I am very fortunate to live near a brand new Round 1 Arcade. It’s a bowling, Karakoe, UFO Ctacher and Video Arcade that originated from Japan. They tend to have the most brand new video arcade games out there. One they just recently got was Super Monkey Ball: Ticket Blitz. A fairly different take on Monkey Ball that rewards you with prize tickets.
Here is a new trailer for Super Monkey Ball 3DS, the trailer shows off the main game and its control scheme. In all honesty the game looks quite fun, bright, and has the same addictive Monkey Ball game play I’ve always loved.
But I really, really hope there is an option to take down those red safety bars that appear in the levels… There is nothing worse than this series being toned down and made too easy for us older fans that look for a bit of challenge in our Monkey Ball ventures.
I’m still a bit disappointed that Monkey Target didn’t make it into the party game selection, but looking at how they changed Monkey Fight and Monkey Race I’m not sure I’d want it after all…
Here’s a very Japanese advert if I ever saw one! The lengthy advert highlights the three game play modes featured in Super Monkey Ball 3D.
The Classic Super Monkey Ball game play which we all know and love. Monkey Race which is a bit of a Mario Kart knock off and Monkey Fight, which is a bit of a Smash Bros knock off… Yeah.
Why they felt they needed to change Race and Fight from the frankly great fun party games they were in Super Monkey Ball Deluxe is beyond me but even more strange in my opinion is the omission of Monkey Target, easily the best party game the series ever had. Oh well, maybe next time.
Sega news has all been a little too sweet recently, something had to give and it just did. I present to you Super Monkey Ball 3DS – Monkey Race Mode footage.
Here I was hoping that a return to the original Super Monkey Ball team would yield some good results for this series but alas, this looks pretty damn awful.
‘Monkey Race’ in Super Monkey Ball: Deluxe was actually a very fun distraction from the main game. Not only that, but it made sense! You would race your monkey inside his monkey ball and use momentum to propel yourself down hills and around tight corners.
This here is just a poor mans’ Mario Kart or Sega All-Star Racing even. The track looks dull, the items look stupid, the graphics are nothing to write home about, and it just doesn’t look fun at all. It doesn’t even have monkey target, I’ll be giving this one a miss.
Check out the western announcement trailer for Super Monkey Ball 3DS! The trailer is all CGI and highlights the three games that will feature in Super Monkey Ball 3DS, classic Monkey Ball rolling, Monkey Fight and Monkey Race. There also seems to be a new bad guy on the block!
I’ve been a monkey ball fan since the first game but I’ve avoided the series since Monkey Ball Deluxe. This is due to the direction the series has taken, using the party games as more of a gimmick to show off a new control scheme instead of focusing on what’s important. Making fun, fleshed out games.
Super Monkey Ball 3DS seems to have returned to the ‘quality over quantity’ notion, and Monkey Fight and Monkey Race, two of my favourite party games, have returned, although they seem to have new gameplay mechanics. But unfortunately my favourite party game of the lot, Monkey Target is absent!
The first trailer for Super Monkey Ball 3DS has arrived.
There isn’t a whole lot to say about the trailer, you can’t tell how well the 3D works on a PC monitor so I can’t really comment on that. I do, however like the tropical sounding music going on!
I’m more interested in this Monkey Ball then other recent ones however, as this one’s being developed by the original team in Japan. One thing I will mention is that I hope those red rails that stop you falling out of the level do not stick around past the first few stages. I want at least SOME challenge!
Finally I really, really hope that the mini games are fun and fleshed out again. I don’t know about anyone else but the mini games in Super Monkey Ball 1, 2 and Deluxe are what kept me and my friends coming back time and time again. In more recent monkey in ball related outings the mini games have been quantity before quality, often serving as more of a tech demo for what ever control gimmick they have been designed around and not fun mini games.
Let’s hope we can trust the original team to get the (monkey) ball rolling again… Yeah, I went there!
SEGA has announced a permanent price drop on their iOS games (iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch). If you haven’t picked up some their titles when they had that crazy turkey deal, you suck. But you can still get them cheaper than usual.
ChuChu Rocket: Now: $2.99 (was: $4.99)
ChuChu Rocket HD: Now: $4.99 (was: $6.99)
Ecco the Dolphin: Now: $0.99 (was: $2.99)
Football Manager 2010: Now: $4.99 (was: $7.99)
Golden Axe: Now: $0.99 (was: $2.99)
Gunstar Heroes: Now: $2.99 (was: $4.99)
Phantasy Star II: Now: $2.99 (was: $4.99)
Shining Force: Now: $0.99 (was: $2.99)
Super Monkey Ball 2: Now: $2.99 (was: $5.99)
Super Monkey Ball 2 Sakura Edition: Now: $4.99 (was: $7.99)
Sonic The Hedgehog 1: Now: $4.99 (was: $5.99)
Sonic The Hedgehog 2: Now: $4.99 (was: $5.99)
Sonic The Hedgehog 4 Episode 1: Now: $6.99 (was: $9.99)
Streets of Rage: Now: $0.99 (was: $2.99)
Wow, Sonic 4 really dropped in price over the last couple of months. Get it!
SEGA will have quite the arcade line-up at this year’s IAAPA. They have put out a press release that they will have 33 arcade machines at the show. 14 of those arcades will be ticket redemption games, 12 video game arcades, 3 will be coin pushers, 3 prize vendors, and one of them will be a photo booth.
For those of you who do not know, the recently released Halo Reach has a level and game-type making mode called Forge World. In this you are able to make any number of this, including modes that make it not play like an First Person Shooter at all.
A Super Monkey Ball fan has taken it upon himself to remake the Monkey Target minigame where you have to jump off of a ramp and aim yourself and hit the target if possible and try to get as many points. Obviously it is nowhere near as good as the real thing, but it is great to see fans take so much time to remake something like this! There are bound to be tons of SEGA themed variants in Forge World by now, so send a link if you see any!
Now you can get all your iPhone games on the cheap, you know before you go back to school and someone steals that brand new iPhone 4 you got during the summer.
Ecco the Dolphin $2.99 –> $0.99 / £1.79 – £0.59
Golden Axe : $2.99 –> $0.99 / / £1.79 – £0.59
Shining Force: $2.99 –> $0.99 / £1.79 – £0.59
Sonic the Hedgehog: $5.99 –> $2.99 / £3.49 – £1.79
Sonic the Hedgehog 2: $5.99 –> $2.99 / £3.49 – £1.79
Streets of Rage: $2.99 –> $0.99 £1.79 – £0.59
Super Monkey Ball: $2.99 –> $1.99 £1.79 – £1.19
Super Monkey Ball 2: $5.99 –> $2.99 / £3.49 – £1.79
Super Monkey Ball 2: Sakura Edition (iPad): $7.99 –> $3.99 / £4.99 – £2.39
I would download them, but I don’t have an iPhone.
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