all about getting there, and the journey has some issues. There will be grinding, for instance, whether you like it or not. One cannot simply progress from story point to story point and hope to survive — enemies would quickly overpower the player character's party if not for side quests, equipment upgrades and a great deal of getting lost. That last bit becomes easier once the player hits Tokyo, which is splayed out in the most convoluted, hard-to-read overland map I've ever encountered. I spent hours lost in those streets, often confused as to where I was supposed to go next. The special edition of the game includes a strategy guide, and I have to admit I cracked that sucker open once or twice. In admitting that, I also admit that Burroughs, as comforting as her presence may be, cannot solve all of Shin Megami Tensei IV's problems. She can't guide me through the twisted streets of Tokyo. She can't make the game's demon roster, pieced together from a decade of art from various creators, feel like a cohesive thing. She can't make me care more about Walter, Jonathan or Isabeau, the three human characters accompanying me on this strange journey. And she can't save me from regular meetings with this gentleman: He's the guy who appears when the character's party falls, offering to bring them back to life through application of money or Play Coins (robbing Animal Crossing's Nook brothers of revenue in the process). One can expect to see him often in the game's early stages, the game's unforgiving difficulty violently driving home the need to grind. Burroughs doesn't fix the problems with Shin Megami Tensei IV, but she makes them tolerable enough. Through 40-plus hours, she's kept me focused on the most important and enjoyable aspects of the game — the demon collecting and breeding, tweaking statistics, upgrading abilities and striving to build a party capable of taking on anything this dark and gloomy world can throw at them. When the less interesting elements of the title threaten to bring me down, she's the mechanical voice that guides me back to the rewarding path of demon domination. Let Shin Megami Tensei IV's soothing electronic voice be your guide. She will not lead you astray.

Who are those five Pokemon? Let's ask Professor Augustine Sycamore, the latest in a long line of tree-named Professors, making his debut in Pokemon X and Pokemon Y this October. Hit the jump for new gym leaders, Team Flare, and an all-new gameplay vid. He speaks for the trees, the good Professor Sycamore, the mentor who will give us a choice of three pocket monsters and then send us off to explore the Kalos region, regardless of the dangerous obstacles in our way. Will we be beaten by Grant, the new outdoorsy gym leader? Shot in the face by Clement, the gym leader of science? Will the new Team Flare finally figure out that stealing Pokemon isn't as effective as explosives? The only thing between us and certain doom is these five new monstrous friends. There's the panda-like Pangoro, evolution of Oancham. He's my favorite. Then there's Inkay, the dark/psychic type with a funny helmet. He's my favorite. Malamar is also dark and psychic, which makes sense as he's the evolution of Inkay. Not my favorite. Fairy-type Swirlix is a puffball with a tail. Definitely my favorite. And Spritzee just sucks. You can find out more about my new favorites and more over at PokemonXY.com, but first watch this.

Have you ever heard of Arashi? It's a Japanese boy band that's so popular, that a poster of the group is drawing crowds, cameras, and grovelling. You might not know Arashi, but perhaps you've seen Letters from Iwo Jima? One of the stars, Kazunari Ninomiya, is a member of Arashi. The group has also appeared in Nintendo commercials, most notably for the 3DS launch, so there's that. Recently, a huge Arashi poster went up in Tokyo's Shinjuku station. It has been drawing quite a crowd and is being a dubbed a "sacred spot" for boy band nerds. Below, you can see a photo taken by Kotaku's own Toshi Nakamura. This particular breed of otaku ("geek") is called "jyani-ota" (ジャニオタ). "Jyani" refers to Johnny's, the group's talent agency. Johnny's also manages pretty much all the other popular boy bands in Japan. Earlier this week, a photo popped up on Twitter of an Arashi fan bowing in front of the giant poster. It was retweeted over three thousand times. People online in Japan seemed to be rather freaked out by the image, writing that it looked "scary" or "like some religion". Others pointed out that hardcore girl group fans seemed just as fervently frightening. (In the West, similar remarks could be made about hardcore Justin Bieber or One Direction fans.) This isn't just a regular old bow. In Japanese, this style of bowing is called "dogeza" (土下座) and it's often translated as "kneeling down on the ground". As previously noted, it can be used for bowing in front of powerful and important people as well as apologizing for huge muck-ups. Various Japanese sites point out that it seems to be a thing to bow in front of Arashi imagery. The vast majority of Arashi fans are not doing this, but a few seem to be. Whether that's at concert venues. Or rather, to concert venues. Or at restaurants. Or bowing to the TV. Or to little D.I.Y. shrines. Or even bowing to cardboard Arashi members selling kitchen appliances. Some of the young people bowing in front of Arashi seem to be doing ironically and for fun, with tongue planted firmly in cheek here. This is like a "We're not worthy" for boy band geeks. If only they knew they were! Photos: AV_RADIX, kz__special, @stri_30px, sakulove21, monster_nnmy, chekkunomafuraa, angelicsts, 2038sgak, joshi_trend, Matome, Maki To contact the author of this post, write to bashcraftATkotaku.com or find him on Twitter @Brian_Ashcraft. Kotaku East is your slice of Asian internet culture, bringing you the latest talking points from Japan, Korea, China and beyond. Tune in every morning from 4am to 8am.

