Stifler
May 13th, 2005, 08:36 AM
IGN:
Microsoft Japan started off its Xbox 360 unveiling event over in Japan with a string of disappointments. First, there was an airing of the Xbox 360 advertisement produced in collaboration with MTV. As cheesy as the American version was, the Japanese one was even worse due to the inane commentary of a couple of MTV Japan VJs. Following early, unimpressive footage of Perfect Dark Zero, the infomercial was cut short for live presentations from a trio of Japanese game producers, the first of whom was Game Republic commander Yoshiki Okamoto, Okamoto announced two games for the Xbox 360, but was unwilling to share names, details or video footage.
We were all set to pack up, take one more look at the hot Microsoft girls, then head home, when Tetsuya Mizuguchi came out and saved the day. Mizuguchi, president of Q Entertainment (Lumines, Meteos), unveiled his company's Xbox 360 project, Ninety Nine Nights. Mizuguchi is acting as producer on this fantasy-action title, with development being handled by Korea-based Phantagram, a developer best known for the award-winning Kingdom Under Fire.
Smart man that he is (he's also still the coolest guy in gaming, even though he's turning 40 this month), Mizuguchi let a video trailer do the talking. And what a trailer it was! Combining quick clips of gameplay with intriguing catch phrases such as "A land in harmony until the order of the world is shattered by conspiracy," "The time of peace is over," and "Chose your side," the trailer was created to look like a movie preview. Mizuguchi drafted a film director for the sole purpose of assembling the trailer and commented that we can expect additional trailers as the game's development progresses.
The gameplay clips, which looked to be all realtime, blew us away. Imagine Dynasty Warriors but with no fog, no visual barricades, perfect image quality and hundreds of detailed enemies on screen simultaneously. Now picture that running at sixty frames per second, and that is Ninety Nine Nights. One jaw-dropping scene in the trailer showed an explosion, with hundreds of characters being smoothly tossed into the air. Judging by the trailer, the feel of a massive battle will be perfectly captured in Ninety Nine Nights.
Giving players the feel of a massive battle is one of the points of the points of the game. How massive? The game's visual engine is capable of displaying up to 2,000 characters on screen simultaneously. In the gameplay sequences from the trailer, the screen seemed to be filled with enemies. Two thousand enemies? We're not sure, but enough so that we couldn't imagine any more fitting unless the camera zoomed out.
Microsoft Japan started off its Xbox 360 unveiling event over in Japan with a string of disappointments. First, there was an airing of the Xbox 360 advertisement produced in collaboration with MTV. As cheesy as the American version was, the Japanese one was even worse due to the inane commentary of a couple of MTV Japan VJs. Following early, unimpressive footage of Perfect Dark Zero, the infomercial was cut short for live presentations from a trio of Japanese game producers, the first of whom was Game Republic commander Yoshiki Okamoto, Okamoto announced two games for the Xbox 360, but was unwilling to share names, details or video footage.
We were all set to pack up, take one more look at the hot Microsoft girls, then head home, when Tetsuya Mizuguchi came out and saved the day. Mizuguchi, president of Q Entertainment (Lumines, Meteos), unveiled his company's Xbox 360 project, Ninety Nine Nights. Mizuguchi is acting as producer on this fantasy-action title, with development being handled by Korea-based Phantagram, a developer best known for the award-winning Kingdom Under Fire.
Smart man that he is (he's also still the coolest guy in gaming, even though he's turning 40 this month), Mizuguchi let a video trailer do the talking. And what a trailer it was! Combining quick clips of gameplay with intriguing catch phrases such as "A land in harmony until the order of the world is shattered by conspiracy," "The time of peace is over," and "Chose your side," the trailer was created to look like a movie preview. Mizuguchi drafted a film director for the sole purpose of assembling the trailer and commented that we can expect additional trailers as the game's development progresses.
The gameplay clips, which looked to be all realtime, blew us away. Imagine Dynasty Warriors but with no fog, no visual barricades, perfect image quality and hundreds of detailed enemies on screen simultaneously. Now picture that running at sixty frames per second, and that is Ninety Nine Nights. One jaw-dropping scene in the trailer showed an explosion, with hundreds of characters being smoothly tossed into the air. Judging by the trailer, the feel of a massive battle will be perfectly captured in Ninety Nine Nights.
Giving players the feel of a massive battle is one of the points of the points of the game. How massive? The game's visual engine is capable of displaying up to 2,000 characters on screen simultaneously. In the gameplay sequences from the trailer, the screen seemed to be filled with enemies. Two thousand enemies? We're not sure, but enough so that we couldn't imagine any more fitting unless the camera zoomed out.