Courtney Whitmire, a freshman at the University of Maryland, suffered tragedy this year when flooding wiped out her house and most of her small town in Georgia. Working together with people in her dorm, Whitmire and some other students organized a tournament that would donate its buy-in money to flood relief efforts in her hometown.

“It clicked all of a sudden,” sophomore English major Quinn Hargitai said. “We love to play Smash Bros. – we play it all the time. We never study.”

It’s an awesome idea and a fine bit of reporting on our ex-intern’s part. It seems like only yesterday Freedman was updating our massive photo galleries and checking my spelling. They grow up so fast!

A smashing act of charity [The Diamondback]

Image Cred

Why, a Wiimote, of course!

That’s what you can get at JB Hi-Fi right. Super Smash Bros. Brawl plus Wii Play – which, as we all know, is basically a Wiimote with a bonus mini-game colelction – for $79.

Seems reasonable enough, given that you’re likely to pay only slightly less than that for either game/accessory individually. And yes, I realise you’ll want to use that extra Wiimote for other games.

But still, it does strike me as a little odd.

Except exactly which flavor of Ninja Turtles to expect. The series evolved a lot since the 1980s, so it’s important for fans to know whether they’re dealing with the original Peter Laird/Kevin Eastman envisioning of the Turtles, or the new 4Kids Entertainment cartoon.

In Smash-Up, it turns out you’re dealing with all the different incarnations of Ninja Turtles at once. Though the character models clearly resemble the 2007 CGI movie and the back story used to drive the “Hey, let’s have a massive beat-down” gameplay is more kid-oriented, the entire game is a pastiche of all that is Turtle. Minus the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III movie — but I don’t think anybody’s going to be too upset about that.

Loved
Easy Beat Down: Thanks to developer Game Arts experience on the Smash Bros. series, it’s pretty easy for any Brawl fan to scoop up Smash-Up and start kicking butt. There are some minor tweaks to the GameCube/Classic Controller control schemes and a bit of an overhaul to the Wiimote scheme (to add more motion controls), but it really does feel just like Smash Bros. once you adjust to the item-throwing system and the jump controls.

Awesome Cut Scenes: My favourite part about fighting games is unlocking new cinema scenes after blitzing through a single character’s story mode. Smash-Up obliges me with homage to the Turtles’ origins in pen-and-ink comic book style cut scenes that look just like the original comics. That made me worried at first because I thought they’d just re-use the same ending sequence for all the Turtles, but so far every character I’ve played has a different ending. Whew.

Environmental Hazards: The stages in Smash-Up aren’t static environments. They have collapsing platforms, destructible obstacles and usually some sort of environmental hazard (like beehives or crocodiles). Rather than being an annoyance, the random chance of death-by-crocodile can make for an interesting multiplayer match. It also livens up arcade mode quite a bit.

Hated
Not As Good As Smash Bros.: It’s almost unfair to compare Smash-Up to Smash Bros., but you just can’t help it. Aside from having a developer and most of the control scheme in common, the sheer notion of mashing together all that is Ninja Turtle into one game smacks of the same decision making behind cramming all of Nintendo’s beloved characters into Brawl. Once you’ve started down the path of comparing the two games to each other, it starts looking really bad for Smash-Up because it just can’t match Smash Bros. in terms of unlockables, mini-games and charm. Really, the only thing Smash-Up has on Smash Bros. is fully voiced cut scenes and that ain’t saying much.

Slow Unlock Rate: You start the game off with a bland selection of characters, but you just know you’re going to unlock so many more based on who you encounter in story mode and who’s on the box art. However, after playing and replaying story mode and sinking a lot of love into multiplayer and mini-games, I still hadn’t unlocked more than a trailer and a few alternate character costumes. This means either I’m playing the game wrong (which is weird, because there’s only so many ways to play a fighting game), or that the game is too stingy with unlockable content.

GET UP! It takes forever to get your character up off the ground once they’ve been knocked down. You can mash the attack button, press up on the analogue stick to jump or just swear incoherently at your screen. But they’ll still just lie there like they’ve got all the time in the world for a nap while the AI character keeps kicking them.

Despite its faults, Smash-Up is a perfectly good way to pass an afternoon with friends who remember what the Turtles were in our youth. It might even be a good game for kids because it’s not a difficult game to play. But while Smash-Up brings a bit of nostalgia and doesn’t build any walls between generations of Ninja Turtles fans, it also doesn’t really do much else. Besides make me want to go watch the live action movie and order a pizza.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Smash-Up was developed by Game Arts and published by Ubisoft for the Wii and PlayStation 2 on September 22. The Wii version goes for $69.95 and the PS2 version goes for $39.95. Played all game modes in both single and multiplayer modes.

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Nintendo is the principal investor, owning up to 72 percent of the company.

The company is hard at work at a game, but it’s not another Smash Bros. title. Sakurai added, “I can promise an experience that’s different from anything [you've played] up until now.”

Project Sora’s website gives a straightforward tour of its new office in a brand new building, located in Tokyo’s Iidabashi. The purpose of the site is primarily to attract new talent, but it does give a peak behind the curtain: there are game consoles, desks, a video conferencing to communicate with Nintendo, computers running 3D Maya software and a cactus.