A new 3DS update in America (the rest of North America, too?) is triggering a major overhaul to the system's Mii StreetPass Plaza. And, in the process, Nintendo adds a rabbit to the system who wants to sell you stuff. The video above shows you this rabbit salesman (salesrabbit) in action. It's quite a sight and probably a more effective way of selling games than just listing them in the system's shop. As for the games the rabbit is selling, well, they're new StreetPass games meant to be played with Miis collected from nearby 3DS systems. I've not played the games. There's not even anyone to StreetPass with at the moment, as I write this from home at 11pm. Sorry, readers! Mii Force, Flower Town, Warrior's Way and Monster Manor will go unplayed for now. Since they all came out in Europe already, you could just read about them in Edge. Each game costs $5. All four can be had in a $15 bundle. Buying each game gets you a new Mii hat. The new Plaza update also adds an "Exchange Booth" that allows players to turn in tickets won in the new StreetPass games for Mii accoutrements. And one of these updates or purchases also got me this... a Pixel Mario hat. UPDATE: According to the StreetPass Mii Plaza Music Player, the rabbit is officially called a Salesbunny. To contact the author of this post, write to stephentotilo@kotaku.com or find him on Twitter @stephentotilo.

The horror never stops in Animal Crossing: New Leaf, surfacing in the most unexpected locations. Really glad Nintendo didn't pick this face for its Smash Bros. character. Dayshot is an image-based feature that runs every morning, showcasing some of the prettiest, funniest game-related screenshots and art that we can find. Send us suggestions if you've got them.

Six champions were crowned in Indianapolis this weekend at the largest ever Pokémon U.S. Nationals ever staged. The winners, and the next three finalists, will all travel to Vancouver, in August, for the 2013 Pokémon World Championships. The winners, by division. (By the way, it's weird to me that someone born between 1998 and 2001 is playing in a "Senior Division" of anything.) Video Games Junior Division (born 2002 or later): Beau Berg, playing with Tyranitar, Garchomp, Zapdos, Cresselia, Hitmontop, and Scizor. Senior Division (born 1998 to 2001): Paul Chua, playing with Politoed, Kingdra, Cresselia, Scrafty, Metagross and Thundurus. Masters Division (Born 1997 or earlier): Gavin Michaels, playing with Ludicolo, Amoonguss, Landorus, Metagross, Volcarona, and Tyranitar. Trading Card Game Junior Division: Carson St. Denis, running a team Plasma deck. Senior Division: Calvin Connor, running a team Plasma deck. Masters Division: Edmund Kuras running a "Deck and Cover" Gothitelle/Accelgor deck. For more information, see the official site for the Pokémon U.S. National Championships.

In the interest of appeasing those who would rather keep all of the new Pokemon coming in X and Y later this year a surprise, we've employed a time-tested technique of obscuring the latest reveal. It's a Ghost type. It's also a Steel type. And it'd be right-at-home in the hands of a DC Comics superhero. Who's that Pokemon? Revealed today by game director Junichi Masuda via a video broadcast to the Japan Expo in Paris, this possessed sword is called — wait for it — Honedge. Nice portmanteau! He looks a little something like this: Like the sword of DC Comics Character Katana, this sword is possessed by a departed spirit and can drain the energy of its enemies. That blue cloth? It's prehensile, and it's been known to wrap around the arms of unsuspecting trainers. Creepy. Honedge can learn Sword Dance, a stackable move that ups attack. Ick. I guess they rhymed him with pwnage for a reason. Pokémon X and Pokémon Y launch worldwide on October 12, 2013.

In an interview with IGN, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata was asked about the company's insistence on region-locking its current hardware. His responses would be funny if they weren't so tragic. "From some people’s perspective, it might seem like a kind of restriction. However, we hope people can appreciate the fact that we’re selling our products worldwide," Iwata told the site, while stressing that Nintendo has "historically" imposed region locks on its hardware. "There are many different regions around the world, and each region has its own cultural acceptance and legal restrictions, as well as different age ratings. There are always things that we’re required to do in each different region, which may go counter to the idea that players around the world want the freedom to play whatever they want." Rubbish. "Historically", every Nintendo handheld up to the 3DS was region-free, while many of its home consoles prior to the Wii were super-easy to import for, with conversion cartridges/discs cheap to buy and easy to use. Throw in the fact that the PS3 and now Xbox One are region-free as well and his words ring hollow. This mightn't seem like a big deal to some, particularly Americans, but for those living in other regions where games are released later and for more money, it's pretty important! It's also a big plus for some of a console's most passionate fans; my DS collection (and love for the system) would have been halved, for example, if I couldn't have imported games like Ouendan. Interestingly, Iwata made those comments at E3, when the Xbox One was a console that also had region restrictions. Now that it doesn't, leaving Nintendo as the sole home console platform holder with region locks in place, I wonder if he feels as comfortable with those answers... Nintendo's President Discusses Region Locking [IGN]

On October 12, Japan will be getting this very sharp custom Pokémon 3DS XL, bearing illustrations of the two new legendary creatures - Xerneas and Yveltal - making their debut in Pokémon X & Y.

Most video games, during development, enter QA/fine-tuning phases called "alpha" and "beta." Not Mario & Luigi: Dream Team! Mario and Luigi's next RPG outing is so big it gets its own buzzword: Gamma. "This time, we divided the entire development phase into the one to create an alpha version, one for a beta version and even a gamma version, and looked back as we developed it," said producer Akira Otani during a recent chat with Nintendo boss Satoru Iwata. "A gamma version?" asked Iwata. "Video games usually only have alpha and beta versions for the developments." Otani responded: "Usually, yes. (laughs) This time, we actually made the backgrounds in 3D, but all the characters are 2D pixel art. It was hard making that stereoscopic for the Nintendo 3DS. That was one reason it took so long after the previous game." This is a big one. The team at Nintendo subsidiary AlphaDream started working on Mario & Luigi: Dream Team—which comes out for 3DS on August 11 in North America—right after Bowser's Inside Story, which they released in 2009. Interestingly, the team says that the second Mario & Luigi game, Partners In Time, was something of a flop—"Sales for the Mario & Luigi series had slowed with the second game, so we thought about how we could make a comeback with the third one."—but that the excellent Bowser's Inside Story performed much better for them. The entire Iwata Asks interview is worth reading. Check it out right here.

Chibi-Robo! was one of the most underrated games on Nintendo's GameCube, so it's nice to see the robot of the same name find a new lease of life in a 3DS title, freshly-announced by Nintendo Japan. It's an augmented reality photography game, where you're given shapes that you have to find in the real world. Succeed and take a photo and the little guy pops out and whisks it away. It's an e-shop title, and is available in Japan today.

Renegade Kid will reclaim the intellectual property rights to its atmospheric first-person game, Moon, in 2014. The developer of Mutant Mudds and Dementium wants to pursue a sequel once it regains ownership of the game, first published by Mastiff in 2009.

"Save your energy. Renegade Kid gains Moon rights back in 2014," wrote studio co-founder Jools Watsham on Twitter. In a follow-up tweet he said, "It has always been our plan to create a sequel to Moon. Never could convince the pub to go for it. Come 2014 we're in control."