About that new game, the site says, “It’s a secret! It’s totally a secret!!”

Office Tour [Project Sora]

(The following stats are pulled from the usage data shared by more than two million Wii users through the system’s Nintendo Channel. For more information about how we calculate these total playtimes, check out this week’s earlier Wii stats post)

Average Per-Gamer Playing Time For Nintendo’s First-Party Wii Games (as of July 1)
(Release Dates in Parentheses)
Super Smash Bros. Brawl (March 2008) — 68 hours, 51 minutes
Animal Crossing: City Folk (November 2008) — 54 hours, 16 minutes
Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn (November 2007) – 46 hours, 40 minutes
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (November 2006) — 46 hours, 9 minutes
Wii Sports (November 2006) — 35 hours, 47 minutes
Mario Kart Wii (April 2008) – 31 hours, 40 minutes
Super Mario Galaxy (November 2007) — 27 hours, 37 minutes
Super Paper Mario (April 2007) — 24 hours, 13 minutes
Metroid Prime 3: Corruption (August 2007) 21 hours, 37 minutes
Mario Party 8 (May 2007) — 20 hours, 39 minutes
Pokemon Battle Revolution (June 2007) — 20 hours, 2 minutes
Wii Fit (May 2008) — 18 hours, 18 minutes
Mario Super Sluggers (August 2008) — 17 hours, 39 minutes
Excite Truck – (November 2006) 12 hours, 39 minutes
Battalion Wars 2 (October 2007) — 12 hours, 23 minutes
WarioWare: Smooth Moves (January 2007) — 11 hours, 39 minutes
Excitebots: Trick Racing (April 2009) – 10 hours 56 minutes
Wii Play (February 2007) — 10 hours, 7 minutes
New Play Control! Pikmin (March 2009) – 9 hours, 44 minutes
Endless Ocean (January 2008) — 9 hours, 41 minutes
Wii Music (October 2008) — 9 hours, 17 minutes
Wario Land: Shake It! (September 2008) — 8 hours, 47 minutes
Punch-Out!! (May 2009) – 7 hours, 55 minutes
Big Brain Academy: Wii Degree (June 2007) — 6 hours, 56 minutes
Mario Strikers Charged (July 2007) — 6 hours, 18 minutes
New Play Control! Mario Power Tennis (March 2009) – 6 hours, 14 minutes
Link’s Crossbow Training (November 2007) – 4 hours, 55 minutes
Donkey Kong: Barrel Blast (October 2007) — 4 hours, 41 minutes
New Play Control! Donkey Kong Jungle Beat (May 2009) – No Data Listed

As of June 30th, 2009, the current service that accepts user-generated snapshots, stage designs, and replay data will no longer be available. Please note, however, that we will continue to distribute such data after that date.

An explanation as to why Nintendo decided to end this service was not provided.

Smash Bros. DOJO! [Official Site Thanks, Steven!]

Masahiro Sakurai, creator of Nintendo character Kirby and designer of Super Smash Bros. Brawl, is creating a new title for Nintendo the company announced today.

On January 22 of this year, Sakurai’s company Sora Ltd., a first party Nintendo developer, created a new company with Nintendo called Project Sora. Sakurai is serving as director for this new project.

Nintendo is the principal investor, owning up to 72 percent of the company.

About this project the new company is working on, Satoru Iwata assured that it’s not another Smash Bros. game, saying, “It’s not Smash Bros. I asked for.” Sakurai added, “i can promise an experience that’s different from anything [you've played] up until now.”

Project Sora currently has 30 employees and is currently looking for “talented individuals.”

Project Sora [Official Site]

Supposedly, the team tasked with creating this 2.5D brawler is comprised of former Team Ninja staffers and folks who worked on Super Smash Bros. Brawl. GoNintendo is reporting that the Wii-bound fighter is scheduled for a late 2009 release and will feature online play said to outperform Brawl.

An Ubisoft rep is quoted as saying that the game, while licensed, is not directly tied to a movie or television show, but will be a standalone effort. Our interest in the turtles couldn’t be much lower, as a grown man, but given the pedigree of the developers, we’ll say “Go, ex-Team Ninja, go!”

New TMNT Game – More Details [GoNintendo]

The Mushroom Kingdom isn’t what it used to be, indeed. Mario and Luigi are hard up for coins. The Lakitu-run media is questioning the Kingdom’s leadership. Toads are turning to hustling and prostitution. Even the Ice Climbers are little more than thugs for hire. That’s the backdrop of the newly launched web series There Will Be Brawl, a dark and dingy look at the story behind Super Smash Bros. Brawl. The first episode, “Twilight Ruin,” is available for those mature enough to watch. We liked the production values and the last minute guest appearance, even if we don’t have the patience for 12 minutes of this stuff.

There Will Be Brawl [Official Site - thanks, James!]

We also love our sequels. The only new properties to crack the top five on each of the big three platforms are Army of Two, Wii Play and Wii Fit.

Another fact that will likely not blow your hair back are the best sellers on the Nintendo Wii side of things. Four of the console’s best sellers are published by Nintendo and four feature strong peripheral tie-ins. Consider us nonplussed!

2008’s Top-Selling Games So Far: How They Stack Up [Gamasutra]