The studio is currently working on Treasurenauts and a sequel to Mutant Mudds, which it expects to launch next year.

As a Nintendo game, it's no surprise that Animal Crossing: New Leaf contains some form of control over what you can name your characters. What is surprising, though, is how extensive the list of blocked words is. The obvious culprits are, well, obvious, from curse words to copyrighted terms, but when alientonx tried to get around them with what for most will be an obscurity, he hit the same wall. The name he entered for his character was "Santorum". Now, that's a real name. Most prominently it's the name of Rick Santorum, who a decade ago was a Senator at the centre of a controversy over his comments linking gay sex to pedophilia and bestiality. As a response to this, a campaign was begun - created by columnist Dan Savage and helped along by The Daily Show's John Stewart - to turn the name into a slang term meaning "the frothy mixture of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the byproduct of anal sex". It worked. If you google Santorum now, you get that result before you get results for even Rick's official site. I'm kind of impressed this is even a thing in the game. We often think of departments like localisation being the domain of a handful of people, but in Nintendo's case, I like to imagine entire floors of people, furiously scouring the internet for every word in existence, in any language, that could even remotely be linked to a controversy. And as we can see here, doing a damn good job! I tried to name a character Santorum and [Reddit, via Tiny Cartridge] Does Rick Santorum Really Have a Google Problem? [New York Mag]

Man. It's hard to watch this trailer and not want to get my hands on Mario & Luigi: Dream Team right now. Well, my hands were actually on Dream Team on Monday, during a meeting at Nintendo's offices in Manhattan. I played about 30 minutes of the upcoming RPG, which is out for 3DS on August 11, and I'm getting a little antsy, because it seems wonderful so far and I want to play more. For now, let's just watch this trailer and say things like "Wow, I want to get my hands on this game right now."

We've gone over how to compose a great town theme for Animal Crossing: New Leaf. But one of the best things about the game is the actual soundtrack, reliably changing tunes every hour as you make your way through a 24-hour cycle. In AC:NL, some players will hear certain songs more than others, depending on when they play. I was talking to Patricia about her favorite music, and it turns out it's from very late at night, music I hadn't heard since I tend to play a bit in the mornings and again in the afternoon. You can listen to the entire soundtrack in chronological order here, if you're curious about the stuff you never hear. My own favorite mini-composition is probably 7:00 PM, as embedded above. I love that that medatative rhythm, the way it moves forward with such calm momentum, before pausing and letting in the space that makes Kazumi Totaka's entire soundtrack so distinctive. My other favorite music, because I have to cheat and list more than one, is the music that plays in the Happy Home Showcase. I couldn't find that online anywhere, so I captured it myself. It was raining today—in Animal Crossing, that is, it's sunny and hot as hell in San Francisco—so I had to let the rain into my recording. But actually, it's kinda nice. Anyhow, you've all probably been playing the game long enough to have a favorite tune or two. Which one's yours? And hey, if you want to let some Animal Crossing into your everyday life, you can go here to listen to the songs, on a loop, in real time with the calendar. It's not half bad to work to!

I'm ten hours into Namco Bandai's massive tactical RPG cross-over for the 3DS, and Tron Bonne just asked Tekken's Jin Kazama who violated his cornflakes this morning. "I don't eat cornflakes." With dialogue like this, who needs plot? If you really need a story to justify 60 characters from .hack, Valkyria Chronicles, Mega Man, Street Fighter, Resonance of Fate, Virtua Fighter, Tales of Vesperia, Space Channel 5, God Eater, Sakura Wars, Dead Rising and more are teaming up to take on familiar enemies on familiar battlefields, then perhaps Project X Zone is not for you. It's the Battle of the Network Stars of the gaming age — we're just here to watch them work and play together. Hell, it's even got Bruce Willis. There is a plot. It involves lots of dimension jumping and confusion. Characters are being shuffled about the multiverse like cards in the hands of Endless Frontier's Haken Browning, another character caught up in this mess. There's a mysterious woman with pink hair that seems to be behind some plot, but the only important thing about that is she has pink hair, and I'm a big fan. Gameplay-wise this is turn-based tactics for dummies. There's not a great deal of thinking involved, just move one of your ever-increasing number of two-character teams close enough to the enemy and attack. The action switches to a fighting game perspective, and timed button presses launch your character sprites into a dizzying array of signature moves. If your team has a support character you can call them in at any time. If there's another team near the one fighting, they can be called in for support as well. Fill the power meter in the bottom right past 100 percent, and you can launch a spectacular team move, complete with quick animation clips. These gorgeous spectacles of sprite choreography never get old — ten hours in I'm still letting them play out instead of skipping them. It's true! At this point I'm a little under halfway through them game. I'm probably looking at a total of 25-30 hours when all is said and done, though the stages are getting more expansive and complicated as I play. At the rate I'm playing I should be done by the end of the weekend. What's significant about the play time is that this is not a game I have to play. I was not assigned it. I have other games I need to be playing for various reasons, and still I've managed to claw away enough temporal scraps to play a significant amount. I am bringing my 3DS with me when I go out — something I've not done for ages — on the off chance I can squeeze in a bit more play. So no, I don't need a cohesive storyline to play Project X Zone. All I need is a little free time and around 60 of my closest imaginary friends.

Just as we said earlier today, these dates are subject to change.

3DS eShop

- Crystal Warriors - Sonic Labyrinth - Kokuga
Thanks to Vernon for the heads up!

Jason's already got me excited for the upcoming Phoenix Wright: Dual Destinies, which is coming to 3DS this fall. And now that I've watched Nintendo World Report play through 16 minutes of the game, I'm looking forward to it even more. This video (as spotted by NeoGAF), is from Capcom's E3 demo. It does have some spoilers for the game, so don't watch it if you don't want to know what happens. And while the game looks good (basically, more Ace Attorney), I have to say I'm particularly excited for the soundtrack. I have heard a lot of this music so, so many times over the years, but I've never heard it done up like this. I know, I know, hype train leaving the station, and all that. But while there aren't many series I'll get unguardedly excited about, Ace Attorney is one of them.Side note: Somehow, I still hadn't played Apollo Justice, and thanks largely to Mr. Schreier's urging, I have finally begun to remedy that. It is, unsurprisingly, excellent. These games, I swear.

If 2012 was the year of Kickstarter, 2013 is the year of the fan petition. Following in the footsteps of the successful #PS4NoDRM campaign, a number of passionate Nintendo fans are setting out to get the Wii U and 3DS region-free. Nintendo's current consoles are region-locked, meaning that you can only use each one to play games from the area of the world you bought it in. If you have a U.S. 3DS, you can only use it to play games released in the United States. Want to import 3DS games from Japan? You'll have to buy a Japanese 3DS. For some context: the DS was completely region-free, so if a North American gamer wanted to play, say, Last Window: The Secret of Cape West, which was only released in Europe, all it took was an import. The Wii was region-locked, so many Americans had to wait a year before getting to play the English versions of Xenoblade, The Last Story, and Pandora's Tower, which were all released in Europe wayyy before they ever made it here. Region-locking is not a very gamer-friendly practice, and both Sony and Microsoft have already announced that their next consoles will be region-free. So Nintendo fans are congregating on Twitter, the Wii U's Miiverse, and message boards like NeoGAF. Their goal: get the 3DS and Wii U region-free, so people can play Nintendo games from any country. A sampling of the lovely Miiverse art created by gamers across the world as part of this campaign: Remember, Nintendo has said they're bringing Earthbound to the Virtual Console because of the fans that requested it on Miiverse, so this petition has at least a small chance of reaching the right ears. I've reached out to Nintendo to ask if they'd like to comment on this campaign, and we'll let you know if they've got something to say.

Masahiro Sakurai is in pain. The creator of Super Smash Bros. suffers from calcific tendonitis in his right shoulder, and it shows: Sakurai often holds his arms as he talks, and he says he can't use a regular mouse anymore. It hurts too much. Still, he is cheerful and friendly—if a little subdued—when talking about his work. It's Thursday, the last day of E3, and we're chatting on the second floor of a booth that Nintendo has set up for corporate meetings and interviews. I have roughly 40 minutes to pick Sakurai's brain about his latest announcement—two new Super Smash Bros. games that will be out for Wii U and 3DS next year. Sakurai is best known not only as the genius behind Nintendo's mascot fighting series, but as the creator of one of their most famous characters, a ravenous pink ball of fluff named Kirby. He's wearing a flashy sequined purple shirt, and he speaks through a translator. We talk about game balance, about the Wii U GamePad, about how he selects characters for Smash Bros. games. When we're done, I want nothing more than to go home and beat up Nintendo characters. Here's the full Q&A, edited for clarity and brevity. Kotaku: My first question is, what is the process like for deciding which characters in a Smash Bros. game to include and which to cut from game to game? Sakurai: First of all, in regard to cutting characters: at this point there's nothing I can say in any official position regarding that process. But let's go ahead and talk a little bit more about how we decided what characters to have. Kotaku: Okay. Sakurai: So the first thing is to take an idea. For example, imagine a game and characters within that game. Take a character such as the villager in Animal Crossing. The next process is think about that character's role in their game and then the structure of the game we're making. How do those work together with each other? What kind of interesting things can you do within the structure of the game? And then if you were to actually implement that character, how would the end result be, how it works with other elements of the game? So an important thing is that the characters stand out from one another—for instance, we might wanna be able to take characters that aren't typically combat-based characters. So you might have a sword-based character, but other characters are not necessarily going to [have swords]. You're not gonna wanna focus on that sort of element, just so there's a distinction between all of the other combat-based characters. They have to have something really unique that makes them stand apart from other characters in the game, and not limit yourself to characters that are just combat-based. Kotaku: I know that you can't talk too much about the characters that will be in the next game, but for previous Smash Bros. games, have there ever been characters that you wanted to include but couldn't figure out a good mechanic for them, like a way to fit them into the game? Sakurai: Yeah, there's been a lot of instances like that. For example, there are places where we planned to have a character but then implementing that character just didn't work out. Or we wanted to implement some character but there was too much overlap with other characters from the same title, and it didn't work out. Or there's places when I wanted to implement some character, but the image for how it works in the game just never comes to fruition. Kotaku: Could you give some examples? Sakurai: Unfortunately, I can't talk about it, because what will happen with those instances in the future is something that is still up for debate. Kotaku: I know Mega Man is a character that has been requested for a very long time - is there something different about this game that will make it okay to bring in Mega Man? Have you tried to include Mega Man before? Sakurai: So no, actually, there was never any consideration to having him in previous games, and if you think about it, there hasn't been really a precedent for third-party characters joining other than very special cases like Sonic, during the last game. It's something that wasn't even possible. We're now going into versions four and five within the series—this is only something that's now possible. Kotaku: When you say four and five, do you mean the 3DS and Wii U versions? Those are separate? Sakurai: Yeah, exactly. Kotaku: While we bring that up, how will those versions be different? Sakurai: Essentially between the two versions the character structure is the same, and the moves shared between the characters are the same, but the stages are entirely different. On the 3DS, we've taken the motif of handheld games and then on the Wii U version, featured primarily stages based on games on console. Kotaku: And how will they be able to connect, the 3DS and Wii U version? Will I be able to play against Wii U people if I'm using the 3DS? Sakurai: So it'll be possible, in fact, on the 3DS version there'll be a certain degree of character customization. You can have your own personalized character that you'll then be able to take over and move onto the Wii U version and play. Kotaku: And you can also—on the 3DS version—play against people playing the Wii U version? Sakurai: Actually, that's not possible. What is possible is for you to be able to customize your character, transfer it to the Wii U, and then play there. It would be technically impossible, just because the stages are so different between the two versions, so there isn't a situation where you have a handheld device and a console and you're able to play at the same time. Just more of a situation where there's integration, and [ability] to transfer data. Kotaku: Back to characters, I just have one more question about the characters real quick—is there any third-party character that you'd most want to see in a Smash Bros. game? Sakurai: I'm really sorry. If I were to answer that question, I'd get in a lot of trouble in a lot of different ways, so I can't answer. (laughter) But I think I can say generally that there won't be a trend of adding a lot of third-party characters. You can sort of think of Mega Man as being the special case. Kotaku: Should people expect returning characters, should they expect most of their favorites from Brawl to come back? Sakurai: The reality of the situation unfortunately is that there are certain limitations on the 3DS, so we're forced into a situation where we may need to reduce some characters to a certain degree, but we're really working hard to include as many characters as possible. Kotaku: Okay. Do you have a favorite character of all the Smash Bros. games? Do you have any character that you like to play the most? Sakurai: As the creator, if I start thinking about one as my favorite, there's a certain amount of bias that enters the creation process. They might sort of unwillingly become stronger. So my stance is that I like them all. Actually, I would like to hear if you have any personal favorites. Kotaku: Kirby. On the N64, in the first Smash Bros., I would play Kirby all the time. Sakurai: As the creator of Kirby, there may have been instances when people thought ohh I made Kirby stronger because I have a preference for him, so I definitely avoid trying to give any sort of preference, and especially even mentioning anything to anybody about—to give them the idea that I like somebody more than the others. Kotaku: Interesting, that's very interesting. And I wanna talk a bit more about balancing characters later. But a lot of people asked—when I took questions from readers—a lot of people asked, they all want to know: will tripping be back? Sakurai: To answer quite frankly, it will not return. Kotaku: Okay. People will be very happy to hear that. I also wanted to ask—obviously with the Wii U we have the GamePad screen, and I wanted to ask you: is there anything cool or unique or interesting you can do with that gamepad for a game like Super Smash Bros.? Sakurai: Actually, I'm not really planning anything that really pushes the GamePad in super-weird directions, just because everyone has their own special preference of what controller they like to use. You would end up in a situation where you have some unbalance in the controls, or in the playing field, so nothing that is super unique and contributes to controls. Kotaku: On a non-Smash Bros. note, do you have any crazy ideas for games that could use the GamePad? Sakurai: I imagine if I started thinking about it, I'd get a lot of ideas. But I'm 100% focused now on creating new Smash Bros., and I imagine until that's totally finished, there will be no room in my brain to consider such things. Kotaku: On a personal note, I remember hearing that your shoulder was hurting, and I wanted to ask if you're feeling better now? Sakurai: So the reality, and very unfortunate reality of the situation is that it's still a considerable problem. I'm in a lot of pain. I'm in a position where I can't use the mouse at this point, so I'm using the trackball, and as the creative director behind an action game, that's a real critical issue, unfortunately. But still, all things being said, I'm still 100% committed to the creation of Smash Bros. Kotaku: I'm awfully sorry to hear that... To switch gears a little bit, how much do you follow the competitive scene, competitive Smash Bros.? There's a big US community, I don't know if there's a community in Japan also, but do you follow that competitive Smash Bros. scene? Sakurai: In Japan, there's actually a tournament scene, and it's an annual thing... that's something that just wrapped up, actually. It sort of reached its peak, and then now with anticipation for the next title, it's sort of on hiatus. I imagine that will pick up again on release of the new games, but that's something that personally I'm not involved in. It's something that Nintendo manages. Personally, I can't really say too much about that. Kotaku: Do you ever talk to the high-level competitive players when you're balancing Smash Bros.? Sakurai: Mostly I don't incorporate feedback like that. Basically, Smash Bros. is designed to be sort of targeted at the center, intermediate players, and if you think of sort of a skill graph or something where if you're targeting just the peak of that performance level, you're targeting a very small group of people. We wanna avoid a situation where it becomes a game sort of like other competitive fighting games, where it's only apreciated by a very small, passionate group of sort of maniac players. We definitely don't want that sort of situation. It's supposed to be a fun game for a wide variety of people. But that's not to say that I don't appreciate very high-level competitive play, the type of very refined competitive gameplay that happens in other fighting games. Personally, I have a lot of experience playing in the arcade scene, and personally came out as a champion of a 100-person battle in arcade Street Fighter II. Kotaku: Recently? Sakurai: A long, long time ago. So I don't wanna ignore that there's that type of pleasure to be had from the game. Kotaku: Could you talk a little bit about how you balance it out, because there's so much going on in Smash Bros.—how do you make it so each character is as strong as the others? Sakurai: Do you mean more as far as the overall game design, or in the process of development making minor adjustments to the game? Kotaku: I would love to hear your answer to both. Sakurai: So in regards to overall game balance, what we do is we use sort of this monitor playtest where we set up players of a certain level to play highly-skilled players in an arena. For example, an arena just with maybe a single platform and we watch them fight over a certain amount of time and view video from that and decide at a high level how to make adjustments to that for the base. Smash Bros. is all about position—where you're at and what kind of power the player has based on where their position is at. So it's something that players have to take advantage of. But if suddenly you create sort of a testing scenario where the position balance is removed from the equation, and you sort of start to see where, when you remove that one factor from the game, you're basically testing two players in the same circumstances, that's when you can really start to see the differences and balance between characters. As far as the overall balance, if you were to take that and then put it in a flat playing field and have characters fight, you get a situation where suddenly, it's no different than any other fighting game. We realized that having different positioning, there's a lot of factors that occur in vertical elements of the stages. Once you get the core balance, then you can stretch out from there and realize, well, players don't want to play a normal flat fighting game: they want the special peculiarities of Smash Bros., where there's a lot of verticality, where the collision detection is a little broader. And the overall balancing goes factoring in those vertical elements as well. Kotaku: It seems like that must be very difficult, to take all those factors into account. How do you manage to make each character still feel strong and still feel like they can be competitive with the rest of the characters, even with all those positional factors? Sakurai: Yeah, if it was just a flat playing surface, it would be one thing, and you could determine pretty quickly which was the stronger character. But given the circumstances of the series, and there are so many factors, it comes down to a quite simple process, where you give characters a special—something special that no other character has. A special technique. And at the same time, as that ratchets up their strength, you also have to take something away, so it becomes a sort of game of checks and balances where you're adding and removing. So again, it's very important to have that system of checks and balances where if a character has some very strong point, you have to give him something weak. If a person really likes that character, and they want to have that special strength, they're going to have to sacrifice something to be able to take that weakness and create sort of a balance in that sense, where each character has something that certain people like. Kotaku: Ah. Could we talk about the Final Smash, will it still work like it did in Brawl? Sakurai: So, yes, the Smash Balls will be included, and each character will have a Final Smash. Essentially, the incorporation of the Smash Balls and the Final Smash was something to accommodate, or to counter a situation where in a game you'd have a strong player and without those things, you would have a situation where clearly always the strong players would come on top. And so we wanted to add a little bit of some accidental or random elements to help sort of narrow the possibility of who would come out on top in a match. And so our opinion on it was that it sort of helps balance the game. Of course, hardcore players might take issue with it, so that's why we decided to make it an option you can turn on or off. That goes along with thinking about how I think each player should be able to customize the experience so we can accommodate different play styles. It's very important for me for everybody to have the play experience that they want. It's also very important for me to be able to accommodate the opinions of the most passionate players, of course, which tend to be the more advanced players. Kotaku: Do you feel like there were flaws or weaknesses in Smash Bros. Brawl that you want to make better, or fix, or learn from for the new Smash Bros. games? Sakurai: I would consider the changes that we're making this time around not as fixes, but that we're changing the direction. And so the vision for the overall balance of the game in Smash Bros. Melee, it was sort of more focused towards more hardcore players. Then when it came around to making Brawl, this was a game that was targeting a Wii audience where there were a lot of beginner players, so it sort of leaned a little bit more in that direction. So now, for this time around, we're sort of aiming for something that is in between those as far as the speed of the game. Because I don't really think this time we're in a situation where we're trying to accommodate that many new players like we did last time. Kotaku: People will be very happy to hear that. Thank you so much for your time.

The conversations between the villagers in Animal Crossing: New Leaf never cease to amaze me. Without exception they're all mildly insane. What's the weirdest thing an Animal Crossing townsfolk has said to you?

New Super Luigi U and Game and Wario are the most notable release from Nintendo’s digital storefront this week. Other digital offerings include games like Project X Zone and Mega Man 6. Here’s the full list.

Nintendo just eliminated the best reason to not buy their newest games digitally. The company's newest firmware, 6.0.0-11U, now lets you back up game saves for most downloaded games (not Animal Crossing), so you can now delete games to save space without losing your saves. Download away!

Shin Megami Tensei IV had its English demo on display at last week's E3, and, as this screenshot proves, it has some funny moments. This tends to happen in some localized games.